Athena really did not know what to expect.
Lunch was around the corner and it was here she started pondering.
Her little girl at home all alone with her brother? This was a nightmare scenario. Vander her youngest son of 4, and her daughter Tanika ; the sweet young thing she was raising was only 11 but smart as a damn whip. And the brown and yellow fur splattered cat-ball Mr. Milton.
She was not a bad mom. She just had no baby sitters. Sharice, Cherise, Danika, Slavia were all in the Bahamas. All close childhood friends. She had four of the best buds in the world and they were all nowhere to be goddamn found.
It plagued her.
She would flash her eyes in full darkness.
Athena closed her eyes and wanted to know what was happening to her , she wanted it to subside.
"I just need some air," she said aloud.
Athena scurried towards other rooms but yet nothing was familiar. The familiarity had bled in and out of her consciousness. She remembered the hotel that she stayed at. The faucets that turned, she could picture all of them in her mind. The wooshing.
"I just need some goddamn fresh air," she said louder. " I NEED FRESH AIR." She bellowed.
Just then one of the hotel workers sidled up next her to ask what the matter was. "Miss is uh everything--not now Marsha, yes I will clean that later this lady she hurts--.said the mysterious woman. She was Mexican in heritage but Dutch in her eyes. And around her neck was a jade necklace. But Athena was so busy yelling and trying to make it all about her, Athena did not even peer up. Athena put her hands on her head " FRESH AIR--MAKES FOR THE BEST OF AIRS." she said. Athena put two hands on her temples and started freaking out. "BEST OF AIRS, I have to get air." she kept saying.
It was if a tune danced in her head once more. Two violins playing and then three and then four. And then nothing.
By this time and during this episode Athena was left sitting outside. The cigarette burning near her in the afternoon breeze. It made her cough but it made her snap to as well. "Hey, can I just get a little drag of that stranger," Athena said. "Yeah, here ya go. What's your name, well duh, name tag, says here, your name, is Athena. Like the goddess?" the stranger said. He wore carter overalls and a Brewers t-shirt. He had blue jeans that were lanky. He had a tattoo that graced and etched into his arm with a clock on one side and on the other arm was a raven. He also had a neck tattoo and a flaming skull on a skinny body.
"They say ravens are paragonally evil," Athena said.
"That right, that right, well I got this here when I was in the Peruvian forests, I was er--a jungle miner, down there, down there in that godforsaken forest. I swear to shit-gravy, we were down there and I heard something howling. Pierce-laden screams down there at base camp, Gilty and Tim yeah--they say you hear that? I says no but it sounded like a woman or mother that lost her pup or something. Tim says no Tim Grandbauer says no--way in hell it could be that. Then we down there carving up these trees to get to sevastplated rubies, down there in Peru -- the man and I hear the howel again. I freaked ship --man, I freaked ship. It was if the voice cut through the trees. " the stranger said.
"You ever get that feeling something is eyeballing you?" Athena said. "I feel uneasy even in my own bed sometimes. They say things go bump in the fucking night friend, and I feel them. One time I go to my daughter's room and she is peacefully lying there. And I revel in the innocence of her, she is 11. And I sit there and look at her in a motherly way and I just don't understand how many monsters she is facing daily. I leave her room. And she opens the door and she is behind me. 'Mommy! Mommy, there's a monster on the window sill he's blackened, he's blackened, she is screaming. I check. Nothing. The week after she starts drawing as children do; It is a black cloud thing with the arms she said. It is in a red notebook with red ribbons in it. She has a black book too, but goddamn if that image was not burned into my brain. My poor little angel disturbed by something. I don't have the guts to explain to her that it was not real. And yet the image stares me down, horrifying." Athena said.
Athena takes a long drag of the cigarette and the cherry lights up brighter.
"They are real." said the stranger. "Realer than the sun, more real than the cherry on this here cigarette." said the stranger.
"And you have seen them?" said the stranger.
"Yeah, but she showed me the other notebooks, and I can't even repeat the things I saw," Athena said.
"Did something visit you?" said the stranger.
Athena made the cigarette's ash as short as a pencil now.
"1 a.m. in the morning I hear an owl hoot outside of my window. My bed is on the top floor. I hear something run up the stairs. My daughter is asleep. Could it be a burglar? No. My door is locked. Something opens my door and comes to the foot of my bed. But it is pitch black and I see nothing, until the fucking things soulless eyes stare at me. Almost, marble eyes and I am in paralytic fear. I picture always in Pet Sematary with the hellacious half dead, fully dead cat. Those ugly deteriorated fucking eyes! I am helpless. My daughter quietly sleeping as I am visited by a ghost, a demon, a dark shadowy figure. 5 minutes of contact and it slinks away. "Athena said panicky.
"I feel your pain lady, but you need not worry Athena. I think you have a guardian. I cannot sense auras but I know good people, ma'am, and yer one, you are. I just met you and you have shit together. You do. " the stranger said.
"Can I hug you. I need to hug someone. I just need human contact. I can't explain it." Athena said.
"Sure." the stranger said.
"Thanks, I needed that," Athena said as she hugged the stranger for a couple of seconds.
The stranger whispered in Athena's ear as it made it past her willowy hair.
"You will face more." the stranger said.
