Dark Visions (7 page)

She doubled over, nausea coursing through
her.

A dead man. She was supposed to help people,
not kill them.

She did it.

From the corner of her eye she saw someone
materialize next to her. She turned to look at him.

He was holding a gun.

"Who are you?" he asked.

Sarah couldn't answer. She wondered if her
legs could hold her any longer. She leaned on the car.

"Where did you come from? Why did you show
up again? Who the fuck are you?" He was shouting now.

He walked around his partner's body, knelt
down and felt for a pulse, the whole time keeping his gun trained
on Sarah.

"Whoever you are, you will die for killing
my brother. You just made Heaven's most wanted list."

He stood up and stepped closer. "I wonder
what you would look like with half your
face
missing."

His eyes were wide, swishing back and forth
in their sockets.

"My gun is loaded with hollowed out bullets,
which causes the exit wound to be a gaping hole. A small entry in
your cheek, half your brains on the street. Now, move, get in the
car before these crowds get bigger."

Sarah couldn't move. Her feet felt rooted to
the ground. She wondered if this was what it felt like when shock
set in.

The gun was a foot from her face. It moved a
little to the right and discharged. The loud report made her jump
and blink. The 'whoosh' where the air was torn to allow the bullet
passage rang true in her ear. She could faintly hear people
screaming. Someone ran past her so close they bumped her arm.

The world had gone crazy.

"I won't waste another bullet. Talk to God
about it or get in the car."

Sarah went to move, but felt too weak.

Then darkness.

Chapter 13

Esmerelda scrunched down against the kitchen
cupboards while she waited for the police to arrive, rolling pin in
hand. After ten minutes she could hear people talking outside. It
sounded like the guard, which meant the police had shown up.

She relayed what happened and both officers
walked around her trailer, inspecting it for signs of attempted
entry or damage. After finding nothing amiss, they told her they
would swing by on an hourly basis for the rest of the night and
reminded her that she was in a gated area, guarded by security. She
reminded them of just how easy it was for someone to breach
security, such as the example provided earlier today.

An hour passed. The police had come and
gone. Esmerelda fixed herself another cup of tea and scanned the
windows to make sure all the curtains were pulled shut. She took a
sip from her mug and wondered if she should call Sarah now or
tomorrow. No doubt she would have gotten into trouble from her
parents when she arrived home in a police cruiser. Esmerelda
decided to call. She wanted to explain the incident to Sarah's
parents as a misunderstanding. Tell her parents it was overzealous
security or something.

She also wanted to talk to Sarah, to find
out why she'd been so persistent in contacting her earlier.

She picked up the note with Sarah's phone
number on it, given to her earlier from Dolan who had grabbed it
from the cashiers at the front and dialed. On the third ring, it
was answered.

"Hello?"

"Could I speak to Sarah please?" Esmerelda
hoped her voice didn't betray her nervousness following the
evening's police visit and attempted break-in.

"Who's this?"

"My name is Esmerelda. I saw you yesterday
at the Psychic Fair when you came to pick your daughter up."

"Esmerelda? Why do you people keep calling
for Sarah? I don't want to be rude here, but this is the second
call in one day."

"Someone else called looking for Sarah?"
Esmerelda asked.

"Yes. A man. As soon as he called, Sarah ran
out of the house."

"Did he say a name?"

"No. He said he wanted to talk to Sarah and
that he was from the fair."

"Would you be able to describe his voice for
me?"

"What's this all about? Why all the sudden
interest in my daughter?"

Esmerelda turned and switched the phone to
her other ear. "I'm as puzzled as you are. I've been a member of
the Psychic Fair for many years. I would know anyone's voice over
the phone if they were a representative of the fair."

"Well I have no idea how to describe a voice
to you. All I can say is that it was a man." There was a pause.
"Wait a minute. Are you suggesting that someone else called for my
daughter and only said they were from the fair?"

Esmerelda cleared her throat. Raspberry
scents drifted from her mug beside her. She took a deep breath and
tried to relax.

"I'm talking to her mother, right? You're
the one I saw at the fair."

"Yes."

"I think Sarah may be in trouble."

"Trouble?"

"How long has she been gone?"

"All afternoon and evening, why?"

"I think it best if you call the police and
go on record that you want to report your daughter as a missing
person."

"What're you talking about? What could you
know to say such a thing?"

Through the receiver, Esmerelda could hear
something scrape on a tile floor. It sounded like Sarah's mother
took a seat on a kitchen chair.

"Because you're telling me this, it means
you know something. What do you know about my daughter?"

"When I met Sarah, I saw her gift and I saw
its drawbacks."

"Gift? Drawbacks? None of this is making
sense. Are you talking about the news lady in the river? Do you
know what's happening to my daughter? Was she involved?"

"All I know is she's probably in trouble. I
tried to warn her yesterday."

"Okay. Since you won't tell me what you know
specifically, I will call the police and I'll tell them to pay you
a visit. Maybe you'll tell them what you know. You have to
understand that this sounds crazy. Yesterday Sarah goes to the
Psychic Fair, today my daughter comes home in a police car accused
of breaking into the fair, and then we get two phone calls from the
fair looking for her. The first one sends her out the door, the
second one tells me she's in trouble."

"I know how this must look, but the reason I
don't know more is because my ability isn't absolute. I can't just
ask questions and get clear answers. Psychic ability is more of a
feeling, an intuition."

"You're kidding right? I saw you yesterday.
You're just like the rest of the false prophets and now you're
calling to tell me my daughter is missing. What's going on?"

"Ma'am, I'm not involved in any way. I
merely tried..."

"I'm calling the police. Goodbye
Esmerelda."

A click followed. The line was dead.
Esmerelda replaced the phone and stood up. She thought she could
help but she'd only done more harm. She walked over to her kitchen
and got another pot of tea brewing. It was going to be a long night
indeed. She expected another visit from the police after that phone
call.

She picked up the remote and turned her
little 20 inch Hitachi on. The news was covering a hit and run in
front of a pizza place on Birk Street that just happened. Crews
were on sight and witnesses were being paraded in front of the
cameras.

A man about seventeen years old said he saw
a young woman with a red bandanna driving a Chrysler when it hit
and killed a man. The bandanna girl and another man got in the car
and sped off.

One girl said she'd recognize that face
anywhere.

She knew the bandanna girl from high school
a couple years ago.

She was definitely Sarah Roberts.

The news capped the story by saying that the
police are now looking for eighteen year old Sarah Roberts for the
hit and run murder of an as of yet unidentified male Caucasian.

Chapter 14

Amelia heard Caleb entering the house.

What magic they had died years ago with her
first born, Vivian.

There wasn't a day gone by that Amelia
didn't think of her. Sometimes she wondered if Caleb did.

Their relationship had become routine. They
were like roommates who made a commitment to each other to stick it
out until their other daughter grew up and moved on.

She sat in the living room trying to work on
a piece of apple pie. It wasn't going well.

"You're home late." She put her fork down.
"We need to talk. Sarah's missing."

She felt Caleb's eyes on her. He had removed
his overcoat and was sorting through a pile of mail on the small
stand by the front door.

"What do you mean, missing?"

"She left the house hours ago and hasn't
returned. It's not like her to come home after midnight."

She picked up her fork again.

"That doesn't qualify as missing. Is there
more? Is there something else you want to tell me?" Caleb asked. He
walked over and stood in front of the coffee table.

"I got a call from that psychic woman Sarah
talked about. She said she warned Sarah about some kind of trouble
she'd be in."

Caleb dropped the envelopes that were in his
hand onto the oak coffee table. He turned and planted himself in
the Lazy-Boy opposite the couch. "What psychic woman? From the
fair?"

"The one from yesterday who Sarah said gave
her a reading."

"You've got to be kidding. If this is real
and she knew about the danger, then why just warn us. Why not tell
us when and where so we could prevent it?" He raised his hand in
the air like he just discovered a lost secret. "You know why?" His
eyes bulged. "Because there are no psychics. It's all a crock. If
this psychic woman said Sarah was in danger and then something
happened to Sarah, then it's either a coincidence or that woman is
involved in some way."

"She advised me to call the police."

Caleb put his hands on either side of his
head and gripped his hair in frustration. "She called here. How did
she get our number?"

"That's not all. A man called just before
Sarah left. He said he was from the fair too. He didn't give a
name."

"What's going on? I knew that fair was a
mistake from the beginning," Caleb said while he shook his head
back and forth.

Amelia got up from the couch and dropped her
plate with the remainder of the apple pie on top of the mail. She
turned and faced Caleb.

"Sarah tried to break into the Psychic Fair
grounds today. Security caught her and sent her home with the
police and a stern warning."

Caleb put his hand up for her to stop. "She
just went to the fair yesterday. We picked her up. I saw the look
in that woman's eyes. Amelia, tell me you're joking. I've already
lost one daughter. I'm not about to lose another."

"Correction; we've lost one daughter."

"You know what I mean."

"No, I don't. Tell me what you mean Caleb."
Amelia was aware her voice was rising. "That has always bothered
me. I know you blame me for losing Vivian that day. You feel I was
less of a mother. And then you refer to Vivian as if she was your
daughter. She was mine too," Amelia said. She touched her chest a
couple of times with her hand.

"I'm sorry. We all grieve in our own way.
It's a very personal thing for me. When I think of her, I think
about her as my little girl. Since we decided to not tell Sarah
about her sister until she was older, we have no pictures on the
walls. The only memories are in a chest in the basement and in my
head. Over the years those memories became so personal; they became
my memories alone." He folded his hands behind his head. "I never
mean to exclude you, but we can't even talk about Vivian aloud
because we have to keep it from Sarah, which I don't agree with
anymore."

Amelia stepped away from the couch. She
stood behind it and crossed her arms. "I don't want to tell her
yet. She's got enough problems with that notebook and her hair
pulling. We only recently helped her out of her depression. I think
we should wait a couple more years. I know she's eighteen, but she
acts fourteen."

"If we keep waiting, there may be a point
where we shouldn't tell her. She'll wonder if she could trust us
after keeping such a secret for so long. I'm beginning to wonder if
we made the right choice in the first place. We could've told her
about her sister, just not how she was killed. And now Sarah isn't
home at this late hour and we're panicking. This is insane. I can't
lose two daughters."

Amelia used the back of her hand to wipe a
tear away. "There you go again, '
I can't lose two
daughters
', like you're the only parent."

Caleb's face dropped. He raised his eyes to
look at her, but kept his face aiming down. "We've gone over this
before. I don't think this is the best time to discuss our
feelings. We need to figure out what's going on with Sarah.
Besides, I think we argued enough last night about the fact that we
let her go to that stupid fair. Now look at the problems it's
presenting."

Amelia walked back around and sat down on
the couch. "Okay, so should we call the police?"

Caleb looked like he was thinking. He
frowned, unclasped his hands and rubbed his chin. "They may take it
as jumpy since she's only been gone a few hours."

A familiar beeping started to come from his
suit jacket by the front door. Caleb hopped up and jumped around
the end table. She watched as he grabbed his jacket and pulled his
cell phone from the inside pocket.

"I wonder who would text me at this hour?"
he said.

He pulled his iPhone out of its case and
clicked the button to open the text messages section.

Then he read it out loud; "Hi dad, it's
Sarah. I thought I'd let you know that I'm staying at Mary's house
tonight. Don't worry. Mom knows who she is. See you in the morning.
Love Sarah."

"Who's Mary?" Caleb asked.