In the dark of the night

Chapter 43

when I enter the house everything looks pretty much the same, the only real difference was the sadness looming in the air. It's seeps in through the walls, stained the carpet and floated around, like specks of dust waiting for it's next victim.

"Mom" I call out,

"I'm upstairs in your room." She answered,

I walk up and stare into my old room, it's like a time capsule. Everything was exactly the same as I had left it,

My mom had already unpacked all my belongings. Some clothes hung in the closet, shoes were lined up on the carpet under them. While other clothes were perfectly folded and put away.

"You didn't have to do all this mom"

"I wanted to" she smiled sluggishly,

"Thank you" I say back,

It's the most affection either of us have shown the other in quite awhile.

"Your Nans wake will be tomorrow, you and I and whoever else found themselves close to her will arrive at 16 hundred. The actual wake will begin at 18 hundred and that's when everyone else will show up. Your Nan was very good about her will, everything has been paid for she's wrote out every little detail she wants. Her burial will be the day after her wake it will take place in a Catholic Church and then straight to the cemetery. She wanted people to come to her house afterwards and eat food and reminisce and heal together." My mother stops talking and then looks at me with concern. "She left you a letter to read whenever you're ready .... she also left her house in your name."

She left her house in my name? I live in New York, she should have left it in my mothers name, she's the one who lives here after all.

My mom stands up and goes towards the door to leave my bedroom, she then stops and turns around to look at me.

My eyes lock into hers,

Her mouth parts as if she's about to say something, but as soon as it dose she closes her mouth reconsidering. She then spins back around leaving my room,

"Goodnight Natalie" she says from down the hall,

"Goodnight mom" I replied,

Goodnight? It's 8pm I can't sleep right now, maybe I should, but I can't.

I seen Paul today and not in a dream or a vision, but in real life face to face and I froze acting like we didn't know one another. I wonder if that what he wanted me to do, his girlfriend was there and all so it probably was what he wanted from me right?

I mean he never stopped me from doing it, he didn't correct me and he most definitely didn't try and speak to me.

No he just stood there looking like he saw a ghost which is honestly kind of ironic considering the circumstances.

I shake my head trying to clear Paul out of my mind as I slump down into the floor.

And what about the fact that I'll have to see all the other people I left behind? Tony, Laura, Toria and Mark who I know doesn't want to see me, can I really blame him though? I wouldn't wanna be there for me if I were him. I mean where was I during his tragedy? I was off tryin to get away from my own that's where, I wasn't there for him, I wasn't there for any of them.

Then there's Simon, who I begged to come with me so we could start over together. All so i could spend years putting him down and pushing him away. What will he do when he sees me again, what do I even want him to do?

One of the things about leaving forever is that you're not intending to have to see the people you left behind ever again.

I groan out of nerves and frustration,

On top of all that I've got stupid visions creeping up and I still haven't really fully let the fact that my Nan is gone sink in.

Because I can't, I just can't right now,

I stand up and shake myself off, shake my nervousness away, I walk downstairs and straight to where my Nan kept her liquor.

When I open the cabinet I move her boxes of corn starch and flour to the side and there I see it two bottles of wine one of champagne and two whiskey bottles.

Nan thought she had hidden this like a sly Fox, truth is she wasn't much of a baker so one night when she was asleep I investigated her secret cabinet.

That's how I found this, I never took anything and I never told her I'd found it either. I just thought it was funny more than anything else and now it's a found memory of mine, one I only share with myself.

I pull out the whiskey and soon pour myself some. If your looking to forget your troubles, might as well drink something that will make you forget everything else too.

So I drink,

I drink until my problems feel like options, I drink until my head spins, I drink until I can barely make it up the stairs.

But once I do make it up the stairs I drink some more. I lay in bed drinking as my room dances circles around me. I fall multiple times while putting my pajamas on.

Eventually I fall asleep,

"Natalie" voices whisper to me,

I find myself alone in darkness running away from the sound, but every time I do, I only find myself closer to it.

"Natalie!" The voices grow louder,

Hands from the darkness begin reaching out for me, they pull on me, ones nails cut my left thigh.

I fall into fetal position on the floor as the hands rip at me tearing my pajamas, I rock back and forth as I scream.

"You should have never came back" one voice that sounds different from the rest speaks to me.

And with a shove my eyes open and I'm in bed, I stand up forgetting how to breathe for a minute.

My left leg stings in pain, I look to see my thighs bleeding then I notice my pajamas are torn to shreds. My forearms are covered in scratches, I've had many visions, but I've never left them with a mark on my physical body.

What is happening?