Obsessed With You

by Jennifer Ransom

  On his way down the interstate to Fort Walton, Aaron stopped at a diner that was already open for business. He ordered a huge breakfast of fried eggs and bacon, hash browns and pancakes, and coffee and orange juice. He took his time as he ate. He allowed the waitress to fill his coffee cup four times before he paid his bill. Back in his SUV, he located a Wal-Mart in Fort Walton and set his GPS to take him there.

  It took Aaron three hours and two shopping carts to get dishes, glasses, utensils, pots and pans, sheets and towels, cleaning supplies, and a few groceries. He had the flat-screen TV he bought brought out to his car when he checked out. Afterward, he stopped at a furniture store in a strip mall. A tiny blonde saleswoman followed him through the store as he pointed at what he wanted: a queen-sized bed, a dresser, a couch and recliner, a kitchen table and chairs, a bedside table, a console for his TV, and two lamps. He didn’t waste any time on it because it didn’t matter.

  “I need this delivered today,” Aaron told the teenie woman. She was the size of a child.

  “I think we can do that,” Teenie said. “There will be a rush fee.”

  Aaron waved his hand to let her know that didn’t matter to him.

  He made a final stop at a liquor store for scotch and beer. He pulled back into his driveway a few minutes before three. It took several trips to unload his car. When he dropped the last bag onto the floor, he sat down on the floor. There was nowhere else to sit. He looked around at the shabby interior. Even though the walls needed painting, the exquisite crown molding shone through the dinginess. The floors needed refinishing, but they were in good condition. The kitchen needed a complete overhaul, but it would serve his purposes for now.

  Aaron wasn’t used to doing a lot of cleaning. He always had a cleaning service, and then after he moved in with Cathy, she took care of the cleaning. He winced now to think of that. He filled the white ceramic sink that had seen better days with warm sudsy water and wiped down the counters, inside the cabinets, and the stove. He shoved his groceries into the pantry and the elderly fridge.

  The furniture store movers were supposed to be there at five, but it was closer to six and already dark when they finally got there. Aaron helped the young boys who seemed like teenagers move the stuff in and set the bed up. He gave them each a tip and shut the door. Finally, he was alone again in his new lonely house.

  He ate a bowl of cereal and stared around the kitchen wondering if he’d lost his mind, buying a house next to Cathy’s with the intentions of spying on her. It was the act of a desperate man, and he knew he was desperate. But he wasn’t crazy.

  After the unsatisfying bowl of cereal, Aaron made up his new bed and spread two blankets on top of the sheets. With his laptop on his stomach, he checked his emails, taking intermittent sips of scotch on the rocks. He keyed in British clothiers to see if he could remember the name of the shop Cathy had bought his tie from. But what did that matter anyway? So what if he could find the shop? What would that accomplish in locating the person who had set him up?

  No shop names seemed familiar, and Aaron wasn’t sure if he ever even knew the name of the place. He drifted into an uneasy sleep, waking up several times through the night, his heart thumping wildly in his chest.

  Aaron didn’t fully wake up until almost ten. He forced himself to make a hearty breakfast of scrambled eggs and sausage. The eggs were dry and the sausage slightly burned, but it would do. He needed fortification for the day ahead.

  The wooded area between his house and Cathy’s was about an acre total, but only a third of an acre in width, he estimated. Aaron followed the perimeter of the woods where it met the lawn of his property, but he saw no pathway. He was going to have to just go into the woods and do the best he could, trying to stay in a semi straight line toward Cathy’s house.

  A few yards in, the thickness of the trees and scrubby brushes and thorny vines that grabbed at his jeans forced Aaron back to his lawn. There was a little shed behind the house and Aaron made his way over, hoping like hell there was something in there to help him. It was dark and dirty in the shed, which had a dirt floor. When in the hell was he going to realize he needed a flashlight? The sunlight provided a little light and Aaron groped around until he located an overhead light with a chain. He pulled the chain expecting nothing, but a light bulb flashed on.

  Various gardening tools hung on the walls on hooks or leaned rustily against the walls. A hoe wouldn’t do him any good in those woods. He picked tools up from the dirt floor and put them back until he found the one item that could help him: a machete. Aaron wasn’t sure why the previous owners had the machete, but he was glad they did. He picked it up and held it to the light. It was rusty but looked like it might work. It was all he had for that day and he was going to use it.

  Aaron considered walking along the shore until he got near Cathy’s property, then cutting up through the woods. But that would have been more like half an acre of woods. It didn’t make sense. He found the place where he had attempted to go through before and swung the machete side to side. His backpack of water and snack bars moved across his back as he swung the blade.

  The machete wasn’t sharp, but it hacked off branches and vines, leaving some dangling at their cuts. It took a while, but he made a very narrow and very rough path through the woods. He stopped when he could see Cathy’s house, a hundred yards or so away from the edge of the woods on her side. Time to sit down on the woodsy ground and drink some water.

  After several deep slugs of water, Aaron pulled the binoculars out of his backpack. There was one spot between the scrubby bushes and small trees that he could see straight through to the cottage. He saw Cathy’s Honda, still with its Georgia plates, parked in front. That hurt. He was going to buy Cathy a new car, but when he told her that, she had said, “My car’s only six years old and is doing fine. I don’t need a new car.” That was Cathy. She wasn’t into status symbols, and though he could give them to her, he loved her for that.

  Aaron looked through the binoculars every few minutes for hours, but Cathy never came out the door. He wanted to see her so much it was killing him. He needed to see her dark hair and slender figure, just to know she was okay. Just to feed his broken heart with a glimpse of her. But she never came out.

  The sun began its descent, and Aaron knew he had to go. He followed the roughened path he had made, though it was difficult in places in the thick woods. But he finally emerged onto his own property and made his way to his new house.

  Tomorrow, he would have to take the time to put the utilities in his name and have the cable connected. He had a feeling his time there would be long and boring.

  The frozen dinner of turkey and dressing was passable. A couple of scotches later, he fell into a dreamless sleep.

  The next morning, the first of February, Aaron put the utilities in his name through Starlight Farms. The cable company would come out on Monday, between noon and two, so he would have to be there. In the meantime, he had some watching to do. It was Saturday and surely he would see some activity around the place.

  He was smart enough to take a big bag of chips with him on his second day out. After he settled himself on his spot, he looked through the binoculars. Cathy’s car wasn’t there. She didn’t drive up through the daylight hours, and when it began to get dark, Aaron made his way back through the woods. This watching thing was not working out.

  On Sunday morning, Aaron drove back to Wal-Mart and bought three flashlights, one of them heavy duty. He got plenty of batteries to last for quite a while. He replenished his food supply and bought a couple of bottles of wine and a six-pack of beer.

  He managed to get through the woods by ten, but Cathy’s car wasn’t there—again. Or maybe she had been gone all night. He couldn’t bear that thought.

  Aaron dedicated himself to staying as long as it took for Cathy to come home, even if he had to spend the night out there. The sun went down, but he sat in his spot. It was getting colder and he wrapped his arms around himself. At one point, he do
zed off, and when he woke up at eleven that night, her car wasn’t there.

  The woods were dark and eerie, but Aaron wasn’t afraid. He’d grown up in the outdoors, the woods. But he wasn’t really prepared to spend the night in the woods. He had not planned things well at all.

  Cathy’s porch light shone down, lighting the area in front of the house. He had a choice. He could stay there in the woods all night or he could go back through the path with his flashlight. Or—and this thought just came to him—he could emerge onto Cathy’s side and walk to the bay and make his way back to his house along the shore. That was the simplest thing to do. Cathy wasn’t there to see her stalker.

  So he crept out of the woods onto Cathy’s property. It was a quick walk through her yard to the bay. He ran along the shoreline until he saw his house, then cut up through his yard. Aaron was definitely beginning to think he was coming unhinged.

  When he woke up on Monday, he was still feeling unhinged. He had called Cathy, texted Cathy, but she had never responded to him. Maybe it was time to try again. It had been over three months since he’d seen her. She might have softened toward him.

  So he called her. The phone rang four times before her voice mail message asked him to leave a message. He was startled to hear her voice again after so long. Had he known how sweet her voice was when he had her?

  Aaron hit End Call when the voice mail ended. He didn’t know what to say to her without sounding crazy and desperate. He decided on a text instead.

  “Cat, I just want to make sure you’re okay. Would you be willing to talk to me? I miss you.”

  He sent the message before he could change his mind. Then he crept through the woods. He wouldn’t have much time that day since the cable people were coming between noon and two. When he settled in, he saw that Cathy’s car was there again, but he never saw her.

  The rest of his afternoon was spent waiting on the cable company. They didn’t arrive until four-thirty, which pissed him off mightily. But they hooked him up. He was going to need the distraction. He kept checking his phone all day, hoping to hear from Cathy. She would see the missed call from him and she would see the text.

  But Cathy never responded. If Cathy had texted him back, then he might have started some kind of dialogue with her. He might have eventually been able to talk to her. But her non-response forced Aaron to continue his watching, and he was beginning to feel a little crazy about that. He fell asleep, even more broken-hearted than he had been when he woke up that morning.

  Chapter Eleven

  If only he could talk to Cathy again. But Aaron felt that unless he had positive proof he had been set up, she wouldn’t have anything to do with him. If he had that proof, he would go right up to her door and tell her.

  But what about his leaving her on a crucial day to go play golf with a client? How was he going to get past that? He wasn’t sure, but he believed that if the question of his fidelity were removed from the table, that he could deal with that one. If Cathy loved him—and he believed she did or he wouldn’t be stalking her—then they could work through that.

  He called Randy, angry that he hadn’t heard from him in nearly a week.

  “I was just about to call you,” Randy said. “I’ve tracked down every one of your girlfriends now. Two have married and divorced and three more are living out of the country.”

  Randy went down the list of names, all fifteen of them, and told Aaron their status.

  “Here’s the thing,” Randy said. “It could be any one of these women, if they were so inclined. I don’t know a way to pin it on any of ‘em. I think this is going to hinge on the tie.”

  “I don’t see why knowing where she got the tie helps us,” Aaron said.

  “Nope, probably not,” Randy said with a sigh. “We need to connect the tie with someone who knows about your peculiarities. Then we’ll have our answer.”

  Neither man spoke for a moment. Randy finally broke the silence with a question.

  “Have you ever had a one-night stand that maybe you’ve forgotten about?”

  “I don’t do one-night-stands,” Aaron said indignantly.

  “Just wondering,” Randy said. “But I think we need to work backwards. Who knew about the tie and who also has seen you naked? Aside from your fiancé, of course.”

  It was all so highly embarrassing to Aaron, to discuss his nakedness with a detective.

  “I’ll keep thinking,” Aaron said before he hung up the phone.

  He packed his backpack with water and snacks and headed through the woods. He just needed to see Cathy. If he could see her, he might feel a little less insane.

  He was wrong about that.

  Aaron settled into his watching spot and focused the binoculars on Cathy’s house. Her car was there, which was somehow reassuring to him. He watched for hours, standing up and moving around periodically to stretch his legs. He was doing just that when he heard a car moving up to Cathy’s house.

  He grabbed the binoculars. A white truck with ladders in the back stopped beside Cathy’s car. Aaron moved the binoculars to the side of the truck, where he saw red lettering. Stevens’ Painters. He tried to memorize the phone number.

  A lanky man got out of the truck and headed toward the steps.

  And then there she was, on the porch. An overwhelming feeling of love washed over him. Cathy was laughing, which sent Aaron’s adrenaline rushing through his veins. Her hair was longer and she was dressed in jeans and a sweater. She crooked her arm through the man’s and they went into the house.

  Was Cathy dating the man? That thought sent his mind into tailspins. Every jealous bone in his body knocked on his heart. He sat there a while longer in a frantic state, until the man came out again, less than an hour later. Cathy waved goodbye to him from the porch. Relief spread through him then. She had not kissed him goodbye—at least not in his presence.

  Aaron had had enough for one day. He was spent with the emotions that had coursed through him that afternoon. A thorny vine grabbed him as he hurried through the woods. He tore his leg away, ripping his jeans. He just needed to get home and get a drink.

  *************************

  Aaron checked for Stevens’ Painters on Google the next morning. He found them in the Yellow Pages. He needed to be able to say that.

  “I need to talk to someone about painting my house,” Aaron said to the man who answered the phone.

  “That would be me,” the man said. “I do the painting.”

  Was this the same person Aaron had seen at Cathy’s house? He had no way of knowing so he just went headlong into his speech.

  “My name is Richard Smith,” he said. “I’ve bought the . . . .” He faltered trying to remember the names of the people he had bought the house from.

  “Well, I can’t remember their name now. But I’ve bought a Victorian on the bay that has a turret.”

  “That must be the Loughlin place,” the man said. “I know the house. It’s been empty for a few years.”

  “Yes, and it’s in bad need of painting inside and out,” Aaron said. “Could you come over and give me an estimate?”

  “I sure could. How about this afternoon around three? My name is Neil Stevens, by the way.”

  “Three would work fine, Mr. Stevens,” Aaron said.

  “You can call me Neil. See you this afternoon.”

  Aaron couldn’t concentrate on anything after he ended the call with Neil. He heated up a can of soup and ate it with crackers. He really did need to get back to his trading to keep the money flowing, but that required more mental energy than he had. There was nothing else to do but go to his spying station. It had become his focus, his target, and he was beginning to feel creepy about it.

  He loaded his backpack and navigated his way down the path. Cathy’s car was there, and he settled in for a long and boring watch. But it wasn’t boring. He saw Cathy emerge from the side of her house and head toward the bay. Her dark hair swung as she walked down to the pier, and then all the way down
its length. She stood at the end, looking out over the bay.

  Aaron wanted to run to her, try to explain everything to her, tell her he loved her forever. But he knew he couldn’t. She would think he was crazy, and he thought he might actually be crazy. If he ran to her, he had to have proof of his fidelity. He forced himself to stay where he was, standing now, binoculars focused on Cathy. After a few minutes, Cathy turned around and started walking back down the pier toward her house. She had a little smile on her face that made him happy and sad at the same time.

  Aaron kept the binoculars on Cathy’s face until she went back into her house. He gave up for the day and went back to his house to wait on Neil.

  *************************

  Neil arrived a few minutes before three. Aaron opened the front door, and Neil ambled in with his long legs, looking around.

  “I’ve never been in here before,” he said with awe. “It’s amazing.”

  “I guess so,” Aaron said. He hadn’t really paid too much attention to the house and its bones. He had one goal and one goal only.

  “I’ll need to go through the whole house,” Neil said. “Then look at the exterior.”

  Aaron trailed behind Neil as he went from room to room on the downstairs, then on the second floor. He leaned down to inspect the baseboard several times, and looked up at the crown molding, which was in every room of the house.

  Back downstairs, Neil walked to a door in the living room. Aaron had never even opened the door, he had been so obsessed with Cathy.

  “This is the turret,” Neil said.

  Aaron followed Neil up the stairwell, which was dark and dusty. They emerged into a circular room with windows facing the front and side of the house.

  “Damn!” Neil said. “This is a gem.”

  The floors were hardwood, as they were throughout the house, but the walls curved around. Bookcases lined the walls, following the curves. Aaron had no idea how they had been constructed so meticulously.