Page 2 of I'll Be Seeing You
I’d thought the pretty little thing they kept locked away upstairs would be the solution to my growing problem. Our most recent admission. I’d seen them carry her in, wave after wave of dark hair covering her eyes as they’d brushed past me. So I’d pushed into her room, grabbed her chart, and waited for her to notice me.
My stomach had twisted. They were the wrong color. Green instead of blue. And as much as I’d tried, I couldn’t get passed 'em.
But Nurse Keller was just my type. A bit young, more naïve than I liked them. But her eyes were perfect. More ocean than sky blue. With little flecks of gold that danced when she smiled at me.
I tipped my hat at her and watched herwatch meexit the secure unit with a beep of a keycard. Down the maze of halls and out the front door. The first slap of fresh, cold air always had the bumps rising on my skin. That prickly sensation that came whenever you were getting away with doing something you weren’t supposed to be doing.
I fought that urge to peek over a shoulder as my feet kicked up the occasional stone in the driveway, the gravel crunching with each step I took closer and closer to the old beaten-down Wagon I’d stashed at the side of the building a few years back. Solid frame, despite the rust and cracked leather interior. She was no show pony, but baby girl sure did purr when I kicked 'er engine on.
I swallowed down a handful of the white tabs I’d pocketed, Xannies by the looks of 'em, and tapped myhand on the steering wheel, tuning out the humming sound coming from the dash. I hated wasting the gas but it was cold as fuck outside and I had at least another hour before shift change. Then I lifted my arms, using the flats of my palms to brace my head, and leaned back in my seat.
Might as well get comfortable.
CHAPTER TWO
HIM
Iwoke with a start. My hands digging into the seat’s interior to keep the rest of me upright as I cracked my neck. Trying to shake that feeling you got when your brain insisted you were falling but you were sitting perfectly still.Fuck.
The time blinked back at me from the center console. 2:00 AM. I’d knocked out for almost three hours.
“Def Xannies,” I grunted to myself before shifting into drive and propelling the Wagon out the gates at the end of the twisty road that led to the main building. It was leading away from it right now. The towering silhouette of Briarwood Sanitorium getting smaller and smaller in my rearview while the rose emblem on the lab coat I’d tossed beside me stayed the same size.
I should have known better than to pop so many pills with a long night ahead of me. But the waiting had had me on edge. Had my knee bouncing and all that pent-up energy bubbling over.
I’d done it to myself. Truth was, I didn’t need to wait.I didn’t need to follow Nurse Keller home to know where I was going. I’d gotten her address from the employee files. But I enjoyed doing it. I enjoyed watching 'em in their natural habitat for a bit. I enjoyed fantasizing about that first encounter. Imagining how they’d taste. How they’d feel. That moment between life and death. How long I could keep 'em suspended there. Like picking out a lobster from a fish tank before the chef boiled 'em alive.
Except, in this instance, I was both serving upandeating my meal.
Thirty minutes later, I was pulling up to a modest little townie. Lower-income with the kind of neighbors who were good at minding their business. It was the only one without a string of Christmas lights and sat nestled between two houses off one of the busier streets. Which had me rounding the block until I found a spot to park. I wasn’t worried about a ticket. Shit wasn’t registered in my name. That didn’t mean I wanted the inconvenience of having my Wagon towed.
By the time I was creeping up the front steps and slipping a hand into the flowerpot where Juliet’d stashed a spare key, the entire house was blacked out. Minus one window, where a stream of light peeked out from underneath the blinds that I knew likely belonged to the only bathroom. The residents on this street weren’t keen on remodeling these older buildings and plumbing was fucking expensive.
The front door creaked when I shoved it open, and I held my breath as I crept up the stairs, careful to keep my steps soundless as I glided my feet from one to the next.Bracing myself on the banister as the scent of her bubble bath got stronger the closer I moved towards the door. I reached out an arm, using the tips of my fingers to slowly guide it forward on its hinges. Pausing in my tracks when the soles of my shoes splashed against the tiled floor and soaked into the carpet on the other side.
I shifted from one foot to another, as my brain tried to keep up with what my body was feeling. And then I looked over. At her. At the tub. At the bubbles cascading over the lip. At the unnatural color of the water. I knew that color. I saw it in my nightmares. In my dreams too.
What. The. Fuck.
CHAPTER THREE
HIM
Irushed forward, my foot catching on a particularly slippery tile and my ass hitting the ground before I jumped up again and scrambled for the tub. I dove my hands inside and fished around, until I was shoulder deep in the bath water and dragging out Juliet’s limp body. The past and present twisting into some sort of perverse nightmare as I wrapped a towel around each of her wrists and secured 'em with hair ties she’d left out on the bathroom counter. Then I carried her down the hall and placed her on the bed.
The cuts were diagonal, which meant she’d been serious. This wasn’t some shit she was doing for attention. Not home alone. Not in the middle of the night when no one was supposed to be watching.
I paced back and forth across the little ten-by-ten room, tugging the mask I’d fashioned from an old CPR dummy off my face and running a hand over my shaved head. I could still smell the fresh layer of white paint I sprayed across the front, feel the slightly jagged edges Ihadn’t had time to file all the way down after I couldn’t get the blood off my old one, as I glanced over at Nurse Keller.
She was breathing. I felt her pulse under my thumb but I couldn’t be sure how much longer that would last. I didn’t knowhow longshe’d been there at the start, how much blood she’d lost.
Fuck!I punched a fist-sized hole into the closest wall. I needed this release. I needed it tonight.
I glanced over to where she was bleeding through the bleach-white towels, her head kinked to one side and her tits on display like a fucked-up offering from some more fucked-up god.
I could… It wasn’t like it would be all that hard. I peered down at my zipper. 'Cept I wasn’t all that hard either.
Now that was fucking weird.
