by Rebel Farris
I took the last bite of my sandwich and went outside to the garage, following the tunes of Xander’s country music. There was a loud clang, followed by what I could only guess was a string of curses in his native language. He was bent over the engine with his back to me. He was shirtless and sweaty, with his T-shirt tucked into the waist of his jeans. I watched, mesmerized, as his back muscles rippled with the strain of whatever he was doing under that hood. Then I swatted the thoughts away like an annoying fly.
“You wanted to see me?”
His head bolted upward and banged into the open hood above him. I tried to smother my laugh and the resulting smile as he turned to face me.
“Yes. I did.” He smiled sheepishly, walking over to the counter and wiping the grease from his hands.
I watched him as he walked to the back wall and opened a tall two-door metal cabinet. He pulled out a small metal box and brought it over to the counter. I met him halfway as he set the box down and clicked open the latch. He made no move to open it. Instead, he reached over and turned off his record player.
“I do not know if you will be comfortable with this. I thought it might help you feel more safe.”
He opened the box, revealing a small handgun. It was silver with a black handle. Near the black part, a little circular emblem read Astra in a sunburst design, and along the barrel, the word Terminator was engraved. He pulled it out of the box, clicking it open to reveal the six-holed revolving chamber. Barrel, chamber, trigger… I knew those from the movies, but I was sure all the other parts had actual names too.
“Have you ever used a gun?” he asked, loading the holes with bullets that were also in the box.
I shook my head, fascinated and more than a little scared. I’d never been this close to a real gun.
“That is what we will do today. You can learn how to use it, and you can keep it with you. You will feel more safe. Yes?”
I didn’t know about that. I could be in danger from myself with that thing, but I nodded anyway. It was something other than feeling helpless and scared all the time.
“Good. Take this.” He handed the gun to me after he clicked it shut, fully loaded. It was heavier than it looked for such a small gun. “Follow me.”
He led me down a well-worn path between the house and the garage. A huge old oak tree shaded most of the space back there, and what was left in the sun was a fenced-off vegetable garden. It looked well-tended but was dormant for the winter. My grip tightened on the gun as my palms began to sweat.
“Stand right here,” Xander said, and he continued around to the other side of the garden.
He picked up old cans riddled with holes off the ground and lined them up on the garden’s fencing. He’d definitely done this before.
Of course he had. He owned the gun.
But it crossed my mind that he was placing a whole lot of faith in me. He gave me a loaded gun and was standing directly in front of me. If the situation were reversed, I wouldn’t be so casual about walking in front of him if he had a loaded gun in his hand. And the thought crossed my mind that maybe that was the point—he wanted me to feel more comfortable. Not just with a killer that could show up any second, but with him.
I realized as I watched him walk back that I did feel more comfortable with him. I wasn’t sure if it was that moment, or something we’d been slowly growing toward, but I wasn’t afraid of him any longer.
“You will want to hold it with both hands, straight out, like this—” He demonstrated like he was holding a gun. “Make sure you tighten your arm muscles when you pull the trigger, because it will want to push back. You don’t want it to hit your face.”
“No, I don’t think I’d like that.” I smirked at him.
He grinned back. I held up the gun like he demonstrated and aimed it at the can on the far left.
“Squeeze the trigger, do not pull on it.” He stepped back.
I tried to will myself to squeeze the trigger, but I was afraid of what would happen if I did. I was not known for being one of the most graceful human beings. I didn’t want to accidentally shoot a poor defenseless squirrel or bird, and with the luck I was having of late, I probably would. I dropped my arms when they started shaking.
“I can’t.” I shook my head.
Xander tilted his head, his stare penetrating through me. Then he shook his head. “You will not hurt anything you don’t want to. It is not that hard. Here.” He walked up behind me and pulled my arms up.
My heart started at a gallop as his smell of cedar and fresh air and engine grease wrapped around my senses. He pressed against my back, bending his knees so his chin rested on my bare shoulder, and spoke softly. His breath tickled over my skin, springing goose bumps to life.
“Line up the sight at the end of the gun. Aim it at the can, and tell me when you’re ready.”
I gave a garbled gasp as my head bobbed in response. “I’m ready.”
My body tensed as he sealed our bodies even closer and his hand wrapped over mine and gave a gentle squeeze.
Bang! The gun went off and I gave a startled yelp, which I didn’t really hear because my ears were ringing. We didn’t hit the can, but we also didn’t hit anything else. My heart was pounding so loudly it battled to drown out the ringing in my ears. But it wasn’t fear that thrummed through my veins; it was this heady mixture of excitement and relief.
“Oh, my God,” I breathed out. “I wanna do it again.”
I felt more than heard his deep chuckle as it rumbled through his chest, sending vibrations through my shoulder where his chin still lightly rested.
“Do you think you can do it on your own this time?”
I didn’t want him to move, but I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. There was something about the way his arms felt around me. I didn’t have the words to describe it, but I’d never felt anything like it. And I was pretty far from a virgin. Never settling down and not having a moral stance to stop me from sexual pursuits had left me with a fairly sordid history of brief flings and one-night stands. I shook my head as an answer.
He’d stepped back after the gun went off so there was a gap of space between us, but it was so thin I could still feel the heat radiating off his body. When he pressed against me, I felt his own answer to the excitement of the moment. I bit back a moan and fought the urge to press farther into it. I wasn’t sure if I was ready for that. I knew that I wanted him, but being stuck out here with nothing else to do, it could be a distraction that would definitely hamper his work and my ability to get back home. It wasn’t a good idea.
I bit down on my lip and gave him a nod. “Ready.”
His big hands swallowed mine again. Bang! Clang!
“We hit it!” I squealed and bounced on my toes in celebration, belatedly realizing that with us pressed together, I was basically rubbing myself up and down the front of his body.
Xander was off and backing away from me like I’d burned him. I turned slowly to face him, afraid of what I might see. He wasn’t looking at me anyway; he was staring off the way we came—from the garage. His back toward me, he wasn’t moving.
He cleared his throat. “I should get back to my work on the truck.”
His words were stilted and robotic-sounding, but I wasn’t sure if that was a smothering of some kind of emotion or just a byproduct of his accent. Either way, with that, he set into motion, leaving me alone with a loaded gun and a box of bullets in his backyard. I watched him take a few more steps, then raised the gun, aimed at the next can, and pulled the trigger. Bang! Clang!
My laughter pealed through the space between his house, the garage, and the trees. I looked back to him, and he paused at the edge of the garage, just before he turned the corner. But he didn’t look back, only rubbed his thumb over his forehead and then went back into motion. Turning the opposite way, he moved toward the house, disappearing from sight.
My brow furrowed a bit that he went inside, but I shook it off and pulled the gun back up and aimed at the next can. Bang! Clang! I fuckin
g rocked at using a gun. And that was the most freeing thought since this whole incident began.
I felt like I could float up through the treetops. I’d never be a helpless damsel in distress again. I was a dangerous badass with the aim to prove it. After the last shot, I pulled the gun up toward my face and blew on the barrel, feeling like that was just something I should do before I reloaded. I probably watch too many movies. I could feel the heat radiating off the gun onto my lips, making them tingle. I dared the killer to come after me now.
Preparations
I was in the kitchen prepping the sides for the Thanksgiving dinner when it happened. A shot echoed through the trees from somewhere in the woods. My heart rate went from steady to thunderous in a split second. I reached for the handgun that Xander had given me. I had it sitting on the edge of the counter and gripped it tight while I moved against the wall to the window, peeking out to see if Xander was still in the garage.
The way the garage angled away from the house didn’t help matters—I couldn’t see him. I’d have to go outside or wait and see if he came out. I decided to give it a few moments. He’d likely heard the shot too, and would come out to inspect. Or I hoped he would. But there was nothing. No sounds. Not even his god-awful country music twanging away as usual.
I was going to have to go out there. I needed to check and make sure he was okay. I wasn’t sure why I felt responsible for him, but we were in this together, so it was the right thing to do. Right?
I darted toward the door and stood against the wall near the edge of the frame. It was open, unlike the windows that were shut and locked, with only the wooden-frame screen door keeping intruders out. It wasn’t cold or hot enough to bother shutting it, and it actually helped regulate the temperature.
I listened carefully before making my move, and when I turned and pushed the door open with my knee, I brought the gun up in front of me, the way Xander had shown me. I turned back and forth, looking both ways off the porch to make sure I wasn’t being blindsided. Then I stepped off and dashed to the garage, keeping the gun sight centered in my field of vision, my eyes sweeping across the area for the source of the shot.
Xander wasn’t there. He wasn’t in the garage. Blood rushed through my ears with the sound of a tsunami making landfall. It was both deceptively quiet and intensely loud, overwhelming my senses and making the world feel like it was tilting. I stumbled and bumped into the side of the truck as I turned back to face the garage door opening. After making sure there was no one in the garage with me, I melted back into the shadows as I heard the chickens chatter. Something had stirred them up.
I shuffled along the darkened wall, soundlessly, toward the door to see what they were fussing about. Just as I was about to peek around the corner of the door, a shadow fell across the dirt yard. It moved with determination, not skulking in the shadows like I was, and that scared the shit out of me. I pressed back against the wall, focusing on controlling my breath. All that focus on being quiet hadn’t deterred the pain from ripping through me. A dull throb radiated out of my chest, and I pressed my free hand against my sternum.
Jesus Christ! I’m having a heart attack. Would I be the first to die of a heart attack at twenty-three?
The shadow moved away from the garage, and I got a second to breathe. I’d be fine. As the pain receded, I moved closer to the door to see where the killer went, but I only caught the door to the barn swinging shut.
Curiously, I hadn’t given the barn a second thought until this moment—what was in it or why the killer would head there rather than the house. And still no sign of Xander. Could he be in the barn? I couldn’t imagine why he’d be in there. But if he was, the killer could have him, and it was up to me to save him. I owed him that much.
I ran across the yard, gun held in front of me in case the killer stepped out of the barn. Hopefully, I’d catch him off guard.
When I got to the door, I halted and threw myself against the outer wall, next to the door. A loud thump from inside made me jump, and my heart set to racing even faster. Xander filled my thoughts. He could be hurt already; they could be fighting. I didn’t know how I’d save him if he was hurt badly. Maybe go in search of the killer’s car? Though I’d no idea where he would’ve left it. It certainly wasn’t here in the yard.
Another thump had me moving. I pulled the door open quietly and slipped through the thin opening before softly closing it behind me, my gun held at the ready. It was dark in the barn, and my eyes took a few seconds to adjust. When they did, my insides twisted. I felt the urge to vomit churn in my gut.
Xander was standing toward the back of the barn, just to the inside of a wall that once separated out a stable. He was covered in blood splatter and held a dripping, sopping mess of flesh that belonged inside a body, not out of it.
A gasp escaped me. His head whipped in my direction. Blue eyes burned through me as he froze on the spot. Oh, God. He’s the killer. Xander is the killer. I stumbled backward, confusion still locking down my brain functions, but the basic instinct of getting away forced my feet to move. I had to get out of this barn of death.
Xander’s eyes widened a fraction as he stepped in my direction. I raised the gun to aim at him. The flesh fell out of his hand with a wet splat. His other hand raised in surrender, yet the glint of the butcher knife in it did nothing to quell my panic. His eyes tracked mine. The knife clattered to the floor.
“Rosie—”
“No, you stay away.” I nudged the gun in the air, threateningly, and kicked the door open behind me.
The sunlight washed over me. I couldn’t see his form anymore in the dark shadows, so I turned and ran. I ran straight for the house. I knew I couldn’t outrun him. We’d played that game before. I’d no clue what I would do, but I could lock myself inside and shoot him if he tried to come in after me. That would at least buy me some time. Enough time to think of a way out of this clusterfuck.
Standoff
With the door bolted shut behind me, I slid down until my butt hit the floor. Tears welled in my eyes. It felt like a loss. Like someone I knew had died. Who really knew who he’d killed and was butchering out there. But the thought jumped into my head that he had a gun. Probably the same shotgun I’d seen him with only days before. Back when I thought he was a good guy. And why did the thought that he wasn’t good hurt so much?
Scooting away from the door, I moved over to a side wall. Behind the door seemed too obvious—a likely place that he’d shoot as he tried to get back into his house. I waited.
I wanted to run upstairs to get my purse and be ready to leave at the first opportunity. But going upstairs would allow him too much time. He could break in and overpower me before I could get back downstairs to react to his intrusion.
I listened for the sound of his footsteps hitting the porch, but nothing came. Though knowing him, he’d do it so quietly, I wouldn’t hear him. Slowing my breaths, I strained to hear some sort of movement.
“Rosie,” he called out. His deep voice booming across the yard sounded muffled from inside the confines of the locked-down house, but I could tell that he was loud. It was in the way he called out my name.
“I’m not goin’ out there, Xander, and you’re not comin’ in here.”
“I should have warned you. I should have told you about—”
I laughed darkly, loud enough for him to hear. “I don’t think warnin’ that you were a psycho would’ve helped, but thank you for not killin’ me immediately. And for giving me the gun. But I’ll shoot you if you try to get any closer.”
“No, Rosie. Please look at me.” He paused. “Look out the window. Any window. I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Not fuckin’ likely. I know you have a gun. And I’m not dumb enough to make myself an easy target.”
“I don’t have the gun with me. It is in the barn. Please, Rosie, just look at me.”
I sat there for a moment, not moving, mulling over the possibilities of what he might want me to look out the window for. Bu
t in the end, it all boiled down to the fact that he couldn’t aim at every window, and there were several to choose from. I crawled across the floor, taking extra care to be slow and quiet. Passing the obvious one near the door, I made my way to the one farthest away.
Would that be the least obvious one or the most obvious? I paused in front of the middle one and turned back to look at the one closest to the door. It really depends on what he thinks of me. If I was smart, I’d go the least obvious route. If I were dumb, or perhaps even sly, I’d choose the one closest to the door. But what were the odds that we would both choose the same of the three?
I was pretty certain he thought I was smart. But how smart? I could sit here all day and debate this, so I gave up and just moved toward the middle window, taking my chances.
Xander stood in the middle of the yard with both hands raised in surrender, but from one hand dangled a half-plucked turkey, dripping blood onto the dirt from the hole where its neck formerly was. The look on his face was half distress, half amusement. Then his eyes locked on mine, and his smile grew. He was shirtless under the black rubber apron and still speckled with blood, but he was so happy I couldn’t help the smile that grew on my face in reply.
“You said you needed a turkey for dinner. I had a couple that escaped the pen in a storm a few weeks ago. I went hunting and found one for you. I am sorry I did not warn you.”
I shuffled off the ground and moved to the door. Unlocking it, I threw the door open and stepped outside. He stepped up onto the porch at the same time. He took another stride in my direction before his hand darted to my side and his momentum stopped.
I looked down and realized that I still had the gun gripped tightly in my hand.
“Xander, I—”
“I am truly sorry. I did not account for your distress in this situation.”
I shoved the gun behind my back and ducked my head. “I’m sorry for not trusting you.”
“You have no reason to, Rosie. I get that.”