DAY 21: Full Circle

Girls, just want to have fun.

Carey froze in the act of turning the knob. Where in the world had he heard those words before? And why should it send shivers through his spine as if his body had just been plugged into a wall socket? He tried to shake the sensation that seemed to be holding him in temporary paralysis. Does the name Cyndi Lauper ring your bell? His thought seemed to ask him. Of course, the female pop singer had a hit which went by the title. Carey reckoned that wasn’t grounds to set a man’s nerves on edge.

Girls, just want to have fun, the parakeet repeated. Something is not right about that song, Carey thought and slipped out the door heading for work.

By the time he returned in the evening, Carey had forgotten all about the words of his parrot. But, as he stepped across the threshold the scent of Rebelle hit him like the return of a painful memory or like the fragrance coming off a rotting corpse. Carey never used the perfume, couldn't. It was for women. Somebody broke into my house while I was away. His lips tightened into a thin line.

Carey searched the entire structure for an intruder and found nobody. He checked to see if something had been stolen or broken. Nothing. What the hell was he looking for? He asked himself. Carey’s house was a little out of the way and stood on an expansive stretch of lawn.

Girls, just want to have fun. The parakeet’s words threw a jump into him. What in the world was wrong with girls having fun? He knew he had nothing against that. And yet something didn’t feel right. Caution kept tugging at the heartstrings of his survival instincts. It was almost like a fire siren going off on his insides. Red Alert! Red Alert! Red Alert! That perfume . . . Rebelle. Where had he come across it? Was it even important if he recalled the personality who used it back then? Was it a former girlfriend of his?

Carey got rid of the day’s clothes and after a hot shower, he sat in front of his TV to watch the soaps. A  Breaking News was running. Two convicts had escaped from the federal maximum security facility. One had been caught, the other, a woman was still at large. She was last seen heading west in a black Honda Element-stolen, of course. Her name is . . .

He had heard enough. And the feeling had finally come home, full circle.

“Carrie,” he said, and shivered like he had the shakes.

The scent of Rebelle at that moment was cloying. Then, as if in reply to his calls, Carey heard footfalls muffled by the rug covering coming down the stairs. He didn’t have to wonder who the feet belonged to. At one time, they had been partners who hacked high-security main frames and stole chips containing confidential info only to resell them to high tech companies at huge prices.

The last time she was here they had been in the sitting room on the same sofa Carey now occupied. The DVD was playing an old school by the pop artist, Cyndi Lauper. The parakeet had been hers and she was always saying those words that had been bugging Carey for some time now to it. The parakeet had not spoken those words for the past ten years since his former partner had been jailed. Carey had betrayed her to the cops when his cover was almost blown. And now she had escaped. And she was back.

            “Payback’s a bitch,” Carrie said.

Girls, just want to have fun, the parakeet said.

Notes to myself:

Flesh out this story in the rewrite.

Does Carrie need a longer backstory?

Is there need to go into details about the heist that got Carrie jailed and turned Carey into a betrayer?