by Ariana Kenny
Chapter 12: Sam
Once we got to the edge of the park, it was a short walk back to the apartment. She was shaking, trembling like she had a current running through her. Her breathing was jagged as well, and I ignored the people staring at her as she walked barefoot along the concrete in a coat that made her look as naked underneath as she was. When we got back, I sat her down and fumbled to find her shoes and some clothes while I called for a cab. I was just giving the hospital as our destination when she startled me by taking the phone from my hand. “No need.”
“Like hell.” I argued back, but tired as she was she simply gave me a re-assuring smile.
Running her hand through my hair she tried to reasoned with me. “I’ll be fine, just need to sleep it off.” My look of protest only made her resolve stronger and she made her argument stronger. “What are we going to tell them Sam?” She moved closer into me as she stroked down my neck and shoulders. “I stopped a car with my mind? There’s an imprint of the license plate number on my chest. Don’t think they’re going to look into it a little.” Her tone was upbeat though she had a worn looking smile etched on her features. “All I need is a bath and the chance to sleep this off a little. I’ll be good as new.” And I believed her.
I ran her a bath and she lazed in there for about an hour before I knocked to check on her. She emerged a few seconds later wrapped in a fluffy red towel. The mark on her chest was barely visible now, but she wore purple and black shadows under her eyes. Flopping on the bed she dangled her legs off the edge, she held her gaze straight up at the ceiling, and I was sure she knew I watched her from the doorway because she spoke to me then.
“Sam. I don’t know why you’re here. Why you want to spend time with me.” Her voice quivered. “But I think you should go.” A single tear rolled down her cheek and on to the bed though the rest of her face remained stoic looking.
“Don’t start that…” I dismissed, but then she looked at me, deathly serious.
“I mean it.” No waver in her voice now. “There’s something not right with me. You should get away while you still can. Please leave.”
I couldn’t help but go to her. I sat on the edge of the bed next to her and she looked away from me.
“There’s nothing wrong with you. You just,…you’re special.” That got a laugh, or a half laugh, half chuckle at least. She propped up beside me.
“I just have a really bad feeling, and I keep seeing….things….when I close my eyes.”
“Like what.” I explored.
“Dirt, screaming, nasty things in my head.”
“Look at everything you’ve gone through in the last week. You wonder why you have things in your head like that? I’d be worried if you didn’t.” I put an arm around her and pulled her into my chest. “A couple more days, lets find out some more. Maybe you should go see Armada again.”
She nodded into me in agreement.
“Why did you bury yourself like that Rach? I really want to know how you knew that would help you.” She was still for a moment and then started rambling.
“The trees know the earth so well. Give back life, health. The earth is everything to us, the dirt the animals, the air and the sun…”
“What do you mean?” I tried to clarify, but all I got in response was more confusion.
“They think I am the hammer. But the truth is I am not of those.” As she continued her mumbling I let her rock back slightly and I realised she was asleep, dreaming. I lay her down as I heard a knocking on the door.
Reluctantly I left her to answer the knock.
“Sabian.” I acknowledged. He handed me the blanket we had taken to the park, with her clothes wrapped in it, and the cooler.
“Her things, your things…” He hesitated after I took the items from him before asking me: “Do I get to come in?”.
I hadn’t even realised I had him still standing in the hall. An old lady with a dog patrolled by glaring in at me. “Sorry, I’m a little distracted.” I apologised and moved aside to let him in.
“It is a bit overwhelming.” He supplied.
“You could say that.” I admitted as I put everything on the floor in a neat pile. Sabian was wearing gloves and removed them, stuffing them in to his pocket as he looked me over. I felt like an intern on probation or something.
“She’s alright then.” Sabian more stated than asked.
“Seems to be. She’s just sleeping.” I felt as stilted as my words. I had to ask him while she was out of it. “You really think something - and I cringe as I say this – mystical is going on.”
“I do.” The response was as certain as declaring the oceans blue. “A war of good and evil of sorts is how I’m grasping it.”
The answer still dissatisfied me, but I was having to accept a lot more than I had thought possible before right now. If there was a chance to talk about this, other than across the table with a shrink, this was it though. “I don’t really get a lot of this stuff, but something that bothers me Sabian, if Rachael has this power given to her by the Asatru – why haven’t they found her? Taken her back. Helped her remember?”
Sabian sighed as if it were an issue troubling him as well. “I don’t know the answer to that.”
“And these wraith are out to stop her.” I had to say it out loud to accept it.
“It seems like that’s what’s going on.” Sabian said as his eye caught a wood and metal box laying on the coffee table. “Listen, I thought I would take this to an antique dealer who has specialty interests in the Occult.”
“What is it?” I asked and took a note of Sabian’s palpable hesitation.
“She found it.” He lied to me. What did he know that she hadn’t told me? It got under my skin that he had a head start on her trust because I hadn’t bought into all this from the start. “She thinks she’s seen it before.” He lied again. If it was something I was good at, it was picking a liar. I didn’t let him know I knew, but was aware of him scanning me to see if I had picked him up.
“Great, take it, let me know.”
“Sure.” Sabian agreed with a guilty twang in his tone.
While I had him so agreeable, I decided to ask him for a favour. “Hey Sabian, Rachael also has that appointment with the regression specialist – I need you to call and cancel for her. I cant take her like this, and if it gets back to them that I made the call for her, I’m in some deep shit with my boss.”
“So this is a long term relationship then.” The snide comment caught me off guard. Before I had time to react though, he excused himself “Sorry – my mouth moving before I have thought things through.” Sabian clasped the box tighter, and readied to leave. “I better get going if I want to get this to the courier.”
“I suppose you’ll be back later. Let us know what they say about it.” I bobbed my head towards the wooden container.
“I have some final arrangements with some of my clients about being off work for so long, then yeah, I’ll be back on the grid later today.” With that Sabian left, taking a moment to dip his head at me as he closed the door behind himself.
That left me standing alone in the apartment with Rachael sound asleep in the next room.
Sabian had actually brought up a sore point. What sort of future was there in our relationship. None really. We were debriefed well in training about relationships of crisis seeming to mean more than they actually did. It didn’t seem like that was what was happening with Rachael though – but then the trainers always said that it wouldn’t feel fake, or circumstantial. But this was different. I could say that because I had been there before, thought I had made this incredible connection with my last girlfriend. Her brother had died in the same hospital my father had been moved to when he took his walk off the rooftop. Together we comforted, lashed out, acted out…all those things you do after someone leaves you. No matter how justified. I had thought how lucky I was to have found someone at just the right time, until James had pointed out how very different she w
as to me, all the space we didn’t quite close, and all the things we had together were locked in what the counsellors call ‘unhelpful behaviours’. Of course as soon as he pointed all this out, the magic disappeared, and we had separated on almost good grounds.
Rachael….was different. I admired her strength and resilience, coupled with her delicate nature. She wanted me, but I knew she didn’t need me. Every time I thought of her I thought of her red lips, the curves of her waist, the way she bit her lip and blushed at the same time when she knew I was looking at her…. She made my heart race in all the right ways and above everything right now, I wanted to help her find her solid ground. If she wanted to leave her past shrouded in mystery, that was fine, if she wanted to track it down and make it her own again, I would help her do that. What I didn’t like was seeing her in pain, and as much as it made me uncomfortable to admit it, Armada had seemed to make some ground towards helping her release that part of her that was kept in shadow. I would encourage her to go back when she woke up.
I found my way back to the bedroom, and lay beside her watching her as I puzzled over who she could be, how much of what Sabian took as gospel was true, and how I couldn’t doubt my own eyes this afternoon. What was this riddle that lay before me. I didn’t want to leave her alone tomorrow, but I had to go in to meet the new guy. Who starts work on a Saturday anyway?! I figured I would see how she was doing in the morning and worry then.
Watching her eyes flicker underneath her lids, she would suddenly gasp as though frightened or surprised, and then almost immediate relaxation again. It was fascinating, but I was tired and willed sleep to come, but I couldn’t close my eyes. It was 12:00am before I realised how long I had stayed there, just watching.
Eventually I drifted into a short lived sleep and woke again at 4:30am. I stretched, hating that I was wide awake, but I still had a lot on my mind. I wandered into the kitchen and made myself a coffee before collapsing on the couch and putting my feet up on the table. I rested in the silence for a moment before looking around for the remote. I found it in the pages of a book on paranormal phenomenon. It was in-between pictures of runic markings and another of a freakish ghost like woman with black eyes and sharp teeth. I started reading the captions, and flicked the page over before snapping it shut.
“Now I’m going crazy.” I muttered to myself before turning on the TV. About 7:00am I took one of my 100 visits to the doorway of the main bedroom to check on her. It was then that I heard a dripping coming from the tap in the bathroom. It sounded ominous in the half light and I stealthily moved through the bedroom to the doorway of the bathroom squinting to see through the dark.
I peered into the blackness of the windowless bathroom and as I did I almost thought I could hear something other than the dripping tap. I felt cold, and took a step forwards…..
I felt hands reach over my neck and clasp me. I jumped for a second before I realised it was Rachael, and laughed at my own creep factor getting the best of me.
“How are you feeling?” I queried as I sat back on the bed with her.
“Fantastic actually.” She beamed, and I had to admit she looked it too. “You looked as though you were looking for something in there.” She pointed to the bathroom. The mysterious dripping tap seemed to have stopped.
“No, just too much thinking, that’s all.”
“About what?” I turned my attention to her in whole.
“About how insignificant all kinds of things are after a day like yesterday.” When I spoke she sank back further on the bed and regarded me with a curiosity.
“You’re questioning everything….it raises more questions than answers some of this.” She offered me sympathy, but I realised for me the whole situation was offering me something else.
“Actually, it answers a lot” Rachael looks confused. “The ongoing debate you have with yourself in my line of work about good, evil, where some of the horrifying things people do to each other come from. I know a bit about psychology, a bit about social constructs of a person, but some of the things I’ve seen.”
Rachael nodded in renewed understanding. “The darker side of mankind.”
“The darkest pit of human behaviour. Seems maybe some of it wasn’t human after all.” When I said that though, her facial expression changed to one that was cynical and very unlike her.
“Don’t kid yourself, humans are quite capable of answering for their atrocities without needing to resort to blaming ghosts and ghouls.” Her voice had been unexpectedly dark and morbid.
It was my turn to ask for clarity. “Where did that come from?”
“Good question.” She said, lightening almost immediately. “I guess I’m not the most trusting of individuals right now – what with the being hunted down and all, seeing things…not remembering enough.”
I paused to think about what she said. It must be a veritable hell to not have control like that. I was just an observer really, she was living it, no matter how much I helped. At least I could make it easier. “My dad said he saw things, heard things before he died. I find myself asking all kinds of new questions.”
“Sounds like an awful lot of hard work.” She bantered and reluctantly I realised I would have to leave her and move on with my day. She was well enough to fend for herself again.
“Speaking of, I have to go to work.”
“It’s Saturday! Aren’t you off until Monday.” She reminded me.
“I am, but my new partner is having his orientation and I really need to be there.” I was looking for excuses even as we spoke, but I didn’t want the gossip about why I wasn’t there to overshadow my and my new partner’s work together.
“Do you have to go?” She sounded so plaintive, I nearly jumped at the opportunity to avoid going in, facing my boss and the idiot office clerk that blew a mountain into a molehill.
“I would rather spend the day in bed with you if that’s what you asking.”
“What happens to us when you go back? Do we have to pretend we don’t know each other, sneak around?” She gave a cheeky smile.
I leaned in on top of her and kissed her forehead, then lips lightly. “You say that like you like the idea.”
“I just don’t want to get you into trouble.”
“I’ll touch base with my boss and see what his take is, then report back – how does that sound?” I asked and she made a salute with the hand that wasn’t holding her up. I hopped up and pulled on my shirt before looking back at her stretching under the sheets. She looked completely restored. Maybe I should have a lie in the dirt every once in a while. “You going to speak with Sabian again?” I distracted myself.
“He’s been doing a lot of research so I want to pick his brain.” She squinted and watched my suspiciously as I pulled on my socks and shoes. “I thought you would be more comfortable with Sabian now?”
“As long as all you want is his brain.” I observed, to which she rolled her eyes in fake exasperation.
“As if…he’s just a friend, and he’s desperately in love with his wife from what I can tell….”
“That may be, but he’s also desperately obsessed with you. Don’t deny it, it’s clear as day. I just don’t want things to turn sour.” I stood, fully dressed and she rose up on her knees, letting the sheet fall from her. I was suddenly hating the clothes separating my skin from hers.
“No sour, only sweet.” She smiled, but then seemed to suddenly recall something. She jumped off the bed and pulled the towel she had dropped on the floor to her chest as she rushed past me and to the front. “Wait before you go, I have something for you.” She pulled a blank envelope from the desktop and presented it to me proudly.
“A key.” I observed.
“To the apartment, so you don’t have to wait for me to be here. So I can come home and be surprised to see you here…” Her face suddenly fell. “I hope that isn’t a no no. No pressure I mean. It isn’t even my apartment really. I just…” I could help but grin at the sudden nervousne
ss in her voice. The horror of the thought of having pushed my boundaries. I broke off her string of nervous conversation by kissing her, and she returned the gesture.
I reluctantly left her, headed to my place to pick up my car, then to the office.
When I arrived, I was greeted by the averting eyes of Gary, the office admin. He slunk into the back filing room as I approached the front desk. A few lingered gazes hit me with a smirk or two in tow. Seemed that the gossiping grandma’s in the office had been running riot while I was gone. I put my game face on and headed back to my desk.
As I shifted through the ever growing pile of paperwork that was increasing exponentially to my absence I couldn’t help but wonder how me not being at work seemed to actually generate more work for me.
I looked over the computer screen at Tan and Peters, shooting me amused tongue-in-cheek fleeting looks. Eventually I had enough, but even as I opened my mouth to chastise their lack of professional attitude, my boss’ booming voice greeted me. “Knott! Finally.” I turned to face him and was relieved at the jovial attitude.
“Hey boss.” I replied tearing my attention from the two delinquents at the back.
“Come.” He announced and demanded, which translated to ‘please join me in my office’. I followed as directed of course and took the routine chair on the opposite side to his.
“Good to see you here. I wasn’t sure if you’d turn up.”
“Any reason I wouldn’t? Other than the office slander of course.” I was testing his reserve just a touch, but he seemed in good enough a mood to take it.
“I hope you got her out of your system. “ I refused to give any form of response. “Did you?” Now he was testing me.
“How is the case looking.” I deflected.
“You’ll have to ask Tan and Peters.” My jaw ticked.
“Whatever. That’s not why I was here anyway. Where’s the new guy?” I had learned enough in those few short words between us to know there would be no letting up, no approval. If I was lucky a transfer might work out. That might be the solution for everyone, if that’s what I wanted. Fuck it! I liked her, what did it matter to everyone else. It wasn’t any secret that Tan had a string of violent allegations behind him. Barker had more than one DUI to explain. So what if I was dating a suspect/victim. Time, I decided, would be my friend.
The orientation meet and greet went well, my partner blissfully unaware of the crap load of baggage I was handing him. Just after the introductions and preliminary jokes and banter, Klink caught my attention. I followed her beckoning discretely.
“You’re a long way from the yellow brick road.” I remarked.
“I was finishing off a briefing for court on Monday, thought I would see vat you found out.”
“Found out?”
“They took ze body, but I don’t know vere.” She added.
“I’ve been away. Someone took the body.” I repeated.
“Ya, bunch of suits with a containment crew. Said there were chemical substances and risks, but there vere none – like I don’t know vat I am doing.” She laughed as though the thought were ridiculous. I was half relieved the gossip hadn’t made it to the other levels, and half chilled by the thought someone had actually come to clean up. Maybe the next step was knocking on Rachael’s door. I had been unaware Klink was still talking.
“…Anyway, I see you next week when you know more.” She winked her good eye at me. “You keep me in the know, ya.” She tapped her nose like a secret code and I had to keep from grinning. She was a character.
“Sure Klink.” I assured as though I had any idea about what had happened.
I stole a long glance at my new partner when Klink left. He seemed so keen, so on board, so eager. I new recruit from the blue zone. I used to be that. I really didn’t miss it. After thinking hard, I decided that warning him wasn’t what I wanted to do. The less I played my indiscretion the better. Let him come to his own conclusions, and I would just get my head back in the game fresh on Monday, and Rachael and I would work out the rest out of the limelight. This case would blow over, close cold and we could move on without incident.
I wondered as I walked over to join the others how long it had taen her to call Sabian after I had left.