Alexandra took the apartment steps with slow, lethargic movements, her eyes half hooded, her hands limp against the lacquered, curving rail that led up the stairs to her third-floor unit. Of course, the elevator was down for maintenance.
She sighed as she pulled her aching and exhausted body further up the steps. And yet, still, despite the way tiredness weighed heavy on her, she found her lips forming a small, satisfied smile.
It was nice to have a job again. A teaching job to boot. Of course, she was more a of helper, really. It had been nice when he'd asked her to help with the others... Sometimes, of course, she felt like a poser. Felt like she didn't really belong. She certainly wasn't better off than any of the rest of them.
But she refused to let this keep her down.
She was trying her best, after all, wasn't she?
That's all a woman could be asked to do.
She paused on the second-floor landing, reaching up to pull at the scrunchie holding her ponytail out of her face. Once it adjusted, so her hair didn't feel so tight, she went up the final set of stairs. The exercise was good for her anyway. She'd put on a few extra pounds over the years.
Being homebound did that to a body.
But now... nearly a month had gone by, and she'd maintained her employment. Her smile spread wider.
Not even the nipping memories reminding her why she'd been homebound could hold back her sense of self-satisfaction and accomplishment.
But she didn't live in denial either. A long time had passed where her trauma had been too extreme for her to leave her house. Years had passed, but she'd never managed to shake memories of that dark night... the others who'd been grabbed with her. Three of them... She swallowed, pushing the thoughts aside. The others hadn't been nearly so fortunate.
“Though a thousand fall at my right hand and ten thousand at my right...,” she murmured beneath her breath... Or was it left, then right? She couldn't quite remember. Still, thank God she was past all of those horrible experiences. Thank God she had survived to begin with. Where there was life, there was hope. She believed that now, far more than ever. Without her church, or that radio station she liked which played worship songs all day long, she wasn't sure she could've found the inner strength.
But now...
“I'm past that,” she murmured to herself. “I'm strong. Let the weak say they're strong.” She repeated the words beneath her breath, reaching the top of the stairs and approaching the nearest door which led to her apartment.
Ever since the attack, nearly seven years ago, she refused to live on the bottom floor. The stairs were an acceptable sacrifice for peace of mind.
It had taken a lot to find any sort of peace.
But now...
Her keys rattled as she inserted them into the lock. She hummed to herself, an old hymn. “...alone... hope is found...my rock, my strength...,” She murmured the lyrics beneath her breath and slowly pushed open her apartment door, grateful to have returned at last. She was looking forward to a long bath, and more than one episode of Friends.
As the door slowly swung in, the light inside cast her shadow out into the hall, and she paused.
The light was on over the dining room table...
She always kept that light off...
Didn't she?
She stared at it and felt a prickle along her spine which felt like her ponytail brushing her neck. She glanced over her shoulder, along the hall.
Empty. Abandoned. It was late anyway.
She looked back into her apartment. For a moment, in the distance, she thought she heard the sound of sirens. But then those faded as well.
“Lord Jesus,” she murmured beneath her breath. “Help me.”
She felt the same sort of peace come over her that she experienced when listening to that radio channel. But even then, a part of her felt a tug of... fear?
She swallowed, staring. Perhaps she should just head back downstairs... Maybe she should...
But she was just so tired.
Alexandra shook her head, staring into the apartment a moment longer. No movement. No sound. She was fine, surely. Just her overactive imagination.
She stepped into the unit and shut the door but didn't lock it... just in case she needed a path out.
Hesitantly, she began to move through the apartment, around the dining room table and towards the hall which led to her bedroom. She passed the kitchen. Clean as she'd left it, save the frying pan on the stove top. The scent of eggs lingered still.
But also... something else.
She wrinkled her nose. What was that smell... like... like... chemicals? Was that cleaning fluids—no... more pungent.
She felt a flicker of anxiety tremble up her spine. Had she spilled something in the bathroom without realizing? She'd been in a rush that morning, trying to muster up the courage to venture forth from her apartment.
Another step... the faux wooden floorboards pressed against her tired feet. “H—hello?” she said carefully. “Is anyone here?”
Another step. Another.
She glanced into the small office space she'd used for so many years. There, she spotted the curtains flutter, caught by a breeze.
She stared, a slow chill creeping up her spine. The curtains continued to flutter.
Someone had left the window open.
She never opened the windows. Never. Not again. Not after...
Terror exploded down her spine, and she spun on her heel, breaking back towards the door. But a shadow suddenly emerged from beneath the dining room table, like a ghoul rising in a graveyard.
The figure lunged at her, and she screamed.
But the sound died as a thick hand caught over her lips.
Not again.
She panicked.
Not again.
She fought for that peace, for that same sense of hope...
The fear was so powerful though.
She kicked, she fought.
But the man was too strong... too big.
A gloved hand pressed to her lips, and she tried to bite a finger. She tried to lurch towards the unlocked door again, fingers spread, but the man brought her down hard. They both thumped into the carpet.
She felt a sudden sharp jab of pain against her wrist. He was too big, too strong. She couldn't fight—couldn't... couldn't... Where was she? What was...
A moment passed...
A strange, chill sensation, starting near her wrist... the fear faded... She almost, in an odd way... felt...
And then blackness took her.