A Collection of Short Stories

2. Him

Daphne Lawrence was always an ordinary woman. She lived in a normal Welsh valley, and was often very nice to people. However, her private life was way more complicated ever since the death of her husband, Andrew Lawrence, three years ago. He died in a car accident, and Daphne has been a mess ever since. She stopped taking her pills and has hallucinations a lot more. She was slowly getting over him, until she started getting texts from him.

It was just a normal day. Nothing strange. After work at 5:30, she went back home. A normal day. She was talking with her best friend, when a message appeared. The number it came from caught her attention. It was Andrew's. She didn't answer it, thinking it must have been some kind of mistake. She ignored it and went about her day. She made dinner and fed her cat, Ripley, and went to bed. But the next day, she got another message.

"Why didn't you answer me, Daphne?" This really freaked her out. Andrew was supposed to be dead. Why was he talking to her? Was this even Andrew? Scared, Daphne asked who it was. The person responded. "It's only been two years. Have you forgotten about me already?" She turned off her phone. This wasn't real. None of it was. Maybe it was just another one of her hallucinations. She was off her pills for quite a while now, so maybe it was a side effect, who knows. Maybe she was imagining the whole thing. Hesitantly, she responded.

"I don't know who you are, but whatever prank you're pulling, it's not funny."

"It's not a prank, Daphne. Are you still taking your medicine?"

Her heart skipped a beat. No one else except Andrew knew about her depression and hallucinations.

"Whoever you are, stop it right now."

"Have you been better since the accident, babe?"

Daphne was shaking. Her chest tightened up, and she felt mixed emotions. She didn't know what to feel. Shocked, scared, panicked, lost? Those were only a few. She was about to respond, when he sent her another message.

"Did you already forget how you killed me that day?"

Daphne froze. She was like a deer in headlights. So she caused the accident? Andrew died because of her? No. There was no way. She couldn't have done it. Could she? Her phone chimed again with another text.

"It's okay, Daphne. I know you didn't mean it."

Mean what? To kill him? She felt like she was being watched at this point. She looked through her window, but she didn't see anyone. She tried her best to ignore it, but she just couldn't. She felt unsafe in her own home. She first thought about leaving, but then she remembered that Andrew's phone was in the garage. She decided to go down and check.

The garage was dark. There was dust and cobwebs everywhere. She went towards the box in the back. It hadn't been opened since Andrew's death. It was old and dusty, cluttered with all of his stuff. The first thing that caught her eye was a photograph of them together. Their tenth anniversary. It was all coming back to her. Just then, her phone chimed again.

"That was the picture we took before the accident. You look gorgeous." How did he know? Was he watching her? He couldn't be watching her. He was dead, right? Daphne didn't know how to react. She was sure she didn't kill Andrew. She was sure of it.

She looked down, and she was horrified. Her hands were covered in blood. They were stained red. There was no sign of her phone, or the box she was looking in. She wasn't in the garage anymore. In fact, she wasn't even in her house. She was at the place where she apparently killed Andrew. It was snowing, hailing, and fog dawned on the sky. Just like that day. There was a car in the distance. It hit a tree. She approached it, and it was their car. The same black Toyota that crashed. It was on fire, and about to explode. Daphne was nowhere to be seen, but Andrew was still in the car. Before she had the time to process everything, the car exploded. It blew up right in her face with her husband still inside. That's what he meant by 'how you killed me.' She left him there to die. She may not have been the one to crash into the trees, but she was the one who left them out there. She chose to save herself and not him. Daphne couldn't move. It was like she was frozen in time. And just as quickly as she came, she went back. She was back in the garage, staring at the beige box and the photograph from that day. The phone was right there next to her, and her hands were no longer stained in crimson blood.

It all made sense now. He was haunting her because she killed him. He wanted to remind her of what she did. She left him there to die. She was so deep in thought that she didn't hear the phone chime with another text from Andrew.

"Daphne, I had to. I had to make you see what you did." She tried responding and building up a conversation so she could maybe get more answers.

"I'm---I'm sorry...I didn't mean to..."

"I know you didn't. I'm not mad at you, but you were delusional. You forgot about everything." It was true. She knew it was all true. Ever since the accident, Daphne began seeing a therapist since she was so messed up. He prescribed her with anti hallucination pills as well as xanax to treat her anxiety. She stopped taking them a year after he died. She realized they weren't helping her, so she flushed them down the toilet. She knew he would be mad since he always urged her to take her medication, but she couldn't handle it anymore. Daphne was a complete mess.

"Go back upstairs, Daphne, and take the box with you."

She did as he told her to do. It was sunset by the time she went back up. She had been down there for at least three hours. She sat back down near the window, and started looking through the box more. She found Andrew's watch, some more photos of them together, and some of his old clothes. One of the pictures specifically caught her eye. It was a photo of their car, the black Toyota, engulfed in flames. When was this taken? She didn't remember seeing it in the box when she was in the garage. She looked through the whole stack of pictures and each one was exactly the same. The black car was on fire and about to explode. But Andrew wasn't in the car, she was.

She was back there again. Back to the place where he died. This time, the car didn't crash into the trees directly. It was found half a mile from where it originally was. Not in the trees, but in the lake. The car had driven down a cliff and landed in the water. Deep water. She headed towards the car, but couldn't find anything. Then, she saw it. Her own body is covered in blood from the damage of the broken glass submerged in the water. Just then, her phone chimed for the last time. She opened the message and read it.

"You killed me that day, but I killed you too. Goodbye, my love." Just then, the air turned black, and Daphne disappeared.