“Mr. Craig and my son-in-law did after Mr. Craig and I told him and my daughter about your surgery,” Mrs. Craig said as she leaned over the rail of her porch.
“Mr. Craig helped? I thought I told him not to do any more housework over here after he fixed my shutters and rail. Would you thank them for me?” Arie said.
Mr. Craig was just a little bit taller than his wife, and just as spunky or maybe even more spunkier, than his wife. He never took no for an answer when it came to Arie and her safety. Mr. and Mrs. Craig’s daughter, Kylee, was the only one of her friends who came to visit her after her accident, and still did to this day, even though she’s ten years older than Arie. They were the family Arie always wished her family had been like. A loving father who came home after work, a doting, supportive mother, and a daughter who got all the love and support she needed.
Watching Kylee with her parents made Arie realize the beatings she received from her mother wasn’t normal. If Arie asked for something, came out of her room, walked in the house a minute late from school even when it was snowing, dropped something or spilled something, she got a beating. The beatings became harsher the older she became, but she thought they were normal. Until she visited Kylee’s home for the first time and watched her mother clean up the spill without beating or yelling at Kylee. Arie had flinched and tears came to her eyes when she saw Kylee’s juice spill onto the kitchen floor and Mrs. Craig walking into the room at the same time. When Mrs. Craig grabbed a washrag and cleaned up the mess without any complaint, Arie knew something was terribly wrong with her life. She always knew there was something wrong with her home life but didn’t know what it was exactly until that moment.
“Aww, hush, you know you are like a second daughter to us. I don’t know why you insisted on hiring a CNA when your parents died instead of moving in with us. Besides, this is our welcoming home gift to you,” Mrs. Craig said to Arie as she leaned forward.
Mr. and Mrs. Craig had insisted on Arie moving in with them when her parents died. They had even helped her plan the funeral, but she had declined their offer and stayed at home. Arie had been taking care of herself for so long she didn’t know how to let others help her.
“How can I make this up to you all?” Arie asked as she made her way to the Craig’s home through a gate Mr. Craig built into the fence so they could get to each other’s homes more easily and without having to leave their yards. She wasn’t used to letting others help her without giving anything back to them in return.
“You can thank us by not letting your fears stop you from going out into the world and following your dreams. Oh, you can also invite us to dinner once you are settled,” Mrs. Craig answered.
“Done,” Arie said as she wrapped Mrs. Craig in a tight hug and kissed her cheek before heading back to her home.
Arie waited at her door until she knew Mrs. Craig was all the way in her home before opening up her own door. Good and bad—mostly bad—memories flooded her mind as she looked around the living room. She closed her eyes and tried to will away the bad memories. She plugged her ears with her fingers when her childhood screams of agony penetrated her ears along with the memories. She slid down the door and quickly started the breathing exercises her therapist taught her to do when the memories became too much.
She sat there in silence long after the memories subsided and the screams from her childhood disappeared, admiring the changes in her home. Reliving those memories never became any easier, even after she first experienced them over ten years ago. After her parents died, Kylee encouraged her to see a therapist after witnessing one of her episodes. The last nine months of the therapy sessions helped a tremendous amount, but she still had a long way to go.
Arie took a huge deep breath and finally stood after she sat in front of the door for what felt like a lifetime but was only an hour. She collected herself and made her way to the windows in her home, she needed fresh air, since the air in her home was hot and extremely stuffy.
After taking a few moments to collect herself, she looked around her home and noticed it looked as though it hadn’t been cleaned since her mother and father were alive. Dirty dishes were piled in the kitchen sink. Dirt was piled on every surface of the room. Despite all of the dirt and clutter in the room she smiled as she looked on at the furniture in each room. Her father had told her since she couldn’t sail anymore with him because her mother thought it was too dangerous since she was blind, he would bring the boat to her. That's when he bought new furniture for the downstairs, and by the looks of it, he had done just that.
The inside of Arie home looked the same as it did when she was a child the only difference was the furniture. Directly in front of the door was an ivory spiral staircase. Behind the stairs was an open family/dining room with a long, white sectional couch in the shape of a boat. While on the right side of the room was a two-toned white-and-black table with round curves in the shape of a sailing boat on the left side of the room.
The kitchen was behind the stairs to the right and closed off from the family/dining room. In the kitchen was a wooden island with a stainless steel on top. The Island was shaped like a ship and looked as though it floated in the air. The oven was concealed in the Island, along with the sink, and some gaunt angular wooden stools. Directly to the left of the front door was the living room. In the living room was a black sectional in the shape of a boat with a rectangle glass table and fireplace in front of it.
I think my dad may have gone extremely overboard with the whole bringing the sailboat to me theme, but I like it in some weird way, Arie thought as she looked around admiring the room before she started cleaning the whole house.
Two hours later just as she was dusting the last room, her doorbell rang. Before she could get to the door, the person on the other side began to pound on it in urgency.
“I’m coming!” Arie yelled as she rolled her eyes. She hated when someone kept knocking on the door instead of giving her time to answer it.
Chapter Two
Christoph was outside playing with his new baseball glove when his twin sister, Grace, came running outside with his favorite truck.
“Cris, look what I got,” Grace said in a singsong teasing voice as she stuck her tongue out. Right before she dropped it on purpose, picked it back up, and quickly took off running into the woods in their backyard.
“Stupid, idiot girl, I hate you, Grace, I wish you would disappear,” Christoph yelled out after his sister when he noticed a piece of his truck was on the ground right before taking off after her.
Christoph woke up with a cold sweat while screaming, “No! Grace, I didn’t mean it, I was just a stupid little boy, come back.”
It was the same nightmare each night since his sister’s funeral. Before the funeral, he was having a different nightmare, and like this one, the other felt too real as well. In the dream prior to the funeral, Christoph is called out to the scene of a homicide while on duty. When he arrives, the murder victim is his twin sister, Grace. His heart starts beating wildly and his palms begin to sweat profoundly as he walks closer to the body. When he kneels down next to the body, a single tear slides down his face, Grace’s corpse turns to him and says.
“I hate you, I hate you, Christoph. What kind of cop are you that you couldn’t even save your own sister.”
The nightmare seemed to follow the other one whenever he attempted to go back to sleep.
The past two and a half weeks have put a strain on his mind, body, and mostly his heart. The dreams were making it hard for him to get any sleep; he could barely eat, and he just couldn’t quite focus on anything. That was a deadly combination in his line of work. Therefore, his captain made him go on a mandatory vacation after seeing how his sister's death affected him after the first two days back to work after the funeral. The month and a half vacation coincidently started when his partner, Derrick, finally left for his two-week honeymoon cruise and six-week medical leave.
His partner, Derrick, was injured a week before his sister
was murdered. They were chasing down a criminal when the criminal’s partner ran over Derrick with his car right after shooting him in the leg from behind. Cris didn’t stop until he found the two men who hurt his partner. Derrick didn’t let getting shot and not being able to walk mess up his wedding five days later though. He suffered through the pain until the wedding was over and then Cris had to carry him to the limo after everyone had left the reception. Derrick always had to make a joke or find the light of every situation. As Cris helped him into the limo, he removed Cris's arm from around him, looked at Cris, and said, “I couldn’t have planned this any better, tell those assholes thanks for the two-month honeymoon. I appreciate it.” Derrick chuckled as he closed the door to the limo.
Christoph thought keeping his mind occupied would take away some of the pain, or at least clear his head, but was he wrong. He never thought his heart would ever ache this bad, but it was hard losing a sibling—and even harder losing your twin. Someone who he shared all his secrets with and had a special language only they could understand. The person who understood all aspects of your personality and never questioned who you truly were. Yes, sometimes she got on his nerves and they argued but who didn’t with their sibling, but they shared everything together including their mother’s womb. She even had her own room in his apartment for when she needed to escape their mother’s home. He tried to throw himself into work unsuccessfully, hoping it would close him off to the pain.
Christoph felt like a failure for not being able to save her life. He raked his hands rather harshly through his short, soft, black curly hair as he thought, what kind of man, let alone detective, are you? Letting your sister get killed like that and not solving the case.
‘Cristo, it was my fault, not yours. I should have told you.’ A chill ran down his spine as the voice whispered softly into his ear and the temperature in the room dropped a significant amount.
“What the hell? I have to get some strong coffee into me. I am so sleep deprived it’s making me delusional and causing me to hear things,” Christoph said aloud as he swung his legs over the bed and onto the floor.
‘You are not delusional, it is just your Cherokee powers from your ancestors helping you talk to the dead.’ Christoph could hear his twin’s voice drifting into his head saying exactly that, while her right hand was on her hip with a look that gave off so much attitude. Without even realizing it, he smiled at the thought.
He didn’t believe in his Cherokee powers like his sister, mother, and the rest of their family members. They all tried repeatedly to prove to him that his ancestors were protecting and helping him. No matter what they had tried, Christoph just couldn’t see it and when his mind was set on something, it was hard to change it. His sister, who was a journalist, even went as far as to tell him her ancestors had helped her solve cases the police department he worked for couldn’t. When Grace said that, he just laughed and told her it was because some of his detective skills had rubbed off on her—after all, they were twins.
The sun was trying to peek through Christoph’s black curtains. He rose off his bed, walked toward his window, and opened his curtains to let some light into the room before making his way down the stairs and into the kitchen in his apartment.
The kitchen was a very standard kitchen with stainless steel appliances, white marble counter tops, and white cabinetry. A short stainless steel island was in the middle of the kitchen with bar stools that didn’t match.
Christoph grabbed the tea kettle Grace had gotten him just this last Christmas and filled it with water. While the water boiled, he sleepily took out some Peet’s instant coffee since it was the strongest he had.
Christoph had a true bachelor pad. In his living room was a long black sectional couch, a pool table, and a fifty-inch television mounted on the wall in front of the couch. The things he did on the pool table in the living room, well, the old one since he broke it and had to purchase this one only a month ago. In the bedroom was a black king-sized bed with black silk sheets on it and a matching black dresser. He thought the different aspects of his apartment showed his personalities and lifestyle.
He was very strong-minded—some would say stubborn—and protective of his family. He was a great friend and listener who knew when to be pushy in order to help a friend and when to step back. A dedicated twenty-seven year old police officer, he had started volunteering at the police station at sixteen. At eighteen, he went to the local community college for a degree in criminology as he waited until he could finally join the police academy at age twenty-one. Without being pushed, he always signed up for the extra classes to help improve his skills. He quickly made a name for himself and caught the attention of his captain. After watching him solve many difficult cases, his captain signed him up for the classes to become a criminal profiler as well.
He wasn’t always serious, he could joke with the best of them, and loved to hit up a round of beers and games of pool with some of the other officers when he needed to relax after a hard case or just needed to get out of the house.
There was one thing that he thought didn’t show what he wanted in life or his lifestyle. The fact that his apartment screamed out bachelor pad, yeah, a few months ago it would have been true. However, after standing next to his partner and best friend during his wedding, and he watched their love grow, he knew he wanted something more out of life now than just hopping from bed to bed with women he didn’t have feelings for. He wanted to feel his body come alive and get hot all over a woman just looking at him or by the sound of her voice.
Derrick’s wedding wasn’t the only reason he was feeling the itch to settle down. Arie. Arie was the reason he wanted to settle down. When he first saw her it was like her sweet angelic voice enveloped his mind and body with the first word she spoke and held him captive ever since. She was the first woman to ever make him nervous just by the sheer thought of her rejecting him in anyway, which was the only thing stopping him from asking her out during his mandatory vacation. He knew her rejection would crush more than his pride and ego, it would crush his heart and the future he was now looking forward to with her. He couldn’t believe a woman had him fantasizing about the future with her just from a few simple conversations. His mother always told him he would know when he met the right one. He thought she was just full of it, but now Arie had him believing in the words his mother said to him and Grace all those years ago.
He made up excuse after excuse to see her after he informed her of her parents’ death, until he had exhausted all plausible justifications of seeing her. Since one of the reasons why he was making up the excuses to come over on his off days was to build up the courage to ask for her number. He usually was a straightforward kind of guy, but with her he wasn’t. When Derrick asked Cris why he didn’t ask her out, Cris said he felt as though he would be taking advantage of someone who was blind since she wouldn’t be able to see his face. Derrick laughed and shook his head since he knew this was the only woman who both scared and intrigued his friend. He was pissed when just as they were getting comfortable with each other he was called out on important case. Just as they were wrapping up that case, something with his partner had come up. Then not too long after his sister was killed. He felt as though there was some sort of conspiracy trying to keep them apart, but he wasn’t going to have that.
Cris knew he was going to have to put his fears aside and ask her out before his chance with her was gone. She didn’t cause him to go running scared just at the thought of commitment. He was going to do it soon before his vacation was over. The sound of the tea kettle whistling snapped him out of the trance he was in.
Christoph added an extra scoop of instant coffee into his mug making it just the way he loved it: strong, black, and bold. He turned toward the view outside of the kitchen window with his cup in hand. As he took a sip of the strong coffee, he gazed out at the beach view. No matter which window he looked out of, he could see the the ocean, but he didn’t live there for the beach view like the other tenants. Hi
s apartment was within walking distance of the police station. Hey, he was practical, he wanted to make sure he could get to work within a few minutes if his car didn’t start.
Cris caught a whiff of himself as he placed the mug with the rest of the dirty dishes in the dishwasher. Damn, I need a shower, as he made his way up the stairs to his bathroom.
Cris turned on the water as hot as his body could stand it. He stripped out of his clothes and immediately placed them in the laundry basket behind his bathroom door. Surprisingly, he was a perfectionist and control freak when it came to keeping things neat and orderly, despite living in what was known as the ultimate bachelor’s bat cave, as his friends on the force called his apartment.
Steam poured out from behind the shower curtain as Cris stepped into the shower. He quickly soaped up his washcloth, washed himself and his hair before walking closer to the showerhead. As he was rinsing himself off, painful memories of his sister invaded his mind.
Trying to redirect the pain he was feeling, he slammed his hands against the tile hard enough that a throbbing pain shot up his arm. Cris leaned forward until his head rested on the cool tile, water continued to cascade down the back of his head and body. He stood under the showerhead until the water began to turn lukewarm long after the pain in his arm and hand had subsided.
‘Get dressed, she is waiting for you, Cris, and remember, the eyes tell all,’ a voice whispered against his ear as the temperature in the bathroom suddenly dropped.
Cris quickly turned around, his eyes opened wide in shock. He knew that voice, but it couldn’t be real, could it? It was just a figment of his imagination.
Damn, I need to get out of this house, he thought as he shut off the water and climbed out of the shower.
The Eyes Tell No Lies Page 3