The word “aftermath” doesn’t have the simple etymology one might expect of a compound word. It’s actually a farming term that means to mow or a mowing. In one definition, it was the land after being sickled. Over time, it became the word we know it as, meaning what comes next after a catastrophe.
Sam, Henry, and I had just finished counting the till and tallying up the numbers, the after math, and I’d made more money in four hours than I had since day one combined. I had been mowed down by my problems, but had somehow managed to squeak in a success.
Sam was the first to say it. He grabbed my hands across the counter and said, “You can do this. You can make this place work.” He laughed with proud delight. “You’ve proved it, Delilah!”
“It was pretty amazing, wasn’t it? I proved I can throw a good party,” I admitted, “but I have to sustain it.”
“Sustain it?” Sam argued lightly. “Hell! All you have to do is throw a couple of parties a month and that’ll be enough not only to make Joe Duffy happy, but to keep you in business comfortably.”
I was cautiously optimistic, and content to celebrate the joy of one success without considering how I’d make more, for the time being. I bundled up the money, receipts, and my scrawled amounts, and locked everything in the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet in my office.
“Ready for me to walk you home?” Sam asked from the doorway.
“Almost,” I said. “Just give me two minutes to shutdown my computer and I’ll be all yours.” To this, he smiled.
“You are all mine already,” he noted, “but I’ll wait at the door.”
I grinned. Yes, I was his, but I wasn’t sure he was really mine – not with secrets lingering between us. I needed to ask Sam about Fayetteville, find out why he’d gone without telling me, again. But, I remembered our Area 51 night, how I pretty much almost ruined it by bringing up Fayetteville and topping off that poop cake with mentioning his wife. I wasn’t about to do that tonight.
I sat down at the desk and moved the touchpad of my laptop to wake it up. When the screen came to life, however, it was not on the desktop screen where I left it. Rather, Internet Explorer was open, and so was my browsing history. My breath caught in my throat. Had I done this and just forgotten? No. I hadn’t. The last time I’d been on the computer was that morning when I printed out my Frankenstein conversation starters. But, I’d left the screen on the desktop. I was sure of it.
My browsing history had been left open to the last significant day when I had researched everything I could think of relating to the redheaded woman. Lighthouses. The Peacock. The number four. Her symptoms. And the web page displayed was one of my findings, an article on the effects of lead poisoning which had popped up during a search of the symptom, blue lips. This had also brought me pages on the Blue Man Group, blue shades of lipstick, asphyxiation, and Smurfs, so I hadn’t really given this article much thought.
But, here it was, glaring at me. Someone had been here, had seen what I’d been up to, and had either gotten interrupted or left it for me to see like this. Why would anyone care about my browsing history?
People had come in and out of the office all night to use the bathroom. Perhaps someone had checked out my browsing history the way a nosy nelly might snoop in someone’s medicine cabinet. An innocent curiosity thing. Could it be?
Staring at the screen, my skin crept alive with goosebumps. Giant, normal, child. The shadows drifted through my head. Then came his. My hand went up to my neck where the cuts stung. In my daydream, he grabbed me, and the panic started to take over again.
With a trembling hand, I shut down the computer. I met Sam at the door. Though I had often battled him foolishly over things like opening doors and walking me home, I didn’t protest tonight and doubted I would for a while in the aftermath of the robbery and now this strange realization that someone had been snooping on my computer.
We strolled around the corner of the building, under the lovely lights Sam had installed, and made our way down the alley. A cool breeze kicked up, and filtered through me like ice water.
“I just can’t get over how awesome it was,” Sam remarked as we went. “The whole thing, from the decorations to the costumes to the food. Yes, even the food. Mike’s not my favorite person, but he did a good job and I can’t believe your Aunt Charlotte showed up. I hope Clark puts a picture of that in the paper-”
“Sam?” I said, stopping as we reached the stairs. His smile fell when he looked at me.
“Delilah, are you shaking?” He grabbed my hands.
“Sam, I know you need to go home,” I spat out, “and I know you haven’t slept and I’ve asked way too much of you already and I get you’re uncomfortable, being alone with me, but would you stay? With me? Tonight?”
“Of course. What’s wrong?” he asked.
I breathed in heavily, almost swearing I could feel the blade at my throat again, feel its tip traveling down my chest. Was my attacker at the party? Had he been the one to get on my computer? Had I spoken to him, smiled at him, not knowing who he was, while he got his secret kicks? I shivered.
“Sam, I-I’m scared,” I let go at last. “I’m, I’m just scared.”