P.M.S. Revised

By Wayne Pearson

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 13, 2011
• ISBN: 9781469111155

Wayne Pearson

Wayne Pearson has been writing since his teen years. Past published works include P.M.S. The greed of Power, Money and Sex (Xlibris) his very first novel which he attempted to proofread and edit on his own. Whoops! Pushin' 40 (AuthorHouse.Com) his second novel, was proofread and edited by Rodney Mangas with better success. Illegal Sweets (Xlibris) was proofread and edited by many people. Burning Embers (Xlibris) was also proofread and edited by many people. Wayne continues to write and improve his work. He has many projects in the works including "White Shoulders" the follow up to Pushin' 40 entitled . He also plans to publish the revision of P.M.S. one day under the title P.M.S. Revised.

Book preview

Prologue

Carnes Levine was dead at sixty-two, a victim of pancreatic cancer. He had been a licensed Private Investigator in Connecticut, as well as my mentor.

My name is Chase Jones.

I received my PI license on the fourteenth of February 1996. By the end of that same week, Carnes had gone to spirit. But that wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Five years earlier, we’d agreed that after I received my license, we were going to be partners. He would semi-retire and let me handle all the leg work.

Now he was dead.

At the reading of his will on the twentieth, Carnes’ longtime attorney, Sharona Grant, a woman in her mid-forties informed me that I had inherited the Gemini Health Club. She also handed me a business sized envelope with my name written on it in Carnes’ handwriting. I don’t know what it says, the curly brown haired Sharona explained. Carnes said it was private. He just asked me to make sure that you got it. He said you would understand.

I thanked Sharona and carried the envelope outside to my tan colored seventy-seven Malibu Classic and climbed inside. A hand-written letter dated August 15, 1995 was inside the envelope.

Chase,

I’ve made some mistakes in my life. Most of them, I’ve been able to correct or make amends for. Yet, there is one mistake that remains unaccounted for. It has haunted me for years.

When Ellen and Joni were killed, I didn’t realize that I was being punished for my actions.

When I learned that I had cancer, I had a lot of time to think. I concluded that I was being taken out of this world because I hadn’t repented. I hadn’t fixed my mistake. Truth is, I was too weak. I guess I will answer to the man upstairs soon enough.

In the meantime, I need a favor or two. First, I need for you to find and destroy the pictures.

Second, if asked, don’t join the group Heaven And God, a.k.a., HAG.

I’m sorry to be so mysterious but I hope I trained you well enough to figure things out.

Your friend,

Carnes Levine.

P.S. You didn’t think I left you the Gemini Club for nothing, now did you?

What pictures had Carnes been referring to? I wondered.

Chapter 1

I first met Carnes in 1982. I was fresh out of the army, where I had been doing clerical work in the 623rd Finance Section at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

I had joined the Army with plans to study accounting while serving my country. I even had plans to one day become a CPA.

After basic training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, I was sent to Fort Harrison, Indiana, where I trained as a 73D Accounting Specialist. I quickly learned that civilian and governmental accounting were as diverse as apples and oranges. Over the time I served in the Army on different posts including a year in South Korea, I slowly lost my desire to become a CPA. By the time I was discharged, my dream to be a CPA was history. I returned to my hometown of Wellman Ivy, Connecticut, a town of thirty thousand, found just fifteen miles northeast of Hartford. I began applying for jobs here and there but wasn’t having much luck. It didn’t help that I didn’t really know what I wanted to do anymore. A month went by and no one would give me a job, no matter what fiction I used on the applications. It was like I’d been blacklisted. Everywhere I went I heard the same lines; they weren’t hiring. They’d just filled the position, they were laying off, or whatever line of bullshit they could come up with. Day after day, it was more of the same. I wondered if I would ever find a job.

One day, on the sly, a prospective employer took me aside and conveyed his dismay for facial hair.

The first thing I’d done, after becoming a civilian again, was to throw away my razor and grow a beard. I could see that if others shared his view no one would ever hire me.

One day, I entered a health club known as the Gemini Club to apply for a job. The first thing that caught my eye, when I entered the club, was the Aerobics Room to the left. A glass wall allowed bystanders, like myself, to watch the class full of scantily clad women shaking their booty. As I looked on, almost in awe, I heard someone call to me. I turned and saw a very thin woman dressed in a red nylon sweat jacket and pants with white stripes down the sides. She was seated on a LifeCycle next to an octagonally shaped reception counter, peddling away. She had red hair, almost as bright as the orange of the counter top. She made her way to me and extended her hand. I’m Pat Ross, the manager.

Chase Jones, I said as we shook.

The Gemini Club is a beautiful club isn’t it?

Yes, I responded.

Pat was very polite, quick to offer me a tour of the club. As we left the reception area, she explained that the Gemini Club was a sixty thousand square foot facility. Straight ahead was the ladies exercise area. The floor was carpeted in burgundy and gold and dominated by mirrors with pink and orange neon lights surrounding the top section of the wall. Beyond that, through another glass wall, I saw a huge swimming pool.

Pat ignored the ladies exercise floor and turned to the left, walking me down a short hallway past the Aerobics Room, also done in burgundy and gold with neon lighting. The rock and roll music was spilling into the hall even though the doors were closed. I managed to give all the girls inside a second look. At the end of the hall, we came to the co-ed side of the club, done in green and orange carpet. It too was dominated by mirrors and neon lights. A large green running track encircled many brand name weight machines.

Pat introduced me to her husband, Ricky, one of the salesmen. He was also dressed in red sweat pants. His white shirt had a circular motif that read Gemini Club. He was tall, muscular, and also had a beard. She informed me that he was a bodybuilder, as she walked me down the right side of the co-ed floor. She pointed out various weight machines, each working a different body part.

Toward the end of the co-ed section, we walked past the Men’s Locker Room and turned right down a hallway. As Pat led me through a back hallway, she told me that the Gemini Club was owned by a private investigator named Carnes Levine. We turned right again and ended up at a glass door marked POOL AREA. As we entered the hermetically sealed area, I immediately smelled chlorine. Inside a large pool were many girls, all in bikinis.

The pool holds twenty-five thousand gallons, Pat said. Leading me away, she said, This is an inhalation room, as she opened the door. Inside the scent of Eucalyptus was strong. If you have a cold you can sit in here and inhale the Eucalyptus. It’ll open you up.

We walked next door and entered the Steam Room. I heard voices but it was impossible to see anything. Next, we entered the sauna which burnt my nose. Last but not least, Pat walked me to the whirlpool. It seats thirty and holds five thousand gallons of water. We keep it heated to one hundred and four degrees.

Pat whisked me out of the POOL AREA and walked me through the ladies exercise floor, toward the reception area where we had started. She made mention of the Kaiser Cam Air Machines that many of the women were using, as we walked past them. She led me to a small office on the right side of the reception counter and closed the door. So what did you think of the club?

Having no idea where the conversation was going, I answered, It was great. It was true. Everything I’d seen in the club was beautiful. I knew it would be a great place to work. I just wondered what line Pat would use on me after I told her I needed a job.

We sell Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum Memberships, Pat said. Then she started rattling off membership fees.

Hold on, Pat, I said, ready to bolt. I couldn’t afford to exercise with the rich and famous after all. I love the club but I don’t have any money. Pat looked shocked. I came here looking for a job, I quickly explained.

Pat’s look changed to a smile. Would you be interested in cleaning the club Monday through Friday during the day? she asked.

Wow! I thought, offering a smile of my own and answering with a resounding, Yes. Pat hired me on the spot. I was thrilled, excited, and finally, employed.

After a year as janitor, Ricky approached me and asked if I’d be interested in working in sales. I accepted.

In 1986, tragedy struck when Carnes’ life was left shattered after his wife Ellen and his daughter Joni were both killed in a car wreck.

A year later, tragedy struck again, after Ricky was involved in a car wreck en route to a bodybuilding contest in Boston. After he went to spirit, Pat didn’t handle it well at all. Neither did their thirteen year old daughter, Aja. Pat was falling apart so bad that Carnes asked me to help her out, promoting me to the assistant manager.

Within a year, while maintaining separate residences, Carnes and Pat ended up dating each other.

Job-wise, I assumed I’d advanced as far as I could unless Pat was planning to step down. I didn’t really see that happening.

In 1991, Pat began urging me to train with Carnes to become a PI. I knew her agenda. She’d hired Aja to clean the club only a year earlier. She quickly advanced up the ranks and now at seventeen, she was already working in sales. I knew she had her eye on being the assistant manager and I felt that was what Pat wanted too. I knew I’d be out in the cold if I chose to butt heads with her. She had Carnes’ ear and most likely other things; thus when Pat made her move, she had a contingency plan for me. That was when I started a five year period of training with Carnes to become a shamus.

Along the way, I met Donna Lufkin, a third grade teacher. For some reason I just felt that she was the one. No more senseless dating, looking for Miss Right. I knew Donna would someday be my wife. My parents liked her too. They were glad to meet her too because they were retiring with plans to move to Ohio, where it was cheaper to live.

I don’t want to say Connecticut is expensive but when you hit their borders they don’t ask for a passport, they ask to see your passbook.

My training with Carnes sailed along smoothly until the last six months. In 1995, Carnes started to get weak. He wasn’t doing as well as he used to. Then he started to turn yellow, causing him to pay a visit to his doctor.

Devon Vance, MD, diagnosed Carnes with pancreatic cancer. There was nothing that could be done. Carnes was going to die and he knew it. It didn’t seem fair, while others in the club were in the best shapes of their lives, Carnes was getting worse. Once the picture of health, he now sat in his office feeling sick. Ever the trooper though, Carnes showed up at the club every day. He was unable to work his cases anymore and depended upon me to do all the leg work. I finished the cases he’d started. Baptism under fire I guess.

I was glad to pick up the slack. Most cases of spying on cheating husbands were done at night and in the early morning hours. Between that and helping out at the club when needed, there was little time left for Donna. She wasn’t happy and our relationship began to suffer. She began accusing me of cheating on her because I was gone at all hours of the night. I promised her that I wasn’t. I told her that Carnes wasn’t taking on any more cases and I just had to finish the ones he’d started. I promised her that things would be different after I got my own PI license. I could set my own hours and we could get married and enjoy life to its fullest.

Finally, the time came, and on February 14, 1996, I received my PI license.

Chapter 2

Upon reaching the Gemini Club, I parked my car in the owner’s spot and entered the club. As usual, Pat was peddling away on ‘her’ LifeCycle.

The Gemini Club hadn’t changed much, if any, since I first walked in fourteen years ago. We greeted as she continued to peddle. Pat likes to exercise while she’s on the phone conducting business. It helps her stay thin.

Our daytime receptionist, Kari Most, who is never to be found without a bag of plain M&M’s hidden inside her navy blue club jacket, was standing behind the reception counter. Her tall thin frame, with long golden blonde hair and a large shapely bosom, is stunning to say the least. A pair of black rimmed glasses adorned her cherub face, hiding her two bloodshot eyes. She won’t admit it but when she’s not working, she has a SLIGHT drinking problem. I don’t know how she’s able to open the club at six in the morning on Tuesday through Saturday. Maybe it’s because she is only twenty-five.

I shared the mysterious letter with Pat. I expected her to be miffed since Carnes hadn’t left her the club. She wasn’t. She informed me that she knew of his plans in advance and had supported them.

After reading Carnes’ letter, Pat said she had no idea what it meant. She didn’t know anything about any pictures. She’d never heard of the group—Heaven And God either.

I entered Carnes’ old office, now mine, to begin rummaging through the filing cabinets hoping to find a clue. There were no pictures to be found and there were no files on any group called—Heaven And God.

Sitting behind the desk, I picked up the phone and placed a call to Bim Vanguard, the pastor of the Baptist Church that I attend. He too said that he’d never heard of any group called Heaven And God.

My first case and I was already at a dead end. What pictures had Carnes been talking about?

That night I had plans to have dinner with Donna. We still hadn’t celebrated my becoming a PI yet. She’d be shocked to hear that I now owned the Gemini Club.

I arrived at Eryka’s Restaurant in Hartford near six. Looking around, I didn’t see Donna’s car. I checked my watch and saw that I was a little early. Tonight, things between Donna and me were going to be different. I intended to make up for lost time and ask Donna for her hand in marriage.

While I waited for her, I reached in my pocket and pulled out the engagement ring and looked it over. I couldn’t wait to see the look on Donna’s face. This was what she had wanted all along.

Ten minutes passed and still she hadn’t shown up. I went inside to wait. She still didn’t show. I asked if perhaps she had called. The lady offered her apologies, a man said. She stopped in an hour ago. She asked that I give this to you when you arrived. It was an envelope, the second one that day. Walking back to my car, I opened it. I quickly realized it was a Dear John.

I picked up the pace for my car. Inside I read her cold and colorful words leaving me heart broken. This was supposed to be the happiest day in my life. It was now the worst.

I drove home and called Donna. A man answered. In the background I could hear Donna telling him to tell me not to call again.

Feeling useless and worthless, I didn’t bother to eat. I just sat in a chair crying.

I thought about my life, about Donna, about my new title as club owner, about my first case, then more about Donna. It was after midnight, when I decided to drop into bed, a bed I’d never share with Donna again. I couldn’t sleep. I tried counting sheep but all I could see were multiple versions of Donna jumping over my bed falling into the arms of a man whose face I couldn’t see. I half-wondered if it was Cord Meretsky, a former member whom she had once dated. Seconds later, another Donna would jump over my bed into the same faceless man’s arms. My mind remained a victim to Donna’s memory, as her image continued to jump over my bed into another man’s arms over and over again.

Pat called and woke me at nine the next morning. I don’t know what time I nodded off but it seemed like only minutes ago. It was nearly ten o’clock when I stumbled into the Gemini Club both looking and feeling like a Zombie.

I told Pat that I’d been up late. She didn’t question me. Afterall it was my club. Who was she to question me?

That night it was more of the same. Once again, I accessed the video file in my brain entitled Donna. I played it over and over watching her jump over my bed and into the arms of another, almost seeing his face.

Sometimes life can be so unfair. I just couldn’t seem to deal with the curve ball Donna had thrown me. Again I tossed and turned for hours, before exhaustion finally subdued me.

Pat woke me for a second day, and a third. Three strikes and I was out. When I staggered into the Gemini Club on the third day, Pat strong-armed me and pulled me into my office like I was going to get a spanking. She shut the door. Chase, what is going on? This is the third day in a row that you’ve shown up late, looking like you stepped out of some horror movie, Pat said in an irate voice, You’re being irresponsible. Carnes wouldn’t have let you get away with this. Now what’s going on?

Donna left me, I said in a weak voice.

Oh, Chase, I’m so sorry.

She left me a ‘Dear John’ letter, I said, almost crying. She said she was pregnant and the baby isn’t mine.

I’m sorry for yelling at you. I wish you’d have told me sooner.

I haven’t told anyone. Pat, what am I going to do? I was going to ask Donna to marry me. I can’t believe she was sleeping with someone else and got pregnant.

Who was it?

Some guy that looks like a sheep.

What?

It’s a long story, I answered without explaining.

At one in the morning after Dennis Ryan, the night janitor, had gone, I let myself inside the club. There was no razzle dazzle of the neon lighting, no splashing in the pool, no music blaring from the Aerobics Room. There was nothing but dead silence.

After Carnes’ wife and daughter were killed, he had a hard time dealing with it. In order to deal with their passing, he began using the club after hours, exercising his night demons away. I was hoping the same thing would work for me.

I walked behind the reception counter and turned on the lights to the Aerobics Room, the men’s locker room, and the main exercise floor.

Inside the Aerobics Room, I popped in a tape of Steely Dan’s greatest hits. After an hour of singing and exercising, I took my tape to the reception counter and set it to play over the club’s PA system.

I exercised on the Nautilus Machines while continuing to sing. A couple of hours later, neither my body nor throat could take anymore.

I headed to the locker room and stripped out of my sweaty clothes. I grabbed a towel and walked nude from the locker room through the back hallway to the pool area.

Moonlight shone through the frosted glass windows causing it to cast a slight glow over the sleeping pool. I opened the Chemical Room door and flipped the switch for the Steam Room before making my way inside. I laid on my towel on the bench and began relaxing as the steam filled the room. From my vantage point, I could see the flashing lights still going in the Aerobics Room. They soon disappeared as the steam overtook the room soothing my tired muscles.

I lay in total euphoria.

When I left the Steam Room, I rinsed off in the pool-side shower (a club policy before entering the pool), then dove into the pool, abruptly waking it up.

Skinny dipping is fun, even though it is against club policy during normal business hours.

After a cathartic night of exercising, I hit the showers. It was just after four when I packed up my sweaty clothes in a plastic bag and left the club, feeling both physically and emotionally invigorated.

I slept well. I’d finally accepted Donna’s curve ball, thus returning my name to the roster of reality.

When the alarm called to me at eight o’clock, I found I was too tired to get up. I phoned Pat and told her about my night and how I felt. I told her I’d be coming in some time during the afternoon. She agreed. She also promised to call if anyone stopped in the club looking for a PI.

That night, I used the club again and came in late the next day. The therapy was working so well I decided to continue exercising during the wee hours until my PI business picked up.

Chapter 3

Wednesday, April 3rd, 1996

My alarm awakened me at eleven-fifteen. It was earlier than usual but I had a dental appointment at one. I silenced the alarm and left my Murphy bed for a pit stop. Although a Murphy bed is designed to fold up into the wall to save space, I always keep mine out.

I walked down a short hallway and entered the kitchen. Walking through the kitchen, I entered the bathroom. My cozy little nook is just an average apartment with a few amenities, including a desk and dresser and a fake fireplace. Other than a couch and a chair, I have no furniture.

Back in my living room/bedroom, I pulled my exercise mat from under the bed and began doing some abdominal work.

Doing abs is an everyday ritual. Keep the abs in shape and the body follows suit. Likewise, if you let them go, the body follows suit.

I showered and started getting ready to head out to Ginger Phelps’ dental office. I downed a can of Carnation Instant Breakfast and then brushed my teeth. I grabbed my navy blue Gemini Club jacket, from the days when I was working as a janitor, and pulled it on.

Leaving my apartment, I entered a short hallway. The hallway, like my apartment, is done in ivory paint with dark brown baseboard. I turned right and headed down the hardwood stairs to the ground floor. The front door lock was still broken. Knowing Shirley Woodlins, my spinster landlady, the door probably wouldn’t be getting fixed either. I don’t want to imply that she’s cheap or that money is her God, but when I moved into the Woodlins’ Retreat, which I later learned was once a brothel, she read me the riot act as though she was performing a musical on Broadway. . . . No rowdy girls, no parties, no loud music, yada yada yada… She finished her Tony Award winning performance by telling me how much the rent was. I swear dollar signs lit up in her eyes when I paid her.

Outside a slight wind was blowing. Despite it being April, winter still hadn’t relinquished its strong hold and spring wasn’t putting up much of a fight. Shrugging off the cold, I zipped my jacket and walked off the porch.

In the front yard I saw Miss Woodlins placing her Apartments for Rent sign in a pre-built hole. Standing almost six feet tall, she looked like a giant raccoon dressed in a brown fur coat and a hat hiding her black and gray hair.

She occupies apartment A and apartment B on the ground floor of the two story Woodlins’ Retreat. Apartment C is rented to an older woman that I’ve only met in passing. The upstairs also has three apartments. I’m in F, Kari Most lives in D, and E is rented to some guy in his twenties with a knack for breaking things, including the front door lock.

Miss Woodlins greeted me in her usual cool way. She never has a nice word for anyone. Not even me. I returned the greeting and walked off.

I crossed Columbus Street and headed east down Ludy Road passing Recent Realty on the corner to the right of the Woodlins’ Retreat. Catty corner to the Woodlins’ Retreat is the five story Rondell Hotel. Across the street on the left is a parking lot for the downtown shopping.

I’ve been doing a lot of walking lately. Driving has been awful since late March when the city began tearing up the streets to replace sewer lines and water mains. Scheduled completion and repaving wasn’t expected until September.

Sand, used to fill in the open areas of the road, began to blow at my face. I donned my trusty sunglasses and pushed onward for the next five blocks.

Inside Ginger’s small dental office, I was greeted by Lydia Miller, a medium height woman with dark hair and blue eyes. She’s Ginger’s assistant/receptionist but I just call her Aunt Lydia since she really is my aunt. She told me that Ginger was waiting for me and led me down a short hall to the examining room.

Ginger, too, was of average height and build. Her brunette hair was short, reminding me of my days in the army. She always seemed to be wearing a surgically implanted smile when I saw her.

After the obligatory greetings, I took a seat. Ginger poked and probed my mouth, eventually concluding that I had a cavity. So much for brushing!

Back in the reception area, auntie