The idea that it didn’t seem right hardly comforted her.
She half-hoped the falling night would make her a poor target. The other half within her hoped that the Big Bad Wolf would just seize that moment to end things. It was almost as if resolution was more important than life.
She was unaware of how long she walked. The blocks stretched into miles. The neighborhood changed, then changed again. She turned first one way, then the next, and finally, feet starting to complain with raw blisters, she turned back and limped her way home. By the time she stood outside her home, she was breathing hard and exhausted, which she considered a good thing. Her knees ached a bit and for the first time she felt cold.
She did not immediately enter. Instead, Sarah stood beneath her entranceway light, door key in hand. Maybe he broke in while I was out, just like he does at Little Red Riding Hood’s grandmother’s house, so he can wait comfortably inside for me.
She shrugged and slid the key into the lock. For an instant she felt as if she had exhausted all the fears she could hold within her, the same way there always comes a point when one can cry no more tears. From inside, she suddenly heard her home phone ringing.
No one had called her in months.
Karen had stayed behind long after office hours were finished for the day. The nursing staff, the receptionist, and even the night janitor had all departed. A solitary lamp threw shadows against the wall.
She remained at her desk, deep in erratic thoughts.
That she was always scared was a given. But how scared should I be? Like the “pain” scale on the wall of her office, she thought she should be able to rate her fear. Right now, I’m at 8. In the comedy club I was at 9. I wonder what 10 will feel like.
Instead, she started to repeat over and over, “Red One, Red One, Red One,” in a low, raspy, but singsong voice that sounded like she was developing a common cold, when she knew that it was more tension that had stripped her throat of melody.
She looked up at the ceiling and realized that the words sounded eerily similar to the little boy’s refrain of “Redrum, redrum, redrum” from the Stanley Kubrick adaptation of Stephen King’s novel The Shining.
So, Karen tried to run the two together. “Red One, redrum,” she said out loud.
Karen had just given herself an inner push, trying to energize weakened muscles and frayed tendons into pulling together to get up and head home, when her desktop phone rang.
Her first instinct was to ignore it. Whatever inquiry from whatever patient could go to the answering service, who would inform the caller to dial 911 if it was life-threatening or else to call back during regular office hours.
But, hell, you’re here, she told herself. This is your job. Someone’s sick. Answer the damn phone and help them. She reached out and picked up the receiver and answered, “Medical offices. Doctor Jayson speaking.”
She heard nothing but silence on the other end.
The absence of sound can be far worse than any scream.
Red One froze at her desk.
A few minutes later…
Red Two nearly lost her balance and had to slam back against a wall to keep from falling to the floor.
A few minutes later…
Red Three stood stock still as darkness flooded around her.
None heard anything other than breathing for the first few seconds. Each was nearly overcome with the desire to hang up or throw the phone across the room or into the night or rip it from the wall socket. They did not do any of these things, although Red Three cocked her arm and nearly let loose, before slowly returning her cell phone to her ear.
Each Red waited for the person on the other end to either say something or hang up. The time seemed fierce, relentless.
Each truly expected something frightening, a disembodied cold voice that said, “Soon,” or “I’m coming for you,” or even some demonic laugh right out of a Hollywood B movie.
But none of these words or noises came. The quiet merely persisted, as if swelling in timbre and reaching a crescendo, like an orchestra gathering for the final symphonic notes.
Then, abruptly, it was gone.
Red One slowly returned the phone to its cradle on her desk. Red Two did the same. Red Three slid her phone back into her pack. But before they stepped away, they all did the same thing: They checked the caller ID on their phones. None allowed even the vaguest hope that this number would lead anywhere near the Big Bad Wolf.
23
Mrs. Big Bad Wolf lay crumpled in bed like a discarded piece of scratch paper. It was shortly after the sun had come up, and she stared across twisted sheets and pillows at her husband, who slept peacefully beside her. She listened to the steady, even sounds of his breathing and knew from long experience that his eyes would flutter open just as the clock on the bureau reached 7 a.m. He was utterly consistent in this and had been throughout the years of their marriage, regardless of how late he’d tucked himself into bed the night before. She knew that he would stretch by the side of the bed, run his fingers through his thinning hair, shake a little like a lazy dog roused from slumber, and then pad across the bedroom to the bathroom. He might complain about morning joint stiffness and arthritis. She could count the seconds before she would hear the water running in the shower and the toilet flushing.
This morning everything would be precisely the same.
Except it wasn’t.
Mrs. Big Bad Wolf assessed every crease in her sleeping husband’s face, counted the dark brown age spots on his hands, and noted the gray hairs in his bushy eyebrows. Each item in her husband-inventory seemed as familiar as the weak morning sunlight.
She could feel an argument bubbling up within her: You know this man better than you know anyone other than yourself versus Who is he, really?
She had slept precious few hours and felt the nasty sort of exhaustion born of tossing and turning throughout the small hours. And when she had managed to sleep, her dreams had been remorseless and unsettled, like childhood nightmares. This was something she had not experienced since the days of her heart troubles, when fears would shake her night. A part of her wanted very badly to rest and forget, but it was overwhelmed by too many questions, none of which she could ask out loud.
The night before-after she had violated her husband’s work space-she had stared blankly at a succession of favorite television shows that failed to make even the slightest dent in her worries. She had shut off the television and turned off all the lights and sat in her usual seat in the pitch dark until she saw the headlights of her car reflecting off the white living room walls. Then she had purposely hurried to bed. Normally, no matter how tired she was, she would have stayed up to ask him about the forensics lecture. Not this night. She had feigned sleep when he’d quietly snuck into the bedroom and slid into bed beside her. She had felt cold, wondering whether this was a stranger who slipped in next to her. Once upon a time, he might have stroked her arm or her breast to awaken her with desire, but those days were well past.