Hello Darkness

Chapter Nine

After my outburst, I find myself sitting at the kitchen island, listening to Alma shuffling in the pantry, while Breccan attempts to clean up the mess I've made. I glare at the pantry as something particularly heavy tings off the floor and Alma curses. She can't help but pick now as the perfect time to clean and organize. But when everything else seems out of control, she focuses her energy on something tangible. Though sometimes her compulsions are borderline obsessive, it seems much healthier than passing out.

Breccan's heavy boots thud up the stairs, and the squeak of the screen door draws Alma from the pantry. She's wiping her hands on a towel.

Breccan sits next to me on a barstool and runs his hand under his bristly chin. "They're gone for tonight."

"I don't know how much more of this I can take," I say running my hands over my face. Breccan looks over at me but doesn't say a word. A calming silence lingers over the room, like the quiet reprieve after a big storm.

Alma purses her lips. "What did they say?"

I swallow a gulp of air trying to fill my constricting chest. The clock echoes its reliable tick... four... five... six...

"Charley is a person of interest." He sighs.

"The police think she had something to do with it?" All of Alma's irritation toward me disappears and focuses on Breccan. "You set them straight, right? Please tell me you—"

Breccan puts up his hand, and she stops. "Well, she did tell them to look into your parents' murder last night, and they did. And they were similar. Then she implicated herself today." He cuts me a glare.

Alma cuts me off before I can speak. "You can't seriously be defending them. An eight-year-old girl couldn't have anything to do with the murder of her parents." Alma's brown eyes blaze at Breccan. "You told them it was ridiculous, right?"

"Well, of course. But they're just doing their job." Alma's stare is relentless. Breccan shrugs. "I don't think they have any better options, so they're grasping at what they can get. And they think they have motivation." Breccan chews on his lip, lost in his thoughts.

"Motivation? Why on earth would Charley want that girl dead? She didn't even know her." Alma sighs, the heat in her cheeks nearly visible in her breath.

"Listen, I would get a lawyer. I know a few—"

"Why?" Alma throws her rag down on the counter. "Charley did nothing wrong."

"You don't think I know that?" Breccan's hands fall heavy onto the countertop making me jump. "They think that she wanted to draw attention back to your parents' case. That she is trying to do some copy-cat murder."

"This is absurd."

My mind swirls. I drop my face into my hands. I finally admit what I had been pushing out of my mind, and I hate it, but it's the only thing I can say. "I'm scared." I meet Alma's chocolate eyes, and she immediately comes to my side wrapping her arms around me.

"I am too," she breathes in my ear, embracing me. Her touch is so warm—so welcome.

Breccan hates hearing those words. It's written all over his face. "I'll get this straightened out. But in the meantime, I'm going to get someone to watch the house."

"No." I push back. "I'm sure they'll be watching us enough. I don't—"

He shakes his head. "This is for your protection. I know you didn't do this and that means there is someone out there who did this."

"You stayed here last night," Alma objects.

"But I can't be here all the time."

"So, we're just supposed to be watched like animals?" My hands fall onto the island.

"Not long term, just—" Concern softens his eyes. "Just a few weeks. That should give us enough time to clear things up and find who did this."

"Yeah, I'm sure it will be that fast." It's been fifteen years since my parents were murdered and they've never caught anyone. "No, I won't have some buffoon following me around—finding more bullshit to incriminate me with. I just stopped getting stares, Breccan. I don't need it to start all over again." My chest tightens at the thought.

A light knock comes from the front door, and Breccan moves. His heavy boots rattle the floorboards as he crosses the room. He opens it. Though he fills most of the doorway, I can still see around him—no one is there.

"No," Breccan spits. "Fuck this." He swats the screen door sending it slamming into the siding and storms onto the porch.

Alma and I glance at each other before sprinting across the room. There on the porch is a small brown satchel bag—my purse. My breath catches in my throat.

"Where are you, you bastard?" Breccan yells in the front yard. "You think this is funny?" he yells again. But nothing. The birds even stop chirping. Alma runs out to the yard, but I don't dare cross the threshold.

The tightness in my chest smothers me. Every breath strains, but my eyes fix on the bag. They're arguing in the yard—something about the neighbors, but I can only see vague shadows. Breccan turns on a heel and storms back up the stairs, his boots loud and heavy—just like my heart. Thud. Thud. Thud.

The world spins with darkness fluttering in its corners.

"Charley..." I can't see Alma, but I can hear her. "You need to sit."

Thin fingers grip my wrist and steer me away from the darkness.

"Breathe." It's a command, and I obey. "In and out," Alma's voice is soothing, my last link to consciousness. "In and out," she repeats a little softer. "Remember that time when Nana took us to get shakes at Old Hattie's? You always got chocolate with whipped cream and a cherry."

Alma's oval face begins to focus, the darkness retreating to the edges of my vision, as my mind focuses on pulling up the memory.

She continues, "Well this time, you waited until you were done with your shake before you ate the cherry. By that time, it sank all the way to the bottom of the glass." She holds my hands, her thumbs making small circles.

"Do you remember the long spoon you were using to get the cherry out?"
I nod.

She lets out a little giggle, and I can see her sitting in the booth right across from me. Her hair in pigtails, and my grandmother smiling at her side. "Just as the waitress came back to the table, the cherry flung out of your glass and hit her right in the nose."

A slight tug draws my lips up, and my heartbeat eases back to normal.

"Thank you," my voice cracks. I count the light freckles dusting Alma's cheeks, even though I already know there will be seventeen—one extra on the left.

"Better?" She continues rubbing soothing circles.

I nod.

"I know you don't want to, but I think you should see Doctor Reed. I know, you feel like you failed, but there is nothing wrong with staying healthy."

I drop my gaze onto her manicured nails. That's right—because I'm sick. I'll always be sick.

"Especially with everything that's happened." Alma's throat bobs as she waits for my response.

Alma isn't wrong. If someone is indeed after me, I need to have a clear mind and not pass out at the first rise of panic. My life, suddenly, is a lot more stressful. Maybe seeing Doctor Reed isn't such a bad idea. "Okay."

Breccan agrees to stay again tonight. But he insists we call one of the officers to retrieve my bag.