The Big Red Apartment

Secrets pt2

****LINDSEY'S POV****

My mom rushed to the bathroom after we broke free from our hug. I snatched the small picture frame off the wall and threw it into my oversized tote bag. I heard Jared and my dad approaching me in the kitchen and I played as if I was looking for something to drink in the fridge. 

"Need help looking for something, Linds?" My dad asked me. "Uh, yes....any wine?" I smiled nervously. "Of course, I got a big bottle of your favorite. Lambrusco!" I smiled as we walked into the dining room to prepare to sit at the table. It seemed like mama was taking quite long in the bathroom...We were waiting for several minutes now for her so we could bless the food and dig in.

"Is mama okay?" I asked. My dad took a deep breath in and out. "Yeah, she always takes awhile in the bathroom. A little health condition she got." I raised a brow, but didn't want to touch too deep on that at the moment. I'd ask her about it later. 

Mama finally came out and we blessed the food. I began passing around the dishes of food, each taking a portion on our plate and passing it on. 

"So, how have you two love birds been doing?" My mama asked us while putting a huge portion of green beans on her plate. "We've been doing great, actually. School has been pretty cool so far..." Jared replied. 

I smiled and added," Yes, school's been amazing other than my first day. It was rough but I'm getting the hang of it." I cut my eyes up to my mom and she had a slight disappointed look on her face. I was hoping she wouldn't bring up the therapist situation again. And she did.

"Ya know, Lindsey....You would have made an awesome therapist like I was years ago." She jabbed her fork into her chicken four times before actually taking a bite. I started feeling some tension. "Well, mother...I didn't want to be a therapist. I'm an awesome teacher and I love my job already." I rolled my eyes and drank some of my wine. I felt Jared tapping his foot lightly under the table, making his leg slightly shake. It was like he wanted to say something.

****JARED'S POV****

I couldn't hold it in much longer. I had to say something about the apartment building that burned down so long ago from my dreams. I felt like they knew something about it....just something. 

"So, uh.....do either of you know anything about the old red apartment building that burned down all those years ago?" I smirked a bit trying to stay positive but their faces were frozen and their eyes were big in shock, just looking at each other. Lindsey dropped her fork, looking back and forth at them and noticed they were acting weird too. 

"Er, uh, what made you ask us that?" Phil asked me. I wiped my mouth with my napkin. "I've been having these horrible dreams about that damned building. I've been seeing a therapist here since we've moved because my dreams were turning into nightmares. And apparently, I've had my first dream about that suspicious building since I was 10."

They both sat their silverware down. Lindsey's mom, Lucinda got up and slowly walked up the hallway to their bedroom. I got nervous as shit. Phil scratched his slightly bald head and fixed his glasses, staring at Lindsey and I. I stared at her back giving her a slight facial impression that her parents were officially weird as hell.

"Uh, where's mama going?" Lindsey asked Phil. "She'll be back." He replied promptly. I got myself ready to grab Lindsey's hand under the table in case I had to snatch her up and run out the door and not look back.

Suddenly, Lucida came back with a big brown old book in her hand. She sat it down on the table heavily and a bit of dust clouded around us. We coughed and waved the dust cloud away to see what was in front of us.

"W-what's this?" I asked. "It's history....Almost all of the history of this city and state we've collected from news paper articles, photos, notes, and such." Lucinda turned page after page, slowly reminiscing the memories she passed in the book. She started turning faster and faster until I saw a big red image and she kept turning the pages even faster after that. 

"Wait wait wait, go back. I saw something." I stood closer to her and the book. "I-I'm sure it wasn't nothing important. It's getting pretty late, how about we wrap it up?" She replied nervously. "Mama...." Lindsey added. Her face was blank. "Go back to that page, right now." Lindsey's face was now stiffening and her eyes widened. I felt some strong, weird energy take over my body. Lucinda gulped and slowly turned the pages back. She kept going slowly, but the red image suddenly disappeared. It was like magic.

"What the hell....Let me see." Lindsey slid the book over to us and we turned through all of the pages in the book. Literally every single freaking page. Not one red image. Not anything about the red apartment. I felt some fishy shit going on here. What the hell are they hiding from us?

I got angry and was about to get out of character until Lindsey interrupted. "Here, I guess we were wrong. We thought we saw something." She gave the book back and drank the rest of her wine. "Can I get a slice of the pound cake now?" 

Her parents smiled and Phil went into the kitchen to bring the pound cake to the table for us to have a piece. I took my phone out and noticed an unread text from Lindsey.

"I sense some weird, fishy stuff going on with them and I don't like it not one bit. Try to stay relaxed until we leave."

I put my phone back on the table and took a slice of cake. We sat and ate and chatted about beaches and restaurants around here we had to try and other stuff that was irrelevant at the moment, til we were ready to head out. 

"Excuse me, may I please use the bathroom if you don't mind before we head out?" I politely asked. "Of course big guy, it's up the hall and to the right." Phil replied. "Thanks. I'll be back shortly."

I went up the hall and observed the photos hanging up. There were old vintage pictures of older relatives that probably weren't even around anymore. I continued to the bathroom. 

As I was peeing, I saw a picture of them above the toilet. It was a very old picture of them when they were very young. It almost looked like them way before they even had Lindsey. I took it off the wall after flushing and washing my hands and closely observed the picture. Behind them was a little view of what looked like the apartment building that was in my dreams. The photo was black and white, but I distinctly remember how the building looked. 

I took out my iPhone and snapped a picture and hurried out the door. Walking back to the dining room, a room on my right was cracked open and the light from the room shone through the hallway, like the apartment door did in my dream when I was 10. I rubbed my eyes and slightly pushed the door open and peaked my head in a bit. There were news articles on the walls and pictures everywhere of the red apartment.

I looked up the hall and heard them still chatting and laughing about who knows what. I took advantage of that little time and snooped around as quick as I could. I took pictures as many pictures as I could that looked interesting. I hurried up and put my phone back in my pocket and hurried out the door, putting it exactly how it was before I went in. 

"Ahh, thank you. May we take some food and cake to go?" I asked, trying to play off the snooping I just did. "Of course! I got the plates already in here ready to go for yal. I made them while you were in the room snooping around." Lucinda said. "Excuse me, what?" I replied. "I said I made them while you were using the bathroom, sweetie." She replied back. I looked around at Phil and Lindsey, they were still chatting amongst themselves. I felt my heart drop to my feet. It was time to go, NOW!