Editor's note: This story contains language some may find offensive.
Erica Klinger was planning to head to Pinchot Park in York County with two of her best friends to soak up the newly warmed summer air. The small-framed, 27-year-old midstate woman left her job at a Silver Spring Township gas station that Sunday afternoon in early June.
She told her co-worker, Natalie Wineland, that she was swinging by her aunt's house. But first, she had to "deal with these people. These assholes."
Wineland, 21, knew the people Erica was referring to. For the three months she worked at that tiny gas station, Erica had complained constantly about "these people." They were Maria Lara, her acquaintance, and Lara's boyfriend, Luis Lugo-Davila, who went by Lugo.
When she was walking out the door, Erica told Wineland, "See you tomorrow, hon." That Kwik Fill gas station was the last place Erica Klinger was seen alive.
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Klinger's family and friends endured a month of twists and turns, spending weeks searching crack houses and the streets for their daughter and friend, only to learn later that her body was tossed to the side of the road.
To them, Erica Klinger was more than a young woman who got wrapped up with the wrong crowd. And to them, this story is far from over.
Something was wrong
Erica Klinger had an uncomfortable question for Melissa Shaver. She asked her longtime friend on June 6 if she knew anyone who could sell her Suboxone, a drug that helps heroin addicts get clean.
Klinger told her friend she wanted to wean Lugo off heroin. But when Klinger obtained the pills to help Lara's boyfriend, Lara wouldn't give the pills to Lugo.
The next day, Klinger and Shaver made plans to go to Pinchot Park on June 8.
"I was calling and calling and calling her phone that day," Shaver said. "But I had three different numbers for her. Every phone I tried calling, I couldn't get a hold of anybody."
Erica Klinger drove away from work June 8 in her 2000 black Chevrolet Malibu. Days later, her boss at the gas station called her parents, Michelle and Lawrence, to tell them that Erica hadn't been at work.
That was unlike her, Michelle said. And while she thought Erica might have been staying with friends for a few days, which wouldn't have been unusual, she was concerned because Erica hadn't texted her back in days.
Something was wrong.
State police declared Erica a missing and endangered person on June 14. She was entered into their databases, and the news of her disappearance circulated among the local media.
Two days later, two witnesses called Harrisburg police. They saw two people — neither was Erica Klinger — driving that black Malibu.
Who was Erica Klinger?
Up a winding dirt road that's just past a horse farm, just past a fruit stand, that's just past Linglestown, the Klinger family lives in a modest home. Michelle has pictures of her four children hanging in the living room.
Strewn on the kitchen table Thursday were three bouquets, a cake and cookies given to the family in the days after Erica's body was discovered. Michelle smoked a cigarette as she scrolled through her cellphone, looking at selfies she and Erica took together not long before her daughter went missing.
Erica's co-worker Wineland said she wasn't surprised about the charges against Lara and Lugo-Davila.
"As soon as I heard she was missing," she said, "I thought it had to do with them."
Lara is not charged with any crime related to Klinger's killing, and friends and family are livid.
"I'm not dumb," said Erica's friend Shaver. "I'm going to keep fighting until they get justice because that girl needs to be arrested."
Lara's preliminary hearing scheduled for Wednesday was postponed. Lugo-Davila is scheduled to appear in court on Aug. 6.
'Our baby girl'
Michelle Klinger hasn't slept well in weeks and has eaten very little despite encouragement from family and friends. A donation box to help fund Erica Klinger's unexpected funeral is sitting at the Kwik Fill gas station in Silver Spring Township.
"Nobody knows what it feels like," she said. "We never expected something like this."
Friends and family will gather to remember Erica at 7 p.m. Monday at Italian Lake.
Michelle Klinger's mind is constantly flooded with thoughts of her daughter. Her hand shakes when she holds her cellphone, tears flow uncontrollably.
She says she's going to see the case through to the end.
"All we want is justice for what was done to our daughter so she can rest in peace," Michelle said, "so our baby girl can rest in peace."