Claire awoke with a start. Even unconscious, her heart had been pounding a hundred beats per minute. She hadn’t dreamt at all—and she hoped that her most recent recollections had been nothing more than a new, intense nightmare—hoping it had merely been the worst ever variant of her “wolf dream.” Claire ached all over and her head was foggy; the pain in her body told her that it had all been very real.
The unmistakable chirping of medical instruments and the strong scent of expensive men’s cologne informed her of her location, and told her she was not alone. Claire turned her head, searching the hospital room for her fiancé. “James?”
His coat lay over a chair nearby. Past that, muted by the door and distance, she could see James through a window, clearly angry at whomever he was speaking with. She hadn’t seen him wear a look of worry very often, but it clung to him now.
She hurt all over. The radiant ache of minor burns spotted her skin. Claire touched the wounds and wiped away the sticky topical ointments she’d been treated with. More than the pain, though, she felt anger. She couldn’t pinpoint the source of her rage, but a feeling of helplessness made her want to lash out.
The frustration mounted as she lay there, unable to get comfortable because of her burns, she listened to the beeping machines. Beep. Beep. Beep. Minutes on end. Finally, her calm broke and she started ripping the sticky sensors off her body, making the machines lose their calm as well. Beep. Beep. Breeeeeeeeeeeee!
Nurses came storming into the room, trailed closely by James. “What are you doing? You can’t do that!” they chided.
“Are you holding me here against my will?” Claire snapped.
“No, but you’re not well,” a large nurse replied. Claire was pretty sure the large nurse could hold her against Claire’s will if she’d wanted to. The other nurse and a doctor stood near the door, only one step closer than James.
“If I stay here a minute longer, I swear I’ll lose my mind,” Claire threatened.
The nurses and the doctor traded sagacious glances. James interrupted their silent conversation. “Doctor Smith, is she well enough to check herself out?”
“Wait,” Claire stopped him. “I want to know. What do you mean by that? I said ‘I feel like being in here is making me ‘crazy’’ and everyone freaks out.”
The long pause after her demand hung palpably. Finally, Doctor Smith said, “Miss Jones, when they admitted you, you were raving about fire demons and werewolves. They found you in the woods early this morning suffering a psychotic break from reality.”
Silence again. None dared break it. Only Claire had that right.
“The fire. The burns,” a confused Claire stammered.
“Yes,” James helped her. “There was an explosion at the house. A gas line ruptured, the fire marshal says. It was very traumatic; the real estate agent died, but Vivian and Jackie got out the front door. Vivian dragged Jackie to safety, but when she came back, you’d escaped out the back entry of the room and apparently fled into the woods.”
“Right!” She exclaimed. “Vivian saw the whole thing! She can tell you, something big—a creature, saved me. He scooped me up and carried me to the woods!”
Her physician regarded her coolly. His white coat sported a gold star-shaped lapel pin and a name tag identifying him as Ryan Smith, M.D.
Doctor Smith watched her carefully as she repeated the same details she’d arrived raving about. “You do appear more coherent, this time,” he said, only stating the facts of his observation, avoiding any diagnosis.
Claire grimaced at him. James had slid in closer and now had his hand on her shoulder in full support of her, crazy or not.
“Can you tell me, Miss Jones, did you lose consciousness at any time?”
“Well, yeah,” she said, unclear why the doctor didn’t have that written on his little notepad too. “Right before I got to the woods; that’s why I had to be carried.” Her frustration mounted again. James met her frustration with a gentle shoulder rub. “What did Vivian say?” Claire demanded, looking at James.
James shook his head negative very slightly, as if it was an answer he was sorry to give. He spoke gently. “She didn’t see anything, Clairebear. Just the fire and chaos.”
Claire withdrew into her shell for a few quiet minutes, leaving the doctor to stand there while she took stock of herself. The nurses switched the machines off and dutifully wrapped the cords, further quieting the room.
“How is Jackie,” she finally asked.
“She’s okay,” said James. “She was treated for minor injuries and burns, and then went to her parents.”
The doctor nodded and then turned to leave but motioned to James. “A brief word, Mr. Shianan?” They stepped into the hall.
After one minute, the nurses left. Claire waited in silence; her frustration waned, morphing into resign. She couldn’t even bring herself to think—only stare at the white wall. Two minutes later, James returned.
Claire looked to him hopefully. Her eyes asked for news.
“The doctor says that he just wants to keep you overnight for observation, but that you can go home tomorrow as long as I keep a close eye on you.”
She nodded at the news.
“Whatever you saw,” he led cautiously into the subject, “has the doctor concerned, but he’s ruled out neurological damage, except for the blackout, there aren’t any physical indicators. He thinks it was a stressed induced state, almost like a PTSD fugue. I mean, my god, a woman burned alive right in front of you,” he said sympathetically.
Claire’s mind started wandering. She wondered if there was any truth to their concerns for her mental state. After all, she worried more about the possibility that her mind was unreliable than the fact that a human being burned to death only feet away from her. She nodded, submitting to Doctor Smith’s verdict.
“Listen,” James slid in next to her, “I’m right here with you. Every step of the way,” he promised. Something in his voice soothed her anxiety; even as Claire felt like she slipped away from her grip on reality, she knew that James could keep her grounded.
Claire squeezed his hand to respond with gratitude. James leaned in and kissed her forehead.
“Get some rest.”
She suddenly felt very relaxed, as if a sedative kicked in. Claire closed her eyes and nodded off.
. . .
The rest of her hospital stay passed uneventfully. Claire had awoken the following morning fully rested. Oddly, she had not dreamt. Perhaps her body needed every scrap of power to continue healing, or maybe it simply couldn’t handle another surreal, recycled psychological encounter.
She passed the remaining time watching television reruns and reading a trashy novel she borrowed from the nurses’ station. James acted admirably. He handled everything, and despite the fatality in the accident, he was able to run interference with the police so she hadn’t had to relive the encounter by giving a statement.
Nothing demanded that she engage it with her brain. It was as if her thoughts cycled in neutral, spinning freely.
A foreboding sense that she’d lost control of her life, and perhaps her mind as well, seemed to envelope her. Claire followed and did as told as if in shell-shock.
Sometime after a soft, bland hospital lunch she signed the discharge paperwork that an orderly brought to her. She neatly packed her few belongings and prepared to return to her apartment. Her mobile phone had been destroyed in the ordeal and so she pulled the memory card from its back and tossed the smashed device in the wastebasket and then met James who waited to drive her home.
The remainder of her day passed like a gray cloud; everything felt tainted by the dull, murky wash. Claire and James went over wedding plans, discussed other houses, and talked guest lists; he changed her wound dressings, but they did not speak about what happened.
She felt like she watched her life as a passenger, looking in from a window but helpless to intervene. The only thing she needed to complete the scene were the three ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future.
Evening crept up. James drifted off to sleep on her couch. Claire retired to her bedroom, laid her head on her pillow, and let go. Her mind slipped off, and she, too, slept.
. . .
Claire awoke with the sun. She looked over where she would have normally left her phone charging and in alarm-clock mode, but she no longer had it. It was very early still, but she knew returning to sleep would be impossible for her.
Standing in front of her bedroom window, Claire greeted the daylight with silence. She dressed herself and peeked in on James. He snored almost inaudibly on the couch and Claire picked up her keys and her wallet and slipped quietly out the front door.
Longing for some sense of normalcy amidst the haze of uncertainty that enveloped her, she wandered towards the coffee shop on the corner near her apartment. After crossing the road, she very nearly tripped over a pair of feet sticking from the alleyway. A homeless man sat bent at a ninety degree angle against the brick building as he rested his back.
She’d almost stepped around him when he sleepily called her name, “Claire?”
Claire didn’t recognize him. “Sorry. I don’t have any change,” she lied, trying to walk past.
“Claire Jones,” He stated.
The fact that the man knew her full name startled her, called her mind to attention.
“He’s got you enthralled, you know. The warlock, the sorcerer. But I don’t think he sent the fire demon.”
Claire chided herself for being fooled. Clearly, this hobo was insane, rattling off the kind of crazy talk one expected from his kind. Maybe she’d merely misheard her name being spoken. Still, compassion had always intertwined around her innermost being. She put a hand in her pocket, searching for some money.
Her eyes searched vainly for a change cup, or somewhere to drop coins. He didn’t have any such thing.
“Nitthogr’s in your mind, Claire Jones. But this will protect you. He thought it would trap you, but it has some resistant power as well. The amulet helps you resist his magics, even if it endears you to him.” The bum held up a necklace pendant. Her pendant, the one her father had given her. It dangled from his fingertips as he freely offered it to her.
Claire looked into his eyes, suspicious of him. They contained not a shred of deception or threat; she snatched the necklace from his outstretched arm. “Nith-who?”
As soon as she grabbed it, the fog in her mind lifted. Her sight seemed to clear and things became more apparent to her state of mind, as if it had been struggling to wake up this entire time; it tingled like a foot one sat on too long before suddenly having blood restored.
“Rob?” she asked, bewildered but suddenly recognizing the vagrant. “What happened?” She stared at his scarred and bandaged forearms; a puffy, red burn mark raked across his face and nose. Soot and grime ringed his face and hairline.
Rob nodded as she latched the clasp of her necklace behind her head. “Don’t lose that.” He suddenly looked over her shoulder at something.
Claire turned to see James opening her patio door. He walked onto her balcony and rubbed his eyes, yawning.
“There you are,” he called out loudly, putting enough force behind his voice for her to hear him across the street. “What are you doing out here?”
She turned back, but Rob had disappeared. She touched the jewelry hanging from her neck. Yesterday she might’ve questioned if Rob was even real; she might’ve believed he’d been a figment of her imagination or a delusion. Now? Now she knew better.
Claire turned to shout back, “I’m just getting coffee. Do you want any?”
“I’ll be right down and join you. You know; doctor’s orders and all. I’ve got to keep an eye on you.”
Throughout the day, Claire regularly checked over her shoulder trying to spot Rob. She still didn’t have him figured out. Her seeming paranoia kept prompting James to ask her what she was looking for; it forced her to concoct any number of tiny, white lies as she placated her fiancé’s protective doting.
Nearing evening, she finally twisted James’ arm enough to drive her to a cell phone dealer; she hadn’t replaced her destroyed mobile yet. Until she’d retrieved her necklace, she hadn’t even realized how much she’d been thrust into complete isolation, and if Rob’s crazy story was right, mental control.
She understood James’ hesitation to venture out, though. Everywhere they went, people snapped selfies with him and tried to engage him in conversation. Claire made the stop quick, however; she told the first person inside the door exactly what model she needed and merely replaced her previous phone and inserted her memory card.
They weren’t there long, and they’d planned it for as close to the store’s closing as possible to minimize any kind of circus. She’d explained to James that she simply couldn’t wait another day or two if she ordered one and had it delivered. What if her father needed to call?
“Here’s your device,” the salesman stated, handing the device over to her as it powered up. “It should be activated and your service automatically transferred over. Can we help you set it up or show you its features?”
She snapped it away as the alert signal began to chirp repeatedly. “No. I’ll do it myself.” She quickly gathered her materials and she and James departed for her apartment.
Claire did feel a twinge of guilt as she ignored her fiancé, even though he could’ve been more on top of this matter. James couldn’t get in a word with her; she’d fixed her gaze on the screen, attempting to update and sync all its services so that she could get back up to speed.
The notes from her friends and acquaintances who had tried contacting her these past few days reminded her who she was. It felt like she had been restored, much like the software on a device. Jackie had especially freaked out, sending a flurry of messages. But her first call would be to her father.
Once back at her apartment, James sat at the couch and asked how she felt. He resigned himself as mere observer as she spread her wings and returned to her former life.
“I’m fine,” she reassured him even as she dialed the out-of-country phone line. “I’m finally back; I feel well.” She smiled apologetically. “I’ll probably be up late,” she shrugged at her phone to indicate the reason. “I’ve got to call my dad and bring everybody up to speed, assure them I’m okay.”
James smiled neutrally. He picked up his own mobile and thumbed the screen over to the internet. “Just promise me you won’t read the news from the past few days? TMZ aren’t the only ones who like to throw wild, yellow-rag speculation around when celebrity news is concerned, and you probably don’t need the added stress that garbage can bring.”
“I promise,” she said, clicking the green dial icon. She slipped into her room and lay on her bed, conversing with her father.
She calmed him down and reassured him that everything was okay. Claire caught up with Jackie immediately after. She followed that with a blast of text messages to other people and then read the news. James had been right. Bloggers and instigators had been critical, blasphemous, and downright unkind, especially since one of the first responders had quoted her raving about a fire demon and a werewolf rescuer. There were even a slew of internet memes comparing her with a raving lunatic and comparing James with previous, famous actors who had married mentally disturbed people.
Claire scowled at her news feed and then peeked out her door. It had been several hours since she’d gone to her room; time had flown without much notice and James had fallen asleep long ago.
Her thoughts turned inward as she absentmindedly fingered the amulet under her chin. What had Rob meant by his comments? What about a sorcerer? It all sounded so crazy—the ravings of a madman! …just like her. They’d said she was crazy at the hospital: that her experience was a total break from reality.
Claire pulled up the website for the real estate agency they’d contracted through. The front page featured a short memorial for Emily Washington and a link to her obituary. Claire clicked to the listing for the home where the fire had occurred; as hoped for, it hadn’t been taken down quite yet.
She poured over the data online. As a high dollar listing, it contained large amounts of detailed information in an effort to appeal to the most discriminating of potential buyers, either informing them or weeding them out in agented efforts to whittle down the prospect pool to only the most qualified buyers.
Finding the information Claire wanted, she clicked on the floor plan and layout tab. She zoomed in and located the room where the incident had occurred.
She ran her fingers through her hair and bit her lip, not wanting to believe what she’d seen. But not wanting to believe the opposite either.
They’d said that she fled through a back door to escape; that story meant she’d gone crazy. The opposite account, that some monstrous creature had saved her and there was no other route of escape, meant that she was perfectly sane—and everyone was lying to her.
Claire snapped a screenshot and emailed the image to herself. She stared at the tiny screen showing the wrecked home’s blueprints. Here was her proof: the room had only the one door.
For the first time since she was a teenager Claire Jones felt terror. At fourteen, she’d been in a hostile, foreign country with her father and the corrupt local military had planned to kidnap her. Her father intervened and prepaid a small ransom to secure her safety. Right now, he felt so far away—and her new captor might just be her fiancé.
She peeked out her window and down to the alley. Sure that she spotted the shine of Rob’s eyes deep in the alley as a car’s headlights passed, she sighed. Could she trust him? Was he the beast? And if he was, then what about all the local killings? Is Rob the murderer? Could she really trust James?
Claire laid down with more questions than ever before. She only knew for certain that she couldn’t tell anyone.