That's my George! "What’s it?"

Georgia lifted the phone off the wall. "I’m calling the police to tell them where they can find your girlfriend. Yessir. Right now."

Bess was up from the table in a flash. "Whoa there, George, wait a goddamn minute!" She grabbed the receiver from her sister and hung it up, putting her body between it and her livid sister. "Nancy didn’t do anything wrong. You should've seen her last night - she was in a bigger state of shock than you are! Besides, I think the police already know where the hell to find her if they want her, dontcha think? Or have you already forgotten about our little joyride to the police station last week?"

Georgia's voice could probably be heard a good block away. "Bess, wake up! This is getting downright scary. Some poor soul that I was asking about is dead." She shuddered involuntarily. "I’m not playing around with this anymore and you’re not either. I don’t even like reading about this in the paper and now I’m directly involved. All I need is them showing up at work. That would just be the ticket now, wouldn't it? Just what I need! And YOU! I think you need to get as far away from this shit as you can." She took a step closer to Bess and said under her breath, "Maybe you should go back home with Daddy for awhile."

"Are you mental? Oh no, I don’t think so. In case you haven’t noticed, you big sissy, I’m an adult and quite capable of taking care of myself!" She took her own step forward, until the sisters were nearly nose to nose. "Use your brain. Think about it! This Formula 409 guy - alright, Agent 409! -was one of her alibis! Why in God's name would she make such a big deal about finding him, only to kill him off? That just doesn’t make sense."

Georgia held her sister's gaze "Okay, so he was one of her alibis and now he’s dead. What if she wanted to find him to kill him, or something screwed up like that? Is everything that comes out of her mouth a lily white absolute truth? All I know is if you asininely insist on continuing to see her… What happens to you if you become one of her alibis, huh Bess?"

Bess caved, but only to the point of conceding the point. "Then you can have the thrill of standing at my grave to tell me 'I told you so'." Bess stomped out of the kitchen and down the hall to her bedroom. She yelled her parting shot, "I gotta get my own place"

Georgia wouldn't allow her sister to have the final word. "Don’t even joke about it, Bess! This isn’t even close to being funny." She followed to find her sister back in bed, under the covers. "Now what are you doing? Don’t you have an interview at The Harley Davidson Café this morning?"

Bess pulled the covers over her head and burrowed in. "Yeah, yeah. I’ll get up again in a minute."

Georgia shrugged with irritation and couldn’t resist one last dig. "By the way, Daddy’s train gets in at 12:30 tomorrow. I told him you’d be happy to meet him."

The lump under the covers simply groaned her response.

"Whattya mean you can’t find her?" Friedman growled and tossed the last of his tuna salad sandwich in the trash with a resounding thud.

"By the time we got to her place, she was gone."

"GONE? What do you mean gone? Has she left the city? The state? The country? The fuckin' planet?"

The uniformed cop arched backwards dramatically to avoid the fragrant fish flavored breath of the older man. "We went to her apartment as soon as you told us to. She wasn't there, from what her neighbor says, she left around 1 A.M. last night. Nice guy, he gave me some balsamic vinegar to give to you. But I think the last thing you need right now is something bitter."

Quinn’s impeccable timing saved the insolent cop from losing a few front teeth courtesy of the fist of an outraged Friedman. Pushing the uniform out the door, Quinn turned to face the older man just as he launched into yet another tirade.

Friedman's stomach was already roiling in protest, and he reached for his ever present Tums. "This is fuckin' unbelievable! First you tell me we should stop tailing her and now we can't even FIND her! I’d be goddamned better off just handling this case myself!"

Quinn backed up and took a deep breath. A lack of sleep and his own frustration finally surfaced. "Keep up that attitude, buddy boy, and you’ll be doing just that."

Ernie was standing on Nancy's doorstep, preparing to knock on her door. He'd gotten frustrated trying to call her all morning. After lunchtime, he decided to go over and pull her butt out of bed.

Silvio interrupted his insistent pounding. "She’s notta home, Ernie."

The small man spun around. "What do you mean, she’s not home? We’re going to Coney Island this afternoon."

Silvio pointed to the street and said, "She putta that pretty l'il girl inna cab last night and left. She never come back."

"Great. Now I'll have to lug those dolls to Coney Island myself. Just terrific. Do you have her spare key? I have to get something out of her apartment."

Silvio walked Ernie to Nancy's apartment and after a short wait, returned with the key and let him in, telling Ernie of the police's continual visits overnight and throughout the morning looking for the elusive photographer.

Bess arrived out front to find Ernie juggling two cases of Freak dolls, his small arms strained to the limit. "Hey Ernie," she greeted him cheerfully, looking around as she asked, "Where’s Nancy?"

Ernie lost his grip on the cases and one tumbled forward and freakishly enhanced dolls spilled out onto the steps. He swore, not something he was prone to do. "That’s the fuckin' million dollar question, isn't it? She was supposed to help me take these things out to Fred today."

As she bent down to help him stuff the dolls back in their box, she paused to reinsert a pin into the forearm of a dominatrix Barbi. Worry plainly tinged her voice. "I had an interview this morning or I would have come over earlier. I’ve been worried about her all day. You don’t think they arrested her again, do you?"

"Arrested her? What for?" He gamely tried to concentrate on what she was saying, but something else was distracting his attention away. He sniffed the air suspiciously.

"You mean you don’t know?"

"Don’t know what? Silvio just told me she never came home last night." He gave the air around them another sniff and scowled in consternation.

Bess filled the preoccupied Ernie in on the events that occurred after his departure the previous evening. "Shit!" he exclaimed as he lifted up his foot.

"Shit is right. I know she was pretty upset when I left her."

He looked at her, perplexed, and then laughed away his previous frown. "No, Bess, I cut through the dog park on the way over here - and I’ve got shit on my shoe." In demonstration, he scraped the bottom of his shoe on the step's edge.

"Oh." She laughed herself, and then moved away from the offensive step. "I’m scared for her. What if they have her again?"

"Silvio said the officers keep coming around asking for her so my guess is they don’t know where she is either. She has trouble sleeping and she wanders all around the city. I'll bet she’s fine. She'd better be, or I'm gonna kill her myself. If they had her again Silvio would know, right?"

Bess nodded in the affirmative although his explanation did little to ease her fears. There was little to do but take his word for it. "Are you taking these to the Sideshow?" She gestured down to the boxes of dolls.

"Yeah, I’m attempting to anyway. Nancy was supposed to help me. I’m gonna have a heck of a time hauling these onto the train."

Bess brightened; glad to be able to do something that might take her mind off her worries for a moment. "Let me help. I already did my daily job groveling so I really don’t have anything else to do today." Grabbing a case she started down the stairs with a grateful Ernie trailing behind. After walking along in silence for a few minutes, she looked to him for reassurance. "Do you really think she’s OK, Ernie?"

Ernie gave her the most confident smile he could muster considering his own misgivings. "Trust me, that woman can take care of herself." He only wished he felt as sure as he sounded.

Nancy was taking her second tour of Times Square that afternoon. Earlier that morning, she stood outside of ABC studios and watched the taping of Good Morning America. She'd stood next to a woman holding a sign that read ‘I wake up with Charlie Gibson in my bedroom every morning!’ After looking around at the enthusiastic crowd, she was half wondering if Monty Hall might come up and offer the woman twenty dollars if she had a tape measure in her purse. Glancing at the large outdoor monitor, she was surprised to find herself in the crowd shot. The mornings when she caught the show, she couldn’t help thinking how ridiculous people were when they waved at the cameraman. Quite unaware of what she was doing, she found herself waving wildly to her image on the monitor before she could stop herself. Dork

She'd craned her neck to watch Diane Sawyer and Robin Roberts. They make me actually look forward to the news. It’s so much easier to hear what's happening in the world when it comes from Robin or Diane.

After getting a heaping helping of female TV journalist eye candy, she wandered off to take in the sites of Times Square like any typical tourist. She went to the TKTS booth and bought a matinee ticket to Phantom of the Opera. Upon entering the half filled theater, she took a good look around. It was filled with tourists; the majority of them senior citizens whom she assumed belonged to the tour buses parked outside. Finding her assigned seat, she grumbled when she discovered people were seated tightly around her. As soon as the house lights dimmed, she moved over to an unoccupied section of the theater. Before the overture was over, she was fast asleep.

"Ernie, these babies are fuckin’ great!" Fredini was closely examining a made-over Barbi who looked identical to Serpentina. He pulled out a doll fashioned after him and laughed out loud. "Oh my god, this is so perfect!" He looked down inside the doll's pants and smirked. "Well, maybe everything isn’t quite perfect, but we could always add like, a doll's sock down there." Ripping off a corner of a napkin, he wadded it up and stuffed the front of his doll's pants. The 'filling' took some adjusting until he got a satisfied grin. Turning the doll so Ernie and Bess could get a better look, he declared, "There. Now, that’s more like the real deal."

Ernie pointed to the bulge in the front of the real Fred’s pants. "You mean that’s all stuffing?" he teased with a wink and a smile, "Pity."

Fredini took the good natured flirting in stride. "Now listen, Ernie, if I thought you could handle the real thing, I’d be happy to show you just how real this is." He finished his boasting with a healthy grab of his own family jewels. "Speaking of sharing my ... attributes with someone, where’s my girl Nancy?" He smiled at Bess and decided she was an easy mark for his brand of smutty humor. "The way you two were getting along the other day I didn’t think she’d let you out of her sight. I thought you two would be joined at the hip -- or tits -- by now."

Bess blushed and turned away, leaving Ernie to pick up the conversational ball. He was happy to do so; he always got a kick out of a little back and forth with Fred. "Ah, she didn’t know I'd be meeting up with Bess. If she did, I don’t think she would have blown me off. She would have been tagging along, drooling away at Bess like a dyke who's been held captive in a monastery for ten years."

Ernie took note of the fact that Fred was alone behind the bar. "So's hows come the Great Fredini is tending bar? Where’s Koko?" Koko usually worked the day shift at the bar and performed in the afternoon shows. He was a midget who billed himself as Koko The Killer Clown. His shtick included telling bizarre murder stories in full clown face and a prison uniform.

Fredini rinsed a few bar glasses and set them on the shelf to drain. "Don’t talk to me about that little prick. He hasn’t shown up in days now and if and when he does, he can just keep on walking."

Ernie glanced over at Bess, and he winked at her. His ever enterprising mind shifted into gear. "So, have you hired a replacement?"

Fred shook his head. "Nah, not many people are lining up to tend bar at a Sideshow."

Ernie knew a perfect opportunity when he saw one. "Hey, Bess, c'mere." She approached them, and he continued, "Fred needs a bartender and you need a job."

Bess pursed her lips, and looked to Fred, and then at Ernie, and then around the bar with an appraising eye. It would sure beat the hell out of cleaning up horse dung in Central Park. That enticing job was her scheduled interview tomorrow. She ran her hand across the varnished wood of the bar and said doubtfully, "I’ve never tended bar before and the only drink I can make is a Screwdriver. Even that's pretty bad."

Fred’s smile widened. "Well, then you’re already one drink ahead of what Koko knew when I hired him. You're perfect."

Remembering the bartender she'd encountered on her last visit here, she suddenly envisioned herself with pierced nipples and devil's horns grafted under her forehead skin. "I’m not what most people would consider a Freak, unless you talk to my sister."

Fred knew she was leaning towards taking the job, and rushed to seal the deal. He loved the bar, but hated working behind it. "No need to be a bonafide Freak, baby! Just show up on time and work your shift and you’ll be everything I could hope for in a bartender. The tips are great too, if that helps you decide."

Bess contemplated going out on more interviews for jobs she really didn’t want. Well, one thing is for sure, it won’t be boring and it beats shoveling shit all day. She gazed back at the stage area to see a man juggling running chain saws. Nope, no way will I get bored. "When do you want me to start?"

Continued in Chapter 9

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