One Last Scream

by Kevin O'Brien

“How can you be so sure?”

  “Because,” she said with a pale smile, “I can feel it, Karen.”

  “Just the same,” Karen murmured. “I’ll leave this upstairs on the kitchen counter. You haven’t been through the living room yet, have you?”

  Amelia shook her head. “No, why?”

  “Don’t go in there if you can help it,” Karen said. “I’ll explain later.”

  Coiled up on the bed, Annabelle let out another shriek. “Hurry, goddamn it! I’m bleeding to death!”

  “Watch her like a hawk,” Karen whispered, giving Amelia’s shoulder a pat. She raced up the basement stairs. She left the revolver on the kitchen counter, and then ran out of the lake house.

  That had been only five minutes ago, and yet it seemed like forever.

  Helene’s dog started barking as Karen banged on the front door of her cottage. “Ms. Sumner!” Karen cried. “Ms. Sumner, I need to use your phone! Please! It’s an emergency!”

  The old woman answered the door with a robe on and a rifle in her hand. It took her a moment before she seemed to recognize Karen from that afternoon. She held her collie by the collar while Karen, frazzled and out of breath, asked if she could use her phone to call the police. “There’s been a shooting at the Faradays’ cabin,” she explained. “Somebody’s hurt.”

  “My goodness,” Helene murmured. She pulled her dog aside and cleared the doorway. “C’mon, Abby, move it. Come in, come in. I thought I heard a shot about fifteen minutes ago. The phone’s right there in the kitchen….”

  Helene’s kitchen had a huge old-fashioned stove, a blue Formica-top breakfast table with three mismatched chairs, and the only working telephone in about a mile. It was a yellow, wall-mounted phone with a dial instead of a touch-tone pad. Karen called the police on it.

  The 911 operator said they’d be at the Faradays’ house with the paramedics in fifteen minutes.

  “Is it Amelia who was hurt?” Helene asked, once Karen hung up.

  With a hand still on the receiver, Karen shook her head. “No, it’s-a relative of Amelia’s. Could I make another call? It’s long distance, but I’ll pay you back.”

  Helene nodded. “Go ahead.”

  Karen dialed George’s cell phone number. She nervously tugged at the phone cord and counted the ring tones. On the fourth ring, he picked up: “Hello?”

  “George, it’s Karen,” she said, the words rushing out. “Is everyone okay there?”

  “Yes, yes, we’re all fine,” he said, sounding just as anxious as she was. “Thank God you called. I’ve been so worried. How are you? How’s Amelia?”

  Relieved, Karen just wanted to sink down in one of the chairs at Helene’s breakfast table. But there was no time. She quickly explained to George what had happened. “I’m not sure if Annabelle’s going to pull through,” she said.

  “Well, her boyfriend didn’t make it,” George remarked. “Just a second…”

  Karen heard him talking with someone on the other end. Then he got back on the line. “We’re here at the West Seattle police station,” he said. “My house is a mess. We can’t go back there tonight, and Jessie says all the hotels in town are booked. She thought you wouldn’t mind putting up Jody, Steffie, and me for the night.”

  “Not at all,” she said. “There’s plenty of room. Please, make yourselves comfortable. Jessie has a key.”

  “Thanks. Think you and Amelia will make it home tonight?”

  “It might be a few hours, yet,” Karen said, still catching her breath. “We’ll have a lot to explain to the police here.”

  “I’m probably in for the long haul myself,” George said. “Salem’s finest have quite a few questions for me. If I make it to your house before you and Amelia, I’ll wait up for you.”

  “That would be really nice, George,” she said with a little smile. “Listen, I should get back to Amelia and her sister.”

  “Please, be careful, Karen,” he said.

  “See you later-at my house.”

  She hung up, and then started to dig into her purse. “Thank you, Ms. Sumner. Do you think five dollars will cover it?”

  Frowning, Helene shook her head. “Put your money away, for goodness sakes. Do you need any medical supplies? I have some bandages and hydrogen peroxide….”

  “I think we’re okay,” Karen replied, heading for the door.

  “What exactly happened?” she asked. “Did I just hear you say something about Amelia’s sister?”

  “I’ll explain it to you later, okay?” Karen said, still frazzled. She opened the door. “I really need to get back. Thank you again, Ms. Sumner.”

  But Karen stopped abruptly. In the distance, she heard a strange pop-like a firecracker going off. Helene’s dog let out a yelp. The old woman put a hand over her heart. “My goodness, there it is again.”

  Karen gazed at her and blinked.

  “That’s the same sound as before,” Helene explained.

  “Oh, no,” Karen whispered. She turned and started in the direction of the Faradays’ house. At first, she just took a few cautious steps, but then she started moving faster.

  “I wouldn’t go back there!” Helene called. She held on to her dog’s collar to keep her from chasing after Karen. “Miss, I wouldn’t go there! That was a gunshot! Wait for the police!”

  But Karen didn’t stop. She didn’t hear her. She was thinking about Amelia.

  And she was running for her life.

  Ten minutes before Frank Carlisle’s old revolver was fired for a second time that night, Amelia had been standing in the doorway of the fallout shelter. She’d watched over her twin sister, curled up on the cot with a bloody dishtowel on her stomach. Shivering in just her bra and jeans, Annabelle looked so vulnerable. There were patches of blood smeared on her exposed pale, creamy skin. Her every breath seemed like a struggle. “I’m cold,” she whispered, her teeth chattering.

  “I know, I’m cold too,” Amelia replied, wincing as she clutched her own stomach. The cut on her hand was starting to sting, too. She wondered if her sister also felt it.

  Amelia had bled all over that itchy old blanket when she’d slashed the palm of her own hand. She knew there were extra blankets up in the bedrooms. She’d told Karen earlier she didn’t think Annabelle would try anything. But she wasn’t so sure anymore. She noticed the large piece of glass still on the floor beside Annabelle’s shoes. Amelia and Karen had removed her brown suede flats in an effort to make her more comfortable.

  Amelia quickly retrieved the shard of glass. “I’ll get you a clean blanket,” she said, finally.

  “Thanks,” Annabelle whispered. It seemed like an effort as she lifted her head to look at her.

  Amelia backed away from the fallout shelter, but then she hesitated. She had a bad feeling about leaving Annabelle unguarded. She didn’t know if it was her own intuition or if she’d read her sister’s thoughts. But suddenly she didn’t trust her.

  “I’m sorry,” Amelia murmured, with one hand on the thick, heavy door. She pushed it shut.

  “Amelia, no!” her sister cried, her voice muffled.

  Amelia set down the piece of glass. Then she grabbed a square-edged, short-handled shovel from the floor, and propped it under the door handle. “I’ll be right back,” she called to her sister. She had a deja vu sense about this moment, about talking to someone locked in a bomb shelter. Amelia didn’t remember ever experiencing this before-certainly not here in the basement of the lake house. She wondered if something similar had ever happened to Annabelle.

  Ascending the basement stairs, she felt slightly winded and dizzy. Between the pain in her gut, the slash across her hand, and everything else, it was a wonder she hadn’t fainted yet. In the kitchen, Amelia went to the sink, and slurped some cold water from the faucet. She splashed her face, and felt a little better. Then she grabbed the revolver off the counter.

  Annabelle’s purse, a large leather satchel, sat on the kitchen table. Amelia peeked inside it to make sure her sister didn’t
keep a gun of her own in there.

  Annabelle didn’t have a revolver, but she had a blackjack and a hunting knife. Amelia glanced around the kitchen for a place to hide them. She finally stashed them in the refrigerator inside the crisper drawer. She dumped the purse’s remaining contents onto the tabletop to make sure she hadn’t missed anything. Amid the junk, she noticed Annabelle’s wallet: her lipstick and compact; several loose bills, some twenties among them; chewing gum; and a beautiful black onyx ring.

  It was Shane’s ring. He’d loved it. That ring had belonged to his grandfather.

  Amelia felt a pang in her gut, and she started to cry. Clutching the ring in her wounded hand, she wandered toward the living room. She’d forgotten Karen’s warning not to go beyond the kitchen. She hadn’t been prepared to see all the dried blood on the wall behind the rocking chair. Another large bloodstain marred the carpet. In both cases, she knew whose blood she was looking at, because she’d seen it happen through her sister’s eyes. She’d seen Annabelle murder her mom and dad, and Ina, as well as Collin, and Shane.

  Amelia tearfully gazed at Shane’s ring again, then she kissed it and tucked it inside the pocket of her flannel pajama bottoms.

  Now the only thing she held was the revolver.

  Her sister knew about guns. But Amelia didn’t. She’d never really fired a gun before. She’d only experienced it secondhand.

  Amelia forced herself to go halfway up the stairs, until she saw the bloodstains on the wall by where Annabelle had shot her mother. Almost in a trance, she walked back down the steps and out the front door.

  She needed a practice shot. She didn’t want to screw it up when she did it for real. Though barefoot, and dressed in only her pink T-shirt and flannel pajama bottoms, Amelia barely felt the cool night air whipping at her. She didn’t even notice that the ground was wet and cold, and hundreds of stars were out tonight. All she thought about was showing Annabelle that she could kill, too. She picked out a target-a pine tree about thirty feet from the house. Aiming the revolver at a branch, she squeezed the trigger. On the branch, there was a small explosion of bark, wood, and pine needles. She felt a jolt in her hand, and the sound made her jump.

  But she hadn’t dropped the gun.

  The shot still echoed across the lake.

  She could do this, Amelia told herself. It was easy.

  She turned around and headed back inside the house. She would tell Karen and the police that Annabelle had suddenly attacked her. They’d believe her, too. Amelia couldn’t help smiling a tiny bit. She was already thinking like her sister.

  With the gun in her hand, she passed through the living room, and then into the kitchen. Once again, she glanced over at Annabelle’s purse and its contents strewn on the kitchen table. She wondered if she’d missed anything, perhaps some jewelry belonging to her mother or Ina.

  All at once, she started to feel faint again. She couldn’t get a decent breath, and she was deathly cold. The only thing keeping her going was her anger. Amelia tried to ignore the signals, the strange feeling that her sister was already slipping away.

  She didn’t notice anything familiar amid the debris from Annabelle’s purse. She opened up the wallet, and saw some fake ID’s and credit cards that were obviously not hers. Amelia didn’t recognize any of the names on the cards.

  She found a photograph in the wallet, creased and worn as if it had been carried around for a long, long time. It was a picture of two identical, dark-haired little girls in overalls, holding hands and smiling at the camera. The color was so faded, and the images nearly washed out. But Amelia remembered those overalls were a very pretty shade of green.

  She remembered, and she started to cry again.

  Karen ran as fast as she could.

  Somewhere along the way, she’d stumbled over a tree root and hit the ground hard. She’d banged her knee, but dragged herself up and relentlessly pressed on toward the sound of that gunshot. Her throat had gone dry, and it hurt every time she tried to breathe. Still, she didn’t slow down.

  She kept hoping to hear the police sirens. But there was nothing except Helene’s dog barking in the distance. She couldn’t even see the Faradays’ house yet.

  Karen kept wondering who had fired the gun. At this point, it could have been either Amelia or Annabelle. And at this point, she was probably already too late.

  All of a sudden, she stumbled again and hit the damp sand. It knocked the wind out of her. Pulling herself up once more, her hand brushed against a piece of weathered driftwood. It was almost the size of a baseball ball-with a few rounded-off knobs where branches had once been. Karen picked it up off the ground, and then caught her breath for a moment. She wondered if this piece of wood was anything like the plank Annabelle had used to bash in Collin Faraday’s skull.

  Clutching the makeshift club tightly in her fist, Karen hurried toward the Faradays’ house. She could see it in the distance now. The lights were on in the living room and the front hall. As she came closer, Karen could see the open front door and the silhouette of someone sitting on the front step. “Amelia?” she called.

  Shivering and pale, she’d thrown a blanket over her shoulders. Even closer, Karen recognized the flannel pajama bottoms. She noticed the bloodstained dishtowel wrapped around her hand.

  But Karen abruptly stopped when she saw the revolver in her other hand. “Amelia, did you-did you fire the gun?”

  Tears in her eyes, she nodded.

  “Did Annabelle attack you?” Karen asked.

  “No. I didn’t fire it at anybody,” she replied with a tremor in her voice. “Annabelle-she’s dead. I left her alone for a few minutes, and when I went back down there, she was dead.” She let out a little cry. “I never had a chance to talk with her-to understand….”

  Karen sat down beside her on the front stoop. She didn’t know what to say. She just gently patted her back and let her cry.

  Hearing a noise behind them, Karen glanced over her shoulder. She didn’t see anyone in the doorway, but she noticed some drops of blood on the floor. There was a trail leading out to the front stoop, and it wasn’t old, dried blood, either. It was fresh.

  Earlier, they’d managed to suppress the bleeding from the cut across Amelia’s palm. Mystified, Karen glanced at the dishtowel around her hand. Then she glanced down toward the stoop at the small puddle of blood. Another drop hit the puddle. And it wasn’t coming from Amelia’s hand.

  It wasn’t coming from Amelia at all.

  Karen gasped. She noticed that nearly all the color had drained from the 19-year-old’s face, and sweat beaded on her forehead. But she was smirking. And she had the gun aimed at Karen. Even with a bullet in her gut, and sitting in a puddle of her own blood, Annabelle was still smiling.

  At that moment, Karen figured she was as good as dead.

  A shadow suddenly passed over them both. Karen glanced back in time to see Amelia in the doorway. Amelia raised the square-edged, short-handled shovel, and brought the flat end of it crashing down on her sister’s head. It made a hollow ping as it cracked against her skull. Annabelle let out a cry, and the gun went off. A spray of dirt exploded from the ground near Karen’s feet.

  Annabelle lurched forward and toppled onto the ground. The revolver flew out of her grasp. Stunned, she rolled over on her back. The blanket fell aside, exposing the gaping wound in her stomach, and two blood-soaked dishtowels.

  Amelia warily stood over Annabelle, as if her sister were a wounded rabid dog. She kept the shovel in her hands, ready to strike her again if necessary. She was shivering in just her oversized T-shirt and nothing else.

  Karen gaped up at her. In the distance, she heard the police sirens.

  “I left her alone for a few minutes,” Amelia said, catching her breath. “I thought about killing her, and then suddenly, I started to remember everything. I felt sorry for her. So I went down there again, bringing her a blanket, and she clubbed me in the head with her shoe.”

  Sprawled out on the ground in front
of them, Annabelle laughed. But then she started to cough, and blood sprayed out of her mouth. She coughed again, and more blood spewed out. Suddenly, she couldn’t seem to get a breath. A look of panic swept over her ashen face. She seemed to be choking on her own blood.

  Karen started to get to her feet. But Amelia moved more quickly. She tossed aside the shovel, and hurried to her sister’s side. She held Annabelle’s head in her lap.

  Annabelle reached up and touched Amelia’s cheek. Her every gasp was a death rattle.

  Amelia gently smoothed back her sister’s hair. “It’s okay, Annie,” she whispered.

  Karen watched, and didn’t say a word as Annabelle Schlessinger struggled for her last few breaths. Amelia’s twin listlessly stared up at the starry sky. Then her jaw slowly dropped and one last breath escaped from her mouth.

  Amelia kept stroking her hair for another minute. “There now, Annie,” she whispered. “There now….”

  The wail of the sirens became louder and louder. The headlights and red strobes illuminated the forest behind the lake house.

  Amelia didn’t have any tears in her eyes when she covered her twin sister’s face with the blanket. She finally stood up, and then wandered over to Karen. She wrapped her arms around her and dropped her head on Karen’s shoulder.

  “I don’t feel the pain anymore,” she whispered.

  Epilogue

  Karen opened her eyes as the squad car turned down her street. To her amazement, there were no TV news vans or police cars parked in front of her house, no reporters or onlookers. All was quiet on her block at 6:40 that morning.

  Both she and Amelia had nodded off intermittently in the back seat of the patrol car for the last forty-five minutes. This was their fourth ride in the back of a police car since leaving the Lake Wenatchee house so many hours ago.

  It had been during that first trip-to the Wenatchee Police Station-that Karen told Amelia about her biological father and mother, and about something Amelia had wanted to know for a long, long time. The cops and the ambulance only used their sirens when other vehicles or pedestrians were around, but their red flashers remained on for the whole trip. “Back when we had our very first session, you mentioned something to me,” Karen said during one of those quiet periods. Amelia clutched her hand. The ambulance, carrying Amelia’s dead twin was in front of them, and the red strobe illuminated the back of the police car. “You mentioned that when some of those other therapists tried to hypnotize you for information about your childhood, what you wanted most of all was to remember the name of that nice neighbor, the one with the playhouse.”