Despite being separated by state lines, cousins Rachel Allison (right) and Natalee Holloway (center) were together for all the holidays and special visits in the summer. At left is their cousin, Phillisha Holloway.
On visits to Jonesboro, Ark., Natalee Holloway (left) would go down to the river with her cousin, Rachel Allison.
By the time they could walk, cousins Natalee Holloway (left) and Rachel Allison already were fast friends.
Rachel Allison, Natalee's cousin speaksBaylor basketball's Rachel Allison lives with the memory of her missing cousin, Natalee Holloway
Friday, November 30, 2007
By Jerry Hill
**There are pictures at that website.
Not a day goes by that Rachel Allison doesn’t think of her cousin. And cry.
Nearly 2 1/2 years later, it’s still painful for the Baylor University junior basketball player even to talk about the mysterious disappearance of Natalee Holloway.
The Alabama teenager was discovered missing on May 30, 2005, when she didn’t show up for her return flight on a graduation trip to Aruba.
As first cousins separated by state lines, Allison and Holloway were close growing up. But “we had made all these plans that when we got older we were going to try to live closer to each other, because we didn’t get to see each other enough growing up,” Allison said.
“She was my only first cousin and the only girl that was my age on either side of the family,” said Allison, 20, who grew up in Jonesboro, Ark. “All the major holidays were spent together, and she’d come down to Arkansas in the summer, and we’d go to the river. In the summers, we’d call each other a lot.”
Even if she wanted to, Allison couldn’t get away from the tragic story.
On Nov. 21, Joran van der Sloot from the Netherlands and Surinamese brothers Deepak and Satish Kalpoe were rearrested on suspicion of involvement in Holloway’s death. Although her body never has been found, Aruban officials believe she was kidnapped and murdered.
“People will say something like, ‘Oh, that happened three years ago, Rachel, you should be over it by now.’ ” Allison said.
“Well, maybe I would be if it wasn’t in the news every single day. And I have to hear my family talk about it, because it’s obviously something going on in our lives and something we’re having to deal with.”
Unfulfilled plans
A two-time all-state high school basketball and volleyball player, Allison decided to leave her family roots and signed with Baylor over scholarship offers from Arkansas, Arkansas State, Mississippi, Louisiana Tech, Colorado, Texas A&M and Vanderbilt. Her mother, father and brother had played intercollegiate sports at Arkansas State in her hometown of Jonesboro.
But it was a happy day when Allison “got dropped off for college” in late May 2005, just before the start of Baylor’s first summer session.
“I think it was the summer before I got here, and (Natalee) had just found out about me going to Baylor,” Allison said. “And she’s like, ‘I’m so proud of you. I can’t wait to watch you play next year. I’ve told all my friends you’re going to Baylor. I’ve got some friends going to Baylor. I’m going to come see you all the time.’ ”
Within a matter of days of Allison’s arrival at Baylor, though, the family received the news of Holloway’s disappearance.
After graduating from Mountain Brook High School, located in an upscale suburb of Birmingham, Ala., Holloway joined 124 fellow students for a five-day trip to Aruba.
Not on return flight
According to police reports, Holloway was last seen leaving Carlos ’n Charlie’s bar and grill in Oranjestad at about 1:30 a.m. with van der Sloot and the Kalpoe brothers. When Holloway did not show up for her return flight later that day, her passport, packed luggage, camera and cell phone were found in her hotel room.
Linda Allison, Rachel’s mother, joined a massive search party that summer that included thousands of volunteers, Texas EquuSearch, Aruban and Dutch soldiers, police and FBI agents. Linda Allison’s brother, Dave Holloway, is Natalee’s father.
“My mom was in Aruba all summer, so I didn’t even see her,” Allison said. “And I was going home almost every weekend, so it was difficult. It’s difficult now.”
Away from home for the first time, Allison said there were nights “where I would come home and just lay on my bed and cry.”
She was the lone outsider in a campus apartment that housed fellow freshmen Jhasmin Player, Jessica Morrow and Tricia Abbott, who were all from the Houston area and had played together for years on the same AAU basketball team.
“As you can imagine, I had no one here to talk to, because I had just met my roommates. I didn’t really know any of them,” Allison said.
But that summer was when she also found out how supportive a team can be. Even a team full of strangers.
“Bernice (Mosby), Sophia (Young), they all took care of me,” Allison said. “So it was nice, right off the bat, to see how your team comes together. And they didn’t even know me. But they knew what was going on, so they were very supportive.
“All the girls were great.”
‘Just hope and pray’
Through her own pain, Allison also marveled at what a “rock” her mom has been.
“She’s been there for my uncle, 100 percent, the whole time,” Rachel said. “They all went to Aruba that summer to help look, and then she’s been down to Mississippi to see him. She’s done interviews. She’s just a wonderful lady.”
Linda Allison and Rachel’s dad, Tim Allison, rarely miss games in Waco and will travel up to eight hours for road trips to Big 12 Conference games. But there were anxious moments the last two years, when Allison and the Lady Bears played at tournaments in Mexico and the Bahamas.
“They would talk to the coaches before and be like, ‘Keep an eye on Rachel,’ ” she said. “But the chances of something like that happening are very slim.”
But as Allison and her family know all too sadly, it can happen. They’ve lived through the nightmare.
And even though the Aruban officials believe Holloway is dead, without a body there has been no closure for Allison or anyone else close to Natalee Holloway.
“Not really,” Allison said. “You just hope and pray.”
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