The Truth Berries

XXXVI

       Two days after the incident at her mother’s house, Helen was starting to start her life all over again. She still could not get back to her own apartment so she started shopping her groceries for the pantry and the fridge was already running low on supplies. To try to keep her mind away from the memories of the past days, Helen also spent her whole time yesterday in applying her own touch to her late mother’s house. She changed all her curtains, her bed sheet and pillow cases and rearranged some of the furniture. She also did not forget to call her local locksmith to change all the locks of the doors and she asked the man to add another set of it to every window in the house. Helen’s personal savings were almost depleted so she had no choice but to spend some of the money her parents left her. It was quite a sizable one and she tried to keep it as it was for so many years already. But she had no income of any sort for more than a week already since she fled Washington and she still could not get to find a new job until she knew what to do with the thing that Nadia left her.

        Since the night before, she made herself elusive. She rarely came out of the house and at times when the situation called for it, she always made sure that she kept her distance to everyone. She never talked to anyone outside the house now and she was always in a rush to get back inside as soon as she could. She kept on telling herself that she was not being too paranoid. But if actions spoke louder than words, hers must be already screaming of paranoia. Yet, she was willing to continue doing so if that meant the salvation of her own life.

       Helen parked her automatic car in front of the house and got out. She opened the back of it and carried the two large paper bags filled with her toiletries and food supplies. Helen kicked the door closed and locked the car before she took her groceries to the front door. She fumbled with her keys as she tried to find the right key to it. Three minutes have passed and she was still unsuccessful.

       “Stupid key!”

       Seconds after, she gave up and put down one of the bags. A can of corned tuna fell out of the bag and rolled towards her lawn. Helen watched it annoyingly as it rolled farther from her.

       “Seriously?” she asked herself in disbelief.

        Seeing no other way but to let go of the other bag, she went to pick up the rogue can of tuna. It was beginning to get dark and a cold gust of wind was lightly blowing already. Under normal circumstances, Helen would have stayed outside a little longer to enjoy that unusual cool breeze at that time of the year. She would have set her own rocking chair at the porch and sipped a cup of hot chocolate as she watched the cars passed by the road. She could have enjoyed looking at the fullness of the moon in the night, for it was going to be a full moon tonight. But now, she knew these were far from happening. Of course, she could still do that. That was only if she wanted a bullet hole or a cut throat. Helen stooped down to pick the can when she heard a crashing sound coming from her windows at the back of the house. She was terrified and she could hardly move. Flashes of the man trying to grab her appeared at the back of her head. She considered running again but where to? The police station was a straight no. Helen looked around her to see if there was anyone that could be of help. A shiny, black BMW was parked a hundred meters away but it looked deserted. She tried to look for somebody, anybody but there was no one around. So she summoned all her courage and took out a can of pepper spray from her bag as she slowly walked towards the back of the house.

       Helen realized that the backyard needed some attention now, for thick bushes were starting to invade its entirety. The grasses that the landscape company planted a year ago was going untamed now and it grazed her pants as she approached the window. The whole backyard has gone silent now and it added to the tension that was suspended in the air. Helen felt her heart racing but she kept on walking towards the window, step by careful step. A few meters more, the broken window was already visible. It was more than two meters high from the garden ground and there was no way that someone can reach it without using a platform of some sort. Growing directly across the broken window was a meter-tall wild bush and its leaves and branches spread out thickly in the yard. Helen thought she saw it moved a moment ago so she started walking toward it. She was about ten meters away when she heard a rustling sound behind it and that made her stop on her tracks. The red can of pepper spray trembled in her hands and when the bush’s leaves moved, Helen raised it in anticipation. She was ready to press the can hardly to empty its contents and burn that someone’s eyes when a black cat appeared from the bushes. It was the same black stray cat that her mother used to feed when she was still cooking, and it was looking hungry. It meowed at her as Helen was holding her right chest.

       “Egoy! You scared the s**t out of me! No dinner for you tonight. That’s after all the anxiety you caused me.”

       Helen looked at the broken window once again when she regained herself. She wondered what she was going to do with it tonight. She went back to the front door and opened it. Then she took the two full bags inside and sorted its contents. She washed all the fruits at the sink, dried it and then she put them all inside the near-empty fridge along with the dozen of eggs and two loaves of cinnamon bread. She also put a six-pack of San Mig Light inside the refrigerator. She wanted to have a small stock of it because she needed a drink from time to time, just to get herself unwired. When all the foods and beverages were already taken care of, she brought all her toiletries inside the bathroom. When she opened the door and turned on the lights, she saw the full extent of the damage done by the stray cat. Pieces of broken glass were scattered on the bathroom’s tiled floor. Helen thought that the cat must have forced his way into house through that window after she changed all of the locks and closed every window. She turned around in dismay and searched for the broom and dustpan. Then she went back to clean the mess that Egoy created. She needed to fix that window but she had no choice but to wait until tomorrow.

       After a dinner of heated pasta and cold beer, Helen went to her bed at eight. At about eight-thirty, she was already dreaming of disjointed thoughts. There was a picture of her and her mom as she was still in bed in a hospital moments before she was gone. She had cried like she did not know how to live on her own. Then, there was Nadia’s mom as she was talking to her, telling her how much she missed her little girl already and she had nothing to say to her. Then there was a flash of the chest as it was opening very slowly, only to reveal a dark hand that grabbed her by the throat. Its grip started to tighten and Helen felt her breath shorten. Then, Nadia suddenly appeared from nowhere and warned her to be careful. She tried to ask Nadia to tell her what to do with the chest. Then she felt Nadia covered her mouth and whisper in her ear to not panic because she was there to help her. Helen was feeling scared now so she closed her eyes to wipe away all the images from her dream. When she opened her eyes, there was nothing but darkness. Everything was all gone but she still felt the hand covering her mouth. And then she heard the same words.  

       “Don’t panic, I won’t hurt you. I’m here to help you.” She heard the voice tell her again.

       She felt confused at first. She thought it was all a dream and that she was talking to Nadia, her friend. But the voice sounded like a man. And then he saw his intense brown eyes looking at her. It was then that she knew she was not dreaming anymore. She was now back in her own room and she was lying on her own bed.

        With a stranger covering her mouth and pinning her down.