A Score & A Decade

Chapter 5

So far, there wasn't much progress. Zoe had managed to get pictures of Roselle, Louise from 30 years ago, Eric from 30 years ago, a group picture of Louise, Evelyn and Harrietta at a cookout where Louise had labelled the other two ladies, and a group picture of the kids in which Louise had labelled Danny and Jesse. 

Roselle, she had to admit, had been a beautiful child. She had blonde hair, blue eyes, and an adorable chubby face. Zoe suddenly wished she could see pictures of herself as a child, but her house had burned down when she was six, consuming her dad and every memory inside it. Shaking her head, she looked at the next picture - Louise.

Louise of 30 years ago was a slightly stocky woman of medium height with dark brown hair, blue eyes which her daughter had inherited, and freckles.

The next picture was of Eric from 30 years ago. The first thing she noticed was that he was tall. He had blond hair and a thick moustache to go along with it. He was thin and lanky and had little to no facial expression.

Evelyn was just how Zoe had imagined her - Blonde with blue eyes, very thin, lots of makeup. She looked very snooty to Zoe. Harrietta was short with dark skin and beautiful curls. She was in mid-laugh when the picture had been taken.

Danny was as white as snow with hair as dark as coal. He reminded Zoe a bit of a male Snow White. Jesse was the carbon copy of her mother in a smaller form - same features, same hair.

She sat for almost two hours, analyzing the pictures, trying to see any flaw, just anything. She read over the case file again and again and read all the suspects' version of the story again and again but had found nothing to point to the disappearance of Roselle. On doing more research, she found out that Harrietta, who was almost 70, had been suffering from Alzheimer's for the last 2 years. She found out that Evelyn was living in France with her husband, Danny worked at an IHOP in California, and that Jesse was doing an accountancy job.

It was all so normal. Everything fit just perfectly into the picture with not one thing out of place. It was like Roselle had just disappeared into thin air.

Pushing her files and photos aside, She decided to take a break and look through some of her letters. She found one letter from an Andra P Kai. Her mother. She had switched back to her maiden name after Zoe's father had died. She rolled her eyes, her mother was the only one who still wrote letters instead of just texting. She ripped open the letter:

Dear Rosie,

I have been thinking about you lately. You haven't visited in a year and you know I don't earn enough to visit you all the way in New York! I have enclosed this picture of you and me from two years ago when you visited to hopefully remind you to VISIT ME.

Love,

Mom

Once more, Zoe rolled her eyes at her dramatic mother and opened up the picture that was inside. It was her and her mother at some hotel two years ago when she had gone to visit for Christmas. Her dark brown hair stuck out like a sore thumb among the white decor of the hotel, the blond hair of her mother's, and the big white patch her mother had on her face.

Her mother and she had always had a rocky relationship. Her mother would drink all night and would wake up every morning with a very bad hangover. She would yell and throw things around the house and every day, before school, Zoe would clean the house up. She had had a horrible childhood and had moved away to a place as far away as she could because she knew her mother would never be able to earn enough to visit her. Of course, Zoe would never visit her mother. Sometimes, she regretted it. But more often than not, she found herself at peace without the presence of her seemingly diabolical mother.

She closed her eyes. Her head was killing her. Maybe she should get some sleep and work on the case later. She then promptly drifted off.