The Truth Behind It All

Chapter 10

            “Bob, right?” she says as she precedes. The man nods.

            She went up the stairs slowly, she had never been upstairs. She looks around her, more horse portraits down the walls, some shut doors. What could there be behind these doors?

            “This is your room,” he says as he opens the door before her. The room was conveniently situated in the middle of the hallway, it wasn’t very far from anything.

            “Thanks,” she says as she sees the room painted in pink and stuffed animals covered the bed. “Wow. Um, whose room is this?” she asks taken aback, was her father hiding a child from her?

            “Yours Miss. It has always been yours,” he replied and walked down quietly, leaving a trace of melancholy behind him.

            Ana Marie walks inside, this would have been paradise if she was nine years old.

           

            Darkness crept down calmly outside and Ana Marie walks out of her room quietly. With a flash light in hand, she decides it was time to know what was behind those doors. She looks around her and sees that the hallways are dark and there is no sign of anybody being alive. She will start with the room on the left, then she will go down the line, giving a turn and go down the right side. It sounds easy enough. She turns the knob slowly, she should probably knock first just in case someone was in there, but she strongly believes there is no one. She opens it just enough for her to squeeze through. This room is apparently the master bedroom. There is a big bed covered in a wine colored covers. She flashes the light at the sides. The usual, a wardrobe, then a closet. Maybe her father has so much clothing that he needed a walk in closet plus a wardrobe, or maybe not. She opens the walk in closet and finds boxes full of files and files covering the walls. Ana Marie starts going through the closest files to the door. It seems like they are bills.

            She went over the closet fast; she had so many rooms to go through and not enough time. But she doesn’t seem to find anything that could tell her anything, if anything she discovered that her father owed a lot of money all over the place. The rest of the rooms didn’t tell her much either. It seemed like he had rooms for every mood he was in.

            Now, the last room at the corner of the house was interesting. The door was locked. The only one from the five she had already checked. Luckily she had a bobby pin and her high school rebellious years. It was a lab, but that didn’t surprise her, her father had to have a lab somewhere, he was a scientist. But the smell in there was interesting. It smelled like herbs, a whole bunch of them. There was boxed like objects that were covered in white sheets. Ana Marie holds her flashlight in her mouth and starts unveiling one of those boxes. It wasn’t a box, it was a cage, and inside there was a big dark green plant. Which was weird, why is a plant caged like that? She takes a closer look, flashing the light on it. She walks around it slowly wanting to see every angle of it. This was a big source of the stench, she recognizes. Could this be Paragalis?

            Then she jumps back baffled. It seemed like the plant has moved. One leaf moved like it took a breath. She gave it a closer look, but a noise distracts her. It came from downstairs. Was Jose back? She leans tightly against the door craving for another sound. There is no talking but there were footsteps. Ana Marie takes a moment to breathe, she had to think things through, she will turn the flash light off then she will slightly open the door, and she will wait till the steps subside. She will then quietly but hurriedly run back inside her room. It seemed like an easy plan, until she opened the door, then she shut it rapidly at the sight of another flashlight. She was going to be dead.

            She tries the second step again, she sees multiple shadows scattering about. She shuts her eyes tightly, convincing herself that that was just part of her trauma. She opens them again but this time she sees one shadow, and this shadow was noisily walking around. She furrows her eyebrows in confusion, why was he being so loud? He was obviously a man, for his big stature and broad shoulders. He holds what it seems a base in his hands then crashes it against the wall. If he was a robber, he sucked at it. Then he saw the guy Bob, who he recognized because of his dark face, flashing the flash light on him. The man, who wore black sweatpants with a hoody over his head, runs towards one side of the house, giving her the chance to scurry back in her room. But she simply walked out and watched Bob run after the man. The man moved effortlessly through the house, and she got a glimpse of his face as the light shifted from side to side. She gasps in disbelief, the man ran out through a shattered window, which she assumed he broke so he could get inside. As she sees Bob looking around making sure there was no one else, Ana Marie takes advantage of the situation and runs back into her room.

            As if she was numb, she got on her bed and covered her face with the covers. It is probably one or two in the morning, the sun wasn’t up but she was certain this time, that this man, resembled Adam,  she sits up, he was the man she had ‘imagined’ back at Jefferson’s, it was Adam Hayes.