The Phone, part 1

As she passed him, he knew she was someone interesting. She strode by with confidence, looking amazingly beautiful. He thought to himself Surely this is what an angel must look like.

She barely even noticed him. That isn't to say she thought he wasn't worth the notice, but her mind was elsewhere. For all her confident stride, her mind was rarely where her body was. As she was walking, her thoughts kept returning to the previous night. Why couldn't she remember the end of it? She hadn't had that much to drink.

She remembered the party. It was a big one. Her best friend had just turned 21, so they had to celebrate in style. And celebrate they did! They had several kegs, and lots of people to share them. She remembered Emily, her best friend, starting the night off with some of the good stuff. She remembered the cops coming at about 1, giving them a warning about the noise. And she remembered deciding it was time to sleep, and leaving to go back next door to her house. But she didn't remember walking there, or getting in bed, or anything. Where did that hour go?

"Hey." A man's voice interrupted her thoughts. "You alright there? You seem kinda out of it."

"Yeah, I guess." She responded. "Just lost in thought.... Do I know you?" The guy in front of her was young, a bit scruffy, but in a rugged sort of way. Not quite the lumberjack beard, or build for that matter, but a bit rough on the jaw, and a bit ripped in the arms. She thought he looked handsome, in a way, but rough.

"No, I don't think so." He answers, looking at her with a bit of a curious expression. "I wouldn't mind changing that though. I'm Ben. I see you here everyday, but I never say anything. Today you just look like you could use a friend."

Ugh. This guy seems kinda stalkerish. "OK, no, I don't think that'll be needed today. I'm kinda on my way out of here anyway."

"Right. Well, have fun, and I hope that you figure it out, whatever you were so lost in thought about." And with that, he got back on the move, heading back the way she had come from. Weird, she thought. That guy seemed so familiar. Was he at the party last night?

She ignored it, and turned her thoughts back to where they had been. She dug back into her memories, trying to sort through the events of the previous night. It was all blurring together more and more, especially as the events got further into the past. She continued on her way. With each step, the events grew blurrier. With each person she passed, the images grew darker. She knew she wouldn't figure it out. Time to get desperate.

She dug into her purse and grabbed her phone. Checking the call log, she looked to see who she called late that night. She saw that she had called Sara around when she left, so time for another call. Pushing the button, she heard the phone ring. And again. After the third, a man's voice: "Hello."

"Hey, this is Kati. Can I talk to Sara?"

"I'm afraid she isn't available right now. Is this her phone?"

"Yeah. What kind of question is that? Who is this, anyway?"

"I'm sorry. My name is Eric, I work at The Burnt Lounge bar. We found this phone here last night. Can you tell Sara to come pick it up?"

"Sure thing. I'll let her know you have it." With that, she hung up the phone, and started trying to think of what to do next. First things first, she thought it might be a good idea to get in touch with Sara's roommates. Flipping through her contacts list, she started searching for them. She called all three, but got no answers from anyone. So, since she was heading home anyway, she decided to drop by their place.

The bus ride was uneventful, and when she got off at the stop, she started towards their house. It was a fairly nondescript house, and there wasn't anything different today then yesterday. There wasn't anything in particular about it that set her on edge, but for some reason today it felt weird. She walked up to the door, taking a look around, and gave the doorbell a ring. A few minutes later, Alexis answered. She was average height, petite, with long black curls around a light face. She was dressed in blue jeans and a tight black shirt with "Love" written across her chest in sparkly silver.

"Hey Kati, whatsup?"

"Hey Lexi. Is Sara around? I'm trying to find her, if I can."

"No, sorry Kati, I haven't seen her. I don't think she came home last night. I'm a bit worried, she isn't usually like this."

"Well, her phone is at The Burnt Lounge. I was supposed to tell her about it, but I think now I'm going to head over that way and see if I can find out what happened to her. You're right this isn't like her."

"Alright, let me grab my shoes, and we can head over there together. Hopefully we can find out what happened."

Kati followed Alexis inside, and took a seat on the couch. Alexis runs off up the stairs, and comes down a minute later in shoes. "Alright, let's get going. We can take my car."

Kati followed her out the door, looking towards the driveway. They headed for Alexis's car, an old blue Accord, and then headed downtown. When they got downtown, they started taking turns looking for The Burnt Lounge. When they found it, they pulled into the parking lot, and headed inside. Beside the doors were a couple of largetiki masks style decorations, part of the Hawaiian theme they had going here. As they headed in to the bar, Kati started to look around. She hadn't actually been in here before. There were largetiki masks on many of the walls, and there were some artistic flowers and seascapes painted on the walls. Over the bar was a fake roof, with the straw style of atiki hut. Kati thought the whole place looked kinda corny, but it worked for the style.

As they walked towards the bar, they noticed that the place was much empty. There was one guy behind the bar, and no one anywhere else on the floor. So they headed for the bar. The guy saw them come towards him, and waited patiently while they crossed the dance floor and table space. When the got there, he said hello.

"Hey" Kati responded. "I want to pick up a phone you guys found here last night. It belongs to a friend of mine, and we're trying to track her down. We're hoping the phone will help."

"Yeah, OK. Can you give a description of the phone?"

Alexis described it, including the stickers on the back, well enough for him to hand it over. Once they had it, the girls started looking through the call log for some hints. There was nothing unusual, so they decided to ask the bartender for a bit more information. Alexis waved him over. "Hey, can you tell me where in the restaurant you found this? It may help."

The bartender looked at her, not quite sure what to make of her, and finally decided. She looked trustworthy enough. "Yeah. I found it taped to the underside of one of the tables on the far side of the dance floor. I just happened to put my hand on it when I was moving the table back out there. It was that table right there." He pointed to a table near the restrooms, towards the back of the bar area.

"Thanks," said Alexis. "If you don't mind, I think we're going to go take a look."

"Sure, no problem. Just don't flip it and don't break it."

"We won't" said Kati, and they went over to the indicated table. It was just like all the other tables, so they took a look underneath. Sure enough, there was a napkin taped there too. Carefully removing it, Kati put it on the table, and they both sat down. It was a set of number couplets. 7-4, 13-11, 2-9, 18-4. They didn't know what to make of it. Alexis started playing with the phone, while Kati tried to figure out the numbers. They had to be a code of some kind, but what did they mean. There was no way to be sure.

"Hmmm, that's odd," said Alexis. "The phone is set to extra loud ringing. Sara never set it that loud, because it was too annoying. Even when she went out."

"I guess she did it when she taped it to the table. Had to figure one of us would call her today, so that would make sure someone found it when we called."

"That makes sense. But why not just call one of us? Why the napkin full of numbers and the phone taped to the table?"

"Still working on that. Maybe she couldn't call because someone would notice, so she wrote a note. But, she wanted to make sure only we would figure it out, so she put it in code. And maybe she had to leave the phone so we could decode it. Quick, see if there is anything in the notes section of the phone."

"Just one thing. It says: 'If this note is found, there is a code. If not, there is a hamster.' What on earth could that mean?"

"A hamster. Good question. Why don't we go home and see what the rest of your roomies think? I'd hate for them to miss out on all this fun."

"Right. Fun. But yeah, maybe they can help." Alexis turned to the bartender. "Thanks for the help" she shouted.

As they headed to the car, the numbers and their meanings were still bugging Kati. She thought for sure she should know what they meant. She checked her phone again. No missed calls. But something still felt off. She checked the call record for the previous night, and saw that she had been on the phone with Sara for nearly an hour that night. Why didn't she say anything then? Maybe she did, and Kati just couldn't remember. But why not? The questions just kept coming.