XVIII

November 9, 2016

1956 Hours

"They're not back yet?" James asked. Dan sat in the driver's seat, watching Sanine's house. James was in the back, doing sudoku puzzles. At this time, we was struggling to see the numbers he was writing.

"No, they're not. If they were back, I would say something. Why do you ask, I thought you were the patient one?" Dan asked, never keeping his eyes off the house.

"I am... but it's getting dark and I can't see the numbers as well. I was wondering, maybe, if I could turn on the light..."  

  "Absolutely not. They might come back any minute, and I don't want our cover blown because you wanted to do your little number puzzle thing." Dan explained. "I also stopped by that stupid police station like you asked, and went to the gas station so you could buy that book. Now no more favors." James closed the book, and tossed it to the side, annoyed by Dan's attitude.

"Why don't we go inside?" James asked.

"Because like I said, they could come any second. Have you not been listening to me? Also, it could be possible that someone is home." Dan replied.

"Well yeah, but they've been gone ever since we got here. It's worth the risk to find out who we're going aga-"

"I said no." Dan said, making his point. James sat back, more annoyed at the situation now. He looked from the house on the left side of the car, to a fence to the right of them. They were parked by the curb opposite of the house, waiting for them to come home. The car itself was turned off to not catch anyone's attention, but that means no A/C.

Thank God it's not summer anymore. James thought.

Staring at the fence, James looked back at the house. All he saw was a white, two-story house with trimmed bushes in the front. The driveway led to a garage, but by the look of it, the garage hasn't been used in months. There was another little pathway leading from the driveway to the front door to the right of the garage. The front door had a patio with a chair swing on the right-most edge of it. A typical looking home, with the exception of a strange barred window in the upper left window. The curtains were drawn, so they couldn't see inside.

James was going to look at the fence again, but he noticed the swing was moving. He looked closer, and saw someone on the swing. It was an old black lady with dark sunglasses. To the right of her was a cane, but it looked more like a long metal stick. It was also too big for the lady to be a cane. She put a finger to her lips as if to hush James, and she stood up. Making her way to the door, she used the stick she grabbed to hit the floor constantly, making a loud resonating, clicking noise.

James looked at Dan to see if he saw the lady too, but he just kept staring at the house without any recognition was off.

"That's a pretty good-looking swing, huh?" James asked. Dan's eyes quickly went to the swing, then back to his routine of looking from the driveway of the house, to the road in front of them.

"Yeah," Dan muttered. James returned his attention to the old lady walking to the door, convinced he was making it all up in his head now. If Dan didn't notice the swing moving, then maybe it wasn't moving at all. Was James hallucinating this girl, just like Dan saw his daughter all those times?

Are we crazy? James thought.

Why am I seeing this lady now? I've never seen her before this.

The lady made it to the door, and opened it. James gasped out loud, but not loud enough to gain Dan's attention. He was still pinpoint focused on the road ahead of him. Inside was pitch black, despite there being light outside from the setting sun. She went inside, then closed the door.

James looked from Dan, to the house in shock. He needed to find out where she was going.

Dan heard the back door where James was sitting open, then close suddenly. He looked behind him, and James wasn't there anymore. Looking outside the window, he saw James running to the house in haste, straight for the front door.

"F**k, James," Dan exclaimed silently, pissed at his brother. He unbuckled his seatbelt, and bolted out of the car to chase down his brother.

"James!" Dan yelled. His brother made it to the front door, and turned the handle. Dan made it to the door as soon as James opened it. The brother's were huffing from the short burst of running, but immediately caught their breaths when the door opened with ease.

"They left it unlocked?" Dan asked incredulously. James shrugged it off, and stepped inside. Dan hesitantly followed, being sure that no one was in the house. The front room was big with an island connected to the middle of the right wall, and it protruded to the middle of the room. On the left wall was a door to the immediate left connecting to the garage, then a set of stairs down the way with a little door to the left of it. Beyond the stairs was the living room, and on the right corner, right of the living room, was a door leading to the kitchen.

James was standing right next to the island, looking around. There was a dining room table with an assortment of papers on them. James took a quick peek, and saw they were miscellaneous papers that showed college level and 6th grade homework. He turned around to Dan, holding a finger up to his lips.

Dan nodded, and pointed to the stairs with his head, signaling he was going to go up there to check things out. James looked from Dan, back to the old lady at the doorway leading to the kitchen. She went inside, and James followed quickly.

The kitchen was a decent sized kitchen with a small dining table in the middle. There was a huge hole to the left of James as he entered the kitchen, connecting it to the living room.

"Who are you, and how did you know the door was unlocked?" James asked the lady in a whisper. The old lady laughed silently.

"Oh sonny, I didn't know the door was unlocked. I was going to enter this house nevertheless. It was pure coincidence." She explained. This didn't help James' confusion.

"What the hell. Again, who are you? And how would you come into the house 'nevertheless'?" James asked.

"Because I wanted you to come into the house. You knew it was the right thing to do, at least in your head. All you needed was some push. A motivation."

"Okay, we'll get back to that I guess, but you're avoiding my first question. You are you?" James asked again.

"My name is Mesaj."

"Okay, wicked name. But that doesn't tell me anything lady," James said. Mesaj looked at him, and chuckled.

"You sure do call me lady a lot whenever we talk," she commented. James furrowed his eyebrows, confused by her phrasing.

"What are you talking about? Have we talked before?" James asked. Mesaj waved her hand aside.

"Not important. What is, is this case. I told you before who you shouldn't chase it, and you knew it in your heart. But now that you're here, you might as well end this. By the way, how are you expecting to do that, exactly? Are you just going to confront Kathy, tell her the gig is up? What about evidence?" James pursed his lips. He didn't really think about it. Then again, he didn't really have to, Dan said he was going to take care of everything.

"Your brother is going to take care of things, he said that, right?" Mesaj asked. James nodded his head, ignoring the fact that she knew this information, and that she talked about warning him before when he never remembered her before this day.

"Yeah, he's got it handled. Believe me." James said, convinced that everything was going to be okay. Especially when he had a plan of his own.

"You do realize you put a lot of faith into your brother," Mesaj  said. James thought about it.

"I mean yeah, but he hasn't done anything to make me doubt him, you know?"

"Oh really? How about the time he ran off to Ellen's without your knowledge? He could've done some serious harm you know."

"Yeah, but he didn't!"

"But he could. And the other time at his daughter's funeral he beat up Rogers on the sight."

"Well..."

"And the other time where he took the interrogation at the prison too far, and left you behind? Or when he punched the hole in the wall with his bare fists, and didn't even remember it?" James stood there, staring down at this old lady who was blind.

"How..."

"And your nightmare, James." Masej mentioned. James was speechless. "You're nightmares reveal your true feelings, and you know dang well which one I'm talking about."

How does she know? James thought. This was getting too freaky for him. He was about to call out Dan when he remembered there could still be people in the house.

"How do you know about any of those things, Masej?" James asked. She sighed playfully.

"Oh sonny, I thought you would've figured it out by now! I'm..." There was a noise from the living room that made James look up. It was Dan, checking on James.

"Find anything down here?" Dan asked. James looked from him, to where Masej was, but she was gone. He looked back up to Dan, and shook his head.

"Yeah... me neither." James looked around the kitchen, trying to decide what to do.

"There's the door by the stairs we could try," James suggested. Dan nodded, and they both went out of the kitchen to the door. It had a locking mechanism on the door handle, but it seemed to be only accessible from the outside. Dan opened the door, and all he saw was darkness below him. He fumbled around for a light switch near the doorway, but he couldn't find one.

"It's probably one of those things where you have to pull on it when you get down there," James commented. Dan nodded, and slowly started to make his way down the stairs. James was going to follow quietly, but he heard something from outside. Car doors shutting.

"Dan," James hoarsely whispered, "they're here, quickly go down the stairs!" James was going to go, but then he noticed the front door was unlocked. Out of instinct, he went to the door, locked it, then ran back to the basement. He closed the door behind him, shutting themselves into darkness. Dan was halfway down the stairs when James joined him. They both stood in the darkness, on the stairs waiting to hear something.

Dan climbed the stairs of the house, reaching the second story. There was a big room that had a couch, a TV, and a few game consoles. Sitting there was a Wii, a PS2, and a PS3. Dan immediately went to the hallway, and saw there were four doors. One of them was decorated with kid-like drawings, another was painted like a police box, the one to the immediate left of Dan was open, and was revealed it was a bathroom. The one at the end of the hallway piqued Dan's interest the most. It was a regular door with nothing on it, except above the door handle were two deadbolt locks. Dan went up to it hesitantly, making sure he was as quiet as a mouse.

Reaching the door, he slowly turned it, to find out it was locked. He didn't want to chance anything, and went to the police box door next. He tried to open that one, but it was locked as well. The drawing door was opposite of the police door one, and this door was unlocked. He opened it, and immediately knew it was a young kid's room. Clothes all over the floor, along with walls painted bright green and yellow. It was too much for his eyes, even in the dim lighting of outside.

He closed the door carefully, and made his way back to the game room. He stood there quietly, assessing everything in sight. He couldn't really think of anything, everything seemed normal in here.

Dan debated whether or not to test his limits against the double-locked door, but didn't want to run the risk of someone sleeping in there, and him waking them up. That would bust them for sure.

There wasn't too much else to do up here, so Dan walked back downstairs, hoping James would find something.

Kathy pulled up to the house with Burt looking at the rearview mirror carefully. She noticed this odd behavior, nothing really interesting Burt this much unless it's some game on his phone.

"What's up, hun?" She asked.

"That empty car sitting across the curb is making me feel uncomfortable," he explained.

Yeah, that was the first thing I noticed when I got here. She thought.

"Really? What car?" She asked as she looked behind her. "Oh, that one? I'm sure it's fine." Burt grunted as he got out of the car. Kathy turned it off, and walked to the door. Alexius was the first one there, and she was turning the doorknob with no avail. She then looked at her mom.

"I promise I left it unlocked," she said. Kathy stared at the door knob, nervous sweat running down her back. She breathed in slowly, then out. Alexius saw this, and thought she was in trouble.

"I'm so sorry mama," she apologized. Kathy opened her eyes, and looked down at her daughter.

"Oh, baby! You're not in trouble! I know you didn't lock the door, I saw you." She explained. Burt came up behind them after grabbing the few groceries they got at Walmart.

"What's the fuss about, open the door already," he said playfully. Kathy took out her keys, and unlocked the door. The house was dark and quiet. Exactly the way she left it.

"Alexius, why don't you help Burt out with putting up the groceries, I have to go check something." Alexius ran after Burt into the kitchen, excited to stack canned goods. Kathy immediately turned her attention to the basement door, which was visibly unlocked. She pursed her lips.

This is going to complicate things a lot. She thought as she walked to her room, which was through the living room. She went into her closet, grabbed the pistol in the case, and tucked it into the back of her jeans. She then flipped her shirt over it, and went back outside.

"You good there, Kathy?" Burt asked as he put the eggs into the fridge. Kathy looked at him, and smiled.

"Peachy."