Anthony Cardon

Constance continued

Realizing that this was no time to be focusing on the past and that the present was much more important, I made myself ready for work and walked down the spiral staircase. I made my way to my car.

Just when I was about to open the door to my car, I believe I saw the reflection of that old cabinet on the door window. Quickly, I turned my head, forcing air to tornado around my hair. Nothing. The cabinet was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps it was from one of the windows? I tried looking into each of the windows that could have reflected off my car window, but nothing was to be seen.

A little distressed, I opened my car door with a quick swing. This was the first time my curiosity had been betrayed. I wanted to find out everything, to feel secure, to know all the beauties of my surroundings. That was my happiness. That happiness was taken from me.

I bent over and climbed into my car, letting my dress run against the interior floor. The dress was red, blood red. I liked that color: my color of the future. Fire. Love. Life. Power. Luck. Death that leads to everything else again. I want to feel that way today.

“Look forward; keep your dreamy eyes on the road!” I heard my mind yell at me. My car skidded across the road as I approached my apartment.

Coming to a somewhat safe stop, I momentarily sat in my seat. Sweat dripped from my scalp and my arms shook rapidly as they continued to grip tightly on the steering wheel. My mind, empty with shock, only took notice of the fierce thumping in the chambers of my heart.

“First time? Yes, first time. No, no, no! Did I just space out a moment ago? This is not my first time. I just knew it,” my mouth began muttering when my once asleep brain started to function again.

Slowly recovering from shock, my eyes drifted by instinct to the clock built into the interior wall of my car. It read: 3:30 pm.

“Now, breathe deeply. In and out, in and out,” I coached myself. Although my chest still thumped rapidly, it was slightly reduced so much that I felt somewhat in control of myself.

It seemed as though I was in my own quiet world, when I lost sight of the direction my car was heading to.

“Spaced out? On what? I don’t remember. Or rather, I probably didn’t want to remember. What was I thinking? I don’t think I’m relaxed enough to think. Am I? Was it about my brother?” Questions rang and sang themselves repetitively in my head.

“Drat! Second time I’m betrayed by my curiosity. Drat! Drat! Drat!”

Tears ran down my cheeks and slid down the steering wheel before they came to a complete stop at the bottom where the hand rests were raised. My golden hair tumbled over my face as I forced my fingers through them from the sides of my head. In a brief moment, that golden hair sprang up as my head pulled them upward and swung them to my back.

“Not this time,” I stared out my window, “Not this time. I’ll know, and I’ll know it soon.”

Yes, I was going to find out what was bothering me.

But, since I was a little tired at the moment, I believed it was time to have a little conversation with someone. That would surely raise my spirits up. My curiosity needed a rest. But, then again, maybe my curiosity could be resurrected if I use it. After all, who was it that would ask all the questions in our little chatting? Me, of course.

The cell phone was located in the side pocket of my purse. I reached into the bag that was red in color coordination with my dress.

Hmmm…the cell phone was a navy blue color. Perhaps it would have been reasonable to change it to red, too. But for now, my mouth needed exercise. And so be it.

Now that I felt completely refreshed, so much that I have almost certainly knew how long I have been fully rejuvenated, I began heading home in the same direction as my usual daily routine. Although quite silly, the person I have been speaking to via cell phone was no more than one of my friends, who happened to be living in my apartment. And...I was heading directly towards my home, and I haven't realized that I should have reached home before speaking to her. This personality; I should do something about it, always wanting what I wanted, how I wanted and where I wanted it. I have always found myself feeling more comfortable during conversations when speaking over the phone. Or perhaps text messaging could have been even more suitable. I usually feel uncomfortable speaking to others when in direct view of his or her face. That was especially true when I was speaking with Mr. Bartholomew. Oh, how I can remember shaking as I knew that I would have to speak directly to him.

I am lively, but in a different way. I like to laugh, sing, and tell jokes. However, I can't find myself to have serious conversations when I have to really talk with other people, eye to eye. Personality, will it ever change?

Excuse my language, but damn no.

And I call myself curious? When I can't even walk up to other people and ask questions? Honestly, when I would try to find things out, I would rather look it up from other sources. Phones are heavenly. After all, I'm a girl and I must speak once in a while. I can laugh and sing with anyone. But on the phone today, the conversation was serious.

I remember when I started the conversation by using the usual greeting, "Hi. How are you?" before proceeding to carry on the conversation. Well, after carefully thinking about what I would talk about next so that I won't end the conversation with a long pause, I asked about that old cabinet that Mr. Bartholomew had introduced into our apartments.

Now, I knew my friend, whose name happened to be my middle name: Lucy, very well. She is well known by everyone in our apartments for her ability to eavesdrop and retain information, especially the kinds of data that nobody would want to ignore.

Well, that should explain clearly why she and I are friends. Curiosity and info-vacuum together are one of a kind.

Well, she explained the situation in this sort of a manner,

“He’s absolutely insane you know. We never had a filthy furniture item like that in there.”

“I know, I was thinking the same thing,” I answered.

“I believe he could be up to something. After all, why would he even think…,” she gasped, “maybe it was something he inherited from an old ancestor of his.”

“Lucy, if you don’t know anything about this, I will have to change the subject.”

“All right, all right, I was just fooling with you. Anyway, I’ve heard that he found it in an old garbage heap. No one knows if there really was a garbage heap anywhere on the grounds, so I went to check it out…”

“You could have let me do that”

“Sure. But it’s exiting you know. Who doesn’t think so?”

“Of course.”

“Well, anyway, going back to the topic, I went to check it out and I didn’t find anything.”

“Huh.”

“Constance, there is no way there would ever be a garbage heap around here.”

“You know what, Lucy?”

“Yes?”
“I just remembered the first time I saw that cabinet. I thought I noticed something peculiar about it...”

“Gone on, go on.”

“The wood seemed darker then than now. What do you think that means?”

“Maybe he altered the color?”

“Actually, the color was the same, just that it seemed darker. If it would have been changed of its color with varnish, the wood would have shined in the light.”

“You don’t mean it…”

“Yes I do.”

“That means…”

We both spoke together, “He hauled that piece of rubbish out of the ocean.”

Squealing with the idea, we laughed at the horror.

“Disgusting, don’t you agree?’

“Well, yes. We are surrounded by an ocean. Why couldn’t he have ordered a cabinet online?”

“Who knows? Maybe we should ask him.”

“Well, I have to get my husband to help me with some homework from school...”

“Again?” I asked.

“Sure. So I’ll see you later on, Constance.”

“Good luck.”

Her phone hung up.

I awoke early, as usual. I placed my hand on my head to try to drown down the painful throbbing. Oh, what an argument I had with Mr. Bartholomew. He didn’t want to answer me, I thought. My curiosity betrayed me once again. I couldn’t satisfy it.

I sat on the side of my bed as memories swished themselves back and forth through my head. First, I saw Mr. Bartholomew looking suspiciously at me. That was yesterday, of course. Then I saw him try to run. I followed him, but he was much faster than my little feet. Tiring, it was after all. When will I ever be able to resist this temptation to follow my curiosity wherever it went?

I knew I should have felt satisfied with the fact that I’ve done my best to make him tell me. But, this heavy feeling in my chest told me that something wasn’t right at all. I didn’t feel empty like I usually did in the morning. What was it?

I walked to the bathroom and turned on the lights. The brightness of the lighting made my eyes wince, but I nevertheless opened them and jerked open the medicine cabinet.

I took out the body temperature thermometer and placed it in my armpit. I sat down back on my bed for quite a while, still throbbing between my ears. I took the thermometer out and read it. It read 98.1.

“I’m not sick,” I whispered my thoughts out. “Wonder what’s wrong with me.”

I never drank for ages so there was no way I was drunk.

Suddenly, I felt a sudden tap of awareness in the corner of my eye when I thought I saw something standing in the left corner of the room, among the hanging clothing.

I turned around and ran to that corner and though I knew there was danger, I plunged my hand behind the hanged coats to feel around. I didn’t feel anything.

Just then, again in the corner of my eye, I saw something move behind me: something big, square, and rigid. I turned around and just briefly glanced at what looked like the old cabinet. But, the image was no longer there in not even a thousandth of a second, it seemed.

My heart pounded. I didn’t think I felt this much panic before in my life.

“I’m so definitely sick,” my voice shook as I ran to the door and checked the lock several times. It was locked tightly. My head turned in a swift motion once more as I looked towards the windows and ran for them. I ran my fingers across them and twisted the locks to examine the security. All of them were locked.

“What’s wrong with me?” my mind raced frantically. I rushed to my bed and covered myself with the warm, comforting blankets, the spring bed bouncing up and down from the sudden impact of my body. It remained silent in the apartment. I felt my face redden and imagined my neighbors waking up with the rampage I was causing. I imagined them walking up the stairway and knocking on my door and shouting at me to be quiet.

Slowly, I clenched the blankets close to my body and shook violently, listening into the air for any trace of movement other than my own. It remained silent, uncomfortably silent.

I then heard something move. It sounded like running footsteps, coming closer and closer until it reached somewhere not far from where I laid. Slowly, I lifted up my blanket and opened my eyes. As I uncovered my sight distance with the blanket, I looked out at whatever or whoever was out there. Gathering all the courage I had, I pushed the blanket completely off. No one was there.

I placed my hand on my chest to try and maybe squeeze the thumping away. My head turned to the door when I heard something out there. A sliding sound of small metal rattling against each other echoed through the outer hallway. The metal rattled and paused with a smooth turning noise and then clicked. Then I realized what it was. Some one was unlocking my door, the only protection I had.

The pace of my heart beat quickened. I leaped out of bed and flew into my closet, letting the closet door shut on its own.

I heard the door to my room unlock and footsteps sounded their way to my ears.

“Oh, no,” I thought, “what if I’m found?”

“Constance,” a voice called out from the person who just entered. I recognized the voice. It was my brother’s.

I opened my closet doors and walked to him.

“I…I’m sorry,” I apologized, “I woke you up didn’t I? I didn’t mean to…”

“Actually, I was glad you did,” my brother looked around, looking like he was in panic, “because just when I was walking across the hall to check on you,” his voice shook, “I saw that Bartholomew’s apartment door was wide open. And when I looked in, I saw him…” He was now shaking uncontrollably.

“What?” I asked him, holding him up because his legs couldn’t support him.

“Mr. Bartholomew has been murdered.”

“What?” my eyes bulged open, “who was murdered?”

“Mr. Bar-tho-lo-mew.”

Roadrunner led me down the hallway to Mr. Bartholomew’s apartment. My heart was thumping wildly as he opened the door. I peeped into the room and examined it.

The old cabinet stood there in the far left corner. The window’s glass was shattered, with wind blowing in, letting the long curtains flow like ocean water. My brother and I ran to the window and looked out.

“Whoever it was, he or she shattered the window and came in,” my brother still shook while he spoke, his voice quivering, despite the fact that he was trying to control himself.

I looked out at the ground. The glass shards had fallen onto the grass outside. I peered back into the room and noticed no shards on the carpet floor.

“This is where I found him,” my brother opened the door to Mr. Bartholomew’s kitchen. I gasped and my hand went to my mouth. The throbbing in my head worsened and I knelt down, feeling my internal liquids starting to rise up my throat. There in the middle or the room was him. There were at least four kitchen knifes planted in his back. Blood oozed across the floor.

My brother leaned against the wall as he shook even more violently than before, now whimpering.

I looked back at the room we came through and saw the cabinet again. Rushing back, while trying to prevent myself from throwing up, I came to the front of the cabinet. The shutters were slightly open and when looking through the small crack, I thought I saw two white dots, like eyes. Those dots shot a current of shivers down my back and I had to fold my arms to keep myself from shaking. Closing it quickly, I locked it up with the combination lock and stood back. I felt uneasy with this furniture, very uneasy. I had to know what this was all about, but even if I tried to understand, I have the feeling that the end of my life would approach soon if I do not find a way to control my curiosity.

12