WARNING. PLEASE READ WITH CAUTION. MAY BE TRIGGERING FOR SOME.
THIS IS A DARK CHAPTER.
WAS HARD TO WRITE.
PLEASE REVIEW.
About two years later.
As she politely kicked her boots against the doorframe, snow fell in clumps at the doorway. Emma knocked at the door, but only out of courtesy. She didn't wait for anyone to open the door to a house she felt was as close to hers as someone else's could. She wanted to think she knew what to expect. Like every other time she'd walked in. Typical house in the Midwest, she'd walk into an entry way with family pictures following the steps up to the place where the bedrooms were. She'd step into a warm place, both physically and emotionally. An antique coat hook stood by the door, and a mat for wet boots would be waiting. Something would be cooking on the stove. Or it would smell as if it had been. Low lighting throughout the house would be welcoming, warming even. Two recliners in the living room, a very used and loved couch would hold someone only for a second before they'd be over greeting her.
At least. That's how it had been for such a long time.
But as she stepped in. Even the low lighting. Even the smell of food. Even the coat hook and mat.
Screamed something was missing.
And the walls grieved, holding memories of a person that no longer breathed.
She took her coat off. Hung it up. Pulled her boots from her feet. Set them on the mat.
And she heard the footsteps. Slower than usual.
And she saw Debbie. Her usually exuberant face was drawn in a tight smile when she met Emma's eyes. Tears began to fall from the elderly woman's face, and as she pulled Emma into a tight hug, the woman's shoulders began to quake.
Emma clung to the woman she'd consider family. She smelled of peppermint and coconut, a combination that came from her perfume and conditioner mixed. A thing they'd all joked about being a weird combination. But tonight, it felt like home.
Once the crying subsided, Debbie earnestly whispered, "Thank you so much for coming."
Emma still hadn't cried. But the words came past the barriers keeping her from losing her mind. "I'm so sorry."
Debbie pulled away, wiping her cheeks. "I just don't know how I missed it."
Then she saw Greg, who reached over and held her tight, the normally stoic man seeming to break in her arms. She held him tight, unable to understand how they were both still standing. After what happened, she could barely imagine how she was upright.
"I just can't believe…" He croaked. He let her go, and turned away as he preferred to cry without eyes on his strong face.
Emma stared at the ground for a second before she felt the hand on her shoulder. Calming. Centering.
"Henry, thank you for coming." Debbie hugged him quickly, and Greg shook his hand, nodding a silent gratitude between the two men.
"He didn't trust me to drive." Emma said, following Debbie through the living room into the kitchen, where a kettle for tea was boiling.
Without thinking, Emma walked over and pulled three cups from the cupboard. Looking to where Debbie had mindlessly sat at the dining room table, she knew what to do. Before she knew it, she'd pulled one cinnamon and two peppermint tea bags from the tea box in the third drawer, poured water over all three. Reaching for the tin of hot chocolate sitting beside the stove, she quickly assembled a fourth cup of normally comforting warmth. Like clockwork, she took the cinnamon tea into the living room for her dad and set the hot chocolate on the table next to where Greg now sat. Then she returned to the kitchen, taking a seat after setting one of the peppermint teas in front of Debbie. She held the other one gingerly in her own hands.
Emma wasn't sure what they said as they sat there. She wasn't sure they even said anything. Perhaps nothing more than, "The guest room is all set up for your dad." And "You know where your room is."
What was there to say? There was too much to think. But nothing to be said. Not yet. Maybe never.
She kept her eyes from falling to the place at the table that would never be filled by its owner. Or the pictures on the walls. Her smiling face that Emma would never see again.
Once tea was finished, Emma urged Debbie and Greg to head to bed. At least maintain some sense of maintaining their bodies. Both said they couldn't sleep, but Emma still wanted them to at least try. She didn't want to know how long it had been since they'd gotten the sleep. But as she watched the couple walk up the stairs to their bedroom, Emma wondered just how much of everything would just be going through the motions. Forever.
Her dad had given her a big hug before he went down to the basement suite. One she'd helped Greg renovate a year ago. He'd told her to come get her if she needed anything.
She turned off the lights throughout the main level. The kitchen lights, two lamps in the living room, and the desk lamp in the office.
It was dark.
Two in the morning.
She started to walk towards the staircase, but suddenly she couldn't move her body. She could go no further. The monster of grief strangled her bones, and she sunk to the ground, her logic fighting the emotions. The questions. She couldn't open the box. Couldn't open that casket of horror in her mind.
But the monster wouldn't let her go. She sunk into the carpet, sure there would be blood pouring from everything inside of her breaking.
Lea, how could you? She wanted to scream. Why? But she couldn't ask. She couldn't. Because she knew she couldn't bear the deadly silence that would never be answered. It would haunt her forever, reverberating throughout space and time, mocking her with nothing.
Shivers went up her spine as she looked around the dark room. Shadows moved. She knew it was from the trees blowing outside the windows. But instead of moonlight, she saw ghostly visions from her memories.
A pale. Bloodless woman. Red hair hung down her back. Emma willed her mind to stop.
But also to never stop.
Long, white nightgown. Cold. Pale.
Walking through the house.
Emma followed the form, leaning against the doorway looking into the living room. Like a look into the past. A scene to only be constructed from her memory.
"I'm so glad you came." Lea said, sitting cross-legged on the floor.
Emma reached over from where she sat on the ground and assured her friend, "la yumkinuk abqayiy baeida." You couldn't keep me away.
Lea had recoiled. And fiery words flew from her mouth, "STOP! I DON'T WANT TO HEAR THAT EVER AGAIN."
Emma pulled away, both shocked and confused.
Lea shook her head, her breathing elevated and her arms wrapping around her body. "I don't know how you can utter that language after everything."
Quickly, Emma apologized. "I didn't know it would bother you, Lea. Please…" Emma had waited until Lea was looking into her eyes before she said, "I'm sorry."
Lea had nodded her head fast, still wary, like Emma had slapped her. "I just… it's so hard."
Emma stood, staring into the empty, moonlit living room. That had been the first time Emma had visited. Then, she had been a guest.
The words echoed, like the walls refused to let the memories go. It's so hard.
Moonlight flickered. The apparition Emma imagined walked through the walls into the kitchen. White gown wrinkled, like it had struggled to escape a confined space. Emma followed. Back to the past.
Pancakes piled high. Sausage and bacon. Eggs.
Emma watched herself stumble into the kitchen, sleep heavy in her eyes. Still in her pajamas, Emma felt comfortable. "Bacon." And she reached for the last piece.
Lea sat as she tended to at the dining room table – one foot resting on the seat of the chair, the other dangling. She brushed her red hair from her face, a smirk on her face as she raced Emma for the last piece of bacon, and mistakenly dragging her oversized sweatshirt through the syrup on her pancakes in her reach.
"Fuck." Lea said.
Debbie, over at the stove, said, "Lea. Language. And I've got more here, girls."
"My mom says the same thing." Emma said, grabbing her napkin and dipping it into the water glass. Then she instinctively reached for Lea's arm, to help get the syrup off her elbow.
The sleeve of the sweatshirt rode up, and exposed Lea's forearm.
"It's fine." Lea said, pulling her arm away. When Emma, startled, started to ask about it, Lea shook her head, "Leave it."
Emma felt the punch deep in her gut.
Leave it
She hadn't left it.
The apparition – turned to stare at Emma. Vacant eyes. Eyes that knew Emma. That Emma knew. But empty. And, to her horror, Emma watched as the long-sleeved white nightgown began to bleed. Lines distinct in their small beginnings, but dissolving into each other, twisting and turning until the arms were completely bloody.
Emma put her hand over her mouth. She tried to close her eyes, but the face was still there in the darkness of her mind as well as the darkness of the house. She opened her eyes, and the ghost was gone. Then she felt a cold hand on her hand. Emma turned and found the empty, bloody form of her friend taking her hand to lead her to the office.
Emma shook her head. She didn't want to see anymore.
But it didn't matter.
There in the office.
Emma walked in from the entryway. Bookbag thrown over her shoulder, kicking her boots off before dropping exhausted into the oversize armchair. "You will not believe the amount of homework I have this weekend."
"Em." Debbie's voice echoed through the dream, "I put dinner for you in the microwave."
Emma called back, "Thank you!"
And then her eyes fell to the form in the desk chair. Lea sat there, staring vacantly out the window. Emma, now more alert, sat up in the chair and asked, "Lea? You ok?"
"Yeah." Lea replied. "I'm fine."
Skeptical, Emma stood up, and stepped closer, "What's wrong?"
Lea shook her head, but when Emma didn't move, Lea whispered, "I just haven't been sleeping well."
"Did you take those pills the doctor prescribed?"
"No." Lea said, "They keep me asleep."
Emma nodded. Knowing. Nightmares were horrible enough, but not being able to wake yourself up from them was excruciating. "How's therapy going? Have you talked to her about the nightmares?"
"I don't ask you how your therapy is." Lea said, defensive. And without explanation, she stood up, her green eyes digging into Emma's. Her lips quivered. "What if I can't get through this?"
She wasn't done with the memory. But the ghost, eyes now refused to leave Emma's, pulled her towards the staircase.
Up the stairs.
Lea's bedroom.
White bedding everywhere.
Quiet. Emma looked to the bed.
White nightgown. Arms crossed over her chest.
Emma pulled away. This wasn't her memory. She wasn't here. She hadn't been here. No.
But she couldn't move. The ghost. The past. The unknown. She tucked her hair behind her ear.
And the ghost walked to the…
Corpse. Lea.
And the ghost laid down. The corpse shook as the apparition settled into the memory.
Eyes open. Vacant. Staring right through Emma.
Emma reached out and touched the cold body.
And she noticed the paper in the stiff hands.
With tears running down her face, she took the paper out. But it dissolved in her fingers. She didn't need the paper. Emma knew. Emma had felt that. She knew what the paper said no matter what. It was too much.
"Emma."
Emma opened her eyes, looking up to find her dad standing above her. She looked around. In Lea's room. The bed was empty.
Emma had fallen asleep against where she sat against the wall.
"Dad…" She whispered, and looked up, tears already flowing down her face. "Dad, she tried so hard. To live."
He nodded, "I know."
Then, looking at the empty bed, through trembling lips, she whispered, "I don't know how I'm the only one who survived it."
