Sarah Before

by Craig Shepherd

  She pulled the loose hanging cream fabric of her curtains together, shutting herself away from the outside world for the time being. She needed to concentrate and really consider what had taken place since she’d had the panic attack in the Everyday Grocery. It felt like a lifetime ago, considering everything that had happened. The most significant being the fact she had found a new friend for the first time in years. Ironically, it was most significant to her now for very different reasons.

  Continuing to retrace the last month in her head, she thought about the first time the unknown figure had appeared on the balcony of the Selwood Avenue apartment building. She recalled she was on the phone to the Everyday Grocery store at the time. On the phone to Jane. Everything started with Jane. Sarah nervously gripped the armrest of the lounge chair, visibly disturbed by this recollection.

  She was confused because it felt like a tree had fallen across the path her mind was leading her down. Her initial fear when realizing Jane knew about the article was that she was the figure tormenting her. She didn’t know why Jane would be doing these things, and surely if she had been on the phone at the supermarket where she worked, she couldn’t possibly have been watching Sarah from an overlooking balcony at the same time. No matter how far she wanted to twist reality, it simply could not happen.

  There was also a hole in that theory when she remembered the second troubling event. The car following Jane away from Sarah’s house on the first night they met. She hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself before, but since she was analyzing everything more thoroughly, she conceded her main worry at the time was the possibility of the balcony person being in the car.

  You’re really stretching to find problems where there aren’t any. You just can’t let yourself be happy, can you?

  The internal voice spoke with a sharpness, almost like a mother chastising a misbehaving child. For a moment, she agreed. Maybe she was just blowing everything out of proportion. Just like the first balcony incident, she was fairly certain Jane didn’t have the supernatural ability to follow herself home, any more than she could be at work while monitoring Sarah’s movements around her back porch.

  She needed to make sense of this though. It had taken over her whole train of thought, not unlike a bad case of the flu spreading through a person until it managed to wreak havoc on every muscle in their body.

  The next incident with her Tormentor was where things started taking a more sinister turn. More sinister in terms of the connection with Jane at least. She was almost certain it had been Jane’s work uniform draped over the railings before she was shown the PHONE sign. The sign which had immediately preceded a phone call from Jane. She tried to remember if the figure holding the PHONE sign had gone inside before her phone rang. If they had, there was every possibility the person standing on the balcony had been Jane, messing with Sarah before calling. It instantly struck her that she didn’t know where Jane lived. She saw the direction her car drove off after she visited, and that direction was consistent with turning around into Selwood. Did Jane actually live in the apartment building?

  All she could remember was everything happening fairly quickly after the sign was held up. The person disappeared from the balcony but she couldn’t say for sure whether it was before or after her phone rang. Even if the person was standing there when the phone rang, Sarah knew she wouldn’t have been able to see their hands closely enough to resolutely say whether they were holding a phone.

  You thought it was too much of a coincidence at the time. Why are you only bothered by it now?

  The voice in her head was right. She had harbored concerns at the time. Firstly she was concerned for Jane’s safety, but after the phone call she had been, at least for a fleeting moment, suspicious about Jane’s part in the whole thing. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to think anything more about it. She had certainly been a little enamored with having another human being in her life, and figured it was natural for her to not jeopardize that with paranoid thoughts.

  The cold in Sarah’s body was gone now, replaced with a warmth that blanketed the whole living room now the heater had done its work. Yet she couldn’t shake the chill dwelling deep inside her. Jane was up to something, she was sure of it, but all that did was lead her to the next question.

  Why?

  Why was this happening to her in the first place? Only now there was an added curiosity to it all – why Jane was involved. Sarah swallowed away the lump in her throat and began rubbing her right thumb back and forth across the palm of her left hand. She didn’t want to acknowledge it, but her anxiety was rising. She wanted to be stronger than it. Didn’t want to give it the satisfaction of beating her, but the feeling was undeniable. Closing her eyes to calm herself, it just became worse.

  Everything felt big around her. Heavy. She had tried to explain this feeling to people in the past, and always struggled to put it into words. It was as though the living room was expanding, growing larger and larger, and all the while, she herself was shrinking. Almost like she were a grain of sand sitting in the middle of an arena. But it wasn’t just the room getting bigger. It also felt heavier, as though the air was thicker than normal and weighed in on her. She felt as though gravity was betraying her.

  The feeling subsided when she opened her eyes again, but the empty feeling grew in her stomach and her skin started to warm. Instinctively, she stood and reached for the heater, turning it off completely but she knew this wouldn’t help in the short term. Her mind buzzed, and she was at least no longer upset about Jane. Her brain function wasn’t allowing her to stop and focus on any particular thought for long enough to register an emotion about it. There was just the over-arching feeling of fear, but her thoughts weren’t even locked onto a particular thing she was scared of.

  Sarah ran straight down the hallway to the bathroom, knowing she would throw up before long if she couldn’t get her body under control. Better it be in the toilet than all over the living room floor. Although there was nobody else in the house, out of habit she attempted to slap the door closed behind her but only managed to scrape her fingertips across the doorframe, barely moving it. She lifted the toilet lid and stood in front of it with hands on knees, marveling at the inevitability of what was about to happen. She felt her stomach draw in, and tensed the muscles of her abdomen, bracing like the professional vomiter she had become. Pulling her hair back away from her face, it was over quickly. She stayed hunched over for about a minute in case there was more to come, but the worst of it was done.

  As she stood there, feeling like a teenager in her first hangover, her skin began to cool and her thoughts became clearer again. Straight back onto Jane, hoping it wasn’t going to spawn another attack. She had rarely experienced two attacks in a row, something she was grateful for. Once it was over, she was usually allowed to return to normal. Her version of normal at least.

  Although the attack had been unpleasant, it had at least been a distraction from her own thoughts, and as she rinsed her mouth out at the nearby tap, she knew she had to face it now.

  Jane was somehow connected to the events that had plagued her for the last month. If she wasn’t the hooded figure herself (and it was fairly clear she couldn’t be – not every time, at least), then she was involved somehow. Even if Jane wasn’t involved, but only knew what was happening, Sarah would still be heartbroken. It would be a betrayal of her trust, and trust was not something she gave freely.

  But it was more than that. Jane was involved, and she couldn’t work out why, or what the aim of this whole charade was, but she meant to find out. Jane would be coming for dinner, and one way or another, she would find out what was going on.

  The panic attack had drained her, and she knew spending the little energy she had on trying to piece together this warped, mind-fuck of a puzzle right now would get her nowhere. She walked to her bedroom, drew the curtains closed, and lay on the bed until she fell asleep.

  CHAPTER 14

  Sarah and Jane sat in the lounge room, sharing a large piz
za. Chicken and ham, as per the request for a meat/takeout combination. Sarah found herself wondering what some of the vegan website authors would think about them filling their bellies with the carcasses of mistreated and slain farm animals. It wasn’t something she dwelled on. The pizza was delicious and since waking from her nap she hadn’t regained much of an appetite until now.

  A trashy dating show was playing on the TV in the background, which she had only turned on to provide some background noise to fill the gaps in conversation while they ate. She intended to confront Jane about the recent goings-on, but didn’t want to overthink it. Silent pauses while they ate would have opened a doorway for her thoughts to escape and run wild, and she needed to be calm.

  Still, even with the television buzzing away in the distance and the sounds of pizza being chewed, Sarah’s thoughts too easily drifted from the task at hand. She was having second thoughts. She knew that confronting Jane could spell the end of a friendship she had begun to cherish, at least until her suspicions had crept in. For the first time since realizing Jane was connected to the recent raft of strange events, she started to really think about how much Jane meant to her.

  She looked over at Jane, who had turned her head to face the television while chewing her second slice of pizza, and she could still see the friendly, well-meaning girl who had gone out of her way to deliver groceries and share some drinks on that first night. She didn’t see a twisted monster hiding beneath a darkened hood of sinister intentions. Nor did she see a cruel mastermind pulling the strings of torment in Sarah’s life. All she saw was the girl who walked to the end of the street with her, calming her down before and during those excursions. Holding her hand while gently nudging her in the direction of recovery, not trying to push her into a dark chasm of madness.

  Despite the steely resolve Sarah had carried into this evening, determined to get to the bottom of things, she now wanted to pack those plans away and retreat. Not only was she regretting having ever doubted Jane, but was chastising herself for being stupid enough to consider ruining the friendship she had found. She didn’t even want to tell Jane about the terrifying things she had seen, let alone accuse her of being part of it. Her eyebrows came together gently, and her eyes fell. It was a look of guilt and shame sent in Jane’s direction, seeking forgiveness for her thoughts, for all the doubts. The look of pure remorse. Jane tuned back to her, possibly sensing eyes on her, and Sarah managed to shake the look from her face before Jane realized something was wrong.

  “As soon as they finished recording this show, this couple never saw each other again, I can almost guarantee that,” Jane remarked, oblivious to the inner turmoil Sarah was experiencing.

  Sarah put a slice of pizza to her mouth and sunk her teeth into it, tearing away a piece and chewing while nodding in agreement with Jane. She felt too flat to speak and in some ways just wanted this night be over. She would sleep, feel better the next day, and life could return to the trajectory it had been travelling before she had let her mind twist against her.

  Her thoughts drifted again, but this time further back. She thought of Mel and Josie. She supposed it was the closer analysis of Jane’s importance that sent her back to those times. It was the last time, until now, she could really call anybody a friend. There was something forlorn about this train of thought, and she hoped it didn’t show on her face. In some strange way, it was easier to think about Jason, Noah and Lizzy than it was to think of Mel and Josie. With her family’s death, she had at least been given closure. There was an ending to that story, but it wasn’t the case with her friends from Pokona.

  Sarah had known both of them since school, as was often the way with groups of friends in a small place like Pokona. If you have friends at school and they don’t leave town, there was never much reason for the friendship to stop. She had been in the bridal party for both of their weddings, having known them when Mel was a Patterson rather than a Helbrecht, and when Josie was a Kirk rather than a Simpson. She wondered if either of them had returned to their maiden names now. Both seemed to have good relationships with their husbands on the outside, but as close as they had been, Sarah knew you could never be certain how things were behind the closed doors. With the divorce rate rising all over the world, it would hardly be surprising. Sarah hadn’t been divorced, not by traditional means at least, so it was probably the law of averages that one of the three women would go down that path.

  The three of them had always been close, no matter what turns their lives had taken. Even when Sarah’s condition worsened, they were all still in contact regularly. As expected considering the tragic events that unfolded that night, Sarah remembered the day of November 28, 2009 in intricate detail. It was the last time she had truly been happy. The memory was so vivid she could almost smell it. The crisp, cleanliness of the air in her nostrils as they walked around Waterson’s Park. The images were so clear it was like she could reach out and touch the memory. The neatly laid asphalt of the walking track, a slinking dark snake weaving into areas of heavy tree cover, and out into open grassy spaces before disappearing again into the shade of the trees.

  The day hadn’t been particularly warm, but the sky was clear, and the juxtaposition of light and dark depending on what part of the trail they were on was almost mystical. The way they would be showered in the bright warmth of the sun and minutes later the world around them would seem like twilight as they entered a cluster of trees. Mother Nature’s shade cloth. Splinters of light would sneak through, but not many, and the air seemed damper in the trees. The shady, wooded areas of Waterson’s seemed to be a place of fantasy.

  Some parts had seating available, a spot for walkers to stop for a rest, but unlike the seating around the picnic areas and playgrounds, these seats weren’t manufactured from steel and timber. They were actual pieces of tree. Huge logs, perhaps sliced up portions of a tree that had fallen long ago, fashioned into seats and scarcely placed to the sides of the walking track. The seats had been carved into shape by men, however they still had that natural feel about them, as though the tools working them into shape had to come to the tree, here in this spot, not the other way around.

  They had stopped at one of these seats to rest during the walk. Josie had remained standing, taking out a cigarette with a mischievous smile on her face. She had given up smoking when she fell pregnant with her first child. They had all smoked as teenagers, and all of them had given up at different times. But seeing Josie standing in the darkened woods, exhaling smoke with the burning cigarette between her fingers, she looked like a model at the after party of a fashion show saying “I smoke, and I’m proud of it”. Sarah and Mel could both smell the burning tobacco, fondly recalling their own days as smokers. There was no wind on that day, and the spirals of smoke rising from Josie’s right hand seemed to hover in front of them, a ghostly temptation seeming to curl its index finger to them, beckoning them to come forth and take the forbidden ashy treasure they truly desired.

  Mel had asked Josie if she had any more, and the three of them had paused for a second before bursting out laughing. They had all smoked that day in the woods, feeling like teenagers when they would sneak as far away as possible to have a cigarette. Away from the prying eyes of teachers, other kids, other adults – essentially anybody who could relay what they had seen to their parents. They had laughed at the deviousness of it all, swearing to never breathe a word of it to their husbands who wouldn’t understand. It didn’t hurt anybody, and there was no malice in the secret. But there was a freedom in their mischief, and if Mel and Josie had needed the sense of freedom which came with their unspoken transgression, then Sarah definitely needed it.

  They had returned back to Mel’s house that afternoon. Josie had brought a selection of movies with her. A romantic comedy called The Proposal, about a woman trying to get married to keep her visa, and a raucous comedy called The Hangover. If they hadn’t enjoyed enough laughter for the day, the latter of those movies made sure of it. It was a ‘what happens in Vegas…�
�� film about four men, but considering their own dalliance with the bad habits of their past, it suited the day perfectly. The three of them had gathered under a blanket on Mel’s couch and enjoyed the movies in between trips to the kitchen to gather popcorn, chocolates, and later on, a bottle of wine they shared.

  Despite the nervousness Sarah experienced in the lead up to their girl’s day, she felt truly blessed sitting on the couch, laughing hysterically with her friends. There was always more laughter when watching something funny with friends, and there had been something medicinal about it on that day. The friends who had never given up on her, no matter how dark her life had become. She had belonged in that circle, the way she now felt she belonged in the circle with Jane.

  There had been closure on the loss of her family, at least in the physical sense. She had seen the remains of her life in the blackness that night, illuminated by red and blue flashing lights, being drowned out by the arching spray of water the fire department used. But there had been no closure for anything else. Not for her friendships, particularly with Mel and Josie. Not for her parents who had raised her, nurtured her, and watched on as she spread her wings and built a family of her own. She’d given no goodbyes and there had been nothing she could take with her except memories.

  The night of the fire was a blur to Sarah. A wild contrast of blackness and pulsing lights. She had been taken to the police station and gave statements, albeit under stress, and to this day she still can’t remember a single conversation she had there. She did remember sleeping in her parent’s house that night, in her old room.