by Radclyffe
“Good.” Abby rocked back and forth on her heels. “Start when you get home tonight.”
Olivia managed to rein in her smile, but only just. “All right.”
Abby walked away, but Olivia had a gut feeling she would double back and shadow her until she was safely ensconced in a cab. She’d never asked for a guardian angel, but strangely, it didn’t feel oppressive. She’d seen things tonight that most humans didn’t even dare to imagine, but all of that paled in comparison to the sensation of Abby’s fingertips digging into her skin. Abby was back in her life.
As she turned toward the nearest avenue, the smile broke free.
Emily
Ronica Black
Nothing else had been on her mind. Work was now nonexistent, food wouldn’t stay down, and sleep…sleep had become a nightmarish hell from which she could barely escape.
The stereo started. She thumbed up the volume and Evanescence riffed through the house. The music kicked up her heart, making her realize she was excited for the first time in two days. Her ritual time was all she had left. And…Emily.
Everything was set and ready to go. Ouija board, candles, wine, drugs, razor blade, and soon, blood. Natalie settled on the cold bathroom floor and leaned back against the giant tub. Carefully, she ran her fingertips over the tiny white tiles of the floor, readying herself for the ceremony. The scent of rubbing alcohol and mouthwash lingered in the air. She scratched a match across the lighting strip on the matchbook and brought a thick flame to life. Sulfur and smoke assailed her senses and she smiled as she lit the three black candles. Though her hand shook a little, she felt confident and sure. This was what she wanted. What she needed.
Emily.
She shook out the match and poured the wine. It gurgled and looked bloodlike as it spilled into the glass. In the near distance she heard what sounded like a door crack open or closed. She paused, her heart racing as she waited for more. It slammed, and though she knew no one was physically in the house, she trembled, hoping nothing more would come. With a new sense of urgency she opened the pill bottle, poured out three Klonopin, and shoveled them into her mouth to chew. The wine followed; she finished the entire glass. The sensation would come soon, she had to hurry. With the razor blade in hand, she chanted the familiar words. She called upon the darkness, the powers that be, called upon them to listen to her pleas. She asked for permission to enter the other side, asked to see the one she loved, the one she’d lost, the one she longed for. She offered her blood, her self, her mind and soul. Anything to see Emily just one more time.
The blade shook in her hand as she pressed its biting edge into the scarred skin of her wrist. Blood surfaced stubbornly and she had to clench her jaw and press harder, tugging at her skin. A murmur of pain escaped her as a tear ran down her cheek. Dark red drops fell onto the Ouija board and she called out, crying for Emily as the blade fell from her hand. Hurriedly, she spelled out Emily’s name on the board, streaking the blood as the stylus moved. Then she sat back, beginning to feel light-headed, and asked if she was permitted to see her.
A door cracked again, this time the bathroom door. She pressed her heel to it, forcing it closed. The distant music was muffled and the knob turned as she wedged her leg harder, keeping it closed. The knob twisted some more and then stopped suddenly. Pounding started, causing her to jerk. It shook the door.
It was here.
She closed her eyes and pleaded with the forces that be.
You can have anything you want. Just please. Let me see her once again.
“Can I see Emily?” she asked, desperate.
And then, as her vision began to fade and the blood slowed from her wrist, the stylus of the Ouija board moved and answered YES.
*
Dr. Vicki Moreno filled the empty silence by stirring her already tepid hot chocolate. She’d filled it upon her patient’s arrival and it was already cold, just like the mood of the session.
“You’re still having the nightmares?” Vicki asked, concern coming through to taint her voice. She had to get Natalie talking. She looked like hell and sounded just as bad.
“Yes,” Natalie responded, barely a whisper. She clenched her spindly hands and spun the wedding band on her finger. Her body was slumped in the chair and Vicki swore she could see her shoulder bones poking through the threadbare cardigan.
“How often?” she asked, disappointed but not surprised to hear it.
Natalie bit her upper lip in a gesture that Vicki knew well. It meant she was carefully considering how much to share.
“Every night.”
Not good enough. “How many times a night?”
Again she sucked in on her top lip.
“Three? Four?”
Natalie didn’t answer.
“What about the walls, Natalie? Do you still see the walls cracking upon awakening?”
Natalie looked away and Vicki fought a sigh. Natalie wasn’t progressing. Wasn’t progressing at all. In fact, she seemed to be getting worse.
“Yes,” Natalie finally muttered. “They creep up the walls to the ceiling.”
“Every morning?”
“I think. Yes. The only time it doesn’t happen is when I wake from a nightmare. But—”
“But what?” she said softly, encouraging her to continue.
“Sometimes I don’t know when I’m awake or when I’m dreaming. Sometimes the walls are cracking and I think I’m—awake.”
“Are you awake?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Why not?”
“Because I can’t explain it.”
There was a long silence and Vicki kept stirring her useless drink. She’d offered Natalie one upon arrival, but she’d refused despite looking terribly cold. Now Vicki was wishing hers was hot so she could sip it for the both of them.
“Let’s talk about the shadow man. Last time you said he wasn’t just in your dreams anymore.”
“He’s not a shadow. He’s a black mass.”
“But you know he’s male?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Natalie skipped the question and answered the previous one. “He comes when I’m tired or almost asleep or when I’m least expecting it. It’s a weird feeling. Like I’m falling. My stomach drops.”
“What does he do?”
“He—” She swallowed with obvious nerves. “He rushes at me.”
“He runs at you?”
She shook her head. “He rushes. He has no feet.”
“I see.”
“It’s fast. He’s fast. I can’t ever move.”
“What else happens?”
She turned her head as if the question had physically struck her. “He—he says something.”
“What does he say?”
Natalie continued to stare at the floor. Her hands twisted into one another.
“Natalie?”
“He says it in this really deep voice. This scary, awful, non-human-sounding voice. Almost like a growl.”
Vicki waited, stirring and stirring.
Then finally Natalie spoke. “He says—he says…‘cunt.’”
“Cunt?” Vicki cleared her throat and sipped the tepid drink, dribbling some on her chin.
“He says it as he’s rushing at me. Like he wants to kill me.”
Jesus. Vicki wiped her chin and forced the shocked look from her face.
“Is that all he does?” she asked calmly.
Natalie blinked slowly. “To me physically, yes.”
“He doesn’t tell you to hurt yourself or others?”
Natalie seemed surprised. “No.”
“Okay, then. So the shadow man is still a problem and now he’s speaking. Let’s talk about your medication.” Their brief med check session was almost up and it was obvious some time needed to be spent discussing it. Natalie had been prescribed several drugs at an inpatient facility nearly a year before due to an attempt at suicide and Vicki, based on the recent info from th
e pharmacy, was beginning to wonder if Natalie took the antidepressant and antipsychotic at all. Vicki clicked the mouse over the order she’d sent two months ago to the pharmacy. Only the Klonopin had been picked up, and there’d been no request for a refill on the other two.
Natalie’s dark hair hung in stray strings around her face, but her sparkling green eyes looked out seemingly oblivious to the obstruction. Her pale lips were now lush and had more color than before thanks to the attention of her teeth. And for a moment, despite Natalie’s dwindling care about her appearance, Vicki was struck by her raw beauty.
“I see here that you’ve only been taking the anxiety medication. Why haven’t you been taking the others?” Vicki asked.
“I take them,” Natalie finally said. “I must’ve forgotten.”
“How can you take them when you don’t even pick them up?”
“I said I must’ve forgotten.”
“Surely they must’ve handed you all of them at the pharmacy.”
Natalie didn’t answer, just stuck out her chin.
“Natalie, have you ever taken them? Since you left Brookside, that is?”
She wrung her thin hands and Vicki noticed the redness in the pads of her fingers. It contrasted sharply with the milky white paleness of the rest of her.
“I’ve picked them up before.”
“But have you taken them?”
Her green glass eyes focused on Vicki. “Sometimes.”
The office grew quiet with only the distant ticking of Vicki’s clock in the far corner. Outside the rain fell, fogging up the already gray, heavy day. Cars splashed through the passing street, hitting the same watery potholes again and again.
“It’s very important for you to take your medicine, Natalie,” she said softly. “Very important.”
“I know.”
“Can you promise me you’ll try harder?” It would help with the shadow man and the nightmares and most obviously her depression. She really needed her to take them before she ended up back at Brookside, or worse.
Natalie nodded, childlike. Vicki was again struck not only by her beauty but by how much she’d changed since she’d first walked through the door. Gone was the healthy, somewhat vibrant, young professional. What remained was a skeleton of sorts. As if Natalie had been slowly withering away, piece by tiny piece, just blowing away in the passing wind.
Vicki knew the main reason why and she decided to touch on it again, to see where Natalie stood with it.
“Have you been thinking about Emily?”
Natalie looked up sternly. The shadows of her cheekbones sharpened as she clenched her jaw. “I think about Emily all the time.”
“How often?”
“Every single second.”
Emily had been Natalie’s longtime partner, and when she’d been killed in a terrible car accident, Natalie had gone downhill and eventually tried suicide.
“The process hasn’t changed at all?” Vicki kept her voice calm and soothing. Emily was still a very touchy subject.
“What process?”
“The process of grieving. Remember we’ve talked about that several times.”
“I grieve. I grieve all the time. That’s my process.” The words were suddenly jarring out of her. Quick and sharp. “I’m tired of you people telling me to move on, to take one day at a time, to get past the shock and anger. I miss her! I want to be with her!”
Vicki sipped her cold drink again. She blinked a few times to get her bearings. “Are you still wanting to leave here to be with her, Natalie?”
Natalie bit her lip and looked upward. Then, “Yes.”
“You want to die?”
“No.”
Vicki cleared her throat. “You don’t want to die?”
“No. I don’t. I want to be with her. Here, there, wherever.”
“But in order to be with her there, you would have to die.”
Natalie sucked in a frustrated sounding breath. “No, Doctor.” She stood.
“Natalie, please. I need to know if you’re considering suicide again.”
With a quick swing of her purse over her shoulder Natalie faced off with her at the desk. “I never tried to commit suicide, Doctor.”
“But you—”
“I never tried to kill myself. I don’t want to die. I told you idiots that at Brookside, but no one listened. And as for you, if you can’t help me with these—these nightmares and hallucinations, then no one can.” She dug in her purse and placed several old bottles of medicine on the blotter of the desk. “You can keep these. I won’t be needing your services any longer.”
The door slammed as she exited and Vicki sat examining the bottles of medication.
“Just as I thought.”
The antidepressant and antipsychotic were all full. She hadn’t been taking them. And God only knew for how long.
*
Natalie ran home in the rain. She had to see Emily. Had to be with her again. Why couldn’t anyone understand? A car splashed her as she struggled along, but she didn’t care. Her hair was soaked and plastered to her head and the rain was freezing the instant it touched her skin. She hoped it made her sick, sick enough to go into a fever-induced coma. Maybe then she could see Emily without the dark man, without all the tricks he played on her.
But anything was worth seeing Emily. Anything. She could touch her, feel her, smell her. Hear her laugh and feel it vibrate her body. She could smell the sweetness of her breath, hear the moans of her pleasure, feel the tight slickness between her legs as they made love. Yes, she could have it all, just as if she were here.
Her breath was squeezing out of her as she slowed before her small house. The rain continued to pummel down, and despite there being no wind, the front rocking chair was moving. She stepped onto the covered porch, ignoring her overgrown lawn and neglected car. A note nailed to the door caught her eye as she shrugged off her raincoat and stepped out of her boots. She pried the paper from the nail and read quickly.
Dear Natalie,
You are destroying yourself and what you are messing with is downright dangerous. Natalie, it’s evil.
Call me when you stop, and please make that soon. For your sake. You have changed so much these past two years.
Your concerned friend,
Viv
Natalie crumpled up the letter and tossed it aside. Viv had first refused to come to the house last week. She’d said all the doors opening and shutting gave her the creeps. She’d seen Natalie’s wrists; she’d forced Natalie to tell her what she was doing. The news had devastated her even though Natalie hadn’t shared every detail, and she’d begged Natalie to get help and to stop. But Natalie had refused, her Emily too important. And now the letter.
Viv was saying sayonara, she couldn’t handle it.
Natalie pushed her way inside, tossed her boots and coat, and headed for the wine. The house was shadowed and quiet, a dank dusty smell to it. There were no pictures or anything that would invite memories. She refused to have such things staring at her day in and day out. The floor creaked underfoot as she opened the bottle and drank straight from it while making her way into the bathroom. Water poured from the bathtub facet as she turned the knob and steam began to fill the room. A nice hot soak would do her good, maybe a Klonopin or two. Maybe Emily would come without the dark man. Sometimes she did, but only for a brief moment. A smooth quick touch to the cheek, a slight brush of the hair from her face, or if she was lucky, a soft delicate kiss to her lips.
She longed for such an encounter despite how brief it might be. She stared into the foggy mirror and thought about Viv’s letter. About how what she was messing with was evil. The word hung in her head as a rush of cold air drifted into the bathroom. She slammed the door and sucked in on her top lip. Then, on the mirror, she wrote the word EVIL.
If what she was doing was evil, she didn’t care. Emily was worth it. And besides, it couldn’t be evil. She wasn’t asking for anything awful, only Emily. She wasn’t worshipping anything, go
od or bad. So how could it be evil?
After stripping out of her clothes, she eased into the tub and killed the running water. Breathing deeply, she relaxed against the tub and allowed the water to saturate her skin and muscles. It seemed to massage her insides. She closed her eyes, reached for her Klonopin bottle, and chewed two down with what was left of the wine. She sighed, feeling really good. Emily was coming, she could feel her. How strong would the connection be?
Her fingers skimmed across the razor blade to the needle. Carefully she plucked it from the edge of the tub and stabbed two of her fleshy fingertips. She allowed the blood to drop into the water, mesmerized at how it sank and spread. A smile spread across her face and remained as she leaned her head back, listening to the blood drip twice more before it stopped. Her mind numbed, heated, and grew heavy, and then blissfully light.
She opened her eyes and looked up. The walls began to crack with vein-like splits, crawling upward to the ceiling where they ate away the plaster to reveal the heavy, gray cloud-filled sky. The rain poured down on her in teasing but steady drops. She laughed and held up her hands, welcoming it.
“Emily,” she called. “Emily.”
The clouds began to part and the sun squeezed through, shining down on her. It illuminated the bathroom just as the door opened, showing Emily standing in the frame wearing a red teddy and matching red lipstick. Her hair was blowing in a warm breeze coming from above.
“Natalie,” she said, coming toward her.
Natalie grinned and held out her hand. “Emily.”
“I’ve missed you,” Emily said, sweeping in to kiss her long and hard.
Natalie groaned as Emily’s hot, slick tongue slipped inside her. This was better than any time before. Better than the snowy mountain where they made love beneath the shelter of a large, low-hanging tree. Better than the beach, the bedroom, and the couch. This was Emily at her most erotic, most passionate.
The kiss deepened as Emily slid into the tub, writhing against Natalie, sucking on her lips. “I love you, baby,” Emily said. “I love you like no other. You are my everything. You are my…” She held her face. Her eyes were a swirling beautiful brown. “Everything.”
