Planted

Chapter 18 Sharing a tub

After another long week, I was in bed in my pajamas nursing a headache. Yawning, I stretched out thinking about the busy day I've had.

Bea had emailed me pictures of an old factory upstream near the bank of the river. One of the photographs showed a dilapidated storeroom filled with huge quantities of toxic chemicals stored in rusted canisters. Her friend sent us a copy of the news report that would be publish within the week naming the owner of the factory and the people he bribed to keep it a secret. Whew! I'm sure glad that was over. Determined, I had been avoiding Tommy like plague again using busyness as an excuse.

"Sandy, I'm heading off," yelled dad. I got out of bed to say goodbye and noticed dad was all dressed up for dinner with a rather smug look on his face.

"Hey dad, who did you say you're having dinner with again? You have on cologne." I teased.

"No one in particular," he answered evasively. He was behaving very suspiciously.

"Dad, if it's serious you have to introduce the lady to your family," I tried to look stern as dad became thoughtful.

"Who is it dad? Is it that nice middle-aged divorcee neighbour down the road? What's her name again? Or that community centre lady that keeps calling you up to invite you to events? Just don't fall for some young chick who is after your money..." I called after him as he tried to wave down a cab.

"Sandy, you'll start to morph into your mother if you're not careful." Dad said waving as he got into the cab. He looked happy. We must have done a good job reassuring him that we would support him through, what Logan called, "Five Stages of Grief".

I crawled back into bed and thought about what Bea discovered about the legal team of G and G. Apparently, See Yew was deep in debt for gambling at the Casino in Marina Sands. Acting suspiciously, he had defaulted on his apartment and car loans, and owed a number of his associates huge sums of money. Bea was sure he wanted to marry me for money, especially since, TUF's true financial state was not widely known yet. Tommy, on the other hand, was well-known amongst those doing aid and development work. Frequently, he worked alongside World Vision and Habitat for Humanity and his whole family was well-respected for their generosity and kindness through their church involvement. At gut level, I knew Bea's sources were more reliable than See Yew's bragging but could Tommy really be trusted? The question churned round and round in my mind like an upset stomach and annoyed me so much that I was getting to point where if I had to marry, I would just pick Christopher.

Soon, my eyelids grew heavy and I drifted into a deep long sleep. In my dreams, I could see Christopher's blond hair blowing in a gentle breeze as he recited Shakespearean sonnets. He opened his mouth and Tommy's voice was calling out for me to a strange rhythmic tapping beat. My eyes shot open and I sprung up in bed. The voice was coming from downstairs. I got up groaning and peered through the curtain. There standing in the lawn was a grinning Tommy pelting pebbles at my window. He was shouting something which I could barely hear. I opened the window and heard him say with a Tudor English cadence, "Sandy, Sandy. Wherefore art thou, Sandy?"

I grinned but shouted, "Go home," and slammed my window shut. The tapping and shouting stopped as I tucked myself back into bed.

He had gone.

Illogically, I felt a little disappointed at his lack of persistence and listened out for noises coming from downstairs. The sound of a taxi pulling up suggested that dad was home. I could hear a woman's voice coming from downstairs. Curious, I looked out the window and saw a woman talking to dad. Her voice was very familiar, was it the neighbour? By and by, the door creaked open, Dad had probably let her in. At the corner of my eye, I spotted a moving dark figure directly under my window.