What Eye See

by Matt A Byron

  The sun had begun to set with perhaps with just under an hour of daylight remaining. Renna’s shop was on the east end of town which also featured a gas station to the left of the shop and a small flower shop to its right. No other businesses occupied the block. Across the street from the shop was an old tire store that had gone out of business years ago and remained deserted. Etchings of words of the previous business were still visible in the storefront window.

  Renna’s shop wasn’t what one would expect, it had a red brick facade, a big window in front proclaiming in big bold white letters, “Renna’s Spiritual Journey”, and a white glass door that depicted two angels outlined in yellow holding hands and smiling.

  She parked the car in front of the shop and stepped out. She looked through the big window but didn’t see any movement. They walked up the few steps that lead to the front landing. The sign on the glass door was turned to closed. Melissa stood beside her quietly but looked less frightened than she did earlier.

  “You’re going to tell me what’s going on Mel.”

  Melissa moved up to the glass door and turned to wait for Emery to follow. Before she could raise her hand to knock on the door, a shadow moved from within the store that caused her to pause. No lights were on the inside, and the sun was settling down beyond the mountain horizon making everything harder to see. A large form moved to the other side of the door, and a moment later the door swung open, and a booming voice erupted.

  “Emery Darling, Oh my dear it is so wonderful to see you. Come in darling, come in.”

  Her voice echoed a sentiment of kindness and assurance. She knew in this first moment that her sister had been right, whatever was going to happen, Renna would be able to help.

  Renna led her to a room she referred to as the parlor. Two high back chairs with floral lining sat on one side of a vintage oak table. A sofa and love seat with matching floral design as the chairs angled at an L shape along the other side of the table and end furthest from them. The chairs were angled towards each other so when they sat down they were facing one another.

  The room was dark as shadows danced along the walls from the many burning candles within the room. She didn’t know if Renna’s electric bill hadn’t been paid or maybe she just had an aversion to manufactured light. In either case, Emery would have opted for more light as the events of the past few hours seemed to coincide with the dark shadows that danced at the edges of the room.

  Renna offered her something to drink, but she declined. She shifted nervously in her seat and Renna leaned forward and patted her leg with her right hand.

  “Something isn’t right, there’s a darkness hanging over you, I can feel it.”

  Emery looked toward the couch where Melissa sat quietly before turning her attention back to Renna.

  “I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t want to bother you, but I didn’t know where else to turn.”

  Renna glanced over at the couch and then back at her. The woman’s big brown gentle eyes, even in the shadowy room gave her some comfort.

  “There are things in this world we don’t understand. There are things in the other world we don’t understand but if we open our minds to what is out there we might be able to see a moment of clarity that would enlighten our souls of what’s to come.”

  She didn’t understand what she meant. Renna leaned back, looking at the couch but this time, her eyes lingered a little longer before returning her gaze to her.

  “Did she see me?” Melissa asked, “She looked right at me.”

  “I knew from the moment I answered the door child, I felt the immense sadness both of you carry,” she continued, “and I can feel your energy child and hear you but I cannot see you.”

  Looking back at Melissa and then to Renna she said, “Something has happened, the spirits are aware of me, and I fear something might be coming for me.”

  “You told me when we first met that you could see the spirits, but they couldn’t see you, I had trouble understanding what that meant. Never in my years had I come across a situation such as yours,” she paused, “I cannot see spirits like you, but I can feel them and communicate with them so my path has always been different from yours.”

  She remained quiet and let her continue, “I believe you have always had this gift in you, but the portal for some reason wasn’t completely open. Your path is unique in that you can see them; some force is allowing you to be aware of them for a greater purpose that is not yet realized. Now it seems that your path is clear now, and your true journey can finally begin.

  “You think some unseen force is using me for a greater purpose? Why me?”

  “Somebody must make the journey I suppose. I believe that something is guiding you, helping you to see what others cannot but for what purpose I do not know. That is part of the journey, the discovery.”

  “I stopped believing in imaginary friends when I was six.”

  “Every one of us has a guide, an unseen spirit that helps us throughout life and with it brings unique experiences.”

  “So the guide that was looking out for my sister must have called out sick that day because he sure as hell didn’t help her.”

  Renna’s voice was gentle and soothing, “These guides cannot interfere with our path, they can only assist us while we are on it. They cannot decide our destination nor can they change it.”

  “So they stand by and watch us but cannot truly help us. I don’t get it,” Emery continued, “I found myself in the middle of a robbery which I was shot, and my sister was killed. There was this boy there I think was a spirit, but he saw me and then something spoke to me in my house, and now I think the spirits are coming for me.”

  “Slow down darling, let me get my cards,” Renna stood up and started to leave the room before stopping and turning back to her, “I don’t feel that they are coming for you, darling, oh no.”

  Renna left the room.

  “You never said something happened at home, what happened to you M?”

  “You weren’t there. You left me, you just left me Mel and when did I have a chance to tell you anything. There seems to be a lot you’re not telling me.”

  “You two shouldn’t fight, you’re going to need each other dear,” Renna said from the other room.

  “I don’t get it,” she said to Melissa, “she said nothing is coming, but you said something was, to come here, that she would be able to help.”

  “M, listen to me, I know I shouldn’t have left. It’s complicated. You still should have told me you were in danger. I still feel that something is coming.”

  The older woman returned and sat back down holding a deck of Tarot cards.

  “Oh, I didn’t say nothing was coming dear, just they aren’t coming for you. Now, let’s see what the cards say.”

  She felt the air rush out of her lungs. She tried to suck in as much air as she could, but she felt a heaviness in her chest, tightness in her throat that blocked any air from finding her lungs. After a minute or two, she was able to draw her breath more easily.

  The flicker of lights continued to dance along the walls as if they were demons in some ritualistic ceremony waiting for their chance to take her.

  “You’re safe here. Nothing evil can come inside these walls, so clear your mind of such things.”

  Her mouth hung open, speechless. She looked at Melissa, who shrugged her shoulders and watched as the woman began placing cards on the table.

  She watched as Renna placed the cards on the table one by one looking at her facial expressions but if she saw anything in the cards it wasn’t’ revealed in her face. She would place one card down, look at it for a moment and proceed to place another card and repeated the process.

  Once she was done with the cards she studied them for a moment, the stillness of the room was unnerving. She felt a lump in her throat and she swallowed hard to get it down. She wanted to ask her what she saw but did not want to know at the same time.

  The Pink Panthe
r tune rang from Emery’s purse causing her to jump. She fumbled it out of her purse and hit a button that muted the tune. The caller ID field showed Trevor was calling her. She apologized and dropped the phone back into her purse. A minute later the tune started again, and she retrieved the phone but this time, it was an unknown number. She hit the ignore button and switched the phone to vibrate before dropping it back in her purse.

  Renna lets out a sigh as she stared at the cards that were laid out before her. Emery thought a sigh was not the type of sound that proceeded good news and felt her stomach begin to tighten.

  She told Emery that there was negative energy around her. The spirits were not at rest.

  “What do you mean, not at rest?” Emery questioned.

  Renna clasped her hands to her mouth and let out a deep breath before moving them back to her lap. She looked over at the couch and then back to Emery.

  “The spirit world knows that something is out of order. Even in death, there is a certain order to things. It’s a cycle much like life, and something is definitely wrong.”

  She looked over at the couch again and then back to the cards before resting her eyes on Emery.

  “She means me, M,” Melissa blurted.

  “No. No. No. she doesn’t,” and then to Renna, “What are you saying?”

  “Your sister knows. She’s known it all along. That is why she brought you to me.”

  “What are you saying? What does she know?”

  She looked over at Melissa, who stared back at her quietly and then faded away before her eyes. One moment she was as solid as the couch and the next moment she seemed to evaporate like something you would see in a science fiction movie.

  “Darling, your sister doesn’t belong here. Her being here has left a door open that is disrupting the spirit world. The spirits aren’t after you, they are after her.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “They see a door that is open that they cannot go through but she can, they see life and want a life which puts you in danger. The two worlds were not meant to co-exist.”

  “I have seen spirits since I was a child, they have always co-existed. I’m sure others have opened the door before and found a way to close it, what are you saying?”

  Renna leaned forward, her voice was low, but her eyes focused on Emery when she spoke, “You see spirits darling that have never closed the door. The longer the spirits linger with the living their essence dissolves, they lose themselves. You have seen it; they seem lost, defeated. They die all over again but this time is worse because their spirit becomes trapped in this world and they are lost forever with no chance to ever cross over again.”

  Nothing made sense; she didn’t understand what Renna was trying to tell her. She remembered the woman she saw the day of the shooting, the helplessness she felt watching her staring at nothing.

  “The spirits I see are ones who can’t leave this world, and they are stuck staring at a tree or something for eternity.”

  “Some of them, yes, but not all of them.”

  Emery saw her first spirit when she was seven years old. Her mother had taken her and her sister to visit their grandfather in a nursing home. Her grandfather was sick, and her mother was upset. She stood in the back of the room while her mother and her sister stood by her grandfather’s bed. She felt nervous, and the sight of her grandfather in that condition upset her so she kept her distance. That’s when she saw the woman sitting on a chair in the corner of the room. She stared at her grandfather but never looked at her or said a word. She seemed sick, her skin was loose and gray like, she remembered, and her eyes never moved from her grandfather.

  Melissa had gestured for her to come next to the bed so her grandfather could see her. When they were leaving the room, Emery looked back at the chair; the woman remained transfixed on her grandfather. Emery asked her sister who the woman in the chair was in which her sister replied there was no one else in the room, and she should stop making up stories. Her grandfather passed away that night, and Emery always believed the woman in the chair was her grandmother.

  Shaking away the remnants of the memory of long ago, Emery looked back at Renna, who was now holding her hands with both of hers. The woman’s eyes looked deeply at her, almost looking through her. She tried to pull her hands back, but the woman’s grip did not relent.

  The room felt different, the air held a musty odor she hadn’t noticed before. The room was dimmer as the flickering light no longer danced along the walls but instead had succumbed to the lingering darkness. Only a trickle of light remained in a sea of consuming darkness.

  “Your sister cannot stay,” the voice was wrong, a sharp bite to the words made her try to pull away again.

  Grabbing her hands, Renna spoke again, “Great suffering will follow, they will come for her, they will come for you, and there will be no escape.”

  She had seen spirits most of her life, and she knew the person that looked back at her was not Renna.

  “What do you want?”

  Renna chuckled a moment before letting out a long sigh as her eyes remained focused on her. Chills ran down her spine as she looked back at her. The room had gotten colder as the grip around her hands tightened, Renna leaned closer to her.

  When she spoke, her voice was flat, devoid of emotion and it appeared that the eyes that fell upon her were filled with hatred.

  “To warn you.”

  Emery attempted to pull back her hands but Renna’s grip was too tight, she smiled at her struggle.

  “Warn me about what?”

  The smile faded, “A trial of death has commenced, the passage has been opened, and that passage leads to you.”

  “Is this because of my sister?”

  The Renna thing nodded.

  “Leave my sister alone, leave me alone!”

  Finally pulling free, she sprang up from the chair as Renna’s eyes followed her. Renna or what resided in her remained seated but followed her with her eyes as she made her way to the door. As she looked back, her face formed a big smile. Not a smile of someone that was happy to see you but more like a smile of someone you don’t want to ever see again telling you in a single gesture that they will see you soon.

  She sprinted out the door and down three steps when she stopped suddenly as she realized she had left her purse inside. She took a breath and turned back toward the door as the spirit inside Renna stood on the doorstep, two feet away, holding her purse.

  The smile was gone from its face thankfully. The thing that pretended to be Renna held out its left hand, fingers curled around the straps of Emery’s purse, the purse dangled in the air, its unblinking eyes transfixed on her. Renna no longer resided in the body and what looked back at her gave her chills as she could feel the darkness that hid behind those eyes.

  She watched as the purse dropped at her feet and when she looked back up she found herself alone on the doorstep. The door was open, but the spirit inside Renna was no longer in sight. She scooped up her purse and ran down the walkway and jumped into her car.

  She locked the doors, turned on the ignition and gave a final glance back at the house and saw the smiling spirit inside Renna gazing at her from the front window.

  Chapter Seven