by Justin Bell
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Louisa always swore there are two different types of people in the world...people like Jules who could sleep through nuclear fallout, and people like her, who always seemed to be in some kind of state of constant alert, jolting awake at even the smallest sound.
That night, the sound wasn't small. It was out by the road, which ran alongside the left side of her house, rounding in the cul-de-sac turn around just beyond her front yard. Her recycling bins sat at the left side of her house, usually right next to the road, so the garbage truck had easy access for the curbside recycling. Two twenty gallon plastic bins, almost like standard garbage cans, and unfortunately Louisa had a habit of leaving them out even after the truck had come and gone. That must have been what she had done, because recycling day was about three days past, yet at just after two in the morning, the series of uneven thumps shot her awake, her eyelids splitting open like the skin of a freshly cut orange. Within seconds she was fully awake, swinging her legs down, her feet touching the floor even as one of the cans thumped a fourth time, then rolled quietly for a second before being silenced.
"Just a raccoon or something," she whispered to herself. "Skunk."
Whatever had struck the cans was big, that much was clear. It hadn't skittered up and knocked them over, it had barreled into them, sending them both sprawling. There was something about that noise that didn't seem like your typical Vermont vermin. It was something different.
The master bedroom was dark with the blinds pulled, and Louisa groped around the nightstand, finally wrapping her fingers around the circular black knob of the narrow drawer. She tried to convince herself again that it was an animal outside, but her instincts growled at her, under the surface. Sliding the drawer free, she rose up on the balls of her feet, carefully trying not to creak the bed and disturb Julietta who continued sleeping the sleep of the dead on her side.
The wood-on-wood scrape signaled the opening of the nightstand drawer, and Louisa eased her hand inside, wrapping her fingers around the comfortable handle of her nine millimeter pistol. This wasn't her service weapon, this was her personal weapon, something she was fully registered for, and something she felt most comfortable with within arms' reach, even though Norwood, Vermont hadn't had an unusual death or home invasion in the past two decades.
Until seven days ago.
Until a week ago when two random men were mauled to death on a deserted dirt road, just about six miles North of where she stood now. A mauling which Agent Grace had called 'murders'.
He had called them that, right? She thought she remembered that clearly. 'The Strickland murders.' Her heart thumped as she took an uneasy step forward, drawing the weapon from its resting place and bringing it low, pointing the barrel at the ground. She wrapped her second hand around the first in a five-finger clutch, lifting the weapon slightly, but just slightly. The master bedroom was on the right side of the house, and these trash cans were on the left, close to the road.
Within three strides she was slipping out of the bedroom and into the short hallway leading to the main living area of the house. Her pistol was still pointed down at a 45 degree angle as she crouch walked, staying quiet and low, hoping the darkness would shroud her. Well-trained ears narrowed and honed, trying to isolate any other strange noises, but the night remained silent and still. Maybe it had just been an animal.
An animal that stopped a garbage can from rolling down the street?
Her eyes narrowed, trying to get used to the dark of the house and she turned slowly to her left, scanning the living room and the window that faced the front yard, where the turnaround curved and headed back down where it came from. There was no shift of movement, no shadow there. The night appeared empty. Freezing for a moment, she listened again, but again heard nothing.
Shifting her weight slightly, she turned left and crouch walked towards the kitchen, an open doorway splitting the living space from where meals were prepared. The kitchen wasn't large, but it faced the left side of the house, and the small, square window over the sink stood there, looking back at her.
Her breath hitched in her lungs. She'd been through the 21 week training circuit at Quantico, and had done an exemplary job, but she had never fired her weapon in service, and in fact had never faced down a serious threat to her person. She was relatively young to be a Chief of Police, and remarkably inexperienced in the real world of law enforcement, but had managed to impress her interviewees, and her spectacular educational transcript had certainly not hurt. Taking another pair of steps, she was at the threshold of the kitchen and slowly walked towards the sink. Her bare feet balked at the cold surface of the linoleum floor, and it occurred to her for the first time that she was crouch walking in short cotton boxer shorts and a thin strap tank top, her typical sleepwear. Certainly not the right apparel for a combat exercise.
She eased closer to the sink, then removed her support hand and pressed on the sink counter, bringing her up on the balls of her feet so she could look out the window. There were no blinds here, just sheer curtains, and the lone streetlight shone in like a watchful yellow eye.
Rising up, she lifted her chin, stretched her neck, and gasped.
Both trash cans were sitting upright.
Had she really heard something? Was it all in her imagination? No, it couldn't have been. She'd heard it. It had woken her. It hadn't been just one short sound that she had dreamt, it had been a clumsy series of haphazard noises. Thumps, whacks, and rolls. Something had been out there. Something or someone. It would have to have been someone if the cans now stood upright, wouldn't it? Louisa dropped back down, her pupils darting, once again acclimating to the shifting light in the kitchen. She pulled her free hand back to support her gun hand and angled slightly right, looking out into the living room. Maybe it had been her imagination, after all.
The sudden thud and scrape at her front wall told her immediately that she was wrong. Something was out there.
Something had struck the wall of her house, either accidentally or on purpose, and it had been something large and lumbering. But it was the scraping sound after that which alarmed her. A sound of long fingernails pulling alongside her vinyl siding as if trying to hold something upright. Something large, heavy, and walking on two legs.
She remained crouching, her weapon still pointed at the floor, and a thin bead of sweat forming just under the hairline at her forehead. A trickle broke free and skated down her skin, curling around her right eye, and a brief sting forced that eye closed. Forcing herself to breath evenly, Louisa took another careful step forward, lifting the pistol slightly, her eyes focused on the front door. The second thumping sound had come from the wall just to the left of the door as she was looking at it. There was a four-pane window to her left, but it was closed tight with blinds, and part of her didn't want to leave any indication that she was awake in here. Whatever was out there, she wanted her to have the advantage of surprise, not it.
Another thump echoed from the front door, not a knock by any means, but another clumsy bump, and it was clearly coming from fairly close to the ground. This was followed by a long, wavering scrape, and Louisa could feel goose flesh crawling up both arms, sending her narrow arm hairs standing at full attention. Her face was slicked with several streams of sweat now as she pressed forward, taking a few more steps, her pistol slowly raising even with her breastbone. She blinked her right eye several times to clear the salty sting of sweat and took another cautious step forward, pushing across the thick carpeting.
The next thump came from just to the right of the front door, closer to regular person height, and no scrape followed it, thank goodness. Louisa took another few steps forward, coming close to the door, and drew her pistol into her chest as she turned and pressed her left shoulder to the particle board surface. The peephole was right at eye level, but stood six inches to her left where she held herself tight against the wood, her arms tensed, fingers clutching the handle of her
weapon. She left her index finger straight and curled around the finger guard. It was silent.
Easing herself carefully and slowly forward, Louisa pushed along the surface of the door an inch at a time, until she finally reached the peephole. Squinting her right eye tightly shut she brought her left eye up to the small circular window in the front door and opened wide, glaring out into the empty night. The peephole reduced everything outside to a strange fisheye look, with slight curves around the edges, and she could clearly see the street rounding and coming back on itself outside her house. The walkway was clear, the sidewalk was empty, and she couldn't see anything obvious on her doorstep.
The hand shot up out of nowhere and slammed hard against the door, completely covering the peephole. It was dark and large, and as Louisa drew in a sharp breath and pushed back, she thought she had seen a smear of red streaked diagonally down the palm.
Her heart slammed in her chest, and her breath now came in rapid gasps. For a moment she had convinced herself that this had indeed been some crazed raccoon, but she'd never seen a raccoon with a hand like that. There was a moment of quiet, then a second thump hit, right at the same place as the first.
Was this person?knocking?
Louisa just stood there. Her pistol remained lowered, her breath started to even out, but she honestly couldn't think of what to do next. All she knew was that she was the only thing standing between whatever was out there and Julietta, sleeping innocently in the bedroom behind her, and she had to do something.
Taking a step forward, she leaned in towards the door. "Who is it?" she asked in a harsh whisper, almost not believing she was even asking.
Silence was her only response.
"Who is there?" she asked a little louder this time, leaning sideways towards the door, and drawing her weapon up in a bent arm.
"I need your help," came the low, whispered reply.
"Identify yourself! I am a police officer and I am armed!" she growled, trying to keep her voice low.
"Please?"
Louisa tilted her head, listening. She didn't recognize the sound of the voice.
"Please!"
She took two steps forward, towards the window to the right of her front door. Using the barrel of her pistol she pushed aside the plastic slats of the blinds and stared out.
William Strickland stood on her doorstep.
Stood was an overstatement. He was hunched over, supporting the bulk of his weight with an uneven right arm pressed up against the house. His shirt was shredded and caked in red at his left shoulder, with that same arm hanging limp to his side. Louisa could see more red smudged across the left side of his scowling face, his eyes closed and pained. He had been through the ringer, and Louisa thought she knew who with.
"You told me to come to you," Strickland whispered from outside the door, a hint of desperation in his voice. "I don't know where else to go."
Louisa remained silent. She wasn't sure what else to do. Richard Grace's instructions had been very clear, and she could only imagine what he would do if he found Strickland in her home.
But she couldn't just leave him there. He wasn't bleeding badly, but he was bleeding. He was a citizen of her town and asking for her help, was she just going to stand inside here and ignore him?
"Hello?"
She remained standing there, her arms bent, weapon clutched.
Beams of white light shone through the kitchen window, strobing across the darkness of the house and streaming towards her. The telltale sign of approaching headlights. Cars were coming.
Three rapid pounds shook the front door. "Chief Gutierrez! Please!"
She could hear the car engines now, approaching. They were coming slowly down the road, headlights beaming towards the cul-de-sac, and now the window to the right of her front door was illuminated in their pale glow.
He pounded on the door twice more, hard, and the door shook on its hinges. She took a clumsy step backwards, her hands coming around, pistol clutched tightly in them. For one brief, frightening moment she thought he might knock the door right off its frame and come in whether she liked it or not.
But then there was silence.
She crouched there, her pistol lifted, not saying a word, and also not hearing one. The white headlight beams settled on the trees past her front yard, leaving half her living room in a strange white light as if a shade had been halfway lifted, but there were no more knocks and no more pleas for help. The headlights drew away, appeared to round around and then fade into the dark of night. Still no more knocks.
Slowly she moved towards the window, her pistol once again lowered, her eyes narrowed. She pushed aside the blinds again and peered outside.
There was no one there.
"Lou?" came the tired voice behind her.
Louisa turned her head slightly, trying to look calm, but she figured she was failing miserably. "It's okay, Jules. Everything's okay."
"What's going on out there?"
Louisa stood, lowering her weapon and releasing the support hand. "Nothing, sweetheart. I think it was just a raccoon."
Julietta looked at her as if she wasn't the least bit convinced, but Louisa approached her and placed a calming hand on her shoulder.
"It's fine, honey. Let's go back to bed."
She followed Jules back to the bedroom and slid her weapon back in the drawer, but Louisa Gutierrez suspected she wouldn't be sleeping again tonight.
At this point she felt like she may never be able to sleep again.