Desirable Trinity

They say she ran away. They say that her alcoholic father finally drove her out of the town where her deceased mother lost her life. Three days ago, Dianna Lynch disappeared within a gust of thin air, without so much as a pair of shoes taken from her bedroom. From the moment she was reported missing by her three closest friends, Dianna was a deemed a runaway, fleeing from a dad who did not care about her welfare. They say nothing but bullshit. Marie Shepard stands in front of the police station, her arms crossed over her chest as she observes the place that has left nothing but bile in her throat since her neighbor and closest friend’s disappearance. She can feel the body warmth of two familiar friends on either side of her, their gaze against the police station undoubtedly holding the same distain as hers, and impatience gnaws upon the three friends. “Third day we stand in front of this station,” Kenna speaks with nothing but distain; anger a quick emotion to come by for the eccentric twenty year old. “And the third God damn day nobody comes out.” “That is until we become a nuisance.” Marie quickly quips, reminding her two friends of the day before, when one all too familiar deputy forced them back to their houses. “And soon will come the threats.” Elizabeth adds on, whose attention is no longer on the station in front of them, but on the two girls to the left of her, an alluring pair of blue eyes staring helplessly in their direction. “Before we know it, we will be inside of this very station but with handcuffs pinching our wrists.” “It’s worth it.” Marie can only seem to murmur the words with a faraway glance, focusing not on the blonde with depleting hope or the police station in front of her but on her own fleeting memories of the friend in which she has so recently lost. “She was taken and we will make sure they find her.” “What if they do look for her? If they continue to think we are crazy when they find nothing just like we have?” Elizabeth’s voice drips with uncertainty, disbelieving the capture they knew to be true since the moment Dianna disappeared, and both Kenna and Marie gawk at her with mutual surprise. “What are you saying, Liz?” Kenna does not ask kindly, there is nothing but fury in her tone. “She didn’t leave without telling us, there is nothing else to it.” Her words hold a finality that neither woman tries to deny, but the uncertainty in Elizabeth’s beautifully unique blue eyes still remains. They are an unusual shade of blue, the eyes of Elizabeth Bell’s, ones too abstract to mirror the sky yet too absent of green to resemble the sea. No, Elizabeth Bell has the most hypnotic shade of blue that surpasses even the hue of sapphires. And, at this very moment, those dazzling powder blue eyes hold doubt that her friend since diapers had been kidnapped. However, unlike Elizabeth, both Kenna and Marie shine with certainty of what had occurred. Three days have passed, and while Elizabeth grows more doubtful, Kenna and Marie become more convinced. They had watched the abuse, the brutal slaps given to her by her drunken father’s hand, followed by the strangled sobs that Dianna begged not to let slip out. And yet, after being thrown down the staircases almost every night, Dianna Lynch always stood up to her feet and ventured towards either her friends’ houses or her mother’s grave without a thought in her mind of leaving any of them. Any time doubt fleets through either Kenna or Marie’s thoughts, they remember those moments when Dianna swore to save up money to rehabilitate her father, expressing it to be her final gift to her mother, a memory Elizabeth desperately attempts to cling onto as she stands in front of this police station. By the sound of the double doors opening, the three set of different colored eyes look up at the young man standing in the doorway, his entire stance displaying the conflicting emotions bottling within him. Casey Romanov is a man of only twenty six years, and is similar to the girls before him solely for the love he shares for Dianna. Nonetheless, the difference is his undoubted belief that his former lover fled from the attacks and towards a brand new world. His brown eyes narrow down on the woman in the middle, the youngest out of the three standing before him, but also the most persistent. Marie has a face that is angelically innocent, a nineteen year old beauty that has tender chocolate brown eyes belonging inside of a church staring lovingly up at a cross rather than glaring menacingly in Casey’s direction. Standing at five foot three, Marie Shepard holds all of the resilience in the world in such a petite frame, something that Casey has always deemed admirable until just three days ago. Beside Marie, Casey observes the one who bore the same birthday as his departed lover but none of her soft demeanor. Kenna Washington’s forest green eyes have yet to show anything but fury since Casey has exited the confinements of his occupation, her anger outshining everybody in the town, and every inch of her frustration is directed at him. While Dianna showed softness, Kenna displayed her animosity on her sleeve; the furious twenty-year old the flame in which Dianna always had to extinguish. Elizabeth is the tender one, a calm bliss beside thunderous storms, but even at this moment the timid female glares with pure antipathy towards Deputy Romanov. The daughter of two elementary school teachers, Elizabeth epitomizes kindness, the one most similar to Dianna. The wind bristles through the young woman’s curled blonde hair, dismissing it from her narrow face so that Casey could clearly see the sweet one’s sourness towards him more vividly. They believe Dianna has been taken, an absurd thought within this innocent town they live in, but also a possibility Casey cannot dare fathom. He yearns to believe that she is safe, the woman he called his for three years, and yet each day he sees Marie, Kenna, and Elizabeth standing rigid in front of his occupational building with their hands intertwined and their eyes leveled in his direction; he begins to fear. Yet, in this moment, he stands by his rational thoughts as he descends down the stairs of the station, forcing himself to block out any doubtful thoughts of what he knows to be true. Dianna Lynch ran to a utopian city. He could not think of anything else as he continues journeying towards the trinity of women hell bent on discovering the absence of the one nobody but them four cared anything about. Casey could picture it, her caramel colored skin absorbing the Florida sun she must be embracing at this very minute, but his imagination is shattered the moment he notices the three woman five feet away from him with pursed lips and enmity towards him. “Ladies,” Deputy Casey Romanov nods his head just once at the trinity before him, all of whom return the gesture with blatant disregard. “You all must be tired; you have been out here since dawn.” “Fury makes you forget about the fatigue.” Marie is always the first to speak and makes sure she is also the last, cementing her place as the ring leader in this charade in front of the station. “There is still an open investigation on Dianna…” “Do you not care anymore?” Elizabeth often prefers agreeing to what the majority do, and since becoming a part of an ostracized party, she sometimes wavers from what she believes until she sees Casey acting as an officer rather than one who swore to love Dianna until the end. “It looks like you are wearing that badge until it rots you from the inside out, Deputy.” “We all know Dianna suffered every moment in this town…” Casey continues to finish a sentence, but each time another member of the trio cuts him off. “How are you going to feel at the end of this day?” Kenna interrupts. “Knowing that you chose the cowardly route rather than saving Dianna?” “She…” “Within the first twenty four hours, ninety five percent of kidnapped victims die.” Marie and the others show no interest in what the Deputy has to say, only begging to make sure it is their words he hears and understands. “There isn’t anything I can do…” “Bullshit.” Kenna’s sharp tone cuts through the air and silences anybody but this tattoo clad, twenty year old woman fueled solely by fury. “You let fear control you. What is the point in wearing that badge if you cannot do anything but sit on your ass and eat donuts with it?” “What are you doing, exactly?” Casey’s eyes roam between the three different women, observing the anger that latches onto each of them. “Standing outside of a police station that won’t help you doesn’t save Dianna from a kidnapping we all know didn’t occur. Either you three find proof she was taken or realize she is horrible at saying her goodbyes.” “Great to see you, Casey.” Marie’s voice drips with sarcasm before abruptly turning on her heels and venturing away from the man and his pack of oblivious co-workers that refuse to help her. It takes a few moments, but soon Marie can hear the sounds of her two friends walking behind her. Each day, Marie’s hope depletes, the visualization of her friend’s smile becoming a blur in her mind. She is used to seeing Dianna every day, her neighbor waking her up to the smell of toast and eggs wafting into her bedroom, her closest friend always bearing a smile throughout the treacheries in her life. There is no way she could be gone out of her own free will. “Marie?” Elizabeth’s soft voice that barely rises above a whisper bristles through the wind and across her ears. “Where are we going?” “To the only person she would say goodbye to if she really did leave on her own accord.” Marie shakes her head from side to side, stopping those fiery tears that build up in her eyes from daring to fall to the ground. “If Casey needs proof, we will give it to him.” “We already looked at the grave,” Kenna tries to bring reasoning in where Marie is heading but she quickens her strides, her eyes on the falling sunset casting over the graveyard not far from where they are. “We are looking again!” Marie doesn’t dare turn around, for she knows the dismaying looks between Kenna and Elizabeth behind her. They believe, just as Marie does, that Dianna would not leave without a goodbye but it is easy to see how wary the two wandering behind Marie are. They are all desperate to find Dianna but Marie is frantic, her movements jostled from sleep deprivation and delusions of the worst imagination. Kenna and Elizabeth do not comment, however, and instead they journey after their frightful friend towards the graveyard of this missing friend’s mother’s tombstone. Nadide Lynch was a fighter, braving through her worlds’ troubles until finally being whisked away from the final disease plaguing her life: cancer. It had not been her husband’s weaponry hands, nor from severe trauma due to these events in her life, but a deteriorating diagnosis known as cervical cancer. Forty nine years, Nadide Lynch fought and just as her mother had taught her, she had made sure her only daughter would grasp the same mantra. Do not flee from your troubles; embrace them. Marie collapses onto the ground in front of Mrs. Lynch’s tombstone, the area just as barren as the first night they went towards it. Kenna and Elizabeth only observe their crumbling friend, watching the faraway caste glazing over her chocolate brown eyes, any words to say to her lodged deep within their throats. Marie’s purple nail polished fingers begin to pluck at the grass around her, observing nothing but the area surrounding this very tombstone. “There isn’t anything here, Marie.” Elizabeth finally has the ability to speak, but her tone is softer than its normalcy due to the worry she holds for the woman sitting in a graveyard as the day turns into night. “Then I’ll wait.” Marie’s voice cracks, displaying the terror she has so easily pushed back with a hardened exterior. “Wait until what?” Kenna takes a few steps towards her friend, the first friend she ever made once moving into this town, but once her hand clasps gingerly against Marie’s shoulder she awaits the worst sight she could ever gaze upon. Tears sprawl down Marie Shepard’s face at this moment, the weight of her world finally crumbling down before her, and her few words hold more heartbreak than Kenna has ever listened to before.  “Until Dianna comes back.”