Traces of Delilah

Six

I hadn't imagined my first day at work to feel so shitty. And by shitty, I meant boring. I officially understood what Skylar meant when she described her experience working at the antique shop. I should have been happy there were no customers, but I felt the complete opposite.

"Ugh, it's only twelve." I groaned under my breath. 

Glaring at the clock and glaring at the door was what I had been doing. It didn't change the fact I was bored out of my mind. Maybe if I glared at the clock hard enough, the hands would have moved on their own. I was willing to hallucinate the movement and pretend it happened at this point.

"What was that?" Oliver retreated from the back room with three boxes in hand. They leaned against his chest as he tilted back slightly to balance them. By the looks of it, he was doing a poor job managing them on his own.

"Do you need a hand with that?" I offered.

"Thanks. I sure could use one." His voice strained. A smile settled on his face as I rounded the counter, taking a box. He guided me to the other side of the store where we were able to put the boxes down. 

Geez, either I was getting old, or those boxes were heavy as fuck. As if my question was answered, an ache shot up my spine. I winced and arched my back, in an attempt to stretch the pain away. Okay, they were just super heavy.

"Thanks, Chastity," he said, again.

I nodded and decided to ask, "What is all this stuff anyways?" If I was seeing him when I closed my eyes, the least I could do was get to know him myself.

"We got a new shipment of supplies yesterday. Thomas ordered me to finish sorting them out." He shrugged.

"Oh, that explains it," I mumbled. 

We began on our way back to the other side of the store, near the cash registers.

Five minutes. In just five minutes, I could look at my phone. I had been itching for my break to come for the past hour now, so I could finish reading the article I had found earlier. It was much different than the other ones I found yesterday about what happened to Delilah and her family. There were more details too.

One would call my findings an obsession. But I didn't think so. I was just interested. I had always been interested in crime and cold cases. It was one of the main reasons I had rather watched shows like 48 hours and Cold Case Files with my father all day long. This was the closest I had ever been to an actual case. It was kind of mind-boggling.

"Hey, nice bracelet." Oliver's comment had me stopping in my tracks. 

I glanced at the bracelet dangling around my arm. His eyes lingered on the bracelet for a while, but he didn't seem to notice who it belonged to. Even if he didn't see it, he must have seen something within the bracelet. Something he recognized. I could tell by the look in his eyes. It was a glint that flashed by so fast, I almost thought I imagined it.

"Oh, thanks. It's just"—I stopped, thinking up an excuse—"my friend gave it to me," I settled with that. 

Revealing what I saw to anyone didn't seem like the most reliable or best option at the moment. Not until I could grasp an understanding. Sometime last night, I had slowly come to terms with the fact whatever I kept seeing as Delilah, was real. The only thing I couldn't convince myself of, was an explanation for it. 

Slowly, he beamed at me with a small smile. "It looks nice."

"Thank you," I said.

The tight smile on my face was nothing compared to his genuine one. It almost made me feel . . . bad? That's what the pressure on my chest was telling me. I wasn't sure why I felt like I was betraying him. I didn't even know him.