|
Journey To The Red Carpet - Chapter 2 Winston believed in magical practices that would bring him good luck and harm his enemies. He practiced rituals that included animal sacrifice. He worshiped the spirits of the dead. Memory didn't really understand this at first. Later, she came to realize that it was her key to understanding Winston. Memory knew that pure evil existed but she had never seen it as well hidden as it was in Winston. Winston was charming, persistent, and selfish. The most important thing in his life was getting his own way. Memory came to know the full extent of his controlling nature. Later, he stopped trying to hide his violent streak. Winston was also insanely jealous. This was one more reflection of his extreme self-absorption. He obsessed over the idea that Memory was cheating on him. It didn't matter that she was telling him the truth when she denied cheating. He continued to accuse her. He continued to threaten her. Eventually, he hurt her. Sociopaths thrive on charming people into believing in them. Ted Bundy, the serial killer, was a sociopath. People who knew him said that he was the most charming person they had ever met. No matter what wrong they do, they exhibit great skill in making others see things their way. Psychologist have proved that sociopaths are extremely successful only in the short run. Eventually, all sociopaths get caught or get killed. In Memory's case, the scales dropped from her eyes when it was almost too late. "Where did his power come from?" she wondered. For all Memory knew, he might drink rattlesnake sperm or have a doll made in her image that he could stick pins in to keep her under his thumb. It wasn't until Memory's husband Tamil met Winston that she truly began to recognize him for who he really was. Tamil finally traveled from Chicago to visit Memory and her son. Her son wanted to see his father. Memory understood that and put her resentment for Tamil aside. He stayed at Memory's Beverly Hills apartment. At the time, Memory was spending quite a bit of time with Winston at his place. It was inevitable that the two men would soon cross paths. Later, Memory would think that she had wanted it that way. On the last day of Tamil's visit, what Memory had been dreading finally took place. As she and Tamil were driving up to her apartment in her SUV, her husband's cell phone rang. It was Winston. He had somehow found out that Tamil was in town and was staying at Memory's. He had gotten Tamil's cell number from someone. "How in the world did he get Tamil's number? Who had done that?" she wondered. Winston had a way of getting whatever he wanted. It was ugly. Winston went right up to Tamil and began threatening his life. He told Tamil that he could easily kill him (or have him killed). Because of his many connections, he added, he would not even come up as a suspect. Tamil remained calm and tried to make light of the situation. Playing the big man was something Tamil was good at. He told Memory not to worry, that he wasn't afraid of anyone in this life. But she knew that Tamil didn't know Winston and what he might do. Memory told Tamil to go to the airport immediately and get on the first plane leaving for Chicago. She prevented Tamil from going back into the apartment. She feared there would be a confrontation, one that might turn violent. Memory told Tamil about the Winston and the Santeria. Tamil tried to reassure her. He said that, because he was of Haitian descent, he knew all about Voodoo and the world of the spirits that Winston invoked. In reality, both Tamil and Memory didn't understand how deeply Winston was involved with the Santeria cult. If they had known, they would have been terrified for themselves and their young son. Tamil ignored Memory, got out of the SUV and entered the apartment. He wasn't there long. Grabbing his stuff, he ran out and motioned for Memory to lower the window. "Take me to the airport!" he shouted. Something he had seen in the apartment had thrown him into a panic. The bravado he had shown a few minutes ago was completely gone. Before Memory and Tamil could leave, Winston suddenly pulled up alongside them in his Cadillac Escalade and started shouting at them. He accused Memory of lying to him and kept staring at Tamil. It looked as if he was visualizing the way he was going to have him killed. Tamil looked at Memory as if to say, "What the fuck?" Memory tried to convince Winston that there was nothing intimate going on between her and Tamil. He had only been staying at the apartment to spend time with his son, she insisted. Without warning, Winston pulled a gun from his jacket pocket. Memory and Winston froze in terror. It looked like a standard issue LAPD Police revolver. Memory had never seen the gun before. Before Winston could say a word, Memory gunned the SUV and peeled out like her hair was on fire. Looking in her rear view mirror, she saw that Winston was following in hot pursuit. Even though the streets of Beverly Hills are fairly broad, Memory found herself driving dangerously on the wrong side of the street towards oncoming traffic. She felt like she was living someone else's bad dream. Unfortunately, Winston was not a dream, he was a living nightmare. Beverly Hills was a place where car chases are sometimes filmed, but this was no movie. And Winston was an actor only in his own imagination. Memory drove the SUV like a stuntwoman. She sideswiped three cars and made several sudden u-turns. She was doing it all by instinct. The one thing she didn't want was to give Winston the chance to do something rash. She finally had begun to realize how capable he was of violence. He would have killed Tamil right in front of her, either with his gun or with his car. The only thing that might prevent him was his fear of having to pay the price and go to jail for the rest of his life. Sometimes, the fear of consequences is the only thing that stops a sociopath from murder. What Memory didn't know at the time was that she was driving a stolen car. Tamil had sold it to her when she had no reason to think it hadn't had a clean title. Actually, it didn't take long for the LAPD to trap them. But to Memory, the chase had seemed like it would never end. Somehow, Winston had been able to stay on her tail. They were finally stopped at the intersection of Wilshire Blvd. and Santa Monica Blvd. It was right in front of the Creative Artists Agency, the most powerful agency for singers and actors in the world. Winston was nowhere to be seen. Tamil got out of the car and began trying to explain to the police that they were being chased by a crazy, out-of-control Jamaican with a gun. As the two policemen were talking with Tamil, Memory's cell phone rang. It was Winston. "What are you doing to me, Memory?" he said, sounding agitated and hurt. He implied that he had only acted that way because he loved her so much. It was always about him, the way it always is with sociopaths. A short, stocky cop with a military-looking buzz cut knocked on the window and she lowered it. He asked to see her license and registration. She gave it to him and feared the worst. He went back to the squad car to run the information. After several minutes, he returned and told her that the registration of her car didn't match the plates. Memory didn't understand and argued that they must have made some mistake in their computer system. Another police car arrived and the stocky policeman put handcuffs on her and read Memory her rights. This was when Memory realized that Tamil had sold her a stolen car. As she was driven away in the back of the police cruiser, she could not believe that she had been driving a stolen car for all these months. As the LAPD was taking Memory into custody, Winston was busy paying off the drivers of the cars that Memory had sideswiped. He always had lots of cash and knew how to stop people from being angry. He was calm and collected as if he had been in a routine fender-bender. It would have been impossible to guess that, minutes beforehand, he had been waving a gun and speeding after Memory and Tamil. Memory had never imagined when she left New York that she would ever be handcuffed to a metal chair in a police station. Tamil did nothing to help her. In fact, he did everything he could to escape sharing her fate. The stolen SUV she had paid $19,000 for was impounded. Memory needed to come up with something on the fly to avoid spending the night in jail. Using her natural charm, she convinced one of the police officers to retrieve her phone from the impounded SUV. The officers allowed her to use it to make her one phone call. She called Winston and hoped that he would be able to follow her thinking. Again, through her charm, she convinced the policemen to disclose the name of the actual owner of the SUV. His name was David Smith. During her phone call, she referred to Winston as "Uncle David" and asked him to call the arresting officer. Her plan was to have "Uncle David" assure him that Memory had been driving the SUV with his permission. Winston had plenty of street savvy. It means more to a criminal than a Harvard MBA. He picked up on Memory's gambit without missing a beat. He sounded like an older black man from Chicago. There was no longer a hint of his Jamaican accent. He was amazing. An hour later, Winston arrived and bailed Memory and Tamil out of jail. He even gave Tamil a lift back to the apartment so he could gather his things and leave for the airport. Memory had no idea who to trust. She would have been better off trusting no one. Winston had tried to kill her and Tamil had sold her a stolen car. "God, why do you send me these men?" Memory wondered. The police took Memory home and then she understood what had changed Tamil's mind about staying. Her apartment had been completely trashed by Winston or one of his friends. Everything was upside down, clothes were thrown on the floor and dishes were broken. It had been a message from Winston to Tamil: Memory is mine. She decided to quickly pack a bag with her jewelry and a few clothes and go somewhere else. She saw that her jewelry was gone, including her Rolex watch. Winston didn't need the money. Simple theft was not his style. It was Tamil who had done it. Anyone who would sell his wife a stolen car was capable of that. It was almost midnight. Memory packed her Louis Vuitton bag with a change of clothes and left. She became a vagrant in expensive clothes. She had no car and no place to stay. Her son was with a babysitter and she needed to call to make sure he was all right. But her cell phone was dead. Memory started walking through the chilly nighttime streets of Beverly Hills. It was late. Everything was closed, even Starbucks. There wasn't even an all-night laundromat where she could plug her phone into an electrical outlet. Beverly Hills is a place of quiet residential streets. She kept walking, looking for a restaurant that was still open. There she was in designer pajamas, carrying her Vuitton bag with a pair of sunglasses sticking out. She had no choice but to call Winston, although it was the last thing she wanted to do. This craziness should have shown her that Winston was trouble. He would only bring more violence and chaos into her life. And if she remained with him, her future as an actress might disappear. But the human mind is affected by emotion more than it is by logic. This was a terrible low point in her journey. Nevertheless, in a quiet moment, she was stunned to realize the truth: She still loved Winston. He did come to her rescue, she thought. When he had calmed down, he had even helped Tamil. He paid the money and bailed us both out, she remembered. How quickly she had forgotten that Winston had pulled a gun on them and started the chase that had gotten her arrested in the first place. The only thing that seemed important to her was that he was always there for her when she had no one else to call. He was also able to provide for her son. Winston knew the power he had over her life. Driving Tamil to the airport, Winston pointed out that he was paying the rent on Memory's apartment and buying toys for her son. He implied not too subtly that he was daddy now and that it was going to stay that way. Winston recounted all of the details of his conversation with Tamil. What better way to manipulate the situation to his advantage? He had Tamil on the ropes and was ready to finish his rival off. Winston told Memory that he would gladly pay for her divorce. Memory accepted another one of Winston's "generous" offers. In the back of her mind, she knew there were strings attached. But she tried not to think of that. Living in denial with money seemed infinitely better than living in reality without money. Since his hasty departure from Beverly Hills, Tamil had repeatedly tried to call Memory on her cell phone. Winston suspected this and became visibly upset every time her phone rang. He insisted that Memory get a new number. Winston was primal. He only saw Tamil as a competitor who had to be eliminated. Also, Winston was savvy enough to see that Tamil was also a liar. Winston didn't trust that Tamil would stay in Chicago and stay away from his woman. And one day, not long after the car chase, Winston told Memory to keep her son out of school. He was convinced that Tamil would try to take him away from her while the divorce was still pending. Memory thought he was overreacting, as usual. But Winston was right. On that very day, one of Memory's friends told her that she had spotted Tamil hiding in the bushes near the school grounds. When Tamil saw that he had been spotted, he disappeared. Winston had prevented her son from being kidnapped by Tamil. This served as more evidence to Memory that she needed him, despite his insanity and violence. Memory felt as if her life was spinning out of control and she wasn't sure what she could do about it. Go Back Chapter 1 >>> |