Waist Deep

32

I called Matt Sinderling after lunch.He was eager to hear any news, but I told him I didn’t have anything concrete.I wasn’t ready to tell him that his little girl may have become a prostitute briefly and might now be starring in sex films on the Internet.I hoped he didn’t frequent those sites himself.I had a vision of him coming across his own daughter’s movies and it gave me a black feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“Tell me something,” Matt pleaded.“Tell me what you’ve been doing.”

“I’ve been following leads,” I told him.

“What kind of leads?”

“Let me see if they go anywhere,” I said.“If they pan out, I’ll fill you in.Rozumis?”

“Huh?”

It was Czech for “do you understand?”My grandmother was born in Czechoslovakia and came to the United States as a fifteen-year-old girl. She used to say it to me all time.It was amazing how many different inflections she was able to come up with-one for comforting me, one for teaching, one for reprimanding.I didn’t know why it popped out, but it did.

“Just something my grandma used to say.Listen, I’ll fill you in on anything that’s worth hearing. I just don’t want to waste your time reporting every dead end.”

“Yeah, I suppose,” Matt said.He sounded doubtful and after the beating Leon gave me, that sound pissed me off.

“Listen, Matt, if you want me off this case, I’ll return your money and we’ll call it good,” I said.My voice was as sharp as his was doubtful.

“It’s not that,” he answered immediately.“It’s just…well, I guess I started to get my hopes up a little.I thought there might be some results by now.”

“I haven’t found her,” I said.“But I’ve talked to someone who’s seen her since she ran away.And I have an idea where she went from there.”

“Where?” His voice was excited.“Who?”

“That’s for a face-to-face conversation. If it pans out.”

He was silent for a moment, as if trying to decipher what that meant exactly.

I didn’t want him thinking about that, so I said, “Listen, I need a car for some of the things I’m trying to do.I can rent one, but I wanted to okay it with you first.”

“That’s fine.Wait-does it have to be a new car?”

“No.It just has to run.”

“I’ve got my brother’s old car at the house.It’s in the garage under a tarp.”

“What is it?”

“An old Celica.I was saving it as a surprise for Kris when she got her license.”

“Does she know the car?”

“Know it?”

“Would she recognize it if she saw it?”

“Oh.” He thought for a moment.“I doubt it.It’s been in the garage since she was twelve.”

“Okay.That’s fine.”

We quickly planned for him to pick me up after work and take me to get the car.When we hung up, I was pretty certain he was no longer worried that I was soaking him for cash.Myself, I hoped that were true.