After Death (21 page)

He raced back to Rachel’s door — to the chair he’d sat in and the blood trail leading away from it.

Only there was no longer a chair there — It was back against the wall with the other — and there was no blood trail — only the strong smell of Pine-Sol filling his nostrils from a freshly wet tile floor that glistened into the distance.

How could this be? Could someone else have come and cleaned? — No, they would have called the police!

The picture was gone from the wall as were any traces of broken glass on the floor. He felt in his pocket — the ring was there — He didn’t remember putting it back…

He pulled it out, careful not to undo the paper towels he’d wrapped around his hand to stop the renewed bleeding from his gash. He turned the ring so that he could see the inscription again in the growing morning light.

Paula L. Danner, Class of ’53

Innocuous.
Normal.

With daylight comes reality
, he thought.
But what kind of reality would he face? The blood stains on his shirt and pants were real enough. The missing picture on the wall was real enough. Something had happened here — but What?!? In the dawn he couldn’t seem to convince himself it was truly Eli. Despite his “hallucinations”, there must be some other explanation…

He tip-toed down the hall, trying to avoid leaving many foot prints on the freshly mopped tile. He came to Lidia’s room where her door was oddly half open. The fresh mop marks continued to the door and disappeared inside.

Not a good sign. Not a good sign at all.

He bumped the door open with his shoulder — He didn’t want to leave fingerprints — or any more than there already were...

The room was almost dark, blinds drawn, and he had to wait for his eyes to adjust.

Slowly… slowly… a lumpy shape took form sitting up in the center of the bed. As his vision grew sharper, he realized that the lump was covered by a sheet and that the sheet was dark across the entire middle.

Blood — it could only be blood
..!

He moved closer with growing terror. He pulled a sleeve over his hand to cover his fingertips and tugged at a corner of the sheet.

Bile rose in his stomach and he threw his arm across his mouth to hold back the vomit.

Lidia sat upright in bed, dead mouth tipped open in terror, one glazed eye fixed on a raised arm that ended in a seeping stump where her hand leaned away from the wrist. In her other hand was a large shard of glass, edge caked with dried blood and nearby, nestled in the sheets, sat the broken picture that Frank had accidentally knocked off the hallway wall.

The entire blurry drive home, one thought rolled over and over incessantly in Frank’s head —
He needed to tell Jackie everything — Everything — every detail.
He needed her objectivity. He was a fool for not doing it earlier and now he had a long story to tell — complicated and bizarre — it would be a lot to absorb and would probably seem far-fetched if one hadn’t experienced it in its building steps and growing stages.

Why hadn’t he told her before? He would’ve been able to get her insight into this… mess… so easily… Now, look what he’d done…

He parked on the street so the sound of the car in the driveway or the garage opening wouldn’t wake her. She wouldn’t be getting up for at least another hour — maybe he could type most of it into the computer by then… It would be much easier for him to compose his thoughts that way — For him to make sure she understood everything that had happened in its proper sequence…

He slipped quietly in the front door and Argus rushed in from outside through his doggie door to greet him. Frank did his best to keep Argus calm but the dog was so excited and his tail wagged so hard that it thumped against the wall and Frank had to put him back outside. Frank moved back to the kitchen and took a garbage bag from the kitchen drawer, then went directly to the bathroom. He silently closed the door and stripped off all the bloody clothes and put them carefully in the trash bag. He’d have to figure out what to do with them later… First he needed to get this… stuff… off
completely
.

The shower really helped — His tiredness was there but at least it was pushed to the background for a while. Being clean and in his fresh robe made the night seem farther behind him — now for the unpleasant task of recreating everything he’d been through in the last few weeks so that his wife could understand…

He slipped back out to the living room and turned on the computer. When the word processor finally loaded and he opened the document that was the outline for his novel he was surprised to see how many pages were already there — already written.
He didn’t remember writing so much… He thought he’d only done a rough outline…

He began to read and realized with a surreal jolt that everything except last night was already there —
Everything
..
!

The details and the descriptions were excellent — Every character was well defined and Frank’s every action (as the main character) was explained as well as he could ever have hoped — actually better! His writing (who else’s could it be?) was the best he’d ever written.

The story stopped at the point last night where he’d left to go meet Fernando — It even had his disagreement with Jackie typed in word-for-word.

On the one hand this was strange —
beyond strange
— he’d never had this happen before. Sure he’d drifted off in front of the computer and imagined everything as though he were there — and “returned” to find the passages written as he’d imagined them — but he always knew that he had never really left the computer chair, and he knew that on some strange level — he was typing away. This time was different — it was reversed — He’d actually undergone something and then didn’t remember writing it at all and he knew that he’d definitely left the computer chair.

On the up side — there was less to type in before Jackie woke up — His job had become considerably smaller. Still… This needed to be looked into. But it would have to wait. He had no time to puzzle on it further right now — He needed his story to be current if she were to understand what was going on so he could get her help — and he definitely needed her help. One thing he was sure of — when he wrote this most current part, he had no intention of re-living it. If the prose weren’t as good as what came before it, so be it. He could always re-write it and improve on it later. The hell he’d just come through would be hard enough to write about as it was…

***

Forty-six minutes later he glanced at his watch — He had just enough time to print it out and intercept her before she got up and disappeared into the shower to get ready for work.

He snuck into the bedroom with the thick sheaf of papers and sat gently near her heaving body on the bed. He watched her chest move and listened to the steady sound of her deep breathing.
He didn’t want to disturb her, didn’t want to ruin their recently improving life — but what choice did he have? Keeping her in the dark was no longer an option. The days of calm were going to end.
But he needed her help, her objectivity. She was often his true voice of reason. He needed that now more than ever.

He touched her arm and gently shook her shoulder. He waited as she rose gradually from her deep sleep. A few disoriented blinks and a glance at his face and she knew something was wrong.

“What is it, Frank?” she asked with concern, sliding upwards on the pillow.

He looked at her and chewed his lip.
There was no way to say what he needed to say gently.
He swept a hand nervously through his hair.

“I think I’m going crazy… but I’ll let you be the judge…” He said, indicating the papers in his hand. “I typed it all out — I didn’t tell you everything before — but it’s all in here. I’m sorry.”

She looked at the thick stack of papers he now set near her on the bed.

“This is about your “research” — nothing to do with infidelity or anything, right...?”

He shook his head adamantly.

“Of course not.”

She smiled ever so slightly.

“I didn’t think I had to ask but…” She paused and then: “I’m guessing this can’t wait..?”

He shook his head “No”.

She rubbed her eyes, sat more upright in the bed.

“Guess I’m not going to work today…”

She put her hand on his.

“Whatever it is, Frank, it’ll be okay.”

He nodded. He really wanted to believe her but something nagging at him deep down said otherwise.
It won’t be okay — Not by a long shot.

She took the first page off the pile and looked over at him with a wince.

“I really need to wake up if I’m going to read all this... Can you make us some coffee?”

***

The time spent waiting for her to read his work was always bad — but this was extreme. She’d kicked him out of the room twice for lingering — but who could blame him? — It’s not every day that one awaits judgment from their wife about their sanity or
lack thereof
…

He’d eventually retreated to the living room and first tried to watch TV but couldn’t concentrate. Then he’d tried to sleep but that was also a wasted effort. It was obvious he would get no rest until the verdict was brought.

After an agonizing and twitchy
two hours
, Jackie entered the living room with an odd smile. She looked at him and slowly nodded approvingly.

“Well — This time I think you’ve done it, Frank… It’s really good! — if you wanted creepy — that’s what it is. The last few pages weren’t as good as the rest but you can fix that. And I was a little surprised to see myself in there… A little strange…”

Frank was confused —
Did she not understand what he was asking?

“Honey…” He began, trying to mask his disappointment that this One Critical Time, she wasn’t her usual hyper-intuitive self. “…Everything I wrote in there happened as it was written. It’s all true.
Every word
.”

She stared at him, smile frozen on her face. It was a moment that seemed lost in time — she seemed to be waiting for a punch-line that never came. Still smiling, she finally began to ask the inevitable question with incredulity:

“C’mon, Frank… You can’t be — ”

His anger flared —
Did she think he’d have her miss a day of work if he weren’t totally serious and in big trouble!

— “I’m dead serious —“ He interrupted. “I know it couldn’t have happened that way… I
know
that. But it did — I swear it! Which means… Which means…

His head fell into his hands, energy abandoning him, total despair dropping on him like a physical weight. He could barely finish the sentence, he felt so weak, so smashed down, crushed and miserable…

“…Which means… I think I’ve lost it…” He finished weakly.

He felt like he was on the verge of tears. A grown man — reduced to… this…
It was pathetic — He was pathetic…
Jackie was still absorbing what he’d told her, still frozen in her disbelief.

“You’re really saying this all happened to you..? I’m trying to understand... Are you really saying you witnessed Lidia’s death last night?”

He nodded.
Would she finally take him seriously?

“What about the bloody clothes? What about
evidence
?”

He got up with difficulty. He was so tired suddenly. He felt as if gravity was working against him. He led her into the bathroom like a zombie and opened the trash bag in the corner. There they were — The bloody shirt and pants, wet with repeated attempts to clean them but totally ruined, just as he’d described them.

The reality of the clothes seemed to get to her. Her mouth snapped set and he could almost see the wheels turning in her head as she tried to reason him (and herself) out of this whole thing…

“Frank…”

She stopped, then re-analyzed, eyes turned inward, searching and sifting through all plausible explanations.

“Isn’t it possible it was a suicide and when you went to check it out, that’s when you got the blood on you?”

He’d thought of that — He would love to believe it — but it didn’t work.
He responded with difficulty. It was like his system was shutting down.

“Lidia’s bed has rails. She couldn’t have gotten into her chair by herself to get the picture. And it doesn’t explain the rest of what I saw…”

His wife was staying on point. She was so focused on solving this, she didn’t seem to notice his condition.

She was nothing if not rational. He had to admire her for that.

“I know this will sound terrible — he’s your friend and everything — but what about Fernando? Maybe he did it or at least brought Lidia the glass?”

Frank shook his head.

“No way. It wasn’t Fernando.”

He’d thought of this as well but it didn’t make sense. Other than the fact that he had gone there with Frank, there was nothing to make this theory work — not motive, not timing, not location, nothing.

“Frank… It wasn’t some…
ghost
… That’s ridiculous… You think that, what — It drinks blood and becomes more... real? — Solidified…? And you think this is Eli? All because of some promise you had him make?”