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She’d love this mural. Or at least I hoped she would. And I was excited to get started on doing art for the rest of the house, just for the three of us. At my home in Cincinnati there was artwork hanging on the walls, both mine and others’, but I had never painted the walls like this and really turned it all into a piece of artwork itself. Now, I wanted to. I wanted to make this a beautiful, personal place. A real home.
I drove back to Maggie’s apartment and parked across the street. It was nice to know that I was welcome. The last few times I’d been here, I had been unsure of how it would go. Maggie had been hesitant about me, about us, and I could understand that. But now we were both all-in. I could just walk right up and—
The door was locked.
Huh. That was odd. Maggie was expecting me. But I supposed she could’ve been worried about safety, given that Fern was a small child. Smart of her.
I knocked softly, worried the doorbell would be too loud and would wake Fern off.
For a moment there was silence, and then I heard was sounded like—a thump, and—and scuffling? It was like two people were struggling.
“Maggie?” I called out, trying not to be too loud.
I heard what sounded like someone whispering, but I couldn’t quite make out the words. Was Maggie whispering to me?
“It’s not a good time,” Maggie called. “You should come back later.”
Her voice was tight and high, not at all like her usual self. Was something wrong? My instincts were screaming at me to get in there, that something was bad—had Fern hurt herself? But Maggie wouldn’t tell me to leave if Fern was hurt.
“Is everything okay?” I called back.
“Everything’s fine!” Maggie replied, now sounding far too cheerful.
There was another whisper, this time a little more forceful, and I still couldn’t hear the words but I could tell now that the voice was a man’s. It sounded threatening.
What the fuck was going on?
“Open the door, Maggie, whatever it is, I’ll help,” I said. “Is Fern okay?”
“She’s asleep,” Maggie replied. “But you really need to go, okay? Go away.”
I didn’t know what was going on, but something was wrong. I could hear the fear in Maggie’s voice. I didn’t know if there was a robber in there, if he had a knife or some other weapon to Fern, or Maggie, if he was hurting them, but I wasn’t about to let anything happen to either of them.
This was possibly the stupidest thing I’d ever done, but I couldn’t exactly call the police. What was I going to tell them when I didn’t know what was going on? And what if it took them too long to get here?
I backed up, and with everything in me, I ran at the door, ramming it with my shoulder.
Ow.
The door didn’t really budge, and I backed up again with a snarl stuck in my throat, ready to ram it again—and then remembered, of all things, a book I’d read forever ago that talked about what to do when faced with the worst-case scenario. It was actually supposed to be a humorous book, or at least much more lighthearted in its delivery than most survival handbooks, but it did seriously tell you how to deal with situations like getting caught in an avalanche or facing a mountain lion.
One of the things it talked about was how to bust open a stuck door. And it had said that using your shoulder actually didn’t work, because of how doors were constructed. But if you used your foot and kicked right at the lock and handle of the door, that was where it was weakest and you could get it to bust open.
I braced my weight back on my left foot and kicked at the door. It didn’t go the first time, but I could feel the door moving, which was more than it had done when I had hit it with my shoulder. I did it again, and again, and then on the fourth try I kicked and the door flew open, the lock busted.
I’d worry about replacing Maggie’s door later. What I saw inside the apartment was enough to drive every other thought out of my head.
There was a man that I vaguely recognized—I was pretty sure he was Maggie’s neighbor, wasn’t he? I had seen him in passing here and there and Maggie had mentioned him to me. She’d said that he was friendly. A nice acquaintance.
Now, he was standing behind Maggie, his hand around her throat from behind, like he was going to squeeze.
My heart froze for a second before taking off at breakneck speed. Maggie’s eyes were huge and even from back here I could see that she was trembling. She looked terrified. Even when we had been sitting at the dinner table with Mark and Violet, I hadn’t seen her look like this. Back then, for one thing, she had been trying to hide her fear. And she had been scared, yes, but she had also been somewhat prepared. Or trying to prepare herself, anyway. It was something scary that she—that we—had to do.
