THE NIGHTMARE WITHIN: Chapter 1

Chapter 14

Chapter 14

His dress shirt wrinkled, and his discarded tie forgotten, Maury left Juliet's enclosure with mixed feelings bandying about his brain.  He had never been with a woman before tonight, and had never actually come close.  It confused him to think of her.  He had never felt this way before.  The fact he had to leave her behind and seal her up inside that confining area like a penned animal… he felt like more of an animal for turning the key to keep her there.  It wasn't possible to let her out.  What exactly would that accomplish?  Would he run off with her, go into hiding from Nolan Gage's far-reaching influence? 

He imagined looking through a big picture window to a cozy living room.  Their living room.  He saw himself with a trade journal on his lap, Juliet sitting on a sofa across the room from him.  On the floor, a child, indiscernible in age or sex (because Maury had never imagined ever having a woman to share his years with, let alone having a child with her), crawled around an oval area rug that covered the floor in front of the blazing  screened-in fireplace.  His imagined self looked up from the crawling child to see Juliet with a handgun in her hand, her smile unwavering.  She lifted the gun ever so closer to her head and…

Maury turned the corner at the top of the stairs, reentering the Nightmare Wing.  He had absently wandered through the museum since leaving Juliet, making sure the place was empty. But he couldn't stay away from her.  He had to see her again. 

What he saw in front of him sharply focused his attention.  The sight turned his stomach. 

He took an unconscious step back.

"I don't think you should leave right now," a gravelly voice came from inside the first enclosure.  Mr. Freakshow's enclosure. 

What drew Maury's attention away from the thought of Juliet was the sight of Juliet, her face smashed against the inside of the glass.  Fearful, wide-eyed, trembling.  Maury took another step back and wondered how any of this was possible.  For one, Juliet escaping her enclosure, and two, for her to wander into Mr. Freakshow's clutches.

Mr. Freakshow left the shadows, joining Juliet near the glass.  It was now evident that the beast's claws were buried through Juliet's back and had expelled her insides to the floor.

"What the… how the hell?"  Maury didn't know what to do.  It had to be fake, an illusion of some sort.  Juliet hung off the ground, suspended by the Freak's impaling claw, but she was still alive.  Frothy blood gathered at the lips he had minutes before fumbled his way through kissing passionately.  Her mouth sputtered gobbets of blood-streaked spit against the glass as she tried to form words.  Her whole body writhed, struggling against the enormity of her pain.

"I've got an idea.  Your friend here, your lover, is in immense pain.  You know she can't die at my hand, not truly and forever, and so does she.  Look into her eyes," Mr. Freakshow commanded in a grating yet soft voice.

Maury looked into Juliet's eyes, and the emotion and longing he saw, the connection he felt for her breeched the glass, the boundaries of their varied existences.  This was no illusion.  Somehow, however improbable, Juliet had unwittingly put herself in the gravest danger possible.

He must have forgotten to lock her enclosure.  Of course.  His mind had been so muddled.  Still was.

This is all my fault.  I can't do anything right.

"Maury, please.  He won't hurt me, anymore… he won't hurt you.  He just wants his freedom," Juliet said, the melodic lilt of her voice melted away.  Only cold edges accompanied her pain-addled words.