Читать книгу Flowers for the Dead - C. K. Williams - Страница 19

I cannot breathe.

Those aren’t the drunks from the pub.

I lie as still as I can. There is no pub. There are no neighbours, nothing but the Kenzies’ old place. This is a back road, a dead end, dwindling down to a path through the woods. Dead trees on all sides, rising like thin fingers through the thick fog.

The sheets rustle beneath my shaking hands. I ball them into fists. It might be nothing. They might need help. Maybe their car broke down.

On a dead-end country road.

I feel the sweat collect beneath my armpits. Between my thighs. There is no sound. Only the stale smell of dead flowers and perspiration. There is someone standing down on the porch. In front of a large, dark house. The door isn’t sturdy. They could come in if they put their mind to it.

Maybe they already have.

Maybe they are already inside, walking through the hallway, towards the stairs leading up to my bedroom. The carpets, grey and silent, swallowing the sound of their steps. More than one person. Or just one man. One man and his silent steps on the stairs to my bedroom. The closed door coming into view. His hands are gloved. His breath is going quickly. His pupils dilated. His heart beating with excitement.

I almost choke on my own breath.

Stop. A car’s broken down, that’s it.

Should I check? What if they need help?

They would ring again then, wouldn’t they?

Wouldn’t you ring again?

I pull the blanket up to my nose. There are no sounds at all. I didn’t hear a car. You hear cars from miles off on this road.

As the minutes pass by, I start wondering. Did I only imagine it?

My teachers always said I had an overactive imagination.

Slowly, I sit up. Rise, carefully. Tiptoe across the carpet. To the window. I don’t dare draw back the curtain. Only lift it, not even by an inch. Through the narrow gap, I peek out.

It takes my eyes a while to get used to the darkness. When they have, I look out across the hollow.

There isn’t a single soul. Not a car, not a bike, nothing. Only the long shadows of the bare birches, a little darker even than the night, like fingers stretched out towards the house.

I drop the curtains again and move back under the blanket.

I only imagined it.

The sweat dries. It leaves sticky patches in the dip between my collarbones, on top of my breasts, beneath my arms and at the seam of my panties. Slowly, I close my eyes. I listen for sounds. A breeze strokes through the naked boughs of the trees. Wood creaks. It’s not the stairs. It’s no one coming up the stairs. It is just the trees. Just the trees and their long shadows.

The sweat is cooling on my skin. It prickles.