The Fine Line Book One Between Worlds Series (16 page)

The ringing landline startled her. She
rushed to the phone hanging on the kitchen wall and couldn’t even
say hello.

“
What’s wrong? Are you
okay?” he asked.

“
I don’t know if I’m okay
Matt. I feel like I’m going crazy.” Her voice trembled and the
tone, urgent.

Robin took pride in her ability to stay
grounded and calm in intense situations. She had always been level
headed and reasonable, but now, after this, she wondered who she
really was.

Twenty long minutes passed before she heard
the truck speed up the lane. The kitchen door slammed. Every light
in the house was on.

Robin sat on the couch with her knees drawn
into her chest, her arms wrapped tightly around them. Not only was
she terrified and unsure of her own sanity, but she was
embarrassed. She knew she would have to explain everything to her
husband, the skeptic, who might put her in an institution and throw
away the key. The thought made her shake even harder.

She felt Matt get closer and the cushion
beside her sunk as her perplexed husband took a seat.

“
Baby, tell me what’s
happening,” Matt said. She felt his hand on her forehead as he
checked for fever.

She turned her face toward his, blankly
staring. “I think I’m losing my mind, Matt.”

“
Why?” he asked with
concern in his voice.

She said nothing, but simply pulled the
blanket away from her legs. Slowly, she lifted the pant leg to
reveal the red hand print.

“
What did you
do?”

“
I didn’t do this,” she
said with emptiness in her voice, still gazing vacantly into his
face.

“
Then who the hell did?”
He paused as anger filled his eyes. “If someone’s hurt
you…”

“
Not someone Matthew…
something.
”

His mouth gaped open, but no words came
out.

“
I can’t even sleep
anymore,” she continued, “Tonight someone was in this house. The
upstairs doors slammed, I heard footsteps so loud in the hallway
upstairs I thought the ceiling would cave in. Cookie, our calm,
loveable dog, started growling and he actually pissed himself Matt!
It was like he was in attack mode. He was defending himself against
a predator.”

Matt listened as Robin continued.

“
Something touched me and
someone talked to me! The voice asked me for help. But, I don’t
know how…how to help. Then I got this feeling of pure sadness;
grief. I felt like someone died. I couldn’t stop feeling sad. I
heard giggling again, someone touched me… I know I’m probably
talking in circles, but Matt, I just feel so… so… overwhelmed. The
point is, I dismissed it all and went to bed anyway. The next thing
I know I’m being awakened by someone saying my name and then
something grabbing me. Matt, I know I’m not alone in this house.
I’m always being watched. I feel like I’m going insane.” Tears
rolled down her cheeks. “Maybe I have schizophrenia or maybe I’m
having a nervous breakdown. I don’t know, but something is
happening to me.”

She cried helplessly as Matt pulled her into
his chest.

“
Robin, when you’re sleep
deprived,” he began, “strange things start happening to your body.
Your body and your brain require rest. If you aren’t getting it, at
some point your brain will shut down. It’s very common to have
auditory and visual hallucinations, just like you’ve described,
with simple sleep deprivation. I think that is exactly what’s
happening here. All of these things you’ve just told me about are
your body’s way of telling you to shut it down and rest. I truly
believe that. You’re the sanest person I know.”

“
How do you explain the
bruises on my ankle?” she asked.

“
Maybe you hit it on the
wooden bedpost when you got out of bed. You’re probably so
exhausted you didn’t even realize it happened.”

“
I’m begging you,” she
said looking up at him, “please, see if you can get off nights. I
want you here with me. I can’t spend another night alone in this
house! I promised I’d never ask this of you, but I’m really scared.
I don’t know what else to do. You told me once that you would
switch if you had to. Please. Matt, I can’t be here alone at night
anymore. I love this house and I don’t want to leave it, but if
these things keep happening, I won’t stay. I just won’t,” she
cried.

She felt his hands stroke her hair as he
pulled her back into his chest.

“
It’s going to be okay
baby. I promise. I’ll work it all out.”

“
I am not spending another
night alone in this house. If I have to, I’ll go to a
hotel.”

“
Listen to me,” he said as
he pulled away from her and looked deeply into her tired eyes, “Why
don’t you spend the day at Wendy’s?”

Before he could finish she shook her head.
“No. I want
you
here. I need
you,
Matt.”

“
Okay, okay.” He got up
and walked to the basement. A few moments later he emerged. “It’s
all taken care of. I start day shift next week. I also took a
couple of sick days,” he concluded.

Robin saw his insecurity when she looked in
his eyes. It was obvious he was contemplating everything she told
him.

“
Robin,” he began as he
took her hand, “if what’s going on here is something more than
sleep deprivation, we’ll deal with it. Do you
understand?”

She nodded.

Matt excused himself and left the room
again. He walked back into the parlor and stared out the window at
the open field. The fog lay thickly, but he saw a woman walking
toward the O’Bryan’s. Clearly, it wasn’t Mrs. O’Bryan. The woman,
dressed in a long white gown with long sleeves, seemed to glow and
it seemed he could see right through her. Rubbing his eyes, he
shook his head and walked back to the living room attributing
everything to his own lack of sleep.

On the couch lay Robin, his exhausted wife,
already asleep. He picked her up gently and carried her to their
bed. He stood watching her sleep for some time, making sure her
breaths were even. Frequently, he checked her head making sure she
didn’t have a fever. Finally, he too crawled in bed and fell fast
asleep as the sun began shining through the panes of glass.

****

Robin heard a woman screaming as she ran
down a dark hallway into what she knew was a basement. Bodies
littered the room, all young women. Blood ran down the walls and in
the middle of the room a pregnant woman lay on a table. Her long,
black hair hung off of the table and her face filled with helpless
panic as she continued screaming. Two men stood beside her, both of
them looking possessed by pure evil.

The woman looked at Robin who stood still
astonished by the scene before her.

“
Help me!” the poor woman
screamed. The voice sounded familiar. “They’re going to kill
me!”

Robin’s mouth gaped open, unsure of what to
do. Immobilized by horror, she couldn’t move her feet. They felt
cemented to the floor.

“
Please!” the woman
screamed. “They are going to take my baby!” Her legs spread apart;
she continued shouting as she lay with her wrists and ankles bound
by straps.

The men looked up and met Robin’s gaze,
their lips curling up in smiles. The taller one held a knife. Robin
watched as he shoved the knife under the woman’s gown and into her
womb, with the screams piercing the air like the knife that now
found its sheath in her body. The sound deafened Robin as she held
her ears and yelled at the men to stop hurting the poor woman.

“
Stop it! Stop it! Stop
it! You’re killing her! Stop it you monsters!”

She felt her body shaking and she heard her
name.

“
Robin, honey, wake up,”
the voice said.

Quickly, Robin sat up in bed screaming and
her eyes opened. Matt sat beside her on the bed with confusion
written all over his face. Her eyes turned toward him as they stung
with tears.

“
Robin, are you okay?” he
asked. She held her hand to her heart as she desperately tried to
resume normal breathing. Relief swept over her as she realized she
was safe in her bed.

“
Ye… Yes, I’m fine. It was
a dream,” she sighed. “It was just a dream.”

“
You want to talk about
it?”

“
No. I just want to forget
about it,” she answered, her hands still clenched in fists. “I’m
sorry I scared you.”

“
I was in the basement
when I heard you screaming,” he replied.

“
I was that
loud?”

“
I thought something had
happened to you. When I walked in you were sound asleep just
screaming.”

She shook her head. “What time is it?”

“
You’ve been asleep all
day.”

She felt the touch of his hand on her
forehead again.

“
I just wonder if you’re
not catching something,” he said suspiciously.

She grabbed her cell phone from the
nightstand to see that the time was 5:00 in the evening. Truly, she
slept the entire day away, which disappointed her.

“
I’ll make some soup,”
Matt offered thoughtfully. “Maybe that will make you feel
better.”

Logic

As time went by, Robin pushed the horrendous
dream and the events of that stormy night deep into her mind. But,
no matter how deeply she tried to bury everything, the dream
haunted her. Her life’s work had been built around helping people
in need or in trouble. Reflecting on the scenario in the dream, she
began dealing with feelings of hopelessness and helplessness far
beyond anything she had ever experienced before. The guilt felt
unbearable at times. She also couldn’t shake the idea that the
dream had a deeper meaning; that there was a purpose to the dream
or perhaps a connection to the house.

Robin turned twenty-seven.

May came with beautiful flowers around the
property, continuous yard work, days of mowing grass, and evenings
of cool breezes blowing through open windows. A year ago she met
the love of her life. It was hard to think that a year passed so
quickly.

Swinging on the porch, Robin let the gentle
wind quiet her spirit. She heard the screen door open and from the
corner of her eye, she saw Matt walk out. He sat beside her on the
swing and looked over at her.

“
Everyone will be here
soon.”

“
I know. I need to get
dressed,” she replied as she stood.

When she opened the door, she saw a large
glass vase filled with roses sitting on the kitchen island. Her
cheeks blushed pink and her heart skipped with excitement. She
walked to the flowers, sniffed them, and noticed an envelope
dangling off of a stem. Handwritten on the front was:
My
lover
. She pulled the cardstock from the envelope and read what
was written:
To celebrate the month we met and the birth of the
most wonderful woman ever put on the planet. Love you always,
Matt
. Tears welled in her eyes.

She felt him behind her as his arms wrapped
around her waist.

“
They’re beautiful,” she
said sweetly.

“
Not as beautiful as
you.”

She turned to him with a warm grin.

“Thank you. Your gift is waiting
upstairs.”

“
You didn’t have to get me
anything,” he protested. “Remember, we’re celebrating
your
birthday tonight?”

“
Yes, that’s true, but as
you pointed out in your card, we’ve been in one another’s lives for
an entire year. That’s something to celebrate, too.” She took his
hand in hers and pulled him along behind her through the hallway
and up the stairs to the master bedroom.

Lying on the bed was a rectangular box. Matt
walked to it as Robin stood watching anxiously. As he sat on the
bed, he took the box into his grip and ripped the ribbon off.
Tossing the lid to the floor he unfolded the white tissue paper.
The expression on his face was priceless. “I’m really confused,” he
said sadly.

“
It’s for our trip that we
shouldn’t go on,” she laughed.

He laughed hysterically as he pulled out a
pair of sunglasses and tropical swim trunks from the box.

“
You gave a straw hat to
me, so I thought trunks and sunglasses may be useful for when we
can actually take a honeymoon.”

He walked to her and grabbed her up in his
arms, kissing all over her face. Eventually, they lay on the
bedroom floor; clothing tossed everywhere, his hands roaming her
body.