2020-01-26 - Tied Up In a Pretty Noose

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : Hi you two. How are you holding up?

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : I should be asking you that question! I can't wait to see you next week - we're doing fine. What about you? Recovering?

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : All systems functioning.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I'm fine. Slowly healing. Patrick is letting me stay at his place so I don't have to navigate the stairs at mine.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : That's good. I'm glad to hear that he's taking care of you in his own way.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Keeping an eye on you. That's not a bad thing. It's going around. ::eye emoji::

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : Yes yes well that's not what I'm texting about. I've been getting restless, so I had an assistant pull some records from the archival bowels...

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Oh. I love archival bowels.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Me too, but like company attracts like company. We're all terrible patients, by the way. We should start coming up with secret handshakes.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : What did your assistant find?

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : We already have a secret club 😃 They didn't find anything, she just brought me up a box. I was really just trying to organize some things. But I pulled another newspaper clipping of Jacob Baxter, from the carousel. [inserted is a picture of a very yellowed newspaper clipping; it's obvious it's the police blotter, but it's too difficult to read except for the date. Which, btw, is Tuesday, August 16, 1983] It was at the bottom of the box.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Another Tuesday.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : He killed himself, you guys. On the sixth anniversary of Jill's disappearance. He hung himself from the carousel.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Oh my god. Wait...on the sixth anniversary?

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : 1983. That's six years.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Poor bastard.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : I know but...I'm not a psychologist and I know that suicides can happen any time, but I wonder what happened in the interim that triggered it.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I'm not entirely sure, but the blotter makes it sound like he was a suspect in his daughter's disappearance. Maybe guilt? Maybe he just had enough?

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Six years of people thinking you killed your kid is more than enough to drive someone to suicide, even assuming he wasn't getting lost or having any visitations.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Right. I also wonder what happened to his body after it was found, if anyone claimed it or what.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : The blotter says 'transported to Hoquiam'. No idea what happened after that, obviously. But it just got me thinking..

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Transported? Not claimed? What were you thinking?

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : Do you think all of this changed the carousel over there? There's no way that it was always glass peacocks and counter-clockwise on Tuesdays. Maybe the counter-clockwise thing. But the music? The aesthetic? It's like all this stuff left some kind of imprint.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Yes. I was thinking that, too. The death changed the Veil. But is it because it's the death of a Baxter, or will any one do it? Or is it certain circumstances of the death?

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : We should go over at the Ferris Wheel.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I don't know. I mean we know the Veil is like Gray Harbor, at least in part. But it couldn't have always been like Gray Harbor, could it? Gray Harbor wasn't always here.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Agree. I don't think the music playing an amalgamation of Elvis' songs was in any way a coincidence at all. And the ferris wheel....where that other picture was taken? With the dead children? You said another Baxter death was involved there also.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : A couple. Also children.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : Anyway, I just wanted to share. We should think about other places that might've been affected. Has there been anything RECENT? Like, something significant that happened HERE, that might've had an impact over THERE?

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : ....the funeral. William Gohl's funeral.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : And his murders.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : There's also the Veil-flu but that spread out through the entire city and it would be hard to pinpoint a location to investigate, but the funeral has a fixed point at the very least and after that occurred, the range of our abilities was affected.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : We got dragged into the Safeway, or a facsimile thereof.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I think we should go there then. Where you guys buried him.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : ::sadface emoji::

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I'm sorry, but I think that we have to. For science.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Okay, but once you're recovered, I think we should do some training runs before we do. We'll finalize your gear list and August and I can run through some field expedition techniques and determine optimal weight for what we carry since we can't carry as much as August or Alexander can. I don't think it'll hurt exploring the Gardens of Eternal rest here, also, before we go over there just so we have some idea as to what we could be looking at over there. Layout, etc.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : For science. And because you're going to do it anyway, and I'd rather be there than not.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : I know the church attached to the Gardens has a basement full of records, which might mean some subterranean passages in those grounds over there, also. We definitely won't have any access to those here even if we do our homework.

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : All right, I think we've got a plan then.

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : Thank you for letting us know. Are you otherwise okay? Anything we can bring by for entertainment?

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : No, I'm fine. Honest! My assistant brought me my label maker, I think I'm going to amuse myself and put labels all over Patrick's things 🙂

(TXT to Anne Isabella) Alexander : I approve of this course of events.

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : Thanks so much Anne, and take pictures of your interior decorating efforts and send them to us?

(TXT to Isabella Alexander) Anne : I will <3

(TXT to Anne Alexander) Isabella : <3 I'll see you soon.