Deadly Visions (Nightmare Hall)

by Diane Hoh

  “Like a dying butterfly,” he says, almost sounding sad.

  It only takes a few minutes.

  When it’s over, he bends, picks up the pitcher, walks to a nearby sink and rinses the glass container thoroughly. He dries it, takes it into the storage closet and lodges it on a shelf. When he comes back out, he returns to the still, silent figure lying white-masked on the table.

  When the time is right, he reaches down and pulls the mask free. It comes off without effort. The face beneath it is almost as white as the plastic, although the lips are blue.

  “I guess I forgot to mention that we weren’t making a life mask, after all,” he says. “We were making a death mask.”

  Rachel woke up screaming.

  Chapter 11

  AS THE NIGHTMARE EVAPORATED, and Rachel realized she’d been dreaming, her screams died. No one came running to her door, pounding on it to find out what was wrong. When she turned her head slightly, she realized why. Sunshine was streaming in through the window. It wasn’t night, it was a beautiful afternoon … Sunday, she thought … and everyone was outside, doing fun things.

  Why had she had that obscene nightmare?

  Rachel lay in bed, as silent and motionless as the young woman in her dream. There had been no oil painting this time, no hidden image to warn her of the nightmare to come. It had slithered into her mind on its own. From where? She had been told that dreams were a product of the subconscious mind. But she couldn’t bear to believe that her mind could harbor images as ugly as those in this latest nightmare.

  It was one thing to think she was having nightmares brought on by the hidden images in the oil paintings. Those, at least, she could chalk up to the power of suggestion. Sometimes, she knew, an image that you hardly noticed the first time you saw it, could sink into your mind and park there. Later, it could pop up when you least expected it, even in dreams, because it was in your subconscious. That could have happened to her because of the oil paintings.

  But dreaming something as horrible as this newest nightmare without ever having seen anything that suggested such an atrocious act, was ten thousand times worse.

  Rachel sat up, leaning against the wall. Wait a minute. She had seen something to suggest that dream. The masks. The white plaster life masks made by Aidan and the others. The process had been explained to her, and she had found it frightening. “Not for the claustrophobic,” Joseph had said, and she had shivered in distaste.

  Surely that explained this latest dream of horror, the worst yet. She hadn’t created it with her own mind, after all. The masks had suggested it.

  Was she the only person on campus whose subconscious was so easily manipulated? Did anyone else suffer as she did when they closed their eyes at night, after viewing the works of art in the exhibit?

  Today was the last day the paintings and masks and sculptures would be on display. She couldn’t wait until they were gone.

  Except, they wouldn’t really be gone. Joseph had said that after the exhibit, the works would be on display in shops at the mall, the bank in town, and in various buildings around campus. Unless she stayed in her room forever, she couldn’t escape the paintings and masks entirely.

  But she wouldn’t look at them. Whenever she came across one, she would lower her eyes and hurry past it without taking in one single detail. That way, she wouldn’t be able to dream about it later.

  Her head hurt. Her palms burned, and her shoulders felt like giant hands had been playing tug-of-war with them.

  That poor girl … lying on the table, the straws sticking out of her nostrils until the black-robed figure whispered in her ear, “Surprise!” and yanked the straws free. Grotesque. The whole, insane dream had been grotesque.

  But then, so had the entire episode in the art studio’s storage closet, and that hadn’t been a dream at all. She couldn’t blame anyone for not believing it, not even Aidan. She had tried so hard to explain, but everything she’d said had only sounded weirder than what came before it.

  And the only proof she’d had was the gouge on her forehead, which she’d admitted had been her own doing, and the bloody lump on the back of her head, which she’d also had to admit she’d sustained when she fell. In fact, the only thing her attacker had actually done to her was kick the boxes free and close and lock the door. There was absolutely no way to prove someone had actually done either of those things.

  Rachel sat up, nervously running a hand through her hair and then wincing as her fingers slid into the bump on the back of her head. Deciding that she was not going to spend the rest of her life hiding in her room, she got up, took a long, hot shower which did a lot to ease her aches and pains, and dressed in jeans and a red T-shirt. She was combing her damp, curly hair when Bibi returned, holding a brown paper bag close to her chest. She hesitated in the doorway, her eyes apprehensive.

  Rachel knew immediately that she didn’t want to know what Bibi was carrying. And it occurred to her then that she had gone, in just a couple of days, from someone who had awakened every morning looking forward to the day, to someone who had begun dreading every passing moment. The thought filled her with rage. Why was this happening? And how could it have happened so quickly?

  She sank down on her bed, holding the hairbrush in her hands, her eyes on Bibi. It had taken her so long to get over her parents’ shocking deaths. Her grandmother had been loving and kind and welcoming, but still, it had taken a long, long time to stop being angry and sad and shake that unbearable feeling of abandonment.

  But she’d done it. And after that long, long time, she had finally begun to feel safe and loved again. It hadn’t been easy. She’d had to fight hard for it. And now someone … she had no idea who … someone was trying to take that away from her.

  Rachel’s lips tightened, and her spine stiffened. She wasn’t going to give them an easy time of it. They weren’t going to take away from her what she’d struggled so long for without a battle. “What have you got there?” she asked Bibi. “It’s for me, isn’t it? Let me see it.”

  Slowly, reluctantly, Bibi approached, holding out the package to Rachel. “It was sitting on the floor outside our room when I came back,” she said. “I looked inside, Rachel. I didn’t know it was for you. There wasn’t any name on the bag.”

  Rachel reached inside the folded bag and pulled out her brown shoulder bag. Confused, she looked up at Bibi. “But this is great, Bibi. Now I don’t have to cancel my credit cards or apply for a new driver’s license. This is terrific. Why didn’t you want to give it to me?”

  Bibi sat down on the floor at Rachel’s feet. “Look at it, Rachel,” she said quietly. “Look at the back flap.”

  Now it was Rachel’s turn to hesitate. Bibi’s voice told her too much. Bibi had seen something when she checked inside the brown paper bag that wasn’t going to make her roommate happy. Rachel lifted her head to gaze out the short, wide window. The sun was shining so brightly, it made her eyes ache, and the sky was almost as brilliant a blue as Aidan’s eyes. Such a beautiful day, why ruin it by seeing something that was going to make her miserable?

  “Maybe I’ll wait until later,” she said, still gazing out the window. “Maybe I won’t look at it just now.”

  “No,” Bibi said firmly, “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Rachel. You’d better look at it now.”

  Rachel tore her eyes away from the window and looked down again at the purse. It looked so innocent, lying there in her lap, the brown leather shoulder bag she had hoped would show up. Now it had, but she wasn’t rejoicing, was she?

  “You’re right,” she said, remembering her resolve to fight against whatever was threatening her safety. “I’m being silly. It’s probably nothing.”

  Bibi’s expression said quite clearly that it wasn’t “nothing.” But Rachel turned the purse over, anyway.

  Paper-clipped to the back flap of her purse was a page torn from a small desk calendar. Every day following Sunday had been slashed through with vivid red paint. Scrawled across the top of
the page in the same shiny red were the words YOU WILL NEVER SEE ANOTHER MONDAY.

  Monday. Tomorrow. She was never going to see tomorrow? Or any other tomorrow?

  Holding the defaced calendar page gingerly, Rachel looked up at Bibi. “Is there more inside?” she asked quietly, her voice strained.

  Bibi’s blonde ponytail flew as she shook her head. “I didn’t have the guts to look. I don’t think you should, either, Rachel. That message on your purse is enough to take to campus security. Let’s just take the purse and go to the security office and let them look inside, okay?”

  Rachel’s expression was grim. “No. It’s my purse. I’ll look.”

  “Rachel, you don’t know what’s in there. That’s a threat on the flap. The purse could be booby-trapped or something.”

  Rachel uttered a short, harsh laugh. “Booby-trapped? You mean like with a bomb? I thought I was the one with the imagination. I’ll bet there isn’t anything at all inside. Someone is just trying to scare me.” She laughed again, without humor. “Like I’m not already.”

  Bibi, her eyes wide, scooted backward on the floor until her back bumped into the desk chair. She sat on the floor, watching.

  Rachel picked up the purse, pulled the zipper open, and peered inside. Then, frowning, she slid her fingers inside and when she withdrew them, she was holding a small, white plastic-wrapped package in her hands.

  “Rachel, please don’t open that,” Bibi begged. “Please!”

  “Oh, come on, Bibi,” Rachel said lightly, dropping the purse on the floor to begin untying the twine around the white plastic, “you know what they say. Good things come in small packages, right?” But her fingers were shaking as she tugged at the twine.

  They were so lost in the moment that when a knock came on the door, both jumped and cried out.

  “Rachel, it’s Aidan. You in there?”

  “And Joseph and Paloma,” Paloma’s voice called. “We’re here, too.”

  “And Sam,” Samantha added, laughing.

  Bibi sighed with relief and jumped up to let them in. “Now I don’t have to be the only one witnessing the unveiling,” she said over her shoulder as she opened the door. In a rush of words, she told the group what was going on. Her words tumbled out in a jumble that no one grasped.

  They were still puzzled as they came inside and saw Rachel sitting on the bed unwrapping the package.

  Bibi scooped up the purse and showed them the words scrawled in paint on the calendar page.

  Paloma paled visibly, Joseph uttered a quiet oath, Aidan hurried over to Rachel’s side and sat down on the bed beside her, and Samantha said sensibly, “Rachel, you should have just taken that package to security.”

  “I told her the same thing,” Bibi said, sitting down on her own bed, “but she wouldn’t listen.”

  “I knew it was a painting,” Rachel said as she peeled away the plastic to reveal a small, rectangular object. She held up the object, facing it toward them so they could all see it. “And that’s exactly what it is.”

  It was indeed a painting. A small one, perhaps five inches across and seven inches high, but definitely a painting, done not in oil this time, but pastel water colors: pink and mauve and rose on a white background.

  Everyone stared at the small work of art, but Rachel didn’t need to. The minute she’d pulled the last of the plastic away, she had known what she would find. Her nightmare … this time, after the fact. And indeed, that was exactly what she saw in the painting, although she doubted that anyone else would see it in the muted haze of pink and rose and white.

  At first glance, it appeared to be another still life, this one also of flowers. This time, the pink and rose flowers were in a field or a rambling garden.

  But Rachel saw clearly, among the vague circles and swirls of pale pink and rose, the white table, the ghostly figure lying motionless on the table, the white death mask covering the young woman’s face.

  No one else would see it, of course. They hadn’t seen the drowning figure. They hadn’t seen the figure tumbling down the flight of stairs. If those images had been cleverly hidden within the strokes of oil, this hidden image of the figure lying on the table among the pale watercolors was even more vague. Rachel thought that she wouldn’t even have seen it herself if she hadn’t already had the dream.

  How could she have had the nightmare before she’d seen this painting?

  “That calendar page is from the desk in the art building lobby,” Joseph said. “See that little design at the top, the crisscrossed pen and paintbrush? But I don’t get it,” he added, furrowing thick, dark brows. “The words are scary, but the painting isn’t.”

  “Look at it closely,” Rachel said, knowing it was futile, but passing the small painting around, anyway. “Don’t you see anything in that painting but flowers?” It was maddening, being so certain of what she was seeing and, at the same time, being incapable of making them see it, too.

  They passed it from hand to hand, each of them studying the watercolor carefully, looking for some hint of what the message on the purse had threatened.

  No one but her saw anything.

  It doesn’t matter, Rachel thought dispiritedly as she retrieved the painting from a bewildered Aidan. The hidden images weren’t meant for any of them, anyway. They were meant for only one person. Me. And I see them.

  The artist had accomplished what every artist wanted more than anything. He had achieved his goal in painting the watercolor. He had sent a message, and the message had been received.

  The message was: Rachel Seaver, you are going to die.

  Chapter 12

  “THAT LOOKS LIKE SOMETHING you’d do, Sam,” Joseph said to Samantha; pointing at the water-color in Rachel’s trembling hands. “It’s got your touch. All those dull, weak pastels. And it is a watercolor, your specialty.”

  “Who are you kidding, Joseph?” Samantha said, leaning over Rachel to study the small painting. “You’ve never paid enough attention to my work to have any idea where my real talent lies.”

  “What talent?” Joseph murmured.

  Rachel hurt for Samantha, although Sam herself seemed unperturbed by Joseph’s comment. She never even glanced at him. “Everyone’s a critic,” she said dryly, and then tapped a finger on the watercolor and said to Rachel, “It’s just a painting, Rachel. It can’t hurt you. But I don’t blame you for being upset about the calendar. That’s pretty creepy.”

  “And Joseph’s right,” Paloma said, “that page is from the calendar in the lobby of the art building.”

  “Which means,” Aidan pointed out, “that any one of hundreds of people who viewed the exhibit could have helped himself to that page. No one would have noticed someone pocketing a calendar page.”

  Rachel wasn’t listening. She was staring at the painting. Flowers … so many flowers … like at a funeral.

  YOU WILL NEVER SEE ANOTHER MONDAY.

  Who had stolen her purse? Kicked those boxes out from under her? Locked that closet door?

  Rachel felt as if her brain was rapidly disintegrating. What was left of it remembered that she had put something in her purse before she’d climbed up on those boxes. What was it? What had she confiscated?

  Oh. A smock. Aidan’s smock. Because of … because of the paint stains, the colors.

  She slid her hand into the purse again, fumbling around, even though she was certain now that she wouldn’t find what she was seeking.

  Because it wasn’t there.

  Aidan’s smock was gone.

  She glanced up at him, her heart denying what her brain was thinking. The truth was, Aidan could have painted this simple water-color with one hand tied behind his back. And only Aidan would have any reason to remove that smock, with its telltale paint blobs, from her purse.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked when he noticed that she was staring at him. “Why do I all of a sudden feel like I have two heads?”

  Rachel’s silence gave her away.

  Aidan’s eyes narrowed. H
e said quietly, intensely, “You just put me on your list of suspects, didn’t you? You think I sent you that calendar page? Why would you think that, Rachel?”

  “I never said I thought that, Aidan.” Then, boldly, “I mean, there isn’t any reason why you would, is there?”

  Aidan looked as if she’d slapped him.

  “Rachel!” Paloma gasped, clearly shocked. “How could you suspect Aidan?”

  Samantha, however, said nothing, which Rachel found interesting. If anyone were going to rush to Aidan’s defense, she would have expected it to be Sam. They seemed to be such close friends. Maybe Sam knew something about Aidan that no one else did.

  “I would just like to remind you,” Aidan said icily, “that while you were supposedly trapped in that supply closet, I was downstairs in the lobby making small talk about art with two professors and a teaching assistant. If you’d like to check with them, I’d be happy to give you their names.”

  But Rachel didn’t feel like backing down. Hadn’t she dreamed about someone being suffocated with a death mask? Aidan made those masks. Others did, too, but he was the best at it. Maybe that particular nightmare had been her subconscious, warning her not to trust him. And as far as Aidan’s alibi went, he could have slipped away from the lobby conversation just long enough to take the elevator upstairs, grab her purse, and lock her in the closet. He could have been back downstairs before anyone even noticed he was missing.

  Everyone was staring at her.

  Rachel didn’t want to think these things about Aidan. If she could be that wrong about someone she was attracted to, that made her too stupid to live. Also, she was still attracted to him, and already sorry that she’d hurt his feelings.

  “Look,” she said, laying the purse aside, “I’m sorry, Aidan. I didn’t mean that. But you don’t know what it was like, any of you. You don’t even seem to believe that it all happened the way I said it did. Being trapped in that awful place, thinking I’d never get out, and then that horrible ride down in the dumbwaiter. I’ve never been so scared in my life. And now this,” holding up the calendar page. “So don’t expect me to act rationally, because I don’t think I can, okay? I’m shaking inside.”