Chapter 3

Heard of Her?

I won't bore you with every little detail of the next few days. Don't worry, because I didn't find anything interesting. I looked up the former owner of Heaven on Seventh. She sounded like a charming creature. She used to own the joint with her husband, last name of Heidigger, no one bothered to mention his first. I guess they just purchased the establishment and left the name that was originally on it. He was dead, died in the middle of a big game, a joint, and a slug of whiskey. His wife Scarlet bet the insurance money on the same game while she finished his bottle and the joint. I wasn't thrilled to be making a call on the lovely-sounding lady, but it was necessary for the job, and unfortunately I always do my job. Why else would I be so screwed up? Besides, I knew this part of town, and I didn't like it. It was where I grew up, and I know it's rough, rougher than when I was a kid. Thing is, she's in the nicer area of these parts, and I have no idea how she's still paying for this given that I'd already found out more about her than I ever cared to know and I was about to learn more. I called her first, hoping that I would be able to get in and out of that hole pretty quick, but I made sure that I was good and ready to notice things too, no matter how uncomfortable that whole thing was going to be.

She was already soused when I got there - inebriated, drunk; whatever pretty word you wanna call it, it's still the same ugly thing. I've been there myself, and I don't do it on purpose. She's as pretty a picture as I could have imagined her. Bright red lipstick half smeared on her teeth, barely wearing a slinky red robe that was falling off everywhere, always with a hip sticking out like she wasn't well over twenty years past her prime. You bet I shuddered when she pulled me in and rubbed up against me.

'You said you were looking fer someone?' I can't be sure whether she was acting cozy like that because she was drunk or not, but I started to wonder if she and her husband's place had been some contender with Corneo's. She was certainly acting friendly enough, and like I said, I was seeing more of her than I ever wanted to.

'Yeah. Jenova Valent. Heard of her?'

'Jenova?'

'Used to work at Firion's, so I've been told.'

'Oh. You're the one who called. Here.' I followed her into the next room after she waved me in and tried not to feel threatened when I realized that it was a bedroom. She bent down and dug through a box for a minute before she handed me a file, but not before I saw her pull what looked suspiciously like a photograph out of the folder and try to hide it. I opened the folder and looked through, not very surprised by what I found there, or rather what I didn't find there.

'What are you tryin' to pull?'

'What?'

'You know there's nothin' about her here.'

'Of course not. She was an employee. I thought that you were interested in Firion's.'

'Yeah, I am. Interested in someone who used to work there. Is this her?' With the way she's swaying from her booze - scotch by the smell of it - and leering at me and decidedly not paying any attention to my face, I knew that I could snatch that picture she'd taken out before she could stop me. She cursed at me in words that I'm way too sensitive to ever use myself and tried to grab it back. It was about what I expected, a pin-up style of picture with the words Love forever, scrawled across it. Only something smelled off.

'Is this Jenova?'

'Give that back!' She screeched.

'You heard me.'

'Yeah. Yeah, it's her.'

'Why were you trying to hide this from me?'

'She's dead. She was a good worker, brought in the high paying customers. But she died.'

'Welp, Loz ain't going to be happy to hear that.'

'No, he won't,' she muttered, like it was something she'd already been thinking about. Her voice suddenly stopped being so slurred, I saw a look on her face that I knew better than any other; her eyes bugged out and her voice trembled. The veneer had finally cracked. But I saw her slide back into it, the same way that I desperately wished she'd slide back into that robe, but it was enough to see that I was on to something.

'I don't know anyone by the name of Loz, Red,' she snapped suddenly and her eyes got real narrow and mean. 'Now leave me the hell alone!'

'Don't ya? 'Cause he's looking for his ma.'

'Well she's dead, do you understand? Dead! Now get out of here! Go,' she yelled at me and shoved me out the door. I didn't protest, I was pretty sure that I had gotten what I came for anyway. I hung around for a few minutes longer, though, just to be sure that I wasn't missing something. Sure enough I saw her make a phone call. She was suddenly calm, like she was taking care of a problem, like she was hiring a pest exterminator. I was pretty sure that the pest was lanky and had red hair, so I tried to hear what she was saying. No luck. I couldn't tell who the call was placed to either, just that she was stone sober and the whole drunk thing had been a well-played act. Not surprising. That woman might be able to drink me under the table, and that's saying a lot.

Well, there was nothin' more that I could do that night, so I went back to my apartment before I remembered that I still didn't have a bed there. I slept on my couch. Again.

A/N: My apologies, this chapter is quite short - wasn't really any better place to cut it off - though honestly I don't even know whether this is being read, so I may be shouting into the void of the internet for all I know…