Beloved Evangeline (A Dark Paranormal Urban Fantasy Trilogy for Grown-ups - Book 1)

by W. C. Anderson

  I was too shaken, and I felt defenseless. I’m not even a real person to them—just some kind of freakish sport—so I don’t know why anything they said mattered to me. Still, no witty comebacks came. “I’m... busy...” was all I managed to get out. So stupid. I could feel the tears threatening to spill out. It was only by force of sheer will that I kept them from doing just that.

  Steve put his arm around my shoulder and pulled me to the side. “Let me tell you something: I know you’re not busy,” he whispered in my ear, “and if you really want to show everyone you’re not just the weird little office loser, you’ll be at my place tonight. You’ve snubbed me for five years now, but you got nowhere left to run. I know you don’t want to hide any more from whatever it is you’ve been hiding from. ” I instinctively stiffened and tried to pull away; he pulled me closer. “Come on, it’s me, the S-dog…” At this, I opened my mouth to make a snide comment, unable to contain the smart-ass in me even at such a moment, but he continued, apparently unaware, “I know your little secret, and if you don’t show up my party, I’m going to make sure everyone else knows it, too. Those are the rules.”

  He squeezed my arm painfully before smiling and releasing his grip, returning to the rest of guys nonchalantly.

  As they left, Steve shot me a look over his shoulder, winking. “See you tomorrow, sweetheart.”

  I hardly said anything during lunch. I know everyone noticed. I couldn’t stop thinking: How could they have found out about me? I couldn’t bear the thought of everyone knowing. I’d have to move again, or would I? I don’t know anymore. I don’t know if it would make much difference. I’m not really close to anyone here anymore. Maybe I could stay. For some reason I stared at the food on my plate like that was going to help matters. I couldn’t help it. It felt like my life was unraveling.

  “Aren’t you going to eat anything, Evangeline?” Nicky asked cautiously.

  Nicky Cauffield was my childhood best friend. She’s a petite, blue-eyed blonde, who never seems to let anything in this world really get her down, and the best friend I’ve ever had. All my subsequent female friends in life have been compared to her, and none have really measured up. She’s never competitive, effortlessly cool, and unfailingly loyal. She’s married now, with two beautiful little girls, Gwen, 7, and Liv, 5, to whom I am godmother. Her husband, Jeff, works for the Jaguars in some kind of merchandising capacity. He doesn’t like me much. Nicky’s life is perfect; something is clearly wrong with her taste in friends.

  I missed her terribly when my family moved to New Mexico when I was about 13. Then, by a miraculous twist of fate, we ended up working at the same place when I moved back to Jacksonville five years ago. I’d like to say we picked up right where we left off as kids, and maybe we did.... for a little while. Unfortunately, we’d sort of drifted apart since then. Friendships are something I have difficulty sustaining these days.

  My head shot up quickly, and I forced myself to make fleeting eye contact with each of them, despite the shame I felt in my heart. “I’m not very hungry today, sorry guys, but… I did change my mind about the party. I decided to go after all.”

  Gavin shot me a look of excited surprise. “That’s great, Evangeline! Wow, this is gonna be awesome. I can’t wait to cuss with Steve’s head tomorrow,” he cheered, rubbing his hands together.

  I shook my head hopelessly.

  “Yeah, Evangeline. It’s been so long since we’ve hung out outside work. I’m really glad you decided to go,” Nicky added, smiling sincerely.

  Simon hadn’t looked up during any of this and continued to glower at his plate. “What made you change your mind? I thought you hated... parties.” He spat out the word.

  “I... just thought it’d be nice to get out ...” More lies.

  I’m a terrible liar and he could obviously tell. Simon got up and left the table without saying another word. I stared after him nervously, chewing on my lip.

  “I think he’s just upset because you quit going to all of Gavin’s parties awhile back, remember? You said you hated parties and happy hours?” Nicky gave a small smile of encouragement, “And I think he was under the impression you didn’t really like Steve, either. Don’t worry, I’m sure he’ll have calmed down by tomorrow.”

  Gavin just shrugged unhelpfully.

  When I returned to my desk, there was a buzz of activity. Before I could ask what was going on, a dark shadow passed across the glass of my office window, and I froze. Time suspended as the shadow moved across the largest pane of glass I’d ever seen it reflected in—a disturbing pair of eyes nearly discernable.

  “Be careful this weekend, Evangeline,” called Mr. Oxley from the doorway.

  Files cascaded out of my hands as I froze, stupefied.

  Only after Mr. Oxley helped me sort out the files—without even asking how they’d escaped from my hands—did I steal a glance at the window. Only an unblemished ocean of blue sky floating in it.

  I shook my head and managed to inquire, “Why? What’s going on?”

  “There’s been another accident I’m afraid. Poor woman. They found her in front of an abandoned apartment building. They’re estimating the time of death at around midnight, just like all the others. Apparently, the police say scaffolding must have collapsed on her, but there just seem to be too many of these strange accidents occurring. It just makes you think. I mean, people aren’t calling this monster the ‘Midnight Murderer’ for no reason. You have to believe there’s a connection somehow.”

  “Yeah, no need to worry about me,” I responded, with maybe just a bit too much confidence.

  He shook his head incredulously, like he couldn’t possibly trust me to keep myself safe over a weekend, before walking away, briefcase in hand.

  Another woman dead. I’d lost track of how many there’d been. Nine? Ten? I couldn’t be sure. It certainly didn’t seem as safe as it had just a few months earlier, before these bizarre deaths started happening. Each woman was killed in a different, slightly bizarre way, or in no discernable way at all. The police were calling them all accidents, but like Mr. Oxley said, it just seemed too much of a stretch for them not to be related. Unfortunately, if the police felt differently, they probably weren’t even looking for a killer…

  The rest of the day passed quickly.

  3.

  That evening I felt like there was something I had to do, and before I knew it, I was on my way to visit a woman at a mental institution, the violent wing. It’s the place I dread going more than any other, but feel a powerful obligation pulling on me. She is restrained, screaming at the top of her lungs, as I walk down the corridor. Orderlies are having difficulty keeping her in her restraints. She has the look of someone who has been institutionalized for a long, long time. Hopeless. Though her features are faintly familiar, she is all but unrecognizable from the woman I remember, the woman whose features I thought I would never forget. The doctor meets me in the hallway and tells me I have to wait—it’s not safe for me to be here right now. Wait, here, he says, until she’s sedated. It’s hard to hear him, with all the screaming.

  I sit down in the waiting room somewhat awkwardly. A peculiar mix of people tend to congregate at mental hospitals for the criminally insane. First there’s this man next to me, who’s wearing a suit and is quite handsome and well-groomed. I think maybe he’s also a visitor until my eyes reach his feet, which are shoed with violent purple Mary Janes. He says nothing and doesn’t make eye contact with the rest of us. Then there’s the woman on the other side of him, who I initially think is an obvious mental patient because of the neon green silk top and jeans six sizes too big that she’s tied with a flannel shirt, but then I begin to have doubts. Maybe she just got herself dressed in the dark or was in a coma for the last 20 years.

  There’s a man about my age sitting in the corner who show’s no outward signs of infirmity except for annoying me with his insistence that I change jackets with him.

  I say, “Thank you,” “No, thank you,” “I’m good,
” and finally, “I really don’t want to?”

  Last, but not least, is a morbidly obese woman wearing a dangerously flimsy dingy white cotton tank top and shorts. She stares at me while chewing her nails and spitting them out. Her eyes narrow before she asks, “You got kin here?”

  Me, I stare off into space and try to look as crazy as possible in order to fit in. Fortunately, it isn’t hard.

  And then there’s the smell. The odor is equal parts long unbathed skin, soiled laundry, and cigarette smoke, with maybe a dash of bleach. There is no other smell in the world quite as haunting.

  Finally, after what seems like hours, I’m lead back into another room as I shrug back into my own properly-fitting jacket. For a long time it seems I can hear nothing but my own heart beat—my own Tell-Tale Heart, haunting me, reminding me of things I’d rather forget. Then I see the woman: she is different now, calm, her face blank, eyes... dead. I try to speak, but have difficulty finding the right words to say, especially with my heart beating so loudly, announcing its betrayal. It’s been a long, long time since I’ve seen her, and that last time was very... painful. I need to tell her something, but I can’t seem to remember what. It’s too disturbing, seeing her like this.

  The woman twitches, finally sensing that someone is there. She turns to look at me, her eyes blank at first. Her eyes slowly narrow in recognition, and she draws in a breath. “What do you want?” she asks in a low, flippant voice.

  “I just… I wanted… I just want to talk to you...” Faltering again? Really? Have I no better words for her after all this time?

  She writhes back and forth. It’s obvious even to this woman that I am an utter failure. She continues to thrash back and forth as I watch her uncomfortably. Every time I’m here, she never seems to tire of trying to break free from the restraints.

  “Wait. Please,” I finally manage, “I need to tell you something.”

  She seems calmed by that, at least physically, however momentarily. Or maybe, focused is a more appropriate term. “Last time you were here I told you never to come back. I have nothing to say to you.”

  I swallowed hard. “But it’s important. Please.... what can I do? There must be something I can do to help.”

  “It’s your fault I’m here, Evangeline, so how could you possibly help?”

  The dagger in my back, every single time I come here. “I know,” I said quietly, trying to regain my composure, “but I saw things, I know that you should not be here. I could help, if you’d just tell me where to look, what to do. I can’t do it on my own. I’ve tried...”

  “That should be obvious to you,” she turned and looked at me for the first time, “Why don’t you just ask… where would a rotten little girl like would you look?”

  “I’m not... rotten…” I turn my eyes downward. I couldn’t look at her any more. I had said the words out loud, but of course, I didn’t believe them. I’m painfully aware of just how true her words were, so much so, in fact, that it actually seems laughable.

  I could feel her staring at me for what seemed an endless moment. My entire soul could feel her eyes, their scrutiny blazing into my heart, my soul. I shifted uncomfortably.

  “I know, I know... I’m sorry I said those things, honey. I didn’t mean them. I get a little mixed up sometimes,” she purred softly, releasing me from her stare. I didn’t know why she relented so quickly, and I didn’t care. Relief flooded over me. I could breathe again.

  While I was concentrating on regaining control of my heart rate, she leaned toward the door, seemingly to ascertain whether anyone was coming. “Hey, can you... bring me something? I like to read the paper, but they say it upsets me too much... would you mind handing it to me, before the doctor comes back?” She gestured toward the newspaper on the table. I’d never noticed it before, but they had painstakingly recreated a mock visiting room table to promote the illusion of normalcy. The paper was obviously months, if not years, old.

  I hesitated only a moment before instinctively bringing the paper over to her, accustomed as I was to doing as I was told. It was, I thought, the least I could. Instead of taking the paper, however, she instead grabbed my wrist. I yanked it defensively, but she was impossibly strong.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be dead just like your little friend?” she whispered, tilting her head toward me. I got a whiff of her breath, which had the foulness of the long institutionalized. The horrific stench knocked my head back.

  “Why did you come here? Haven’t you caused me enough pain?” The words were serious, but her tone was mocking. She smiled a crooked smile. “Sorry you didn’t kill me too when you had the chance?” Her words paralyzed me; I had no response. While I was stunned and distracted, she managed to break her arm free of one of her restraints and grabbed for my throat.

  The orderlies charged in at the sound of chaos and went about holding her down. She burst into cackling laughter. That hideous laughter failed to subside the entire length of the hallway.

  Obviously, coming here was a big mistake. Nothing had changed. Whatever redemption I was searching for continued to elude me; perhaps it would be that way forever. I watched her all the way to the end of the hall, the echoes of her mad laughter still vibrating in my ears, my hands forever trembling. “Love you, too, Mom,” I whispered.

  That night I woke up in a cold sweat on my bedroom hardwood floor in a state of confusion. Photographs were scattered all around, on top of, and underneath me. As I sat up, an odd sensation made me reach for my cheek. I discovered a picture stuck to my skin there. I hate it when I get nostalgic like this—it often induces nightmares. Unfortunately, unlike most normal people, my nightmares aren’t so easy to shrug off. My nightmares are real. The doctor are fond of telling me these visits upset her, but what choice is there?

  I looked down at the picture I’d unstuck from my cheek. That one caught my attention, as I was sure it had done last night, though I had no memory whatsoever of actually pulling out these pictures in the first place. This particular photograph was of my mom and me. I was probably five or six in the photo. My mother was improbably beautiful back then. She had flowing chestnut hair and brilliant blue eyes.

  I looked at myself in the cracked vanity bureau. I hadn’t inherited many of her traits. My hair is sort of a plain, mousy Celtic brown, not the rich color of my mother’s, and I simply cannot stand to have it looking perfectly done. The current cut is a kind of long shag, with the ends looking at once jagged and tousled. That’s the way I like it. Also, unlike her, my skin is covered in freckles, which, I’m frequently told, is somewhat unusual for someone who also has the ability to tan. Though any color I’m lucky enough to receive never lasts for very long, the price, apparently, for defying these laws of nature.

  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I feel that I’m necessarily unattractive, it’s just... there’s no other woman in movies or on television who looks anything like me, and it leaves me feeling slightly freakish. At a lanky—gangly even—very broad-shouldered five foot ten, with a freckled face and a dark cloud over my head, I don’t exactly fit into any particular mold.

  Anyway, none of that matters now. I’ll tuck the memory of her away, and bury it down deep again so I can go on with my life—such as it is.

  Underneath one of the pictures, I saw the glint of a laminated card and my heart skipped a beat. I reached into the box cautiously, pulling out my hand-made Haunted Explorers Society badge. I loved my mother dearly, and I knew she’d never been crazy. I’d seen things with her, a kind of magic, that was impossible not to believe. As soon as I was old enough, I set out to search for proof; proof that I hoped would absolve her. I know now that the roots of an obsession had taken hold, an obsession that lives within me still, but at the time, I couldn’t see it.

  At the time, I thought my obstacle was not having a guide, a mentor, someone to see me on my way. Where do you start on a quest without a guide to show you the way? Without a shepherd, I believed I was lost. I pored over 19th Century novels in my sp
are time, thinking that would help somehow.

  Many of them started out with people who didn’t really know what kind of problem they had on their hands—let alone where to begin—and there was always someone whom they could count on to go out and set things right. I don’t know if things were just different back then or what, but nowadays, there’s really nowhere for a person to turn for help with the kind of problems I’ve got. (I dare you to read Dracula or Jane Eyre and not come away thinking they were possessed with a certain knowledge back then that has simply been lost to us today.)

  For want of anything better, I began simply by trying to rule out all possibilities to arrive at some sort of starting point. The most important of these was to prove or disprove a supernatural explanation and had indoctrinated Nicky and my neighbor, Jonathan, into my search for the supernatural when we were just nine-years-old. Society membership came with painstakingly drawn cards, me donning each of us the status of Beloved Member, just because it sounded creepy and, perhaps even official and clever.