A Deep and Dark December(3)

She pocketed her keys once again and fit the dirt-smudged key from the planter into the lock. It fit, turning easily in the knob. The door creaked on rusty hinges, the curse of coastal living.

“Hello? Mr. Lasiter?” Her voice echoed off the walls of the near empty room.

Daylight made a weak effort to invade the space, casting no shadows. It was colder here, but not cold enough to mist her breath. The air lay still and ripe with wariness, as though the house had not yet made up its mind to accept her. Or maybe she was the one who refused to accept what had been so clear in her vision. She didn’t want to go into the house, didn’t want to be the one to make the discovery.

The layout was different from what she’d seen in her mind. Almost a mirror image, except for a door where there should have been a hall, and a fireplace where there should’ve been none. The differences were disorienting. It took her a moment to get her bearings. Different. Everything was so different from what she’d seen.

Why? What does it mean?

She called out for Greg again. No answer. She should leave. Right now. But her feet propelled her farther into the room as if controlled by someone or something else.

She swallowed at the lump of dread in her throat. She’d been drawn to the door at the far end of the room just like her vision and now there, standing before it, she couldn’t seem to stop her shaking hand from reaching out to open it. A noise from the other side made her flinch.

She swung the door open slowly, revealing the room inches at a time. “Greg? It’s me, Erin, fr—” She let go of the knob, clamping both hands to her mouth. The door continued on its own, exposing the scene.

Greg knelt over the body of a woman sprawled out on the floor in a thin pool of blood.

Behind him, the kitchen wall was dotted and streaked with more blood. He slowly raised his gaze. “I didn’t do it.” He swayed back and forth. His eyes, dull with shock, stayed on Erin’s. “I didn’t do it.”

Erin lowered her hands, resting them over her pounding heart. This wasn’t right. None of this was right. Greg was the one who was supposed to be dead. “Who… who is she?”

He looked back at the woman, squinting down at her as though he was trying to figure that out. “Deidre,” he finally answered. “My wife.”

She knew that. Didn’t she? Yes, Deidre. She’d met her a few times. But it was supposed to be Greg lying on the floor. “Wh… what happened?”

He stood and held out his hand to Erin, watching her now as though she had the answers to her own questions. That’s when she noticed the gun resting in his bloodied palm. She started, knocking a shoulder into the doorframe behind her. They stared at each other across the kitchen. Thin beams of light filtered through the blinds, slashing everything in the room. The air was thicker here, so thick she could barely breathe, her chest heaving with the effort. The raw scent of blood and death filled her lungs, making her nauseous.

“I didn’t do it,” he insisted again.

“O-okay.”

“You don’t believe me.”

“I do.”

She’d answered too quickly. His eyes widened a fraction and then he looked around wildly as though searching for a way out. His fingers flexed over the gun, drawing her attention to it. She reached for the doorframe, needing its solidity. Her vision tunneled on the weapon.

The feeling of being sucked back, then jerked out of her body and dropped into another time made her clutch for the wall that wasn’t there. She saw Deidre, whole and well, here, sitting at the kitchen table. She was waiting for someone, a neat stack of paperwork in front of her. She’d dressed carefully, her makeup just so. Something important was about to happen. Erin could feel Deidre’s excitement. At a knock on the back door, Deidre stood, smoothing out her skirt. She opened the door, smiling.

A gun was thrust at Deidre, forcing her to move back into the room. Deidre gasped, her hands going to her mouth. Sunlight crowned the head of the person holding the gun, shrouding his identity. Erin could feel Deidre’s shock turn to confusion, then fear. The same fear burned in Erin’s chest. This was someone Deidre had loved and he’d come to kill her. Erin stared at the gun as Deidre did and then the room exploded in blinding light.

“I didn’t do it!” Greg wailed, plunging Erin back into the here and now. He swung the gun in a wild arc. “I didn’t do it!”

She sucked in air. Real and not real blurred for a moment. What was happening?

“I know you didn’t,” she answered, placing a hand over her stomach, trying to staunch the nausea.

She was sure Greg hadn’t done this. Even though the murderer’s identity hadn’t been revealed to her through Deidre, Erin was sure it wasn’t Greg. The clothes, the body type, and overall sense of the person were very different from the image she’d seen in her vision. Her vision couldn’t be wrong a second time. Could it? She shook her head rejecting that thought.

Greg looked down at his wife as if noticing her for the first time. His face contorted, his eyes clamped tight. His hands went to his head. The gun thumped dully against his skull. “No one’s going to believe me.”

“I believe you.”

“Why did they kill her?” he sobbed, dropping to the floor. His knees dipped in his wife’s blood. “Why… Why… Why…?” He smoothed a hand over Deidre’s face and hair, smudging them red. The light in the room changed with the waning daylight, bathing them gray.