Chapter 6 #2
She looked down at her knees, which were bleeding, so she obviously had cuts which would lead to bruises. “I don’t know. … At least one of my knees is pretty screwed up at the moment—like I need that on top of everything else.”
The security guard turned to Gladys. “Your attack of Chelsea was caught on camera,” he declared, “and I just happened to be looking at the feeds when that came through.”
Gladys flushed and said, “I tripped.”
“No,” he stated flatly, “you did not trip, and this is not your first offense.” He looked over at Chelsea. “I will need to get a statement from you though.”
“Even though you have it on camera?” she asked, feeling her knee already starting to throb, and looking at the scrapes on her hands and elbow that she hadn’t even noticed before. She stared down at the blood on her knees and swore.
He looked at her knees and said, “We better get you into the hospital.”
“No way. I’m not going back in there,” Chelsea countered. “You know that’s her domain, and she’s made it very clear how she feels about me.”
His face twisted in frustration, and he immediately pulled out his phone, calling somebody. Immediately after that was a mass of chaos as more people came outside. Scott, the administrator who had just offered her a job, was one of them.
When he saw the matter concerned the two of them, his face hardened, and he looked over at the security guard. “What’s this all about?”
“I have a video to show you,” he began, “but Gladys here attacked Chelsea … and from behind no less.”
Gladys glared at him. “You don’t even know what you saw,” she sneered.
Scott studied her, and his calm demeanor didn’t disguise his anger. “Gladys, what is going on? We’ve never had a problem in all these years.” Then he stopped himself and clarified, “At least not a major problem.”
“I’ll tell you what the problem is, … you’re getting rid of me for some upstart like this one. She’s nothing and nobody.”
Chelsea stared at her. “You don’t even know me.”
“No, but I know your mother,” she declared, spitting on the ground.
And that comment revealed so much. Chelsea felt something inside her just close off and shut down.
There was no point arguing with or trying to understand this woman because Gladys already had whatever beef or hate going on inside, and there was clearly no changing it.
“I don’t know anything about what my mother might have done to upset you,” Chelsea began, “but I am not my mother and, as such, am not responsible for her actions.” And with that she turned to the security guard and declared, “I really need to get off my feet.”
“Yes, you do,” he agreed, frowning at the blood that continued to trickle down her pants.
Before he could say any more, a vehicle pulled into the parking lot and stopped abruptly. She chuckled, feeling slightly hysterical when she saw Joel hop out, scowling, walking quickly over to see what the chaos was.
She sighed when she saw him. Scott was still by her side. “I know that you won’t believe it, but I don’t think Gladys has anything to do with the rest, but I can’t be sure.”
“What’s happening?” Joel asked.
Chelsea filled him in briefly, both Scott and the security guard nodded in confirmation.
Then Joel turned and shook his head at Gladys. “Unless she had something to do with the murder.”
At that, the security guard raised his eyebrows, then turned to Gladys.
Her eyes widening in fear, she realized she’d suddenly crossed into some chaos she hadn’t expected. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” she cried out. “I didn’t have anything to do with any murder.”
“So you say,” the security guard replied, “but it’s not like I can believe you anymore because you also just said that you had nothing to do with tripping her, even though I saw it very clearly with my own eyes on camera.”
At that, Joel took a good look at Chelsea and saw her knees. Frowning, he asked, “She knocked you to the ground?”
She nodded. “Yeah. … Apparently it has something to do with my mother.”
“For God’s sake,” he muttered. “That mother of yours is a gift that keeps on giving.” Turning his attention to Gladys, he continued.
“Her mother’s in jail. She’s already being charged with as much as possible that we are aware of, and, if she should be charged with anything else, then maybe you should contact Richard at the police department and actually put that into writing.
What’s it got to do with you anyway?” Joel asked Gladys.
When she failed to respond, Chelsea suddenly felt so tired and fatigued that it really didn’t matter. “At the moment I don’t even care.”
Joel nodded, wrapping an arm around her shoulders to support her, then looked over the security guard and shared, “I want to get her home.”
“Please do,” the security guard replied. “I’ll send Richard to talk to her later.”
“She doesn’t need to talk to Richard at all,” Gladys snapped.
Joel turned on her. “And yet maybe she does because obviously you attacked Chelsea, and it was unprovoked at that,” Joel snapped.
“If you do have anything to do with that recent murder, then you can bet that your life is about to get a whole lot worse.” And, with that, he led Chelsea over to her vehicle.
They had barely moved when he took a good look at her bleeding legs and declared, “You’re coming with me. ”
“I can’t leave my car here,” she cried out. “Last time I did, it got towed.”
He turned back to the security guard and said, “She doesn’t think she can leave her car here. Apparently it was towed before.”
He looked at her in surprise, shaking his head. “It should have never been towed.”
“Well, it was.” Suddenly she turned to Gladys and cried out, “That was you too. Why?”
But Gladys stayed mum, not interested in talking.