Excerpt
The night sky was a black ink, the moon hidden behind thick rain clouds, and the screeching silence in the street should’ve forewarned Willy of what awaited her. The road sheening from the first downpour an hour ago and another looming ahead. Save for the street lights and a few lit-up front porches, Willy could barely make out the path stretched out before her. It was by sheer luck she was able to reach her house without any accidents, as driving at night wasn’t exactly her forte.
Her front porch wasn’t lit, obviously, as she was just getting home from the clinic. She placed one foot after the other, trying to maintain a good grip between the glistening plastered concrete pavement and her shoes. It was a few minutes past midnight, she noted from the screen of her phone, which she held out before her serving as a flashlight.
Usually, she never leaves the health center this late. Mrs. Owens from across town had been rushed into the clinic at 6 p.m. by her frantic husband, claiming she was in labor. The poor woman looked far more relaxed than her husband, who could barely sit in a spot.
Willy was on her way out of the center when the couple spotted her. Immediately, she knew she was a gunner.
Months ago, at a town’s bake sale, she had passively promised Mrs. Owens to be present during her delivery. Keyword: passively. She couldn’t have said ‘no’ to the pleas of a hormonal pregnant woman. Plus, Cindy’s famous pot pie was selling out faster than one could say, Jack Robinson. She needed to get her hands on at least one of them.
Back then, she was rounding up her nurse residency program, and her last ward rotation was gynecology. If she had known they’d come rushing in bare minutes after her handover, she wouldn’t have made that promise. It had been a long day, and all she needed was to get out of her scrub and into her cozy pajama set, then kick her feet up.
True to Mr. Owens’ words, his wife was indeed in labor, and it lasted four hours. Their beautiful and healthy baby girl was born into the world with only two solid pushes—as expected for their second child. As wonderful as it was to witness, the entire process drained Willy, and it didn’t help that an unforeseen torrent of rain began to beat down on the town, keeping her longer at the center.
While the night nurses, Kelly and Sarah, looked over the day entries from the handover, Willy prayed earnestly that the rain would let up. She was not about to spend the night on one of those small, thin beds in the break room till her shift came around in the morning.
God listened to her prayer and showed her some mercy. After an hour, the rain slowed down to a drizzle, and she hightailed her behind out of there. Now, she was in a battle against time to get in, shower, and grab the most sleep she could before her alarm roused her in the morning.
Her flashlight caught a small, dark object lying carelessly on the side of her footpath. Moving closer, she realized it was a thick black plastic bag, beaten down by the rain. This was unusual. She thought as she bent forward to lift the wet bag.
She couldn’t remember seeing such a bag or leaving it out in her yard. She expertly maneuvered the knotted bag while still holding onto her phone till it came undone. Nothing had prepared her for what she saw nor the smell that hit her square in the face as she peered into the bag. When she looked into the bag for the first second, she didn’t immediately register what her eyes viewed until her flashlight lit up the poor animal.
A dead cat—ginger—bloody and headless. The presentation was so grotesque that Willy's body went stiff in the split second she recognized what she was looking at. The head was severed from the body in a clean cut— a kaleidoscope of blood vessels stared back at her —and the smell indicated the injustice wasn’t recently done. In such a quick second, the image was burned in her brain, and it would haunt her dreams for many nights afterwards.
Later, she would be thankful for the rain because if she hadn’t been so careful not to slip and fall on her footpath, she wouldn’t have noticed the bag. Whenever she thought back to that moment, her skin crawled at the idea of stumbling over the bagged dead animal.
In the moment, she flung the bag away from her hands along with her phone in a frenzy as she let out a bone-chilling scream. She didn’t bother with picking up the device as it fell on its back, submerging her back into darkness. She dashed out into the street.
Her nerves were all shot up, and she didn’t know where exactly she was heading, but it was definitely not into the arms of a tall, dark figure that gripped onto her sides. Another bout of ear deafening screams rang out through the neighborhood.
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