Needy, Needlessly

"I need the need to be needed by the needy, needlessly." The strange email sent a chill down his spine. The subject was quite provocative: "Read it Loud." What was it? A threat? A warning? Or a mere joke? The sender's name appeared quite fancy: Diandra Preston. As a former investigator, he could match names to possible personalities. And Diandra gave his intuition a boss-lady vibe: confident, bold, and sexy. 80% of the time, he was right, so much so that it had cost him his job. One need not be so truthful all the time. That was what he had figured out after whatever had happened. But for now, he had to focus on the mail, and he decided to ignore it. Too much curiosity was not good for him. Not anymore. 

Working at a security office had been better now. He was offered a top-tier position, but he chose to be at a lower rank. It was his choice, as he did not want to compromise his peace. So much decision-making, so much responsibility. Nah, he didn't need it. He is single and okay with the kind of pay. At least it is consistent, unlike his investigation days. Either you make thousands a month or nothing at all. Now he was seated in the parking lot of the office complex. His duty this month was in the parking lot. He was checking all the CCTV screens at intervals. Suddenly, his eyes fell on a particular piece of footage from the 3rd-floor parking lot. An elderly woman was staring at the camera. She was standing beside a car, facing the camera, as if posing for a photograph. Her eyes were fixed on the camera, and her hands were in an attention pose. He zoomed in on the camera as much as possible. He watched for almost 2 minutes. Her eyes were focused on the camera, straight for all this while, without a single blink, as if she was looking at him, like a lifeless statue. Suddenly, he noticed her lips forming a curve as she slowly opened her mouth. She opened it wider and wider till the hollow of her mouth made her entire face disappear, and then the darkness within spread throughout the screen. A moment of shaky, disrupted footage later, he could see the parkway and the car again. Only this time there was no trace of that lady. Was he hallucinating? A sudden blink on his phone diverted his attention. It was an email from the same sender: Diandra Preston.

“Need to need the need to be needed, or not?” The subject read: Read it Loud, just like the previous one. This time, his curious investigative mind could not ignore the message. He immediately searched the net for the name Diandra Preston. There were many individuals, and as he had thought, most of them held high-ranking positions in different sectors. There was only one profile that read "Model" under the name. He clicked the thumbnail to get a clear view. No, it could not be real. It was that same woman from 5 years back. The one who died in an encounter which he had tipped the police about. He came to know of a human trafficking racket while investigating one of his client’s missing teenage daughter. What he found out was shocking. A major entertainment business, which included several top-tier modelling agencies, was connected to it.  And he informed the police. They raided their office, and a brutal fight took place between those miscreants and the cops. A woman, who had come there for some modelling auditions, was shot and died on the spot. However, the main culprits ran away. The higher bosses walked free, without a scratch on them. But the woman, an innocent young woman with dreams and ambition in her eyes, lost her life. He could never forgive himself. He was responsible for her death. That was it. He left his 15-year career as a private investigator. He took to drinking, but after some mental health struggles and a few sessions of therapy, he finally took up the job. Loneliness was becoming unbearable, and he could not stop thinking about the incident. But as far as he remembered, her name was not Diandra Preston. She was Ruth Lester, all of 21 back then. His thoughts were interrupted as the night duty guard came in. He had to leave; it was enough stress for today. He was still on pills for his anxiety. And he popped a couple of those before starting his car.

Just before his car was about to leave the parking lot, at the last turn, someone came in front of it. It was that lady. He had to press the brake. The woman stood there, looking at him, without blinking. A horn from the back compelled him to turn his head. A car was honking at him to move ahead. He again shifted his head to check on the lady, but there was nobody. He might be hallucinating. He drove back home with a heavy head. He booked an appointment with his therapist. Then he sat down. He tried to get a hold of himself. Did he know the elderly woman? Was she a familiar face? He could not recall. His friend Lopez from the Police Detective team was still working with the force. He called him for a check on Diandra Preston and her possible connection with that 5-year-old trafficking case. While he was preparing dinner, he heard his phone ring. It was Lopez. As he had suspected, Diandra Preston was the maternal grandmother of Ruth, and she had died a couple of weeks back of a sudden heart attack. She had been perfectly all right, hale and hearty, with very few hospital visits. She had taken care of Ruth till she was 18. And for the past few years, since Ruth’s death, she had been trying to follow up on the case, asking whether the real culprits would ever be caught. Lopez also sent a picture of Diandra. And yes, it was the same lady who was appearing before him today, again and again. So, he was not hallucinating.

After listening to Lopez, he again felt a chill in his bones. If Diandra was dead, how could she possibly be there in the parking space? Was it a doppelganger, or was it something beyond what the normal senses could capture? He closed his eyes while thinking all this, and lay back on his couch with a bowl of noodles he had just prepared. A shivering wind blew past his ears, along with a whisper: “You need to know that you are needed by the needy.” He almost fell from the couch, and while he was trying to figure out what had happened, his eyes fell on the chair near the bookcase. An old woman was sitting on it. It was Diandra. This time he did not hesitate. “Diandra, what do you want from me? You should know I was not responsible for your granddaughter’s death. It was an accident. And I had been struggling to get over it forever.”

The apparition of Diandra whispered once again, “The needy know; you need to know the needy need justice, and the justice needs you, needlessly.”

“Diandra, are you asking me to reinvestigate the case? I have left that career. I am not mentally stable enough to go against such powerful people.” He almost pleaded.

“The needy need justice.” Diandra’s apparition vanished, but the room kept echoing her whispers.

He got up and rummaged through his old files. The case files were worn out but still readable. Investigation was not only his job but also his life. Diandra was right; he needed to be there with the needy- the thousands of innocent people who fell into the dirty racket of trafficking. He fully understood that it would not be easy for him to put the real culprits behind bars, but he could not give up. He had to be with the real needy, needlessly. 

This post was created for the Blogaberry Creative (Monthly) Challenge with the theme word Need