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Amy comes up behind me and pauses next to me.
“See. I told you,” telling her as if I am not phased. My eyes shift around the room. I can still feel him.
Where is he?
Chapter 2
Rain
“Happy birthday, my sweet girl.” The smell of mom’s perfume fills my nose. Lavender and pear notes can be detected.
I’m in bed, home late from my shift. It's well past one in the morning, meaning it is indeed my birthday. Mom stays up waiting regardless. Making sure I get home safe. It’s sweet, I tell her she doesn’t need to, but she does each and every single time.
“Thanks mom, night.”
She turns off my bedroom light and closes my door. The old floorboards creek beneath her with each step, until I hear her own bedroom door close.
Yesterday was my last day being twenty. Today, which is only a couple hours old, I turned twenty-one, officially of drinking age. Not that it matters, no one actually ever waits until then to have alcohol. I work in a bar, for fuck’s sake.
This is also the last check mark needed for the ‘what makes you an adult’ checklist in the eyes of the state of North Carolina.
I still live with my mom in my childhood home, still sleeping in my childhood room.
I am the product of a one-night stand. I’ve never met or known my father. My mom has never brought him up, unless I have. Which was only when I was old enough to realize I was one of the kids in class who only had one parent instead of two.
It’s never bothered me, just having my mom. It’s always felt right being just the two of us. I didn’t need him. I didn’t know what it was like to have him. So there is no void or resentment.
I am one of the few left here from my high school graduating class, most left for college the first chance they got. Not me, I have no idea what I want to do with my life. Mom doesn’t pressure me. She says I have my whole life to figure it out, which I love, but at the same time I feel stuck. What is my purpose? Sometimes it does frustrate me, but most times I just go with the flow and hope one day it clicks.
They do say it happens when you least expect it.
My eyes are heavy. My body is sore after working a ten-hour shift. One server didn’t show up for an earlier shift, so I went in early. I didn’t see that guy after my shift either. The feeling of him being around never left me. And still hasn’t. It’s such a strange feeling. One that I am not sure I can describe.
Thankfully, I’m off today.
Happy birthday to me is the last thought to cross my mind as I drift asleep.
My eyes open rapidly.
My heart is racing. I’m too nervous to move. There is someone in my room. The curtain which normally blocks my window is missing. The bright moon shines through the now open window. A slight breeze can be felt from where I lay in bed.
Someone is in my room.
They have to know I am awake. The reflection of the moon’s light must be reflecting off my face, my eyes glistening in it. They have to know.
My senses feel heightened. What I cannot see, I must be able to hear.
Before I feel brave enough to move my body, a deep voice startles me. They are next to me.
“Don’t do it.”
My eyes squeeze shut. Panic.
Tears slowly trickle down my cheeks as I try to contain any emotion.
I’m going to die. My mom is going to find me, dead, in my bed when she wakes up. She is going to need years of therapy to get the image of my dead body out of her head. Possibly even move away from our home, my childhood home, to escape the memory of my twenty-first birthday. I wonder how he will do it. Slow and painfully, or quick and easy. I hope it’s quick and easy. This way, people won’t have to lie to my mother when they say, ’It probably happened so fast, she didn’t suffer,’ compared to if it is slow and painful.
Unless, has he already killed my mother?
