9. Jael
pretty kitten - Dua Saleh
“ A uthorities are baffled by the murder of 47-year-old Stanley Vedder. Vedder was found dead yesterday at the Mariner’s Motel, after sustaining numerous stab wounds. Police have yet to confirm if Vedder’s death is connected to the notorious Cleaver murders, though numerous media outlets are speculating that is the case. The Cleaver, still on the run, has evaded capture for weeks now. Investigators urge anyone with information to call the tip line at?—”
I switch off the radio, the voice cutting to silence. I’m in the driver’s seat of the station wagon at yet another truck stop, a greasy burger in hand. It’s day two on the road and I’m closer than ever to my destination.
Just a few more hours.
In the meantime, I needed more fuel for the wagon but also for myself. I turned on the radio hoping for more staticky tunes of whatever genre the radio station in the area was playing. Instead, I’ve been confronted by more updates about the Cleaver.
Everyone really is obsessed.
But the police have been two steps behind so far. They’re tripping over their own theories, chasing breadcrumbs that lead to nowhere. It seems they don’t even realize their trail went cold a long time ago.
The irony almost makes me laugh. Hopefully they don’t mind that I borrowed Stanley’s station wagon—he obviously didn’t need it anymore.
I scarf down the last bite of my burger and then toss the greasy wrapper into the trash. Starting up the station wagon’s engine, I peer into the rearview mirror. The landscape around me seems harmless and unremarkable.
Just another truck stop by the highway with a diner and gas station and parking lot for travelers to hang around in.
Nobody even glances my way. I’m a traveler like they are.
Yet I know I’m not truly alone. He’s still out there, watching, waiting.
Earlier, when passing through a different small town, I had stopped for a few minutes to go inside a sporting goods store. I needed to pick up supplies, but it felt like a risk doing so while on the run. I was quick about it, rushing inside to grab what I had in mind before stuffing the items in the back of the station wagon.
As far as I could tell, he was nowhere around. But how could I know for sure? I was operating on hope as I got back in the car and drove to this truck stop.
I shift gears into drive and pull out of the parking lot. The horizon sprawls out far ahead of me, the road humming beneath the wheels. The scenery blurs into smudges of brown and green as time ticks away.
The paranoia that once ate me alive has morphed into a numbness that’s settled my nerves. I’m no longer fighting it but embracing it. It’ll be a weapon that I can wield to my advantage. Paranoid people are cautious people. They’re observant, noticing details everyone else overlooks. They survive.
My grip tightens on the wheel and my mind spins through a number of possible scenarios. I’ve stayed alive this long. I’ve made it far outside of Easton, leading the shadow man every mile I’ve traveled.
It’s how I’ll catch him—and the Cleaver.
They’re one and the same.
It’s the only explanation that makes sense. The Cleaver is merely a moniker that authorities invented. He’s really the shadow man who has been targeting me all along. He went after my sister to force my hand.
Why else would she go missing as I was finally free? He wanted this cat and mouse game.
A twisted smile tugs at my lips.
Let him watch. Let him think he’s winning.
I’ll never give in. Not until I find my sister and we’re together again.
Dr. Wolford said I had codependency issues. He claimed I needed to stop fixating on my sister. When I demanded to know why I wasn’t receiving her letters, he said that she had never written me back.
“Your mail has been delivered, Jael,” he’d say in his flat, condescending tone. “There was nothing from your sister.”
“My sister always promised she’d write me.”
He’d tilt his head to the side almost pityingly. “I’m sorry to say, she’s yet to do that.”
Sometimes I’d freeze up, so turn up on the inside was all I could do. Other times, I was bursting with emotion. I’d scream in frustration and accuse him and the staff at the hospital of hiding my letters.
“You’re keeping them from me!” I’d yell, half rising out of my chair. “I know you’re hiding them. Give them to me! Give me my letters!”
He would shake his head and sigh, resorting to jotting down notes in my file. The pen would scratch against the paper, driving me even more insane.
I hated that pen. The way it floated across the page. The way he clenched it between his fingers as he logged more damning evidence against me…
It was how I eventually realized what I needed to do.
The only way I would ever see daylight again would be if I pretended. If I told him what he wanted to hear.
What would he think if he could see me now?
He would claim I’m having a breakdown. Another episode that required medication to dull my behavior and take away my ability to think for myself. I’d be restrained, locked up in the little room they kept me in.
Four walls and a small window that felt like its own form of a prison cell. The same place where the shadow man appeared and no one ever believed me.
I’m never going back. No matter what happens, I refuse to go back to that existence.
The truth is, people like Dr. Wolford and even Detective Laurent—people like most of the world—underestimate me. They claim I’m the delusional one who’s out of touch with reality, but what about them?
They see what they want to see: some fragile, fractured young woman who is broken and unstable. But those fractures are proof that I’m stronger than they realize. I’ve been hurt and damaged and I’m still going.
Hours into my drive, the sun hangs lower now, dipping into shades of gold. The windshield glints in the fading light, forcing me to squint and lower the visor. I press harder on the gas, the station wagon picking up speed.
The landscape shifts into darker tones as the sun begins to set. The first signs of the night to come appear, a few stars dotting the sky.
I’ll be there in less than an hour. Then I can finally set my plan into motion.
I’ll be one step closer to reuniting with my sister. It’s been so long since we’ve been together that my heart aches thinking about her.
When we were girls she used to braid my hair (when she wasn’t practicing on the piano). We would fight often, but all sisters do. Our mother pitted us against each other; she wanted me to feel inferior to my sister’s musical genius.
It gave me a complex. It made me jealous. I wanted so badly to be just like her.
But when I find her again, we’ll clear the air. She’ll see that I never meant to hurt her…
The GPS on my phone dings, signaling I’m close to my destination. It’s the exit ramp from the highway, leading to a road that’s surrounded by the woods. I switch lanes and take the exit, entering the wooded area.
Only a few hundred feet in, I pull over in the first clearing to park. I flick off my headlights and go dark.
The shadow man’s close. He has to be. Even if the dark may make it harder to find me.
The station wagon door pops open as I get out and gather my things. My pulse beats fast, the anxiety I’d usually feel coursing through me as caution and awareness. Two things I’ll need if my plan is ever going to work.
I smirk to myself as I start toward the dark wall between the thick trees.
Let’s see what the night brings.
When I first came across the Klum family’s apartment, I only intended on staying a couple nights. I had watched the family of four load their car with their luggage and drive off. I wasn’t sure how long they would be gone.
Once I gained entry to their home—and access to all their things—I realized they would be gone for a couple weeks. It was a family trip up to the cabin they owned a state over. Some spying on social media revealed their exact location as Mrs. Klum posted update after update to her friends and family about their vacation.
They had a key holder tacked to the wall in the kitchen, where they labeled each key and hung them up when not in use. I swiped the extra key marked cabin and stuffed it into my duffle bag, figuring it would come in handy if I was ever on the run. The Klum family wouldn’t know if they were at their apartment in Easton.
There was no harm in borrowing their cabin like I was borrowing their apartment.
Borrowed keys. Borrowed car. Borrowed homes.
I would be on borrowed time if I hadn’t taken these things. I needed them more than their owners.
The key jingles softly as I walk in the woods and the cold air draws goosebumps on my skin.
The cabin will be the perfect spot to hide away. Remote, quiet, hidden deep in the woods. Not only will it provide me cover from the authorities, it’ll give me a place to roll out my plan.
The necessary next step to find my sister.
The air chills the deeper into the woods I go. Dead leaves and brittle twigs crunch under my boots. I use the flashlight feature on my iPhone to light the way, but only occasionally, only to make sure I’m still on the right path.
Otherwise, I walk in darkness. I stop every so often and listen to my surroundings.
I drop breadcrumbs for him to follow.
The trees feel alive, rustling in the wind.
He’s coming. I can sense his presence growing closer.
The weight of it presses against me, suffocating and all-consuming.
Good.
It’s what I want.
I hear him before I see him. The not-so-distant snap of a twig. My pulse quickens. Then comes the ragged, uneven draw of his breath that clashes with the howl of the wind. I swallow down the fear and panic and force myself to remain calm.
It’s time.
Flicking on the flashlight on my phone, I spin around and shine the light at the path behind me.
There he is like I’ve always imagined him, shrouded in thick shadows, his mass as big as the trees he stands between.
“Stay away from me!” I warn, then I power off the flashlight and break into a sprint.
He scrambles after me, his steps heavy and ominous.
We’re off.
The forest blurs into indistinct shapes around me. I can barely see where I’m going, but I trust my instincts and don’t stop.
Branches snag at my sleeves and whip against my face. Behind me, his footsteps pound the ground, faster now.
Closer.
He’s bridging the gap between us, the heat of his pursuit like fire on the back of my neck.
I don’t dare glance over my shoulder.
I’m panting as I push myself harder, running for my life. He follows me through the thick trees as I take him down a trail that leads where I planned for it to.
The trees only grow in size, wider and taller the deeper into the woods we make it. Their gnarled roots claw up from the ground like traps of their own. I do my best to avoid them, swerving when necessary.
He’s so close now that I can almost feel his monstrous hand reaching for me.
But he never gets the chance.
The sharp snap of the rope echoes through the woods, followed by a hoarse grunt. I skid to a stop, heart hammering as I turn and double back.
There he is, thrashing in the air, suspended several feet above the ground. The net I set earlier when I first arrived holds tight, its thick rope tangled around his limbs. He thrashes and snarls like an animal caught in a snare, his shadowed form swaying as he tries to muscle himself free.
I’m quicker than he is, rushing over with the syringe in hand. I jam the needle straight into his neck and then jump back as he roars into the otherwise eerily silent air.
Whereas an average-sized person would be out immediately, he only fights harder. He tears at the rope using brute strength that would be terrifying if I didn’t have the insurance of the bear tranquilizer I’d nicked at the sporting goods store. It gradually takes hold, his thrashes slowing down and then stopping entirely.
His head rolls to the side and his breathing shallows.
I remain where I am, letting the moment sink in.
He’s mine now.
After years of enduring his torment, the hunter has become the hunted. A triumphant laugh bubbles up my throat admiring his unconscious form dangling from the net.
“How does it feel?” I whisper. My voice trembles with giddy adrenaline. “How does it feel to be the prey for once?”
Only the wind answers me with another shrill whistle. I don’t even care as I wipe sweat from my brow and start on my next task.
Dragging him to the cabin.
The tables have turned, and this time, I’m the one in control.