Free Fiction

C R I M S O N   H E A R T S

First appeared in Horror Express - Issue 4
This version has been slightly altered.

A cool mist holds just above the earth outside, darkness breaks away, early morning melts through her stained-glass windows.

She awakens, her eyelids flutter, a shaft of multicolored daylight embraces her as it streams through the window near the foot of her bed.

A slight dry cough rises in her throat. She yawns and wonders. Am I free? Am I really still this free?

Her tomb holds the dampness like a sponge. As the summer heat squeezes, its moisture leaks away. The sweaty warmth has revitalized creatures that live in her ancient room. Their faint clicks and squeals reverberate inside her head.

At the top of her small bed, an open window oversees a stony field. She slips up to the glass, peers out and smiles as pink sunlight ignites the sky. Mossy trees appear partially leafed and the fragrance of ocean fog dissipates as the sun rises over the flanking distant hills.

She turns and glances across the room to a faded American Woman touring poster. It shares the flowered-wallpaper with a thread-worn Canadian flag. His favorite, she thought. A smile crinkled her parched lips. Beneath the poster, on her dresser, two dusty extra-large pickle jars glint as their crimson contents become saturated with early sunlight.

Where is he? she thought. How come he hasn’t come to take me away? We should be together, now that we can.

She tip-toes to her closed door and slowly cranks its rusty knob. The door creaks as it swings open. The stench of rot fills the hallway. She inches down the narrow wainscoted corridor and presses her ear against her parent’s unlocked door. It pulls away from the frame. She pushes her face into its slight opening. Dusty morning lightly coats their dark-stained sheets while a couple of humps lie silently beneath. She eases the door shut and backs away, being careful not to disturb their slumber.

She wanders into the bathroom at the head of the stairwell; a mirror greets her. Rolling streams of sunshine echo her age. She braids what’s left of her thinning gray hair until she looks like an older version of Pippy Longstocking. She smiles at the wisdom lines etched across her face and quietly leaves to descend the sixteen steps to the main floor. She looks about, searching for someone, but no one other than herself occupies this house.

She sneaks into the kitchen, picks up a butcher knife, an empty restaurant-style  pickle jar, a loaf of hard bread and some refrigerated molded cheese.

She eases into the foyer. There, she hoists her nightie and slides on a pair of rain boots, snatches a winter parka off a coat hanger. She drapes it about her shoulders and then carefully passes over the threshold of the front door, crosses the veranda, draws in a breath of humid air and then climbs down its steps.

Insects buzz around her face as she stumbles over a meadow of dried clumpy earth, a field where her father used to plant corn every spring. After walking some distance, a dilapidated boathouse appears suspended above a pebbly beach.

Inside, she waits for the man who made sweet love to her years before, under a shade tree, next to the pounding surf.

As the old woman unscrews the pickle jar lid, she sits quietly, contemplates, and watches over the sea. “I'll capture his heart one last time," she whispers," and keep it with me for always.”

 THE END