"Belle! Stop! What's wrong?"
A scream lodges in my throat, choking me, when David wraps his arms around me from behind the moment I step out of the kitchen and into the backyard during my headlong flight from the house.
He'd either left his weapon behind in the sunroom or dropped it off in the kitchen because his hands are empty. His embrace is as firm, gentle, and comforting as it's always been, confusing my body into relaxing against him while my brain screams at me to fight him off and run away.
Where to?
I'm trapped in this place. This cosy little island that I was starting to love (when I don't hate it) with a man I already loved only a few minutes ago.
What changed?
One vague, flickering woman with wounds on her face, bruises circling her neck and a caved-in skull who seemed to point accusingly at David. That is what changed.
What was she? A ghost? A house memory? One of those lost-in-time moments running on repeat where she's not that different from a hologram perpetually pointing in the same direction? A hallucination brought on by stress?
Besides, why would Iris wear a long, sombre black dress dating back at least a century or two? I don't know much about fashion, but it did not look like a lighter, more modern version of an old design... if she's into that kind of thing. Were they playing dress-up? Having a costume party?
David didn't seem to see her, and he is not suddenly trying to kill me; he is gently stroking my hair, whispering in my ear, asking me if I am alright. His voice is as warm and soothing as his hands, and, paired with his intoxicating fragrance, it is singing a sweet lullaby to my frayed nerves, calming them down and causing my heart to murmur happily in response.
David did not kill that woman, whoever she was. I know he didn't! Well... I'm pretty sure...
"I'm fine, thanks... The dust got to me; I needed some fresh air," I lie, turning in his arms to bury my face in his chest, breathing in his warm, soapy scent, revelling in the strength of his embrace. Everything inside me is vibrating with a repeating prayer, begging for me to be right about David not being able to murder anybody.
"Honey, you're trembling," he mutters, tightening his arms around me. "Are you cold? Did something scare you?"
"My nerves are chafed to the bone," I finally tell him about my biologically impossible dilemma and reluctantly pull out of his hug. He lets me go, sliding his hands along my arms and hands as they pass.
"I'm going to work in the garden for as long as the light lasts," he smiles, his eyes warm and comforting, gazing into mine, and guilt stabs at my heart. He has done nothing to deserve me, believing some random transparent woman without proof or confirmation. A woman who might be a figment of my imagination. David has only been kind, generous and tolerant with me since his arrival... and I didn't just imagine that.
I hate feeling this uncertain because I am so in love with this man!
"Wanna help me? Perhaps being outside in the fresh air will get your nerves to settle down again."
I am not against that idea. There is no way I'm going back to the solarium to work right now. That woman and the piece of chain linked to the wall freaked me out, and David is right; some fresh air and weak sunshine might be just what I need right now.
If I went back to the art studio and the woman (if there even was one) appeared again, she might point accusingly at the same spot, confirming that she did not mean David, but what if she didn't? What if she pointed out the window to where he worked in the garden? This is the kind of thing one wants to have confirmed as a misunderstanding but would rather not know if it were true. Even if not knowing could place you in danger. Knowing something that terrible is just impossible for me to handle right now. It is simply too awful to consider.
"Sure," I smile and follow David back into the house to change into suitable clothes and shoes and tie my hair while he finds me some worn old work gloves and more gardening tools from the pantry where he keeps them stashed.
We're soon companionably labouring among the weeds near the pond in the backyard, and with the wind stirring in my hair and the sun rays gently caressing my skin, I am able to pretend that there was no battered woman in the art studio and that all is well with the world. There is only me, David and the fragrance of turned soil.
David loosens the stubborn weeds, and I pull them out, proudly observing our ever-growing pile of leafy invaders and admiring the expanding patch of dark earth we've cleared of imposter plants. The plan is for David to plant various seedlings to create a garden surrounding the small pond. One day, it is going to be beautiful. I can hear it in his enthusiastic descriptions.
Watching David's animated face when he talks about his plans and seeing the dedication and dexterity with which he is nursing suffering plants and ripping out threatening ones, I am once again convinced that this man could never beat a woman to have the kind of wounds I'd seen on the face of the one upstairs or smash her skull in, killing her.
Every so often, my eyes stray to the windows far above, looking down on us, but the solarium remains devoid of any form of life or moving figures. The woman is not standing up there looking down at us, pointing at David.
Perhaps she was never there.
There is one way for me to know for sure if the woman I saw or imagined was Iris Stirling. Gathering my courage during an interval when I'm working close enough to David to speak to him, I take a deep breath and just blurt out my request.
"David, do you have a picture of Iris I could look at?"
The question catches him off-guard, as I suspected it would, and he pauses his work, turning to frown at me in confusion.
"I... uhm... I just want to put a face to the name," I add, my cheeks flushing brightly. It is a strange request... even for me. "I might be a bit jealous," I explain, and it is not a lie. I don't like the idea of another woman capturing his heart to the extent that he would marry her. I'm relieved when his expression softens, a teasing smile parting his lips.
"Do you have a picture of Hank?" he asks, arching his eyebrows. "I might be jealous too."
"You have nothing to be jealous of," I assure him with a chuckle, but I'm panicking because I've deleted all the pictures I had of Hank. If I don't show him one, will he not show me any of Iris? "Uhm... Facebook. I can show you what he looks like on Facebook... when I have a signal again."
I have my phone with me all the time now, and I've been checking every now and again - it's become a habit - but the signal remains stubbornly absent.
"Yeah, me too," David shrugs and, turning away, resumes loosening the roots of tenacious, unwanted plants. "You also don't have anything to be jealous of," he says, causing my heart to skip a beat.
Great! Now, all I have to do is stay safe and unmurdered until I get to see a picture of Iris on Facebook and confirm once and for all that she is not the woman I saw in the art studio. I don't want to think about what I'll do if it turns out to be the same woman. The idea scares me to the degree that it makes my stomach churn and clench uncomfortably, as if I'm in the clutches of a bad stomach virus.
"Oh!" David suddenly exclaims, sitting back on his haunches and turning to give me an embarrassed look. "I do have one! My phone's lock screen."
He has his ex-wife's image on his phone's lock screen? Why? The question must be written on my face or is reflected in the air between us because he gives me a sheepish grin and a shrug, gesturing with the small garden fork in his hand.
"At first, I couldn't bring myself to delete all the images on my phone because I didn't want to admit that it was really over. Then, one day, I did. I finally let go and accepted that our marriage and what I thought was going to be our future together were dead and gone. It was not a fun day, but I deleted all the images and changed my phone background. I forgot about the lock screen because my phone unlocks with my fingerprint when I pick it up, so I seldom even see it. I notice it occasionally but haven't cared enough to change it for a long time." He narrows his eyes, trying to gauge my reaction, I suppose, and adds. "I care now. I'll change it; I promise."
That is not so strange.
As a prank, Craig once changed my phone's lock screen to an image of a large bug eating Hank's head, and it took me months to finally remember to change it because I didn't see it often, and when I did see it, I was in a hurry, and eventually, I just got used to it being there and didn't notice it anymore. I had to make a conscious effort to change it, and this was when I was still in a relationship with Hank and didn't want a bug to eat him.
"Problem is," David continues, and my flared-up hope evaporates in lustreless sparks around me, trickling away with the sweat running down my face. "I don't remember seeing my phone since before I woke up naked in the cave. I have no idea where I left it. I might have taken it with me when I was sleepwalking, doing fun things, and put it down somewhere."
We work in silence for a long time, and when the strain and the work-generated heat finally becomes too much for me, I get to my feet, stretching my aching muscles. I'm impressed with how well we worked together. We've cleared a large area, and David did not once wander off during our task to do something else, as he said he was prone to do. Working together kept him focused.
"David," I sigh, brushing my hair from my face, using the back of my wrist. "I'm really tired. How much more are we going to do today? The sun is fading fast now."
"Wow," David grins, rising to his knees and swivelling to observe the huge area we've covered. "This is great. Thanks for your help, Belle," he smiles up at me, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his glove-covered hand. "No need to torture yourself if you're done. I'm going to work until the light is gone; I'll be in to wash up soon."
Am I brave enough to enter the house by myself?
I look up at the sunroom, but it's too dark inside the house to see through the windows now. I cannot allow fear to rob me of my ability to function, so I nod and turn away, leaving David to his task. I'm happy when Professor Ass-Cat joins me when I'm near the house. I didn't even notice him coming outside with us earlier.
Passing David's truck, I stop, looking back to where he is once again, labouring with all his focus on what he is doing. Shaking off the pangs of guilt assaulting me, I slip off the dirty gloves and leave them on the ground with the small gardening spade I'd been using before I open the passenger door and hoist myself inside. If David sees me and asks me what I'm doing, I'll truthfully tell him that I thought to look for his phone in here.
I am, but I'm also going through the cubbyhole and feeling under the seats and in the storage compartments in the door panels, searching for anything that might seem suspicious. I find his wallet and, biting my lip, ignoring the prickly feelings of invasion, I scan through the cards in it. His driver's licence has a picture of him and the name David Richard Stirling.
There are no surprises in his wallet, aside from a bit of cash and bank cards in his name and relieved, I put the wallet back where I found it. His truck is disappointingly clean inside, hiding no secrets and also, unfortunately, not his phone.
Once I'm standing in the kitchen, my muddy shoes replaced by the bunny slippers I changed them for at the door and the gloves and spade cleaned and stored in the pantry, I find myself at a loss as to what to do now. I really don't like being in this house without David. The shadows have deepened, and the house is eerily quiet, as if holding its breath for the next strange event.
Clenching my teeth and walking on my toes, I hurry through the short corridor, and when I reach the foyer, my eyes involuntarily stray to the thick beams in the ceiling. Nobody is hanging from there, but I still have shivers running down my back when I slip into the bathroom to rid myself of mud streaks. My courage increases marginally when the cat wraps his warm body around my ankles and lies down on my feet to play with the cuff of my tracksuit pantleg and the ears of my bunnies.
The landing, the foyer, the stairs and the solarium have all been captured by the enemy. The areas where I feel safe are constantly shrinking. I am an eighth of the thickness of a banana peel away from crawling under the nearest piece of sturdy furniture and curling into a tight ball like an armadillo to wait for the flood to be over.
Leaving the bathroom, I suspiciously eye the furniture filling most of the foyer. None of the pieces are very inviting for the whole ball-curling routine, and the longer I study the rows of cabinets, tables and chairs, the more possible it seems for someone to hide among them. Even with the foyer light on, the shadows are thick enough to serve as decent camouflage for a man who longs to drag me along by my ankles.
Sufficiently spooked, I hurry back into the kitchen, the only room besides the bedroom that seems warm and inviting. As the sun starts to set, making it harder to see outside through the ivy snaking across the windows, a strong melancholy rises like yeast in the pit of my stomach. Loneliness and fear crawl through my body, entwining with each other until I can feel tears burning in my eyes.
I don't want to be afraid of David. He is the one thing in this strange place that has constantly brought me comfort and even joy. If he murdered his wife or anybody else, I would truly have nobody here on my side, and all the ghosts, whispers, and violence I've experienced will double in their intensity.
I need to know!
Clenching my teeth with resolve, I curl my fingers around the long steel skewer lying next to the spatula on the serving island. David must've left them there when he hurried after me from the solarium. Taking a ragged deep breath, I run from the kitchen, down the hallway, through the honour guard of furniture and up the stairs. For fear of losing my resolve, I don't pause for one second until I burst through the door of the solarium.
There is no woman in the dusky room. No moving shapes are breaking away from the draperies; there isn't even so much as eddying dust swirls. All is quiet and just like we left it. My paintings are waiting to be finished, and the boxes and discarded art David and I were going through are still where we stacked them. Clutching the skewer in my sweaty palms, I cross to the shelves, finding the spot where I'd been standing with David when I saw the woman.
My eyes latch onto the ring with the piece of broken chain protruding from the wall, and I move closer, swallowing against a wave of nausea washing over me. The floor in this part of the room is covered in deep scars gouged into its surface. The area of the wall surrounding the ring bears the marks of wear and tear, as if someone or something unsuccessfully tried to pull it from its moorings.
Who or what was kept tied up in here? Why here?
Movement behind me and off to the side catches my eye, and I straighten up, whirling around simultaneously, skewer ready to strike. I step back in fright, my breath escaping in terrified puffs when I see the woman standing as close to the windows as the chain running from a steel collar around her neck will allow her to go. I don't think she'll be visible from outside.
Remembering the bruises I'd seen on her neck earlier, I follow the links of the chain from the collar, running tautly past me to the ring in the wall. I can see it clearly as if it is truly there, solid and tangible, every nick and fleck of rust visible. I can hear it scrape and rattle when the woman moves while I stare at her, mesmerized and afraid.
Am I dreaming? Is she a ghost?
She is quite lovely with large dark eyes, sleek black hair, a gently sloping nose and full lips. She is not looking at me; I doubt she could see me even if she did look. I don't think we exist in the same time dimension. She is glaring past me at the wall next to the shelves, where the small windows start facing the front of the house, causing me to turn in fright to see what she's glaring at, but there's nothing but discarded canvasses.
Was this woman kept here in the solarium, chained to the wall? For how long? Why? Who did this?
"Who are you?" I ask in a voice so dry that it crackles when I speak.
She doesn't answer, and I am not surprised. She just stands near the windows, glaring at the wall to my left, her expression a perfect blend of fear and rage. I watch her, in awe of a vision this perfect. She's here and also not quite here, solid and yet diaphanous at the same time. My eyes grow as I brace myself for more disturbing accusations when her lips part... and then she screams.
The sound slams into my chest, knocking the air from my lungs. It fills my ears and crashes around in my head with such loud violence it physically hurts. Dropping the skewer, I cover my ears with my hands, but I was wrong; the sound is not coming from outside, entering through my ears. The sound is inside my head, burning behind my eyes.
Bowing under the sheer agony filling my brain, I run, crashing from the room, nearly falling down the stairs. I rush across the balcony, the noise still shrilly, cutting into me when I realise that someone is following me. I can hear footsteps cascading around me, spurring me on to run faster, but I cannot quite tell which direction they're coming from.
Entering the foyer, I trip when the battered throw rug shifts under my feet and in my attempts to regain my balance while still blocking out the sound with my hands, I overshoot the entrance to the small hallway and stumble into the living area.
I can still hear the footsteps and don't know where they are exactly. Above me, behind me or coming from the kitchen. My flight or fight instincts override every ounce of ability I have for logical thought, the flight part taking over by a mile. Dropping to the floor, I roll under the couch and finally give in to that overwhelming urge to curl into a ball.
Breathing shallowly, futilely blocking my ears against the sounds of the scream and the patter of feet, I can feel hot tears trickling down my cheeks, preventing me from sneezing while lying in the dust.
The scream stops as suddenly as it started, and I can no longer hear footsteps either, but my brain is pickled in confusion, my head pounding from the abuse. Still, I do not trust that whoever was moving about is gone now. Was it David coming in from outside? If it was, is that comforting, or does it make it all so much worse?
After what feels like an eternity, when the severest of my panic subsides and slowly starts to ebb away, my surroundings gradually grow in focus, and I become aware of something poking into my ribs. I'm lying half on top of a hard, uncomfortable object. Moving gingerly, careful not to make a sound, I twist until I can work it free. It is a flat rectangle wrapped in a leather cover. A phone, and definitely not my phone. Mine is still securely in my pocket.
Bringing it level with my face, I flip it open and touch a button on the side, turning on the screen. Seeing the lock screen image, I know at once that it is, without a doubt, David's phone.
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