Ah good, she’s home. She enters her building, but not before looking over her shoulder, a new aspect of caution she’s never before shown me. I know as she walks up the stairs, she’s bracing herself against some unseen enemy. She’s also mentally berating herself for feeling scared. She’ll try to shake it off, but it will stay with her.

She reaches her door. Methodically she begins her ritual of opening it. Fingers move over all the locks as if to memorize them, some instinctive gesture, but this time, this time with a bit of trembling. She fits keys to each of them –four to be precise, and there are three more on the inside. She’s done this so many times, she could find them if she was blind. Quickly, in one fluid movement, she’s inside and has the door closed, and locks everything. Seven locks. Seven locks to make her feel safe.

I know her routine. She’ll toss her purse on the chair in the entry way, hang up her coat, kick off her shoes and walk to the kitchen. She’ll open the fridge to peer inside, not really looking for anything. She’ll shut the door and then proceed to the coffeemaker. She’ll put a pot on and go into the bedroom. She’ll take out something comfortable, perhaps those old faded blue college sweatpants I saw, and maybe a black t-shirt. She has a lot of those. She’ll put her hair up, wash her face and take off what little jewelry she wears. She still can’t find the missing one to her favorite pair of earrings –a silver teardrop shape. I know she’s searched all over for it. She hasn’t quite resigned herself to it being gone.

She’ll go out to the kitchen now, feeling more relaxed. She’s got a lot of coffee cups but I know she’ll use the rather battered red one, with the chipped handle, the multitude of scratches from the dishwasher. It’s the one that looks the most used. I
know it’s her favorite. She’ll settle herself in the oversized chair in her living room –the only thing that looks like it’s been sat in. The couch and loveseat have no creases. No trace of her faint perfume. Only that chair. She’ll curl up and pull that afghan over her and turn to grab the book she was reading. She reads a lot. She always leaves the books open and face down on the side table, within easy reach. She’ll reach for it –and find it’s gone. She’ll turn to look where her hand has been grasping. She’ll see nothing there. She’ll move to check under the table, even the sofa and loveseat. I know she’ll be frustrated. She’ll start pacing, running nervous
fingers through her hair, trying to think where it could be. She’ll search the living room, the kitchen, even the bedroom. She won’t find it.

She’ll give up eventually. She’ll grab another book off the shelf, pick up her coffee, and go to take a bath. She’ll undress, grabbing the thick velour bathrobe off its hook as she goes to start the tap. She won’t sense anything unusual. Nothing will seem out of place. She’ll set the book and coffee down and turn to the tub. Then she’ll stop.

I can only imagine the look on her face. Sometimes, I picture it horrified, other times, just pale with shock. Sometimes I think she screams, once I played out a grand fainting scene.

This time I imagine she leans down and picks up the book that was missing from the bottom of her bathtub. She might be able to get her mind to believe that nothing is wrong. She might tell herself that she left it there the last time she took a bath. She might, until she sees the pressed flower marking her page. An iris. She once carried an armful of irises home with her. She never noticed that one went missing from the vase a day later.

She’ll try to make sense of everything. She’ll try to make it fit into a pattern she recognizes. Something that is normal, something that explains away the most likely and yet most horrifying conclusion. She will pace. Drink more coffee.

She’ll check the locks.

I smile.

Maybe next week I’ll leave the earring for her to find.

10/19/2006

Author's Note: We were asked to do a piece on a reoccuring nightmare for one of my classes -we didn't have to duplicate the nightmare exactly, but the underlying fear within it.

Posted on 10/20/2006
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