Chapter Twenty-One

STEVE ASKED THE Uber driver to let him off about a mile from his home. He wanted to walk a bit, stretch his legs, and absorb the conversation he’d had with Connor.

The night air was cool. A mist hovered above the sidewalk, muffling sound and giving an eerie, lonely feel to the night. Steve felt all by himself, even though it wasn’t that late. Maple Leaf was quiet for the most part, even during the middle of the day. The biggest and busiest places were an Ace Hardware and a Chinese restaurant that was deservedly popular. Otherwise, it was a quiet little area, one you wouldn’t expect to find in a bustling metropolis like Seattle.

He was far enough north that the light pollution from downtown didn’t interfere with his view of the sky. Although there were blue-gray clouds against the deep navy of the sky, they were mere strands, like cotton candy, and still allowed for a glimpse of stars. Steve paused to gaze up at the Big Dipper and to search for the Milky Way.

His footfalls on the pavement for company, he pondered his conversation with Connor. Even though Rory had turned Steve’s head when they’d first met last fall, Steve had never really fallen out of love with Connor, who continued to represent home and family. And now, in the wisdom of 20/20 hindsight, he knew he’d never really fallen in love with Rory. Sadly, he’d taken the qualities of love and home, so vital and important, for granted. He’d chosen the spark of new love, lust really, as something to prioritize. It was no comfort that he wasn’t the first middle-aged man to do so, nor would he be the last. Yet, he maintained in his heart and soul that he was beyond those foolish men, chasing after excitement over stability and warmth.

He and Rory had been a mistake. Steve knew it pretty much from the start, but the roar of new lust drowned out his misgivings.

The error he’d made was no small thing. But neither was what he had with Connor and Miranda. They were a genuine family unit and the love they’d shared was real and, he’d once believed, lasting.

When Steve discovered that Connor had gotten married, he’d thought all was lost. That news, that shocking information, woke him up as much as someone coming into his bedroom late at night and hitting him over the head with a crowbar. A wake-up call indeed.

When he found about Connor’s nuptials at City Hall, Steve knew that the wedding he was planning was wrong, a huge mistake, and something, given odds, he’d bet would never last.

He recalled how he’d tried to cover up knowing about the wedding with Connor. He wasn’t sure why. Embarrassment? Grief?

Except for the very early days with Rory, he’d had misgivings. But he buried them and could make that burial with some comfort because he believed Connor would always be there. If he should deign to call off his and Rory’s summer wedding, he was sure Connor would back him and maybe, just maybe, welcome him home with open arms. The shame Steve felt was rooted in how he’d underestimated Connor, thinking he’d mope around, pining for him, until he realized his error and begged to come back. Connor was better than that, more than that.

Why did realizations like this take so long to make their appearance?

Tonight had changed everything.

Where he thought no hope existed, he’d found a miracle. There was not only hope for a reunion; there was a chance. That’s not to say Connor would simply divorce this new man (and Miranda had given him an earful about how mysterious the guy was—and not in a good way, but in the manner of lots of secrets and lies), but at least Steve now knew there was trouble in paradise. As a middle-aged fool himself who should know better, Steve bonded with Connor over the impulsive decisions none of us are immune to, especially when facing our own aging process and mortality.

He felt the door was open just a bit, for him to get Connor back, to once again live in the condo he adored, to be part of all the family holidays and celebrations. To once more wake next to Connor and gaze out at Lake Union from their bed as the sky changed from blue to purple to orange in spectacular sunrise. He could hope again that maybe there’d be the comfort of good silences, good food, warm affection.

Maybe not the fireworks of young love, but something that, really, was so much more.

Now, he stood in front of the gray-and-white Craftsman and debated whether he even wanted to go inside, for this was a house, not a home. He could lay no claims of ownership because the deed was in Rory’s name. They’d discussed adding him to the paperwork, but Rory always put it off. Maybe he knew, too, that their union was one big error?

The house looked dark and imposing. Unwelcoming.

Even Rory was in Miami.

Steve was tempted to take out his phone, call another Uber, and head downtown to the Westin. Their heavenly beds foretold oblivion. The next day, he could come back and gather his clothes, books, electronics, and find his own place. The road back to Connor, a possibility, was still going to be longer than the road away and most likely fraught with potholes.

He wasn’t so devious that he would deliberately scheme to ruin Connor’s marriage. Yet, if that marriage was a rocky wrong turn anyway (as Miranda had sworn it was), he couldn’t be blamed for hurrying its demise.

He put away his earlier fantasy of an escape for the night. A hotel was stupid. A waste of money. Besides, he’d be alone here in this “house not a home,” and he’d be comfortable. At least Rory was in Miami, and he didn’t need to contend with his life’s biggest error staring him in the face.

Steve freed his keys from his pocket with the distinct feeling this would be the last or at least one of the last nights he’d spend here. He had no place lying on sheets scented by a man for whom he really had no love.

He needed to get out. It would be a hassle, but he had no choice.

He mounted the stairs and paused on the top one.

Someone was watching him.

The hair on the back of his neck rose, despite the only sounds being the whisper of new leaves on the maple in front of the house. His only sights were the warm yellow windows of neighboring homes.

He shivered and pressed his key into the deadbolt. Just before he opened the door, he looked behind and up and down the residential street. The warm yellowish glow of streetlights revealed not even one person. The wind rustled the leaves and buds in the trees and the sound mocked his paranoia. A Prius glided up the street and passed him, not slowing.

Still, the feeling of eyes on him persisted, quickening his heart rate.

“Man, you need to get some sleep,” he said to himself as he opened the door. “Must be fatigue creeping you out.” Inside, he paused to turn off the alarm and then noticed that he must have forgotten to set it before leaving. He shrugged. It wasn’t like him, but he reasoned that since this wasn’t really his home after all, maybe he was subconsciously unconcerned with its well-being.

Whatever.

The exhaustion from the excitement of spending time with Connor again washed over him. He moved to the front room, turned on the mica-shaded lamp on the end table, and plopped onto the couch. The room was warm, with a fieldstone fireplace bracketed by built-in bookshelves filled mostly with a lot of Restoration Hardware knickknacks in favor of being crammed with books. As soon as he saw these beautiful shelves contained almost no books, save for crap like Chicken Soup for the Gay Male Soul and the equally awful Velvet Rage, he should have known Rory was no man for him. He could be, and was, charming, but there was nothing of substance under that charismatic veneer.

Rory was a smile in search of a soul.

The stained glass windows above the bookshelves were dark now, their colors muted.

It really was a nice house, but like Rory, it had little character. It was all perfectly coordinated surfaces, matched furniture, dust-free…and dull. The home’s historical details Rory had erased in a frenzy of postmodern minimalism. It was a crime.

Rory’s taste revealed nothing of who he was.

And it revealed everything. He was a trend chaser.

Steve pondered heading out to the kitchen, with its white cabinets and travertine marble countertops, and pulling the bottle of sauvignon blanc out of the fridge, pouring a glass.

But his tired mental voice intruded, telling him to get his ass in bed where it belonged. He imagined his sleep would be dream filled, maybe not all of them pleasant, after tonight. The quiet meal he’d shared with Connor was a life changer.

He stood, grateful that the master bedroom was just across from the living room.

Since Rory was gone, the bed was unmade for once, a tangle of striped sheets and quilted gray comforter. Steve was too tired to do anything other than to strip down and hop in, letting the comfort of flannel sheets surround him, his head sinking into a couple of eiderdown pillows.

He was asleep in seconds.

When he woke, he thought it was to the sound of a branch tapping at the window. But then, waking more, he realized that was impossible. Yes, the bedroom had a big picture window, but it looked out onto the front porch. No branches could sneak under the porch’s overhang and tap on his window.

So what had he heard?

Or had he heard anything at all? Was the noise merely a fragment from a dream?

He turned in bed feeling uneasy, despite his rational mind telling him his most obvious assumption was simply a mostly forgotten dream particle. There had to be a better reason that his senses were on high alert, as though nerve endings were exposed.

And then there was a creak, the unmistakable alert of a floorboard pressed and released.

He struggled to see into the darkness. One quirk about Steve was that he loved an absolutely pitch-black bedroom for sleeping. No ambient light and certainly no little night lights. The blind was drawn, blanketing the room in what was now a creepy, velvet darkness.

Gradually, even the darkness couldn’t prevent his dark-adapted eyes from making adjustments.

He gasped when something darker than the dark itself separated from the shadows and moved toward the bed. Listening closely, Steve could hear the soft intake and exhalation of breath. Another presence in the room made his skin tingle.

Steve swallowed but found no spit as he faced the terrifying reality that someone stood unmoving at the foot of his bed.

“Who are you? How did you get in?” he managed to rasp.

It would have been less terrifying if the figure had answered or even laughed demonically.

But whoever, or whatever, was in the house with him kept its own counsel. He tried to recall a fantasy book or graphic novel he’d read a long time ago, one in which the villains were shadow people who spun themselves out of darkness. They were barely discernible, but they had enough mass and shape to be just slightly different from the darkness surrounding them. Black on black.

Steve was paralyzed. He could barely breathe, let alone move. He knew he was beyond vulnerable, lying here like this in only a pair of boxer shorts, nothing to protect him save the thinness of a sheet and quilt. And yet, even though his rational mind told him these things, urging him to leap from the bed and get moving, he was unable to move from the bed. If he couldn’t fight, he could at least flee for Christ’s sake. Even though his head was screaming these things, his heart was too terrified to do anything; he might as well have been bound and gagged. He wanted to pull the covers up over his head and curl into a ball.

The thing standing there watching him, breathing, saying nothing, was a monster.

No.

Monsters weren’t real. Or at least the ones that existed arrived mostly in human form. As evil as human beings could be, one could still deal with them—there was always a fighting chance because even the most vile and villainous person had limits to their endurance.

The darkness shifted and Steve sucked in a breath. The figure moved to the side of the bed, and Steve wanted to scream, but it was like being in a nightmare. He had no voice, and although the shriek scorched his throat, aching for release, he couldn’t summon breath or voice.

He watched in helpless horror as the man—he could now see it was a man and not simply a faceless shadow—reached near him and grabbed a pillow off the bed.

And then he raised the pillow and centered it above Steve’s face. With one swift motion, he brought it down, holding it tight.

All the air in the room disappeared as the softness of the pillow engulfed his face like some alien creature, stealing breath. Without thought, Steve struggled, heels kicking against the mattress, arms flailing.

The harder he resisted, the more the intruder pressed down.

A vision appeared behind Steve’s eyelids, and he saw himself sitting at the long, distressed oak table at the condo with Connor and Miranda. They were laughing and there were empty, tomato-sauce stained plates in front of them. A smiling Connor raised a glass.

The vision departed as abruptly as it had arrived, and Steve found himself in a battle for his very life. He twisted. He turned. He tried to quell the panic rising, causing his heart to hammer, so he could think.

And maybe what saved him wasn’t thought, but instinct.

He wasn’t going to free himself by struggling. No, the answer was simple. In fact, it was so simple he would wonder—later, after the panic had ebbed—why he hadn’t thought of it immediately.

The answer was not to fight back, nor to resist mightily, but to go limp.

He let his body sort of melt into the bed beneath him. By doing this, he was able to slide out from under the pillow, despite its being held down over his face with brutal force.

Once out, he knew by instinct he would have to move fast. He rolled over, toppling painfully to the hardwood floor. He groaned in pain and managed to get to a sitting position. He began swinging wildly and kicking.

But his hands and feet connected with nothing, making him fear he was dealing with something beyond the natural.

But then that idea was dispelled as rapid footfalls sounded in the darkness, mercifully moving away. He could trace them all the way to the front door.

There was a pause. And the house was deathly silent.

A voice emerged, sending paradoxical sparks and chills through him, so hard it made him spasm, jerking convulsively for a second or two.

“Connor. Leave him alone. Or I come back and finish what I started.”

The voice was deep, a voice from hell. Even Steve realized he was already embellishing his terrifying encounter with melodramatic details. There was no need for melodrama when one does battle with an anonymous stranger who’s invaded, especially when one is at the most vulnerable.

A creak sounded as the door swung open. A snake of cold air rushed in. It chilled Steve, who groped his way back to the bed, leaning against it as he tried to catch his breath.

When he could finally get up, it seemed as though hours had passed, but again Steve realized he was being fanciful, perhaps from spending too many years by the side of a man who made his living from imagination. It was really only a few seconds.

He managed to hold his fear at abeyance and to walk the few steps it took to get to the front door, which stood open. Wind blew in and a few scattered leaves and twigs danced across the floor.

Steve looked out into the night, but all was quiet. Had he imagined it all?

He knew he most definitely had not.

The intruder came as a warning—a lethal threat that Steve had little doubt could be carried out. He even knew who it had to be, but that knowledge gave him no comfort. He could tell no one about this encounter because he believed no one would believe him.

And if he did, how could he be certain that the owner of the voice wouldn’t make good on his threat?

He closed the door, threw the deadbolt, and then leaned against its solid oak surface. The feeling of a gap with reality persisted. He moved to the pad for the alarm and keyed in the code to arm it. Yet, even when he also turned on just about every light in the house, the aura of nightmare hung over him, like smoke or a dense fog.

He couldn’t go back in the bedroom. Not tonight. Maybe never again. So he stretched out on the couch and pulled the cashmere throw off its back and arranged it over his legs. He had a feeling, no, more a certainty, that he would still be sitting here in this same position as the room flooded with gray light.

And the same question would taunt and torment him.

What do I do now?