Page 22 of Eyes in the Shadows
Yeah, right.
Still, I keep a critical eye out, scan local news, listen to chatter in the restaurant and streets. Nothing. No one is talking about any local murders, and that feels too conspicuous to be a fluke.
But life goes on and the world keeps spinning.
I just wish I could stop thinking about him, stop fantasizing about him. In my head, he never stopped when I told him to. In my head, he peeled down my sweatpants and bent me over the arm of that sofa and just absolutely filled me with what he was hiding in that bulge in his pants…
At least I found my phone—it gives me something to do to keep my mind busy in the long mornings before work. And the timing was lucky, too, because I’d just been about to get another one when I realized I’d left my ID at home. My bank account is thrilled.
My next day off finds me at home, contemplating the list of foreign films currently playing near me, when there’s a knock at the door. I’m still in mypajamas, so I check the peephole because I really try not to make the same mistake twice.
There’s an unfamiliar woman in the hallway. She’s got flowers in one hand and a small package in the other, and her ugly brown polo is clearly a uniform.Zippy Deliveryis embossed on her chest.
“Who is it?”
“I’ve got a delivery for Eleanor Wilson?”
“Just a second.” Even though this pajama top covers much more than my other one—which I think maybe the laundry goblins ate—I go into the bathroom and put on my old, tattered terry cloth robe. I unchain and open the door.
“Eleanor Wilson?” she asks again, like she didn’t get the confirmation she needed the first time.
I nod, a little breathlessly. “That’s me.”
She hands me the shoe-box sized package and I turn it over in my hands. It’s got some weight, and rustles in a satisfying way when shaken, but it’s a plain brown box with nothing on it. No shipping address or payment label. Weird. I didn’t order anything.
Then, she extends her other arm and hands me the flowers.
“Oh, these are for me, too?” I ask, shocked.
“Yup,” she says, snapping her gum and grabbing the clipboard out from her armpit.
They’re so gorgeous, I’m stunned for a second. The colors are bright—oranges, reds, pinks, purples—and it looks so perfect that I’m afraid to do anything with it. Even the wrapping looks expensive, with thick brown paper, tied with twine. No cheap plastic sleeves, here. I don’t know a thing about flowers, and I don’t see anything I recognize, except roses. I lean down and press my nose against the bouquet, as one does, and pull away a little disappointed. It doesn’t smell like much, just fresh and green and very faintly of roses.
There’s a card poking out the top with writing only on one side, a message that doesn’t make any sense to me.
I’m sorry.
Who is? About what?
Disappointment surges. “Oh, these must be for someone else…”
The woman looks up from arranging the paperwork on her clipboard. “I work for the delivery company, not the flower shop. You’ll have to take it up with them. Sign here.”
Well, the card has an embossed logo on the top. If they’re local, maybe I can give them a call and let them at least know that their delivery missed its mark. I place the package and flowers down on the kitchen counter so I can take the clipboard and pen, draw a squiggle on the line as meaningless as my signature would have been, and close the door.
The flowers are making me grin like a schoolgirl with a crush, so even though they’re not for me, I’m going to pretend they are. I’m keeping them.
I give them another sniff, just in case I missed a scent the first time. Nothing. I almost feel robbed of a quintessential part of the receiving-flowers experience. Especially since this is my first time. I just assumed roses smelled a lot more like… well, roses. This scent is nothing like the body products that claim the name.
I’ve never gotten flowers before, but I have seen movies. In the movies, they always put them in water. But, because I’ve never gotten flowers before, I don’t have a vase. I don’t even have an excess of clean drinking glasses. However, I do work in a kitchen, so I always have an excess of something else.
I grab a deli cup and unwind the thick paper from around the bouquet. The sight of the beautiful flowers in the cheap plastic is almost painfully ridiculous. But even though it makes me laugh at myself, I have to admit that the deli cup is a nice touch. It feels more like me.
I take a butter knife to the box next. Inside, nestled in some recycled cardboard packaging material is something about the size and shape of a hardback book, wrapped in thick black paper with a white silk bow. I frown, confused. Black and white doesn’t exactly scream holidays, but maybe it’s a belated Christmas present? But who could it be from? I already received the e-gift cards from my parents and the Christmas card with flight vouchers in it from my sister so I could come visit her and the kids. No one at the restaurant knows where I live and Harrison and I don’t exchange gifts because we both agreed we’re too poor.
I untie the bow and unwrap the paper, then I drop it with a gasp. It hits the packaging material with a soft swish and I back away a few steps.
It’s a picture. In a frame. Of me.
