Killing Me Softly (#Wattys2016)

FORTY-FOUR

FORTY-FOUR

"Oh, my God," Sondra whispered.

"Wow. She looks just like Tracy. They could be twins," Ricky said.

"Pause the tape," Sondra said as she peered in for a closer look. She studied each detail of the smiling woman's face from a picture taken at what looked to be a family function, stunned at how much Carol Henderson looked like Tracy. Same coloring, hair in a similar style, almost identical.

"Hang on a sec. I'll be right back."

Sondra ran towards the newsroom to find Cicely. She found the tiny newswoman dwarfed behind a huge computer monitor, where she was pounding away on her keyboard.

"Cicely, I need you to come back and look at something."

"What's wrong?"

"Just, please, come look at this," Sondra said as she began to walk back to the editing bay. The two women sat down and Ricky cued up the tape. Much like Sondra and Ricky, Cicely almost fainted when she saw Carol Henderson.

"My God, they could have been twins," Cicely murmured.

"That's what I said," Ricky chimed in.

"This is the woman I saw in the autopsy photos. No question in my mind."

Cicely leaned back in her chair. "Jesus. This is just... unreal. I can't believe no one made the connection at the time,"

"Ricky, can I get a dub of this?"

"No problem," Ricky replied, his fingers springing into action as he worked to do the transfer.

"Can you tell me if you have any more stories about her?" Sondra asked.

Cicely turned to the computer next to the editing bay. "Yeah, I can check the archives. Hang on." Cicely tapped out a few words into the computer and waited. She shook her head, a resigned look on her face.

"Just that one. Now that I think about it, that was about the time of those bombings in L.A. and then the sniper attacks in New York. Pretty much pushed everything else off the page." She leaned back in her chair and looked at Sondra. "Looks like Carol Henderson's disappearance fell through the cracks."

Sondra rolled her eyes. "Doesn't surprise me. Being black and all."

Ricky snorted in agreement as he handed Sondra the DVD.

"What now?" Cicely asked.

Sondra simultaneously dropped the dubbed DVD into the bottom of her bag and pulled out her cigarettes.

"I'm going to see what I can find out about Carol Henderson."

"Shouldn't you let the police know about this?"

"I will. Soon." Sondra shook her head as she extracted a cigarette from the pack. "Of course, they're the ones who fucked this up to begin with. I just want to search out a few more things first."

Cicely folded her arms across her chest and looked at Sondra. "Do you think she's still alive?"

Sondra let out a deep sigh and shook her head. "I don't know. Sondra looked at her watch. "Listen, I gotta go. I'll call you. Thanks Ricky." Sondra stood and rushed out of the station.