The Darkness To Come

by Brandon Massey

  When he awoke, it was half-past six o’clock in the evening. Coco was at the bedroom door, which was closed; she was shivering in the distinctive way that Chihuahuas did, and something about her struck immediate fear in Joshua.

  He flung aside the sheets and sprang out of bed.

  “Rachel? Are you here?”

  There was no answer. The house was dark and silent.

  She’d been gone for over two hours. He couldn’t imagine that a routine trip to the grocery store would take so much time.

  He hurried downstairs.

  On the kitchen table, he found a letter.

  Chapter 18

  The kitchen was dark. Joshua flicked on a light switch.

  The letter lay on the table, bracketed by the hurricane lamps they’d burned at dinner last night. A small silver key rested at the foot of the paper; it resembled one of those keys you might use to disengage a padlock.

  Joshua did not immediately pick up the letter and read it. He wasn’t sure that he wanted to.

  The lies Rachel had told lately . . . her inexplicable crying jag earlier that afternoon . . . his own, growing sense of the ground shifting underneath his feet . . . it all blended into a dread that churned in his gut like rotten food. He would not have been more frightened of the letter if it had been delivered by a messenger with wicked horns and fiery eyes.

  Burn it, a quiet, firm voice counseled. Or send it through a paper-shredder. You don’t want to read it, man. It’s gonna knock your ass out.

  At a glance, he noted that the letter was inscribed in black ink, in Rachel’s neat handwriting. She had used Moore Designs letterhead.

  Finally, his hand trembling, he picked it up.

  He started to pull out a chair to sit at the table—and inadvertently knocked the chair off balance. It clattered against the tile floor.

  He was too nervous to sit, anyway. He set the chair upright and leaned against the counter for support.

  He began reading.

  Dear Joshua,

  It is with the deepest regret that I’m writing this letter to you. I’ve prayed for so long that things would never come to this. But one lesson I’ve learned, unfortunately, is that prayers sometimes go unanswered.

  There’s a lot about me that you don’t know, baby. I’ve lied to you about many things in my past. I never lied with the intention of hurting you. I lied because I was ashamed of my past. I lied to protect myself. Most of all, I lied because I was afraid of losing you.

  But it looks like my past has finally caught up with me. So I’m going to be leaving, for a while. This is for your safety, mine, and most of all, the safety of our baby. (Yes, I truly am pregnant with your child. I would never lie about that.)

  As terrible as it will be for us to be apart, this is the best decision for our family. You must trust me on this. It is for our protection.

  I can’t tell you where I’m going, and I can’t say when I will be able to come home. I wish I could tell you these things, but I can’t.

  Please don’t try to find me, or to contact me. I will get in touch with you when it’s safe. Again, this is for our protection. Please, trust me on this.

  I can’t begin to put into words how sorry I am that things have turned out this way. I love you SO much . . . I’m crying as I write this. I hope that when I can finally tell you the truth about me, you will be able to forgive me for everything I’ve done. I don’t know if you ever will, but that is what I hope and pray for.

  While I am away, I must caution you to be careful. I’ll say it again—BE CAREFUL. I’ve left you a key. It will unlock something that I have a strong feeling you might need soon. I wish I was wrong . . . but you know how I sometimes get these feelings.

  Joshua, I may have lied about many things, to my everlasting shame, but I never lied about how much I love you. Please know that, baby. You are the only man I’ve ever truly loved . . . and always will.

  Your wife,

  Rachel

  P.S. Please take good care of Coco. I’ve left her with you as proof that I’m going to come home soon.

  Joshua read the letter again. Then once more. Numbness traveled through him, starting from his fingers that grasped the letter and traveling in an icy current up through his wrist, into his arm and shoulder, through his chest, and then spreading through the rest of his body. Like an overdose of anesthetic.

  His legs became deadened tree stumps. Swaying, his knees folding under him, he slid down the cabinet doors and dropped to the floor on his butt, barely registering the pain that stung his tailbone.

  My wife’s left me.

  He couldn’t believe it.

  Chapter 19

  Driving in the purple-black twilight, Rachel put Atlanta behind her.

  A box of Kleenex was wedged in the cup holder, and tear-dampened tissues littered the seats and floor. She had been crying ever since she’d pulled her car out of the garage and driven away from the house.

  Leaving her family and friends in Illinois had been extremely difficult. Leaving Joshua was harder. They shared a soul connection she’d never experienced with anyone else. With every mile she drove, the pain of separation grew sharper, like a knife sinking deeper into her heart.

  But leaving was the only sensible thing to do. Dexter was coming for her with the destructive force of a tornado. She had to protect their baby.

  She’d considered staying home, telling Joshua the truth, and, if Joshua still wanted to be with her after her confession, hunkering down in their house and mounting a defense against Dexter. But Joshua, in spite of his formidable size, was a gentle man; when he discovered a spider in their home, instead of squashing it, as most people would, he would capture it in a napkin and set it free outdoors.

  He was no match for a man like Dexter. For Joshua’s own safety, it was better for her to be away from home, rather than risk Dexter finding them together.

  At least, that was what she told herself. But she wondered if she were underestimating Joshua’s strength—and running mostly from her fear of telling him the truth about her past. It was easier to run than to deal with the consequences of owning up to her lies.

  No, I’ll tell Josh the truth, when the time is right. But right now it’s safer for us to be apart. If Dexter found me with Josh, he would kill him.

  She dried her eyes with a tissue. The two lanes of Interstate 16 unfurled ahead of her, miles and miles of tree-lined highway winding through southeast Georgia.

  She was heading toward a place she’d visited many times before, a sanctuary that even Dexter, as cunning as he was, hopefully would never find. Somewhere she would be safe until the threat passed.

  A keening gale sniped at the windows, and the winter darkness pressed down on the world, chasing away the light of the day.

  Chapter 20

  Joshua wandered around the house in a daze.

  Rachel could not have left him. He couldn’t believe it—wouldn’t believe it. None of what she’d said in her letter made any sense. He was going to get to the bottom of this and prove that she was bluffing, playing a sick joke, suffering from a mental illness of some kind . . . anything other than what she’d claimed in her note. This could not be happening to him, to them.

  He lurched into the garage. Her Acura was gone. He’d figured it would be missing, but he’d needed to see the vacant space, to believe what she’d written.

  He tried to call her on her cell phone, in spite of her advisement not to contact her. She didn’t answer; her voice mail picked up immediately, indicating that her phone was shut off.

  He left her a message anyway: “Rachel, it’s me. I got this letter. Listen, baby . . . I don’t understand this. I can’t believe it. Whatever’s going on . . . I need you. Please, call me. Please . . .”

  He couldn’t go any further; a sob was boiling up his throat. He hung up.

  He turned around and around in the family room, feeling lost in his own home. The Christmas decorations, the holiday cards clustered on the fireplace mantelpie
ce, the photographs of their wedding day and their happy times together, seemed to be exhibits of someone else’s life, not his.

  Coco was perched on the sofa she’d shared with Rachel only a few hours ago. She watched Joshua, her big eyes apprehensive.

  Joshua realized that the little dog was as anxious as he was. Canines lived in sync with the energies of their human masters. Coco had probably seen Rachel tearfully write her letter, had stood nearby as Rachel had prepared to leave, had watched Rachel leave her behind in the house as she entered the garage and got in her car and sped away to an unknown destination.

  Rachel had, in a very real sense, abandoned both of them.

  His erratic behavior had probably thoroughly unsettled Coco. Seeing the dog forced him to realize that he had to get himself together, because he was on the verge of coming unglued.

  He made another phone call, this one to Rachel’s salon. Tanisha told him that she hadn’t spoken to Rachel since she’d left for her appointment earlier that afternoon.

  “If she gets in touch with you, call me right away,” Joshua said. “It’s very important.”

  “Sure, honey,” Tanisha said. “Is everything okay?”

  “It’s fine,” he said. He didn’t yet possess the fortitude to tell anyone what was happening. It was a challenge for him to keep his wits about him, and he was in no shape to console anyone else or answer a barrage of questions. “Remember, call me, okay?”

  He started searching for clues of where Rachel had gone. In the master bedroom, he checked the walk-in closet. It was a large chamber—the walk-in closet was one of the areas that had sold Rachel on the house—and half of it was dedicated to her belongings.

  Rachel was fastidiously neat. Her clothes hung inside, arranged by color, season, and occasion. Her shoes were tucked away in a stackable shoe organizer, and her purses and other accessories sat on built-in shelving. Nothing was out of place.

  It confused him. Would Rachel have run away with only the clothes on her back?

  He rushed out of the closet, entered the guest bedroom. Flung open the closet door.

  They kept their luggage stored in this closet; his aunt and uncle had given them a set of luggage as a wedding gift. One of the large suitcases was missing.

  This evidence, more than her car being gone, was like a hammer striking his heart. The vacant garage space could have meant only that she was out running errands. The missing luggage was proof of her serious intent to go away.

  Although she apparently hadn’t taken any of her clothes, she could easily purchase clothing on her way to wherever she was going. It seemed like the kind of thing she would do—start fresh.

  His heart banging, he went into her study. She’d left behind the laptop, but the computer was off, and he remembered the password lock from that morning.

  He looked frantically over her desk, seeking a Post-it or some other note of where she might have gone. He found nothing. Her desk was clean, and even the trashcan was empty.

  Back in the kitchen, a laminated list of emergency telephone numbers was pinned to the refrigerator by a magnet for Coco’s veterinarian. He picked up the phone, to dial the police— and then he paused to reconsider.

  What could he possibly tell the cops? That his wife had left him a Dear John letter? He’d watched enough TV crime dramas to understand that it wasn’t illegal to leave your spouse. Rachel hadn’t committed a crime of any sort.

  Further, she clearly had left of her own volition. There was no evidence that someone had forced her to leave—though it was obvious that her fear of someone had compelled her to run.

  As terrible as it will be for us to be apart, this is the best decision for our family. You must trust me on this. It is for our protection.

  Who was she running from? The man in her nightmare? Someone who had been in prison in Illinois?

  He just didn’t know.

  But he could predict what the police would think of her cryptic letter. They would be suspicious, not merely of Rachel, but possibly of Joshua, too. They might suspect foul play, might think that he had done something to Rachel and written a phony letter to hide the evidence. Everybody knew that whenever something awful happened to a married person, conventional cop wisdom assumed that the spouse, especially when the spouse was a man, was always the prime suspect.

  Although he could avoid mentioning the letter at all and could report her as a missing person, he was pretty sure that she had to be missing for at least forty-eight hours before the cops would even talk to him about it.

  No, he couldn’t call the cops. Not yet. Maybe not at all.

  He started to put down the phone, but then, out of vain hope, he dialed Rachel’s cell again. Voice mail picked up right away.

  Hearing her voice was like torture. He hung up without leaving a message, his hand shaking.

  A vibrating noise came from a darkened corner of the kitchen. Joshua hurried over there, nearly tripping over his feet.

  The noise came from the side counter, where they kept the day’s mail, a glass bowl that held their keys, an erasable task list, and their respective cell phone chargers. Joshua’s Blackberry lay there, vibrating rhythmically.

  He didn’t immediately pick it up. For he noted that Rachel’s cell phone stood there, too, nestled in the recharging cradle.

  His calls to her had been pointless. Not only had she left him behind—she’d left him no means to get in touch with her, either.

  Anguish squeezed his heart in a vise.

  A check of his phone confirmed that he’d received only a stupid text message advertisement from the phone service provider. Nothing from Rachel, wherever she might be.

  Out of ideas, he stumbled into the family room and collapsed on the sofa.

  A photo sat on the coffee table. It was a wedding shot of Joshua and Rachel walking down the aisle at his family church, arms linked and smiling, the pastor having recently declared them husband and wife.

  He cradled the photo in his hands. And wept.

  Drawn by his wracking sobs, Coco wandered into the room and hopped onto the couch. She crawled into his lap.

  He set aside the picture and held the dog close, scalding tears dripping from his face.

  Life with Rachel had been a sweet dream, too good to be true. Now, the dream had shattered and set free something that he feared had been hiding around the corner all along.

  The nightmare.

  Part Two

  Chapter 21

  At a Best Buy in a southwestern Chicago suburb, Dexter purchased a StreetPilot GPS system. He didn’t have time to waste getting lost, and with today’s navigation technology there was no sensible reason for anyone to lose their way when seeking a destination. Although he hadn’t had access to high-tech hardware during his prison days, he’d regularly perused newspapers and current events and popular science magazines, and was abreast of the latest-and-greatest tools available to aid his mission.

  He also bought a prepaid cell phone, loaded with one hundred minutes of talk time. At some point, he might need to place a few calls.

  Walking out of the store toward his Chevy, snow slanting into his face, he spotted a white delivery van in the far corner of the parking lot. Infinity Delivery Services was printed on the side panel, in large blue letters. The company symbol was depicted underneath the text; an alternating pattern of green and blue circles within circles within circles, meant to represent infinity, perhaps.

  He had seen the vehicle before—he was certain of it. When he was approaching Betty’s house, the same van had driven past . . .

  But if it’s a delivery van, then the organization probably owns an entire fleet of identically painted vehicles. Like UPS or Fed-Ex. Their company trucks are virtually indistinguishable. It doesn’t mean anything.

  But the acronym of Infinity Delivery Services was IDS. “IDS” was stitched into the bottom of the mysteriously equipped duffel bag he’d discovered beside him in the Buick—which he’d also acquired under circumstances he’d yet to
explain.

  You’re really reaching, man. IDS could stand for anything. Hell, it could mean Irritated Dick Syndrome for all you know.

  As he reached the Chevy, the delivery van drove across the parking lot, to the exit. He was too far away to see the driver, and the van soon vanished in traffic.

  Perhaps it was a coincidence. Paranoia was not his nature. But neither was an inclination to disregard a possible clue.

  Lips pursed thoughtfully, he got in the car.

  * * *

  Sitting in the cold automobile, he read the St. Louis address on the personal check that his wife’s homo friend had given to Betty. He keyed it into the GPS unit, and received confirmation that the address was valid.

  After mounting the device on the dashboard, he resumed driving.

  He reflected, again, on what had happened outside Betty’s house: his apparent invisibility to the postal carrier. Logic suggested that it was a fluke. The white man had simply ignored him, as they were often prone to do when they felt secure in their environment. If they had been in a rougher neighborhood, the guy would have either crossed the street to avoid brushing past Dexter, or discreetly rested his hand on the pepper spray that postal workers carried to ward off vicious mutts.

  But intuition told Dexter that his eyes had not deceived him, that the weird darting movement in his peripheral vision and hissing noise occurrences were somehow related to him becoming genuinely invisible to the mail carrier. He remembered the tangible, heavy sensation of warmth and the feeling of being protected as the mail guy walked past. It was as if he had slipped on a cloak of . . . well, invisibility.

  The idea was so incredible, so ridiculous, that he laughed out loud. A cloak of invisibility? That was some shit out of Dungeons & Dragons, one of those role-playing games that teenagers played into the wee hours of the morning.

  But what if it was true? What if he really could become invisible? Not invisible in the metaphorical way that Ralph Ellison had written about, the sad way the lives of black people rarely merited a blip on the mainstream public’s radar screen—but invisible for real?