Page 34 of One Killer Night

The only sound in the room is my breath, heavier and more audible as my chest rises and falls faster and faster.

I’m helpless to stop it. Helpless against the anger inside me. To the rage that bubbles right under the surface, waiting to be unleashed.

The world around me begins to disassociate, like the blurred edges of a fire, until suddenly, all the air evaporates from my lungs, a back draft of consciousness sucking out all the oxygen before an explosion of realization.

My head snaps to the right.

The crisp feeling of cold slices across my cheek first, like a slap that wakes me up. I can’t feel the paper I’m holding as my eyes narrow into tunnel vision directly on the thing that’s wrong.

The back door. It’s open.

A breeze billows in, making the hinges squeak, disturbing the silence as the wood frame sways.

Shadows tucked in corners of the room dance in my periphery, like taunting demons, but all I can process is the fucking moonlight that’s illuminating the kitchen island.

Everything inside me stills, all that I’m feeling transforming into unnerving calm. Because there are only two options: Someone’s in my house. Or they just left.

I shove the papers back inside the folder, then squat and hide them again, never taking my eyes off the door.

As I stand, slowly and quietly, my hands ball into fists, and corded muscles in my back flex. But my feet are already moving as I search the space like a predator, stalking toward the back door.

Passing the hallway leading to my bedroom, I double-check that it’s still closed before the quiet sound of a whetted blade punctuates the space as I swiftly and expertly slip a butcher knife from the block.

I sneak behind the door, not making a sound, the only line of sight the crack in the door between the frame and the hinges. I lift my chin as I strain for a better look, the heavy steel knife dangling in my hand brushing my skin, but I’m glued in place. I don’t even swallow, twisting the glinting metal around and around, trying to stay hidden in the shadow.

The silence stretches out longer and longer as I listen.

Leaves rake over the porch, crawling over each other, grating the quiet, and wind chimes from the neighbor’s house softly play, alerting anyone who’s listening that the night’s awake.

But I only hear the footsteps that grow closer.

There’s shuffling and the knock of a chair from the porch as another breeze sways the door harder, but I touch the handle, controlling it.

Seconds tick by like an old wall clock. Tick, tick, tick. But still, I don’t move. Like the man who watched us tonight. I’m still. Waiting.

The whining in the wood gives away weight on the threshold, so I fling the door open and draw back the knife, aimed to the gut.

But a screaming meow erupts, along with a bloodcurdling cry.Fuck.

“God flucking! Shiv!”

A streak of calico launches at me, bouncing off my bare chest as Goldie’s arms flail toward the night sky. I immediately tuck the butcher knife behind me as I step away from the doorjamb. Bile rises to my throat.

She’s wide eyed, half spun around herself as she stands in one of my T-shirts.

“What the hell are you doing out here?” I shout, feeling panicked, motioning with my head over my shoulder. “You were sleeping. I didn’t know ...”

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

She laughs. I frown.

She’s laughing? She’s fine. It’s fine.

Goldie puts her hand on her chest like she did when that guy at her sister’s party scared her, completely oblivious to the cold metal in my hand.

“Apparently, getting the shit scared out of me. I couldn’t even cuss correctly. What the hell, Noah?”

Pull it together.