Fragile. Frail. Breakable. These are not the words one would associate with her – but today, I do. She’s changed again. She’s weaker somehow. She looks like she’s the one who fell down the stairs.
It is this feebleness, though, that terrifies me the most. I’m running out of time. I feel it in my lungs, in my chest, in the recesses of my inner being.
I need to do something. I need to save him. I need to save us all.
This whole thing has gone too far, and I’ve sat witness too long. So many excuses have swirled in my head, a jarring carousel tune that won’t stop. I need to stop it. I have no choice but to stop it because suddenly, with clarity, I realise how this thing ends – and I can’t let it happen.
* * *
She sits now in the dining room, staring out the window. For a long moment, I wonder if she’s staring at me – but then I realise her face is too blank, too forlorn to be making a statement. She’s too far gone.
She rests, hands perched on the arms of the chair, gaze steadily fixed on – what? The sky? The birds? The grass? – for hours. I stare right back, studying, watching, waiting.
What’s going on in that head of hers? Is tonight the night she pushes it too far?
No. She’s too fragile today. She’s not feeling powerful today. She’s … different. Almost pathetic.
Her body is slumped so that she’s almost folded into herself, and I see the crumpling of her body as a mirror image of the crinkled soul within.
How does one get so lost? And why isn’t anyone trying to pull her out?
Desperation clings in my chest. Why couldn’t I pull her out? What was I thinking? Instead of helping, I’ve pushed her. The knife. The harsh words. The questioning statements.
I knew better. I know better. That was my chance. I could’ve set things right. I could’ve made up for it all. But now it might be too late.
It’s all too late, but the thing is, I did know. I knew.
And it’s the fear in me that’s been fighting back, sinking its teeth into her, into the situation, and into everything else around me.
* * *
I inhale sharply as my eyes fling open, my heart racing. Before I can understand what’s happening, I see her wicked grin, her almost-black eyes. Her pupils are too large, and her skin is milky grey.
She stands over me now, silent. I sit straight up, scooching so my back is against the headboard, the sheet still pulled over my legs as I inch my bottom closer to the lumpy pillow.
Heart pumping and breath ragged, I feel tears welling.
I push them back down. This is no time to cry. I need to be reasonable. I need to be cunning. I need to survive.
He needs me to survive.
‘Please,’ I say gently. It’s not a begging word the way I say it. It’s a calm, rational word that asks her to reconsider.
But hovering over me, she’s too calm now, too rational as well. Her ruby-red lips don’t utter a single word or explanation, they just curl upwards into a smile, disconcerting.
How did she get in here?
Now that the veil of sleep is lifting and the panic of the shock has dulled enough for thoughts to come in, it’s the question of the moment. How did she get in here? And what does she want?
I don’t have to study her long to know what she wants can’t be good.
The darkness drowning out my room is partially broken up by the moonlight cascading through the window. The beam of light glints off the item in her right hand, the shimmer mesmerising.
The knife. She’s got a knife.
I take two deep breaths – I don’t have time for ten. Not now.
I don’t move a muscle, afraid of triggering her.
‘What do you need?’ I ask, fighting to keep my voice soothing.
I fight to hold back the scream gurgling in my throat. What good will it do though to scream? Who will hear me?
She says nothing, her uncanny smile still painted on her face. I don’t even think she blinks as she creeps forward, her feet plodding on the carpet, thudding towards me. I scamper to the edge of the bed, my fingers now clutching the sheet.
This is how it all ends. This is where I leave this world. This is where my chance to change things cracks.
I bite my lip so hard I taste blood. I don’t squeeze my eyes shut. I need to see her, to look into the face of the woman sacrificing me. If this is how I go, I’m determined to face the end with dignity, with grace and with the knowledge that atonement is now mine.
But right before the knife can plunge into my chest, before the hot blood can cascade down my chest in a final dance, before the sweet release can absolve me from the lifetime of horrors, my eyes flash open.
Panting, heart pounding, I stare up at the ceiling, the sheet up to my chin.
I sit up with a start, eyes darting across the room.
Nothing. No one.
Just empty blackness, no moonlight, no Jane from 312 Bristol Lane, no knife.
Just me and the emptiness again. Always me and the emptiness.
I take ten deep breaths and bite my lip, the taste of the blood comforting in the silent darkness.