Storm Warning

A Deadly Price

              Finding myself sprawled on the kitchen floor, I am stunned to feel a cool thick substance seeping through my fingers. With great care, I work to resist the urge to wipe the sticky substance off on my dress. With a quick motion, I am on my feet and flicking the light switch while praying I didn't ruin the dress Maddie brought. I blink as the room is flooded in bright fluorescent lights. Without turning around, I stare at my hands and find myself staring in confusion at my hands which are covered in a red liquid. Red Syrup?

            With little ability to think past the words, WHAT THE HELL, which are bouncing around my skull, I turn to take in the scene of the kitchen from my childhood home. Other than the counter containing the sink, the dish washer, and the stove, the swinging door of the kitchen is the only other thing in the kitchen that was not completely destroyed.

            The table on the other side of the kitchen island is laying on its side with one leg sporting a giant jagged c***k running vertically down its length with a ceramic plate laying in several pieces on the floor among the leftovers of yesterday’s pizza. The chairs were in piles of rubble. One laid in pieces at the bottom of the far-right wall; yet, another chair can be seen on the back porch from where it was thrown through the glass sliding door.

            The walls are covered in the same red liquid that now covers my hands. With a whimper, I fall to my knees as I finally look down at what I tripped over… or who.

            With surprise, I see a man with a wooden chair leg protruding from his neck. He is laying face down in a giant pool of blood. He has long hair with it all pulled back in a ponytail. The color is blonde underneath all of the blood. Against my better judgment, I roll him off of whatever is propping him off of the floor until he is face up. I freeze in horror.

            Sarah lays in a pool of her own blood with her lifeless brown eyes staring to the ceiling. Her lips are a deep shade of blue from hours of blood loss and lack of oxygen. Her once flawless face is pale, very. White as a sheet. White as the dead. Following her gaze, I see more blood splattered across the ceiling. Without meaning to, my gaze takes in the cuts and slashes that now make up her lifeless course. Sarah has a deep gash across her throat and is where the majority of her blood was spilt. The gash is ragged as it travels from just under one ear all of the way to the other. This would have been a fatal blow. Without laying my hands on her, I count 5 stab wounds in her stomach and chest. These had to occur first. Without knowing how I know, I knew, without a doubt, that this man would have wanted her to suffer in pain for as long as possible. Shaking my head, I can no longer hold back the tears.

            As the first tear falls, the dam opens, and I mourn the loss of my only family. As my heart breaks, I imagine her last moments.

Sarah has started decorating. She spent the afternoon baking a cake, a five-to-six-hour process. While it was cooling, she went out and bought birthday decorations, which we never keep year after year.

Upon her return, she frosts the cake. Then, she sets the cake and party ware on the coffee table. All the while, a giant grin is plastered to her face as she imagines my surprise.

It is almost enough to forget what happened next.

While hanging the birthday banner, there was a knock at the door. Not at all embarrassed by wearing the shirt she had made for my birthday this year, no b*a, and tight black shorts that stopped mid-thigh, she opens the door.

Catching Sarah off-guard, the guy uses his size to force his way into the house. Sarah responds by trying to shut the door on the man to find that the sheer size of him makes it impossible. Sarah decides to change tactics by running towards the kitchen.

He catches up to her as she passes into the kitchen through the swinging door and stabs at her as she turns on her heel to face him. Using his weight to propel him forward, he is able to make up the space between their bodies and to force his knife into her lower abdomen.

As her torso bends over the knife, the guy pulls her close in an almost loving embrace as he twists the hilt of the knife.

Being the scrappy person that she is, Sarah realizes that she could never outrun him – especially with her bleeding heavily from the wound in her lower abdomen. Sarah reaches for his eyes with her thumbs pointed outward. Anticipating the move, the man throws Sarah over the table, which falls with a crash to the floor as she lands in a heap.

She is slower now. She never even had the opportunity to take in the situation or to find her way to survival until it was already too late. Now, her only hope was to hurt him enough to get him to leave. Despite this, Sarah uses the pain to force her body to move and fights past the hurt. She is so hurt and growing weaker from blood loss that he doesn’t see her grasp the chair leg in her hand as she struggles to stand. Maybe he did, but thought she was too weak to do anything with it. Overconfident asshole. Struggling to her feet, she prepares to fight once more, knowing that soon her body would be unable to remain upright. She backs up as he stalks toward her like a predator until they are both on the opposite side of the kitchen island.

Feeling around the counter behind her and to her right, she reaches for the knife she put in the sink earlier. Sarah strikes out at him with her blood-soaked fist as he moves past her guard with ease just as she brings up her other hand and stabs behind his ribs. He bellows in pain and knocks the knife from her hand before grabbing it and tossing it aside. Forcing her already weakened body to the ground as she moves her arms in some attempt to fight him off, he stabs her until there are five stab wounds covering her stomach and chest. As Sarah lays dying, he roams the kitchen smashing chairs into blood smeared walls.

As Sarah lays bleeding to death, she pulls out the hidden chair leg from the waist of her shorts.

Paying little attention to a dying Sarah, he rummages through the kitchen, dumping and tossing things to the floor with carelessness.

Before he left, he came over to her to watch her die. He smiles as she wheezes, knowing her vision is dimming. With one last sudden act, Sarah plunges the chair leg into his neck. Now, they both got to watch the other die.

            I shake my head at my overactive imagination. The explanation was probably must simpler. It was more likely that burglars broke in and were surprised to find her. I mean, this is a small town, where everyone knows everything, including my birthday. Why would one think my mom would be home on my birthday if I was not there too? Or maybe... or maybe? Oh, I don't even know what else could have happened.

            Using what little strength I had, I knew I needed to get up. I knew I needed to call the police. I knew I needed to call … Sarah. The one person I would go to in a situation this bad was lying on the floor. There was no one to help me. I could not put this on Maddie or Derek. I could call the cops, but what if they thought I did this?

            Overcome with a sudden terrifying thought, I look to the ceiling as if I could see through the ceiling into the rooms upstairs. What if the kitchen wasn't the only place he ransacked? What if they didn’t just stop with killing my mom? What if he went upstairs too? It is unlikely he would stay down here; especially, if this was a common burglary. Still, if he was dead too… would there be others? Furthermore, Sarah has a giant s***h across her throat. Would he have done that before or after going upstairs? He would have had to come back to do that or do it in order for Sarah to still be alive to kill him. The more I think, the more my brain spins, the less things make sense.

            With a small smile that hardly reached fullness, Sarah always said I watched too many crime shows. Guess she was right. Taking a deep sigh, I decide to stop trying to play detective in my head and see what things actually look like. Pulling myself to my feet, I wipe my hands on my shirt and suppress a shudder as I walk around in clothes covered in Sarah’s blood. I really needed to get away from this house.

            With slow and cautious movements, I walk out of the kitchen through the swinging door and up the carpeted stairs. At the top of the stairs, I notice only two doors open when Sarah has a habit of keeping doors closed, meaning the man most likely looked through those rooms and not the others because why care enough to shut doors when you just committed a homicide.

            Walking heel-to-toe, I look into Sarah’s room to see her dresser drawers have been haphazardly rummaged through and tossed . Her dresser was laying on its side. Her bed was falling on of its frame. Everything from her closet has been tossed about the room in a mini-tornado. With a shake of my head, I head to the only other open door on the hall… my room. Nudging the door open with my fingertips, my room is worst than Sarah’s room and a close second to the kitchen.

            Clothes are shredded; the closet is clear of everything that use to be in there. Drawers from the dresser were removed, dumped, and tossed around the room. The dresser itself was laying 'face-first' on the ground with a giant gaping hole in the back. Why? So unnecessary. My mattress had been thrown across the room and was leaning up against my desk. The computer was destroyed with keys scattered on the floor from where it was thrown. My bed was thrown up against the wall, and my computer was lying in pieces under the desk, which is now upside-down too.

            Unable to take any more, I back out of the room, close the door… and the door to Sarah’s room before I head back down the stairs. Uncertain of what I am going to do, the only thing I know for sure is that this will be my last night in this house, with this family, with this life, and I don’t know why. AND that scares me. It was horrible how the horrible act of one person could effectively shatter everything that is important to you.

            I knew Sarah had something important to tell me. She been hinting at it for weeks. Walking back into the kitchen, I wonder ‘what if that had something to do with this?’

            As I prepare to kneel next to Sarah once more, my eyes find one word written in blood on the kitchen island. The word was written top to bottom rather than left to right. Very likely due to her unable to sit up after the knife wounds. I tilt my head to read the word. It is this one word that ricochets around my skull as I hear a car door slam outside the front door, which I didn’t shut or lock when I got home.

            I want to close Sarah’s eyes, but I know it would be better if I didn’t. Yet, I already shut the doors upstairs. The truth is that the men who own those gruff voices outside the front door will know that someone was here. Closing her eyes and sending out a prayer of thanks for her love and support, I wipe the tears from my face as the words in my head grow louder. Run! Run! Run! RUN!! RUN!! RUN!! RUN!! RUN!!

            Taking the last word Sarah left for me to heart and uncertain of anything other than the pounding of blood between my ears, I stand, retrieve the journal (my last gift from Sarah) from where it lay when it fell, and hop through the brown sliding door and run into the line of trees just as someone yells, “The girl was here. She can’t be too far.”

            Without looking back for pursuers, I run with no destination in mind. My only thought is to get away. That is what Sarah wanted. She wanted me to run, but from what? From who?

            In the same moment, I hear a clap of thunder and look to the sky with a startled glance. The weather changed in such a short time. One raindrop fell from the sky before opening the floodgates to the rest, but I don't stop. Not for the rain. Not for the thunder. Not for the lightning. I spent a long time running before I finally forced myself to stop. It feels like I spent several hours running, but I’ve only been running for a short while because as I look around, I notice the park where Derek left me several hours earlier.

            With surprise, I look up to see the dark sky painted with yellow and whites specks... stars. Looking at the phone, it was just a little after two in the morning. Just under an hour since I arrived home. With nowhere to go, I back into the shadows cast by the tress and turn on my heel to go to the one place that could offer me peace now. The park is nearly 20,000 square feet with a hidden meadow with a small pond in the middle. Very few people ever go that far into the tree line making it likely that I can be safe there until I figure out my next move.

            It was three hours later when the sun started to make an appearance and turned the world into a beautiful pink and orange.  It is hard to fathom the way that my life has changed in those short six hours since leaving the club with Derek at midnight. With nowhere to go, I can’t help but shudder as I am burdened by pain and grief. I would never be able to return home. Sarah will never be there waiting for me. My life here just burst into flame, and I still have no idea why.

            As I continue to sit on the rock, I couldn't bother to get up and walk around to address the numbness that had overtaken my body. Half an hour later, I am startled by a buzzing in my pocket. Shocked, I pull the phone out of a jacket pocket… and marvel at my own stupor. I don’t remember picking up the phone or the jacket, but I must have grabbed them as I ran.

Shaking my head to clear the cobwebs, I look at Sarah’s phone to see a message from Maddie.

WAT THE HELL?!?!

WHERE ARE YOU?!?!

WHAT IS GOING ON?!?!

I know it’s you, Arielle.

Just got house call from cops.

Saying they responded to a call about screaming at your place.

Sarah’s dead.

DID YOU KNOW?!?!

Apparently, was for several hours before she texted me last night.

AND they can’t seem to find you!

Called Derek. You weren’t with him.

Figured you were using Sarah’s phone.

Since yours was left at the club.

Where are you?

Please talk to me.

I am freaking out over here.

ARIELLE!!!

DIDN’T TELL THE COPS!!!!

Talk to me!

PLEASE!

Are you okay?

What happened?

As I read Maddie’s panicky text messages, I feel something break in my soul. With heavy streams of tears and a stuffed nose, I text back the only thing I can put into words at that moment.

Don’t know what happened.

So much blood.

I am scared.

No. That's not quite the right emotion anymore.

I'm numb.

Yeah. That's more appropriate.

Come get me at our place.

While numbly waiting for a reply, my reality set in. I watch as a lone raindrop falls from the tree above me and falls to the screen of the cellphone I am holding just as it flashed with another text.

I’M COMING!

            Despite the urge to tell her not to come for me, I find I cannot force myself to warn her away. I need a lifeline, and she is all I have left. I am alone. I am scared or numb... or some weird combination of both. I need her.

            I didn’t need to tell her where to find me. She always knew what our place meant. She was the first to show me this meadow. Ever since then, this area had acted as our “clubhouse”.

            With a flash of lightening, my gaze is drawn back to the sky. The sky that was a gorgeous pink and orange moments ago now looks ominous. Larger dark gray clouds move across the sky as another clap of thunder opens the sky and makes way for torrential rainfall.

            Within moments, I was drenched and shivering again. The blood on my hands, face, hair, and shoes had formed a small b****y puddle around my feet. I can see the path the b****y river took from the hair plastered to my head to the droplets falling from my fingertips and as the blood finally flowed down my leg, I look at myself to see how much of the blood has gone, but the dress is still soaked through with Sarah’s blood.

            Unable to do much else, I wrap my arms around my legs and make myself as small as possible. That was how Maddie found me an hour later – soaked, tired, inconsolable, and rocking back-and-forth in a daze.