flipflop_diva

Prologue

It’s darker out than she can ever remember it being. She can barely see her own hand in front of her eyes.

What sliver of moon there is in the sky above is fully covered by the dark clouds of an impending storm and the layers of fog that have come in from the ocean and settled over the area around it.

Even the house itself is dark. She can’t make out any lights or even the flickering of a television.

Audrey is home, though. She knows she is. She has been watching her for hours from afar. She saw her car pull up after a long day of work around four o’clock, and she hasn’t left again since.

She takes a breath and starts to slowly move down the cobblestone-lined path that leads to the front door she knows so well. She has been in and out of this house more times than she has been in and out of her own.

She tries to keep the memories at bay as she places one foot carefully in front of the other, but it’s no use. Snippets of the past float before her eyes, almost like they are coming to life once more on this dark, overcast, soon-to-be-stormy night.

She sees herself, no more than four years old, standing on the porch before her, sobbing hysterically as Audrey’s mom wraps her in a blanket and leads her into their home for the first time. She sees Audrey, just a few months older than herself, watching her with her big blue eyes. She almost feels Audrey’s hand on her arm and hears the whisper of her voice in the air.

“It will be okay. My mama will make it okay.”

She pushes the memory away, but more are appearing now. Playing hide and seek in the big creaky house. Sleeping next to Audrey in her little twin bed, both of them curled together so tightly in order to make sure neither of them fall out.

Hidden kisses behind the huge oak tree in the back. The feel of Audrey’s fingers under her shirt, stroking over her breasts.

“No!”

She whispers the word into the silent night and then quickly freezes mid-step.

That was stupid. She can’t risk anyone hearing her. She can’t risk anyone even suspecting she was here. Not with what she is about to do.

She slips a hand into the oversized pocket of her cargo jacket, the one Audrey bought for her a few years back. Her fingers slide over the cool metal before reaching the wooden handle.

She exhales. Of course it is still there. Of course everything is fine. They are just memories. Memories of days long ago. Memories of another lifetime really.

Her fingers curl around the knife in her pocket, and her teeth grit together, almost involuntarily.

It didn’t have to come to this. It never should have come to this. But Audrey had made her choices long ago, and this is where they had led.

This is Audrey’s fault. All Audrey’s fault.

She reminds herself of this as she starts walking again, sure no one could have heard her accidental whisper.

The darkness of the night plus the complete silence is almost suffocating. They seem to be filling her head. Usually, she can hear owls hooting or a car driving down the lane in the distance. Most days, she can even hear the rush of the waves if she listens carefully enough.

But tonight, all she hears is her own blood, rushing through her veins and pounding in her ears.

The walk up the cobblestone path seems to take an eternity, but she doesn’t dare go any faster. She has been dreaming about this moment, planning for this moment, for ages; she cannot afford to let haste ruin her plans.

Not now. Not when she is so close to breaking free.

Audrey needs to pay for what she has done.

She makes it to the front porch and stops just short of knocking her foot into the step. She still can’t see anything through the pitch black of the night, but she knows this path and these steps and this house like the back of her hand.

She pictures the layout of the house in her mind. The long hallway from the front door, with various rooms branching off to the sides. The dining room to the left, which then connects to the biggest kitchen she has still ever seen. The office on the right with its cozy fireplace that she loved to lay in front of on winter nights when she was a kid. And straight in front of her, the huge wooden staircase that branches off in two directions.

Audrey, if she knows her like she is sure she does, will be up the staircase on the right and down another hall to the back of the house. There is a library back there, full of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves and overstuffed arm chairs that are as easy to sleep in as they are to read in.

It’s Audrey’s favorite room — once it was hers too — and it’s the one of the few where the lights wouldn’t be visible at all from the front of the house.

She makes it up the few stairs to the front porch and then over to the towering door. In the dark, she can’t see its navy blue tones that used to feel so comforting.

She digs her free hand into the pocket of her jeans and pulls out a tiny key, the same one Audrey’s mother had given to her on that long-ago day.

Her heart pounds in her chest and her blood roars in her ears as she slips the key into the lock and turns it, a little click signaling that it works before she pushes open the door.

The house is as completely dark as the world outside. It is also colder.

She shivers in her cargo jacket and wonders why Audrey doesn’t have the heat on.

But it doesn’t matter. Audrey won’t need heat soon enough.

She closes her eyes for a few moments, gathering her nerve and her wits, reminding herself one more time that this is Audrey’s fault. If she had just stopped … if she had just not …

She pulls the knife out of her pocket and uses both hands to ensure she has the best grip on it as possible. And then she begins what might very well be her last walk through this house — this house that was one her safe beacon before it became her nightmare.

Her feet seem to lead her toward her destination with no help from the rest of her body. Down the hall, up the stairs, down another hall.

Finally, she sees light. Just a hint of it, but just where she expected it to be. A tiny little patch on the hallway floor seeping out from the almost-closed door of the library.

She stops outside of the room and listens. It is as silent as everything else about this night. She doesn’t hear breathing or even the turn of a page. Perhaps Audrey is asleep?

She thinks about this. It would make it easier. To slide the knife into her soft flesh without resistance. She imagines the fear and the horror in Audrey’s eyes as she awakens for her final second of life and sees her in front of her. And then she imagines the comprehension on Audrey’s face as she realizes why.

Maybe there will be regret or guilt too.

She’s not sure if that’s what she wants.

But it doesn’t matter. The time has come.

She takes one last steadying breath and shoves open the door.

It takes a few seconds for her eyes to adjust to the bright light after the darkness of the house and the world beyond. But once she does, the bile rushes up her throat. The knife falls from her hand, clattering against the floor. The world spins, and her knees give out.

She hits the ground, right in a pile of blood. She leans over, emptying her stomach. And then she stares at the sight in front of her, unblinkingly, unbelievingly.

Audrey lay face up on the ground, her body contorted, her face frozen in a horrible expression.

A gash crosses her bare chest and her neck, and there is blood everywhere. The whole room seems to be covered in it.

And there, by Audrey’s feet, lays a knife, covered in blood and glinting in the light.

She can’t help it.

She screams. And screams and screams and screams.

In horror. In shock. In outrage.

Someone got here first.

Fiction. Surprisingly. Or, well, not, since hopefully no one thinks I'm planning to kill anyone. But my first time writing fiction this season. Since the theme is Survivor, I've been doing more of a reality spin to all my entries, as a way to hopefully share more about myself and my life and just who I am. But I realized fiction can also show a bit of who I am.

I really, really love thriller/suspense-type novels, and if I ever write a novel, that's what I'd want to write. And this idea has been in my head for awhile, so I thought, why not put it down on paper finally? So I did!

Thank you for reading! This was written for

therealljidol: Survivor Idol! We're at the final immunity challenge now, so there's no voting. We just write an entry every day until only one person is left standing.

That said, if you want to read the entries, you can find them all here.