Halfling (Black Petals Book 1) (6 page)

“Crispen?” I ask, and reach over to touch his shoulder. My hand grasps empty air. I sit up further in the dark and switch on the lamp next to the couch. Where did he go in the middle of the night? Did the hospital call him in? I stand up and check the porch for his shoes. It’s been nearly five weeks, since I got my cast put on and thankfully it’s finally off, and I can walk properly. I will not miss it. Crispen’s shoes are sitting right beside mine, so he must be in the house somewhere. “Crispen?!” I call a little louder.

Nothing.

A movement in the front window catches my eye, and I wonder if he ran to his house to grab something, though my place is more his home than his place is now days. I don’t know what he would be grabbing when half of his stuff is already here, and why wouldn’t he wear his shoes if he left the house? A male figure walks across the front lawn. It must be him. I open the front door and smile when I meet eyes with him.

“What are you doing up?” he asks, wrapping me in a tight hug.

“I woke up with that terrible feeling again,” I admit sheepishly. I feel like such a child. Lately, I’ve been waking up with this anxiety that something has happened to him. He thinks that it’s because everyone in my life, until him, has left me, and I’m afraid that he’ll do the same.

He scoffs lightly. “I’m fine. I just had to get some fresh air that’s all. I couldn’t sleep. Your couch isn’t very soft.” He kisses my forehead lightly. We’ve spent a lot of time together in the past five weeks, and I’m more than happy to be able to finally call someone my best friend, even if he’s my only friend which doesn’t put him up against much competition. Crispen is the first friend I’ve had, since I was just a child. He means
everything
to me, because he’s really the only thing I have.

“You’ve never complained before,” I mention.

“I have trouble sleeping on the full moon. That’s probably all,” he decides and removes his dirty socks.

“Full moon? Why? Why didn’t you wear your shoes? You could have stepped on glass or something.”

“At the hospital, things are crazy on the full moon. I swear it isn’t just a legend or whatever. It really does bother me. Even if I don’t know it’s a full moon, I can’t sleep,” he tells me. “I don’t know. I planned on sitting on the steps, then I remembered I forgot to lock my car. The remote for it is broken, so I had to walk over to it.”

He locks the door and takes a seat on the couch. “How is life without that cast? Do you miss it yet?” he asks, gesturing to my leg.

“It’s good. I don’t miss it at all actually.” That was the worst few weeks of my life. Good thing I had him around to help me out with housework and things.

“Glad to hear it. I’m going to miss watching you struggling to walk.” Crispen takes his sweater off and tosses it onto the back of a chair at the kitchen table effortlessly before taking a seat on the couch. “You should get some more rest.”

I can’t argue with that. I lean my head against his shoulder and fall back asleep almost immediately.

When I wake up, he is gone again. This doesn’t surprise me, he’s been working the early morning shift, and I can’t keep his hectic schedule straight. I notice that he forgot his sweater, it still sits on the back of the kitchen chair that he threw it on last night. I need to do laundry today anyways, so I decide to add it to the pile for him.

I gather the rest of the laundry, and I’m about to throw it all in when a deep red stain catches my attention. It looks like blood. Fresh blood. I look closer at Crispen’s sweater and lie a finger on the red splotch. It’s still damp, and it’s not just a little blood. It’s a stain the size of my open hand across the back of the sweater. What the heck? Did he hurt himself? Maybe he got a bloody nose or something.

I take a picture of it and shoot it to him in a text message with a bunch of questions marks. I then rub stain remover across the mess and toss it in with the rest of the laundry.

“It was juice,” a throaty voice says from behind me, as I close the washing machine lid. I scream in surprise only to see Crispen standing in the laundry room doorway.

“I thought you were at work!”

He shakes his head. “I finally have a day off. I was just upstairs showering. I didn’t expect you to be up already.”

I hold a hand over my heart dramatically as if he’s almost given me a heart attack. Well, he almost did! I remember what it was like a few weeks ago when I was constantly scared out of my wit and jumping at every small noise and movement that I didn’t expect. I’m glad that the paranoia has worn off drastically. If no one’s come for me yet, I doubt anyone will.

“That was not
juice
,” I argue and point at the washing machine. I’m sure my voice comes off a little harsh, as I’m still shaken up by surprise.

He shrugs. “Hmmm. I could’ve been wearing it at the hospital yesterday who knows.” The fact that he has a bunch of blood on his sweater doesn’t seem to surprise or bother him in anyway. How do you not notice getting that much blood on yourself?

I eye him wearily, searching his face. Whatever I’m looking for, I don’t find it. We continue to stare at each other a moment longer, before he smiles. “What do you want to do today?”

“I think I’m going to go get some groceries. If you want, we can hang out here at noon?” I suggest and throw my hair behind my ears.

“Do you think you can manage getting to and from the grocery store all on your own?” he wonders half-jokingly.

I stick my tongue out at him and squeeze past him. I run upstairs and get ready quickly before making my weekly run to the grocery store. I spend a little more than expected which bugs me slightly, because I’m currently jobless. I really need to get on that.

When I return to the house, it’s nearly noon. I shove my groceries away in cupboards and fix myself a sandwich for lunch. When twelve-thirty rolls around, and Crispen still hasn’t arrived, I begin to worry. He is never late, if he is, he calls to let me know. I know he hasn’t been called in to work, because his car is parked in front of his house down the road.

I call his cell phone at one and then again at two. I remind myself that he was up in the middle of the night, and maybe he just fell asleep at home. When night rolls around and I still haven’t heard from him, I decide to call the hospital. It’s possible that he walked to work, it really isn’t
that
far.

I’m shocked when I ask to speak to him, and the lady on the other end says she can’t find who I’m looking for in the hospital directory. She claims that there is no doctor employed there under Crispen’s name. Crispen doesn’t work at the hospital and from the sound of it, he hasn’t worked there in a while. Why would he lie? The confusion this brings, causes me to look back on his recent behavior. Nothing has really been
that
out of the ordinary. If he hasn’t been going to the hospital all the time though, where has he been going? The first thought that comes to mind is one of jealousy. I imagine him slipping off to another woman’s house. Why should I be jealous though? We’re nothing more than friends. The second thought I get is that maybe he switched hospitals, but I let that thought go when I recall him talking specifically about
this
hospital, and he would tell me if he switched hospitals.

I can’t think of a single explanation for this except that maybe whoever typed up the directory, missed his name. A strange gut feeling that I can’t explain overcomes me and leads me to the front door of his house. I bang on the front door, and when there is no answer, I try the knob. It opens. Doesn’t he lock his doors?

Surprisingly, I’ve never been to Crispen’s house before. Each time I suggest we hang out at his place instead of mine, he tells me that it’s too much of a mess or that I would be more comfortable at my own house, but upon moving in, he did drop off a spare key to his home at my place.

I switch on the light and further confusion hits me. There is not a single piece of furniture in his the front room or attached kitchen. Why? Where are all of his things?

“Crispen?!” I call up the stairs. When there is no answer, I climb them slowly.

I open the first door on my left to reveal a small empty bathroom. Then the next door which looks to be an empty bedroom. There is literally not a single thing in this house. It’s like no one has lived here in forever. Something rolls in my gut, and I stand frozen in the upstairs hallway gaping. What is going on?

I descend the stairs and enter the kitchen. I pull open drawers and cupboards hastily in disbelief. How can someone own
nothing
? Has he ever even lived here? A piece of paper on the kitchen island catches my eye, and I pick it up. It is a real estate paper for the home. The date of listing catches my eye. Two months ago this home went up for sale, and at the current date at the top of the paper, as of two days ago, it was still for sale. This revelation nearly brings me to my knees. Does everyone have to lie? Unless he was renting this house while it was for sale, which I doubt by the vast amount of dust and lack of items in the place, then something is very wrong.

I escape the house and run up to his car parked parallel to the house. I stick my face to the glass windows and peer inside. It’s tough to see through the tinted windows, and I don’t make out much at all. Where could he be?

“Looking to steal my wallet or something?” a familiar voice asks smoothly from behind me. I swallow hard and turn to face Crispen.

“You have
a lot
of explaining to do,” I state in the calmest voice I can muster.

His grin fluctuates a bit. “I guess I do,” he agrees.

“You can begin any time now,” I encourage.

“That house I was living in, my uncle is the seller. I’ve been living in it while he finds someone to take over it,” he explains calmly, as if this is the most normal thing ever. “He called me this morning after you left and told me that he wants me out as soon as possible, since it’s kind of illegal for me to be living there, so I rented an apartment downtown as quick as possible and spent the day moving all of my stuff there. I should’ve called, I know. I left my phone in my car. I rented a moving truck for the day.”

“You haven’t been working at the hospital for quite a while,” I continue.

He flinches but catches himself and fastens a smile to his lips. “What do you mean?”

I look at him dubiously.

“I’ve been working there…” he trails off as if he has no idea what I’m talking about. It’s almost like he’s attempting to make me look crazy.

“Not what the lady I called and talked to said,” I argue lightly, struggling to maintain my calm.

“You probably just called the wrong department,” he offers.

There’s a specific department I was supposed to call? Am I making a bigger deal out of this than there needs to be? Am I going bat-shit crazy again with not trusting people? I thought I was over this? Maybe the lady I talked to didn’t know what she was talking about.

I sigh and look at the facts. He
could
be telling the truth although it seems he isn’t. Nothing that he’s said thus far has been too
strange
to be possible or true. I trust Crispen, so why am I questioning his every move? I’m being obsessive and over reactive. When he sees my skepticism tame, he wraps me in a hug.

“I’m sorry for not calling, Megan. I didn’t mean to scare or worry you,” he promises and lies a kiss on my cheek. Here I thought having him as a friend would help with my trust issues, apparently not. I don’t deserve to have him around. Here I am snooping around his house, car, and job for heaven’s sake like some creepy stalker.

“I’m sorry for invading your privacy,” I say in return. “I don’t know what came over me.”

He shrugs. “You can invade my privacy all you want.” He unlocks his car, grabs his phone, and shoves it into his pocket. “I have nothing to hide. So I have a plan. Since I don’t work until later in the day tomorrow, I was thinking that we should celebrate your newfound freedom tonight.”

“Huh?”

“You cast-less-ness,” he points out and nods to my leg. “We always hang out at your place, but I was thinking that maybe tonight we should go out for some drinks and have a good time. I think you need it. On me of course.”

I look at him, confused. He wants to go and celebrate the removal of my cast? Is that something that is usually celebrated?

“You need to let loose a little. Look, it’s been like over a month since that whole thing with those creepy kidnapping brothers and
nothing
has happened to you. You’re still alive. I told you that he just said that whole thing about promising you dead to scare you. You’ve been all uptight, and I think you need to just have some fun,” he explains further. He eyes my expression as if he’s unsure of how I will react to his suggestion.

“I’m not sure,” I whine and raise my top lip a little in disgust. I’m not much one for partying.

“It’ll be fun. Come on,” he urges carefully. “We can just go to Bob’s Lounge down the road. It’s not far. We can walk there.”

I sigh in defeat, and he grins.

“While you’re getting ready, I’m going to binge watch that new crime series on your new television.”