Bleed

Chapter 7: Sort of Delilah

Still Wednesday morning. On the way to work.

Her new haircut felt pretty fantastic. Ana felt light and free without the weight of all that hair. She couldn't stop running her hands through what was left of her hair to feel the difference. However, she couldn't forget that Christian was the reason behind this change. Whatever she did, Ana couldn't shake the feeling that she was letting him down. Worse, that she was betraying him. Like Delilah, she thought; except I had my own hair cut and that's obviously not a good comparison. In an attempt to properly put Christian out of her mind, Ana fulfilled a promise to herself and called Jason.

'Hi Jason.'

'Aren't you supposed to be working right now, Ana? I wouldn't want to be the cause of you getting into trouble with your boss again,' Jason pointed out. Considerate, Ana noted.

'No, I'm not at work yet,' she tried to reassure him, but inadvertently she did the opposite.

'Did something happen?' he immediately asked. His voice was laced with concern. She explained what Christian had done and how she had reacted.

'You didn't report the incident to the police? I know that it's not my place, but you really should, Ana. Please do that in the future,' Jason urged. In the future? Ana responded with a tiny voice.

'You think there'll be a next time?' she asked.

'Don't you?' he countered.

'Yes,' she reluctantly admitted. At that point, it seemed like there was little else to discuss, so they ended the call after Jason told her not to hesitate to call if she needed his help. Feeling blue, Ana stared out of the window of the bus. Was there nothing she could do to make this go away? She turned the matter over in her mind, but the answer stubbornly remained negative.

Her phone rang. Ana looked at the display. It was an unknown number which made sense because Ana had only entered a few essential numbers under contacts. Christian, she thought. Somehow he had gotten hold of her new phone number. She let the phone ring; ignoring the looks of other passengers. Eventually, her phone stopped ringing.

She breathed a sigh of relief, but then the phone started up again. Fumbling for it, she answered it.

'I'm so excited, Ana! I know that I'm not supposed to say anything, but I'm just so excited! Oh, I'll call you later to discuss the details,' Mia rattled.

'Mia, what…?' Ana stammered, but Mia had already hung up. I should call her back to find out what this is about, Ana realised. The problem was that she didn't want to. She didn't want to know without a doubt why Mia was so happy. She didn't want to know for certain that Christian had her number and had given it to Mia. She didn't care that it wasn't the smart thing to do; she simply didn't want to know. She wanted to be able to go to work and to go to sleep and do all the things normal people do without having the feeling that something terrible was about to happen.

She had the paranoid feeling that someone was watching her, but she didn't want to know that for sure either, so she kept her eyes on the floor and called Elizabeth to tell her that she'd be there soon.

'Where are you?' Elizabeth demanded.

'In the bus. On my way.'

'Do you have a good explanation for not being here yet?'

'I have an explanation. I don't know if it's good,' Ana confessed, trying to convince herself that she was leaving anyway, so it really didn't matter if she got fired. Except, it did. She wanted to do her job. She wanted one area of her life to stay reasonably intact.

'Well, let's hear it and I'll decide,' Elizabeth said.

'Over the weekend, I broke up with my boyfriend. It doesn't seem to be getting through to him that I'm serious. That's what the commotion on Monday was about. And last night, he broke into my apartment and did something to make his presence known. I'm late because I had to wait for the locksmith to arrive.'

'What did the police do when you called them?' Elizabeth inquired.

'I haven't.'

'Why not?'

'He left no trace, so I don't have proof. I don't think the police will believe me,' Ana elaborated. It was close enough to the truth to make her uncomfortable. She didn't want to face this. She wanted to live her life and hope that Christian would go away on his own.

'Shouldn't you at least inform them?' Elizabeth suggested. 'Shouldn't they know what's going on? An incident report could help establish a pattern of harassment.'

Unable to handle Elizabeth's logic, Ana loudly announced that this was her stop and she'd see Elizabeth in a few minutes. She'd barely ended the call when her phone rang again. It gave her such a shock to hear it that she didn't even dare to look at the display for a while. When she did, it was her mother. Quickly, Ana took the call.

'Hi mom.'

'Christian told me. Congratulations. I wish you'd told me yourself, though,' Carla admonished her, sounding upset.

'What exactly did Christian tell you?' Ana asked. Her mother hesitated briefly before replying.

'That he asked you to marry him and you accepted.'