Spider-Man | Doesn't Need Help

CHAPTER 39

POV: Aaron Kline

A few months earlier

“Hi,” I said to my colleagues as I was leaving the police station where I worked.

I had been a police detective for ten years and still enjoyed the job as much as when I started.

It might seem like I had the perfect life. A well-paying job, a wonderful wife, and a daughter I loved more than anything. And I truly did have a good life, though I never believed things would turn out so well.

In my youth, I was a spoiled child who had everything I wanted. That was until I met my current wife, Aurora, who—as the saying goes—set me straight. I met her while I was still in private high school. At first, we hated each other, and we ended up married and having a child, whom we named Victoria. Because she was our victory after everything we'd been through with our families.

We've lived in New York for almost fifteen years. Moving here was our shared dream.

I didn't live particularly far away, so on days like this I walked to work.

As usual during the summer, I returned home around 4 p.m.

Today was an astonishingly beautiful day. And I don't know why, but something about it just didn't feel right.

“I’m back!” I called, entering our rather large apartment.

I took off my shoes and started walking deeper into the apartment.

"I'm so exhausted after today, all I want is a cold beer," I said, but when I reached the kitchen and saw that she was in the same state she'd been in after breakfast this morning, I was surprised. "Aurora?" I said my wife's name, hoping she was somewhere around here and would call soon.

But that didn't happen. Still silence reigned.

“Rora, honey!” I tried again, this time shortening her name because I knew she liked it when I did that.

But that didn't help either.

"Victoria, where are you?" "Still nothing." "Hey, this isn't funny, I'm starting to worry."

I was really starting to get nervous. I walked through the living room, which was connected to the kitchen, looking around for the women in my life, but they were nowhere to be seen.

I checked the bathroom, then our bedroom, but they were still gone.

I headed for the last room—our eight-year-old daughter's room. And what I saw there... I knew then that I would never forget that sight.

My wife. My dear wife lay on the floor next to the bed with a hole in her chest, near her heart. And another in the middle of her forehead. Her eyes were still open—terrified.

And on the bed, on the snow-white sheets, lay our victory. And as soon as I saw her condition, I knew it had been some time since she lost consciousness. Someone had stabbed her, including in the chest. Yet... my daughter was still alive.

I quickly called an ambulance. I asked them to come as soon as possible, explaining the situation. They arrived within twenty minutes. Then they took her away, really taking their time.

I immediately followed them, already knowing that my wife was dead.

When we got to the hospital and they wanted to take her into surgery right away, they found out she was dead. She died on the way to the hospital.

I couldn't move. I couldn't do anything. I was a man, yet I began to sob, slowly sliding to the ground in the hospital corridor, oblivious to everything.