The Red to My Grey

by William Dudley Berridge Tuckey

  “It was alright. What about you?”

  “Yeah I worked at the café in the afternoon. I met an old lady and a shady looking guy with glowing red eyes.”

  “You catch their names?” I asked though I wasn’t expecting much of an answer.

  “No, the old lady ordered some tea while the guy just sat and spoke with her…actually, now that you asked, I think the granny called him Sinclair.”

  “I’ve heard that name before, but I can’t remember where.”

  “Wade, I know you’re interested in this but don’t do anything crazy. The old lady seemed nice enough, but that guy had the vibe of a killer.”

  I took his advice with a grain of salt and knew even if I didn’t act that trouble would find me anyway. So I kept to my own business. After about half hour of standing next to the water machine, chugging down cups of water because of the heat and boredom, we both got to work; it was around lunchtime that I received a phone call from Dad. He told me to try and finish up early for the night because we would be having a guest for dinner. My city was in no way a small one, but I already knew who it was just from what Dan told me. I didn’t make it home until about nine-thirty after fooling around with Johnson and Sabrina on the way home. When I got to the front gate of the house, I was dragged inside by Angel who had a big smile on her face. We came to the dinner table to meet our parents and an old lady. “Bout time you came home. Wade, meet our guest Charlotte, Sophy’s mother.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  “It feels like only yesterday that Sophy brought home Angel as a shy little girl that could hardly talk, now she’s almost all grown up ready to have kids of her own.”

  “Yeah,” I answered nervously, not able to say anything else. The old lady turned to Sophia and Dad, she reminisced on times of their past, leaving Angel and I out of the conversation. The two of them continued to flirt with each other while Charlotte rambled on.

  “You two are so sweet together, it’s a shame you fell out with each other all those years ago. Jason, you’ve grown into a strong man and Sophy, you’re as beautiful as you were the last time I saw you.”

  “I’ve missed you so much Mum, sorry I ran away.”

  “Don’t apologise to me. Apologise to Jason, he did everything he could for you, but it wasn’t enough for you.”

  “Charlotte!” Dad went off, but Sophia stopped him before he got any angrier.

  “No. She’s right…I was selfish to run away.” I had hoped to learn something from this, but the answer I searched for seemed further and further out of my reach, I realised that this went deeper. One thing I did notice was that Charlotte was much different to her daughter and to Angel, who were very similar. Her eyes drew my attention the most, they were a clear blue. Her skin wasn’t pale either. Far as I could tell, she was completely normal, she even looked her age while Sophia looked no older than thirty. After I had made my observations of her, I came to notice that Celia was missing from the table. I turned to Angel and asked her where she was, as I did, she came in through the front door piss drunk with Johnson holding her up. I ran over to him and helped them inside.

  “What the hell’s this Johnny?”

  “I found her running around the streets on my way to the convenience store.”

  “Why the hell is she wasted?”

  “I see your family is still as bad as ever with alcohol, Jason.” Charlotte remarked in between sips of her tea.

  “Ha-ha-ha right…sorry old lady. This is kind of embarrassing. Johnson, can you and Wade help Celia to her room and then call it a night. Angel, can you head up to your room. I promise you can see more of your grandmother tomorrow.”

  “Aww but,” she went to argue but Sophia gave her an expecting stare and she went to our room. She moped for the rest of the night and I had to deal with it. On the bright side at least, we could sleep that night since the old lady was staying over, so our parents would have to keep it civil. As Angel laid in bed and whined, I read a book to pass the time. It wasn’t anything particularly interesting, just some old science fiction novel that Dad used to read. Had I invested myself more into it, it probably would have been more enjoyable.

  “Wade, are you even listening to me?” She got my attention by shoving her face into mine over the top of my book.

  “What? What’s wrong?” I asked her, so I could get back to reading.

  “You weren’t!”

  “Hey, do you know someone named Sinclair?” I asked abruptly, changing the conversation.

  “You’re still not listening!” she screamed at me. Celia then screamed through the wall, telling us to shut up. We went quiet for a few minutes but then continued the conversation.

  “Sinclair is my father’s name. Why do you ask? Where did you hear it?” She gave me a serious stare; it was threatening enough to steer me away from asking any more questions.

  “I think I heard your mum say something about him a few days ago.”

  “Like what?”

  “Uhh, nothing important enough that I can remember.” I wanted her to let what I said go but I could tell she was curious because he must have been important to her. She climbed on top of me and whispered in my ear.

  “Don’t lie to me Wade. Giggle.” She brought her teeth to my neck, not biting down but enough to feel her cold breath against my skin. I moved away from her and sat back against the wall.

  “Let’s drop this for now alright. I’ll ask some other time.”

  “Aww what’s the matter? Is there something you don’t feel comfortable with talking to me about?” She pressed her hand against the wall and kept her face close to mine; her hair smothered my neck and she definitely wasn’t making it easy to drop the topic.

  “No seriously, I’m just tired is all, we should probably sleep. We got work tomorrow anyway.” It was at that moment my train of thought went completely still as she brought her lips closer to mine with her eyes closed. I closed my eyes and seconds later they shot back open after I felt a sharp pain in my cheek.

  “You bit me!” I yelled angrily while she laughed aloud. Thud. Thud. Celia banged on her wall to shut us up. Before I tried to sleep, I went through the hallway to get a glass of water from the kitchen. I hid around the corner of the doorway when I saw Sophia chatting with a mysterious red-eyed man. His face was covered in black tattered, blood-stained cloth and his entire body was garbed in tight black clothing with a heavy teal green cowl over his upper body. The only thing that wasn’t covered was his left arm which was muscular, pale and covered in scars.

  “Sophia, I’m sorry, what more do you want from me?”

  “No Sinclair, I ran away because you became a vicious monster. I won’t let you see Angel if you’re clearly still shedding blood to solve your problems.”

  “Look who’s talking. You ran away because you’re a fool, fleeing from your responsibilities yet again. Angel was lucky I was still there to protect her, or who knows what might have happened to her,” he said in malicious tone as he reached for a machete that rested at his hip. “You locked her in that house…Mother could have taken her.”

  “Yes, if she didn’t mind raising a monster without an outlet. Had I sent her to Charlotte, the old lady would have been nothing more than a meal for her.”

  Sophia tightened her fist and her eyes burnt brightly in the dark kitchen. “She wouldn’t have…”

  “You can’t expect an elderly woman to be capable of taming a beast, only other monsters can, after they’re the last one left standing,” he laughed light-heartedly in his deep voice.

  “She’s our daughter!”

  “Precisely why I’ve come to see her. Now, out of the way.”

  I let out a gasp as he looked to the hallway. Our eyes met only for him to vanish and reappear directly in front of me. He wrapped his hand around my neck. I choked from the strength of his grip. He was tall, and his gaze made my legs tremble as I struggled to pull his arms away from me. I was then suddenly thrown into the wall. I looked up to Sophia driving her
knife into his shoulder. He backhanded her to the ground beside me. I panicked as she fell unconscious and blood dribbled out of her mouth.

  I tried to stand but my legs shook and I fell back against the wall. I tried again and pushed off my knees but as I stood back up, he kicked me back down.

  “Stay down. This is solely between the Natsuki’s,” he turned his back and went to walk through the hallway.

  “Sinclair. I won’t let you take Angel…and you definitely shouldn’t have treated Sophia that way,” I called to him.

  At the end of the hallway was my Dad. His eyes were stone cold as he brought them to both Sophia and me.

  “Jason. Why am I not surprised?”

  “Get out of my house, Sinclair,” he said in a calm but cold tone.

  “I came for my daughter, then I’ll leave.”

  “Get out.”

  “Sigh. You were always such a pain in my side, Jason. What does she see in you?” he asked pointing to Sophia. Dad stared down at her, tensing up but then brought his eyes back to Sinclair. The two of them were unflinching. Dad took a single step forward but surprisingly that’s all that was needed to persuade Sinclair into leaving.

  “Very well, I can see you’re serious about this. If we were to fight in a narrow space such as this, we would tear each other to pieces. Enjoy my family for now; I’ll be back for them,” he turned around and pulled the knife out of his shoulder and threw it at dad. He caught it mid-flight and by the time he did, Sinclair disappeared into thin air after waving back over his shoulder. I saw Angel peeking out of our bedroom door with a single big red eye of hers. I wondered just how much she saw. My back ached as I got up from the ground, my legs felt a little less weak. Dad held Sophia in his arms and tears swelled in his eyes. After about ten minutes she woke up, her face had already started to bruise and was even more noticeable because of her pale skin.

  “I’m sorry, Sophy. I should have been here for you.”

  “No, I’m sorry; I tried to deal with him by myself.”

  “You know you can rely on me, Sophy, you always can.”

  I went back to my room and fell back against my bed next to Angel who pretended to be asleep. I could tell both of us were shaken up, but I wasn’t about to let her play the whole thing off like she didn’t know anything. So, I used the opportunity to mess with her a bit to get back at her for earlier.

  “Angel, you awake?” There was no response, but her ear twitched in the direction of my voice. “She’s really cute asleep and to think, I’ve never noticed until now,” I said out loud. I laid down next to her and hugged her. She blushed up and she relaxed her body in my arms. She had a habit of sleeping in nothing but my shirts, they covered just to her thighs and they gave me a sure-fire way to get back at her. I kissed her on the neck and her body moved on its own but before she could enjoy herself too much, I grabbed the edge of her shirt at the back of her legs. My hand brushed up against the back of her thighs as I grabbed the fabric, her body went still. I moved my face away and as I did, with a quick flick of my wrist, I pulled the entire shirt off her body. I held her close to myself with one hand and the other with the shirt behind my back. Her eyes sprung open. I was expecting a scream, but she gasped and went silent.

  “Can I please have my shirt back?” she asked nervously with her arms wrapped around me.

  “Yeah, in a minute.”

  I kissed her and though her lips were ice cold, I had never felt so warm. My heart sweltered and boiled under the passion of my own actions. She brought her lips from mine and held her hand out, it nervously twitched and shook. Her face was completely red, and she could hardly speak.

  “P-please…please can I have my shirt back?”

  I sat there silently staring at her naked body until I finally came back to my senses.

  “Y-yeah sure.” I handed back her shirt, but I was left feeling utterly guilt ridden. She tossed it over herself and hugged me although I wasn’t sure what for. Thud. Thud. Thud. The bedroom wall was pounded once again from the other side. We both laughed as we heard Celia screaming through the wall at us. We fell asleep beside one another considerably easy that night when realistically our family could have easily been torn apart if it weren’t for Dad. I think I only slept for a few hours until I woke back up. Angel was missing from my side and the bathroom door was wide open. I walked out into the hallway; all the lights of were off in the house. I heard noises from the bathroom. I walked over to the doorway and peeked inside to see Angel vomiting over and over into the toilet. I came to her side and rubbed her back gently until I realised something horrible was going on with her.

  “Wade…don’t look at me,” she begged me while vomiting still. The toilet bowl was filled with chunks of red and blood dribbled down the side of her mouth. I held her hair back as she hurled some more. It was her hands that really terrified me. She had long thin blood red claws coming from them and they carved the porcelain on the toilet as she clutched it tight.

  “I’m not a monster…right, Wade?” she asked me after she finally stopped vomiting; her skin was dry and dehydrated. I swallowed before I could say anything.

  “You’re not a monster,” I said sternly as she stared at me expectantly. I didn’t know what to do and all I thought was that maybe Johnson would know what to do. I tried calling several times, but he wouldn’t pick up. I began to feel like Angel’s life was in danger more and more with every passing second. She was losing blood by the buckets as injuries I wasn’t even aware of split open and gushed from her. She didn’t panic but her strength faded to the point where I held her from the ground. The bright red of her eyes wilted and with the last of her energy, she reached for my face and brought it to hers gently with her long, bloodied claws, but leaving my skin unharmed.

  “What the hell is happening? Why? Why are you like this?” I cried to her trying to hold back my tears and to keep my breath. She didn’t answer and brought her face to my shoulder. She then bit down as hard as she could, not once but as many times as she was able until I slapped her after the shock wore off. She drank the blood from my shoulder as it rapidly poured out of it and the pain was almost unbearable. I watched her eyes brighten back up to a crimson red, her gashes and cuts healed flawlessly leaving her with smooth, soft pale skin as always and the bloodied claws dissipated from her hands. I stood there holding my shoulder as it continued to bleed, watching her sitting in a pool of her own blood soaking the bathroom tiles. She smiled at me while squeezing the red from her hair in nothing but a now horribly stained shirt. She rose to her feet and hugged me while affectionately staring into my eyes. The room resembled something out of horror slasher movie, but she wanted to unwind with a bath, one that turned red within the first moment of entering it.

  “I’m sorry for scaring you…that was the first time anything like that has ever happened to me,” she said softly.

  “How are you feeling now? You really did scare me. I didn’t know what to do.”

  “I feel great, like I got something off my chest.” When she said that, I couldn’t help but look to hers. I looked away and shook my head. After the bath, she helped with the bandages for my shoulder. “Sorry about this too. Well I’m really tired. I’m going back to bed.” She left the room in nothing but a towel and if I remember correctly, pretty sure I spent another hour in the bathroom mopping it clean of all the blood.

  Finally, what was a long eventful night come to close and I actually managed to get some sleep. After seeing Angel how she was, I didn’t know what to do or for that matter, say about it. I was worried for her but also for myself. I started to think maybe she wasn’t just strange, that there was something seriously wrong with her. Fortunately for us, things calmed down for a while after this crazy night, but Angel still would find ways to make things interesting.

  In the morning I woke up on time for work and had a chance to go at my own pace for a bit. We left for our jobs for the day and time I got to the office. I bumped into a peculiar visitor. They were outside the b
uilding waiting for it to open.

  “Hey, can I help you?” I asked casually.

  “Wade Naem? Are you him?” The stranger asked, getting straight to the point.

  “Yeah that’s me. You came here to see me?”

  The man looked to me and sighed with relief. He wasn’t the approachable type; he came off as very professional and was well dressed in a pair of black jeans along with a buttoned white shirt underneath a typical noire style brown overcoat.

  “Glad I ran into you early. I wanted to avoid calling you out in front of your co-workers. My name is David Swan. I’m a detective and I’m working for the Fellbroke City police department to investigate the string of events related to the Natsuki’s. I also knew both of the police officers that lost their lives in the Natsuki estate personally and I’d like to bring closure to their families.”

  I went silent, unsure of what to say at the risk of incriminating myself, Angel or Sophia back home. Mr Swan was very perceptive, however, and could see right through me.

  “Why come to me?” I asked bluntly but I was curious that he knew of my involvement with them.

  “You’re currently in contact with both Sophia and her daughter. I’m certain they are staying at your residence…look I’m not here to make an arrest. I’m here to ensure that the mistakes of the past don’t repeat themselves.”

  Mr Swan dragged me along for his investigation for the day as well as Johnson, who had more information than I did since he was investigating before any of us. It felt strange to be dragged away from work yet again, but Mr Smith wasn’t going to refuse a request from a private detective working for the city. We went to the police station and sat down to talk inside a cluttered office. A series of photographs, newspaper articles, profiles and locations were pinned across the walls. It was clear that this detective was serious about his work. Johnson studied the pieces of evidence and clues extensively while he drank coffee as the detective coerced with his superiors outside the office.

  “Wade look at this,” Johnson pointed me to an article dated for ten years ago. The caption was ‘Natsuki confirmed dead’. The article stated that Angel was brutally murdered for reasons unknown by her father; she suffered a strike to the head from some sort of blade. Sinclair’s name was cleared, however, only two days later when he came to court and showed wounds similar to that of his daughter’s and claimed he failed to defend her from an intruder that had entered their home.