Hunter: Crossroads

Chapter 23

It was late afternoon as I walked up to the door, and knocked. I looked behind me, to admire the view, a hazy orange sky began to burn darker with the coming sunset. This wasn't anything like Matt's home back in France, and as the door opened, Alice gasped.

"You're here! Already." She did a terrible job at hiding her shock, and her nerves, though considering the past I wasn't surprised or offended. It was a little different to this morning when I had been given the full celebrity treatment.

"Matt wanted to see me," I say slowly, hoping I hid my nerves better than she did.

Alice nodded, but didn't move; just looking me over from head to toe with scared eyes as she held the side of the door so tightly the tips of her fingers had turned white.

"Can I see him?"

"Oh. Yes. Of course. Um, you are invited into our home." She bowed, her arm waving out to motion me inside. "Please come in."

I wasn't sure what that was about but went inside anyway. Everything was white, except for the collection of ferns along the wall by concrete steps that led up to the next level. It was cold and didn't actually look like a home or anywhere I'd expect Matt to live. I followed Alice through to the room on the right, which was just as bare and minimalistic. My steps were loud compared to hers, each click of my heels seemed to make her twitch as she attempted to subtly keep staring at me as we walked and failed.

"He's down there." She pointed down a smaller staircase to the one in the foyer, and the smell of paints and coffee filled the air. "He's been working a lot lately."

I offer her a smile as I start down the stairs, pausing as she doesn't move to follow or leave. She hugs herself anxiously as her eyes stay locked on me and I'm not sure what I am about to walk into as I keep going. It's warmer down here, yet a small fan in the corner blasts me with a cool breeze as I enter the basement. The smell of the paints is stronger now and looking around at the canvas that is piled up around the walls, it's as if all the colour in the upstairs had been locked down here.

I don't know where to look first; some of what I see is familiar, older pieces and gorgeous scenery. Portraits of faces I don't know stare back as if they're scared their secrets will be told, and then the life and colour fade to darkness. Reds and blacks, pain, suffering. None of it makes sense, and in the opposite corner of the room, Matt is sitting at his easel, multiple pencils in his hand as he draws furiously on the paper in front of him.

Daring to go closer, I step around discarded bits of paper, broken frames and torn canvas. I see Alfie in a jungle, bits of Kara on her throne, more places and people I don't know and then the very familiar golden arch of Artemis' bow. If he knows I'm there, he doesn't show it, too busy drawing whatever it is that's haunting him now. His movements are frantic and hard, the tip of the pencil snapping before he tosses it aside and grabs another.

I feel like I'm intruding, and as I catch a glimpse of my face, I reach down to pick it up from the floor. It doesn't give anything away, my hair is tied up in a ponytail, my expression cautious and the rest of my body has been ripped away. I look around for the other part, wondering what else there had been to see, but it's gone, or maybe it never existed.

"Matt?" I say softly, it comes out as barely a whisper and I'm not sure he'd even hear me.

"He won't stop when he's like this," Alice spoke up from behind, and I spun around with a gasp as she managed to sneak up on me. "He gets in the zone. We've had months of peace, he could focus on his new show and I thought the nightmare we'd just gone through was over. About a month ago, he started waking up in the middle of the night again. The sketches started to get darker. He'd get moody and stop sleeping for a couple of days at a time. The drinking came next. Familiar faces started to reappear."