The Quiet Witness

Evening Celebrations

Kate awoke in a daze. Her eyelids wouldn’t open, almost as if someone had gleefully glued them shut. She wouldn’t put it past her family. Bracing for the laughs, she lifted her head with a groan. Urghhh… What’s with this, pounding headache?

At last her eyes fluttered open. Red washed over her vision. She stiffened. Just the tablecloth, with its happy snowman figurines dancing across the fabric… Every year, the same sight.

…Did I… fall asleep… on the table?

The flaking, golden cutlery rattled as she braced herself on her elbows, digging into the hard wooden table. White hot agony shot through her abdomen, forcing her to double over.

She pushed herself up, each breath jagged, just as a chair clattered to the floor, scraping across the hauntingly silent room. Her hand flew to her face as she backed away from the table, nearly tripping over the chair behind her.

The Christmas tree’s colored lights flickered across her foster mother’s silhouette, whose head rested on the table as if swallowed up by a deep sleep.

Did… did some kind of gas escape and knock them all out?

To her right was Aunty Teresa, slumped over in her chair. This was nothing unusual, as she was never far from her favored tumbler of whiskey. The glass she’d been nursing all evening, as she hiccuped repeatedly between deep gulps, now lay abandoned, mere inches from the edge of the table.

Her sister, Ingrid, sat huddled against her new boyfriend, Nicolas, his calloused hand resting on her knee.

Their faces were ashen, eyes closed as if in prayer.

Bracing one hand below the other, Kate inched closer.

Knees quaking, she put a finger to Nicolas’s throat.

One second passed… two… three… She waited, heart racing in tune with her mind.

Nothing pulsed beneath her trembling fingers…

…lifeless…

She still wanted to believe it was one of their harshest jokes yet. But the blood trickling down her foster father’s nose told the truth. This was real.

Her pulse roared in her ears…

…louder… louder… wait…

It wasn’t her racing heart. It came from above her.

Her head snapped up, eyes rewarded with a layer of dust falling from the ceiling. Coughing, she wiped it from her face to see the floorboards move… creak. Someone was in the house. Whoever had done this was now creeping closer to the stairs.

Kate spun around, almost too fast, as the world whirled around her.

Food? Something must have been in the food.

Her eyes flitted around as she pushed down the nausea, looking for a way out. For a split second, she thought about running to the phone to dial 911, but she’d have to cross the stairs, the visitor would be right on her heels. Hide? The intruder would know the table held an empty spot.

Worthless. All worthless. She let the all too familiar word fuel her anger as she firmly nodded her chin, turning to the cabinet she knew held her father’s favorite toy. Opening the drawer, Kate reached for the gleaming black handle, letting the coolness of the metal seep into her fingers.

Kate gripped the gun hard. Wishing her foster father had taken her to the shooting range and had taught her the ropes, as she had asked, nearly begged for, a million times. Maybe that had been his reason for refusing her.

Smart man… But damn it, maybe my hands wouldn’t be shaking like this now.

She closed the drawer, its ancient wooden handle complaining like a rusty joint.

You got this Kate. It’s nothing more than a risky option in a sea of piranhas. Each one can bite you in the ass… Wasn’t that life?

Her shoulders sagged at what came next, but it did not matter now. The killer was here, but so was she. And she would be the one making it out alive. She had to be.

Not far away, black gloves slid down the chipped railing. The stairs that had always groaned under her sister’s racing feet now made barely a sound as army boots stepped down, evading every creak with ease, almost as if it was… practiced. This wasn’t the first visit.

Kate peeked around the corner, heart in her throat as she watched the unfamiliar man’s gaze slide from the locked front door, to the phone still neatly on its hook, and finally to the deserted chair, not sparing even a glance for the five bodies spread out around the celebratory table, as if they weren’t even there.

A heavy sigh filled the room, sounding almost… bored.

As his head turned to her direction, her heart leapt like a horse trampling in place, wanting out. But the stranger glanced past her hiding place. The dozens of discarded papers and knick-knacks spread over the tiny cabinet shielded her searching eyes from view. Thank God for the mess.

She squinted but couldn’t make out any of his features underneath the black hoodie he was wearing.

If her life hadn’t been hanging by a thin thread, she might have commented on the cliché of the color.

As it were, the last shreds of her courage sank right into her shoes.

The hidden confidence of the man was betrayed in the ease of his movements.

There was no tension in his broad form. Every move was as smooth as a predator’s, even though one of his supposed prey had survived…

…thus far…

Kate shivered violently, the cold fingers of desperation sinking into her failing muscles as she cradled the gun to her chest. Please, just leave.

But her prayer went unanswered.

“Come out, come out… Wherever you are!”

She shook in place as the sing-song voice mocked the space between them.

Too close.

The sheer ice in his words crept into her veins, urging her to freeze over like a lake in winter’s grasp. If she didn’t get to her feet now, she might stay frozen in place, hunched behind the cabinet like some kind of…. Prey… no, never again.

Legs trembling, she pushed off the wall and stepped into view.

“There you are.”

His eyes snapped to hers, the shock in his green depths unmistakable. But that wasn’t what kept her rooted to the spot. They regarded the world with such a coldness, roaming over her not cruelly, but like a predator sizing up his next victim.

Finally, his gaze halted at the gun as her trembling hands leveled it toward him, aiming right for his heart. The killer cocked his head to the side, eyes boring into hers.

“Now that is a surprise.” He gestured to the gun with a loose hand and took a step forward. “If you plan on using that… I would urge you to hurry up.”

“Stay back.” She took one step back, clinging to the same space between them while her voice shook. “Or I will shoot you.”

A glint flashed over his eye. He nodded in… admiration?

“I trust you would actually.”

So why isn’t he staying back?

Sweat trickled down her brow, burning in her eyes when a desperate idea hit.

“If you leave now, I won’t tell anyone that I saw you.”

A low chuckle escaped the man. “Everyone says that in the panic, girl. But after? When all is quiet?” He shook his head. “Not a chance.”

Her stomach flipped, her breath hitching. She could feel her chances slipping through her fingers as the cool metal bit into her palms. She didn’t have a choice.

He moved closer, nearly towering over her. A nameless man, hellbent on ending her life. She couldn’t even name a single reason why. Yet, here he was. His presence foreign in the Christmas decor, too heavy for the little old house in which they stood.

The man halted just out of arm’s reach. Holding her gaze steady, he spread his arms wide, palms up as if in surrender.

“Time to use it, don’t you think?” He was right. She’d had enough. She’d offered him the choice, and he’d made it. Her lips formed a thin line of resolve. Hopefully one shot would be enough.

But then she saw his mouth open, words poured out.

“You might wanna—,” She pulled the trigger. Click. She saw him fall, blood pooling from his chest. Straight through his heart… a death sentence.

Wait… click?

Silence fell. Horrified, she stared between the weapon and the man still standing before her unharmed. The sound echoed in her mind.

Click, click, click.

“—Take the safety off,” He continued, cutting through the fog.

Oh, God. No.

As if in slow motion, she reached for the safety. In a second he was there, covering her fingers before she could even locate the damned switch. She hissed as her wrist buckled under the force of his hand, fighting to keep control. But he simply twisted the gun out of her grip.

Almost nonchalantly, he disarmed the weapon with a few deft flicks. The bullets fell to the floor in a dull clatter, right alongside her hope for survival. She hesitated, watching meekly as he pressed the gun back into her hands with a conspiratorial wink, leaning over to whisper.

“It was meant to look like an accident. But this will do.”

Her guts twisted in protest. A family murder… His new plan, to cover up his failure of killing her the first time. Lord have mercy on her.

She snapped, and the gun went flying toward his face. A flicker of surprise passed over his eyes before it landed. Turning his face with the blow, he lessened the impact, but the escaping grunt betrayed him. Her fury had hit its mark.

Kate stiffened, muscles bracing for what was sure to come.

But damn her, she would not be making it easy for him.

Slowly, his fingers went for his lips, gingerly checking for the damage.

They came back bloodied. Seeing it, he laughed, bloody teeth showing as she backed away a step, covering up her flinch.

Show no fear.

He straightened, dwarfing her once more.

“Now that… is… a… surprise.”

“So you keep saying.” Kate forced every ounce of fear into the words, twisting it into hate.

“True, though if it’s any consolation…,” he paused to wipe the scarlet streaks off his lips. “I only repeat myself when genuinely surprised.”

“Why? Used to people begging you for your mercy?”

As she spat the words at his feet, his eyebrows shot up in the air. Surprise written in every line of his face.

What’s wrong with me? Shouldn’t I be? Begging?