The ancient townhouses gave way to new residential apartments that towered over the streets. There was a Starbucks on every corner, an internet cafe close by, and a bagel shop in-between. I happened to glance at one of the corners as we sailed through a green light and something caught my attention. Or rather, someone.
It was a man of thirty-five with skin as pale as a sheet. He wore a simple black polo shirt with dark blue jeans. He stood against the corner building with his arms at his sides and watched my bus drive by with a glare on his face. I swear his crystal-blue eyes were even on me, but it was hard to tell because the whole moment was over in a flash. The bus moved on, but I had a harder time.
I turned away from the window and shuddered. Something about him gave me the creeps, and I was reminded of Osman's accusation against me. That any one of those things could look like a human. That guy looked only mildly human, and the way he looked at me was definitely not normal.
I was still unsettled when the bus came to my stop a half hour later. The bus had traversed the commercial district with its high-risers and mega-corporation office buildings, and entered a part of the city with some greenery. My workplace was built on a newer section of the city where there were still parks every few blocks, trees on the sidewalks, and the houses were a picture of suburbia. The mental health center sat between the new and the old, and catered to both.
I stepped off the bus and looked over my workplace. It was a three-floor white-colored office building with a long-term residential wing to the left. The parking lot was filled with a mix of cars that were owned by the patients, families of the patients, and the employees. You could tell which ones were the doctors by the year of the vehicles. The newer the year the more likely it belonged to a doctor, especially one who'd just finished paying off their medical school student loans after twenty years.
Two pairs of sliding doors that opened to a sort of chamber made up the entrance, but they didn't wouldn't work until the place opened in a few minutes. I used my key to open one of the doors and locked it on my way into the front room area. The front desk lay on my right with a sitting area to my left. The wall in front of me had a single door that led into the rest of the building, including the residential wing. The doctors liked to have control over who could come and, more especially, who could leave.
It was ten minutes till eight when I slid behind my desk at the front counter. My coworker already sat at her desk to my right. We were the first line of defense for angry phone calls, angry visitors, and angry patients. The second line was the orderlies and the doctor with the sedative.
"Rough night?" my coworker asked me.
Vera Stevens was a woman of forty-five with the patience of a saint and the anger of a woman scorned. Her fuse was slow to light, but when it did you prayed you weren't on the receiving end. She'd worked as a nurse and office manager for twenty years and knew her business. She also made it her business to learn everyone else's business, at least as far as it concerned the clinic. A tired or agitated employee had a high likelihood of transferring those vibes to patients, and once the snowball got rolling there was no way to stop it except with a cabinet full of sedatives and a lot of apologies to family members.
That was definitely not something Vera wanted to deal with. Ever.
I smiled at her and shook my head. "I just had a bit of a scare, that's all."
She raised an eyebrow. "What kind of scare?"
If I told her the truth I'd exchange my comfortable seat at the front desk for a padded room behind that door. "With a-um, a barking dog. It just wouldn't shut up."
"And that scared you?" she wondered.
I shrugged. "I'm not really a fan of dogs." That part was true. We had a mutual hate-hate relationship where a dog would growl at me and I would snarl in return.
"A bad experience?" she guessed.
"Lots of bad experiences, but it's no big deal, really," I insisted. "Besides, it's just one more day until my weekend and then I promise I'll get a long, peaceful, rejuvenating rest."
Vera opened her mouth to reply, bu a swoosh in front of us caught our attention. We looked to the sliding doors and watched the one on the right closest to us slide shut behind a man of about thirty. He wore a white suit with a blood-red tie and black dress shoes. His hair was a dazzling red color, his skin was ghastly pale, and his eyes were a dark blue.
He turned to the front desk and flashed a bright smile. "Good morning, ladies," he greeted us as he walked over to the desk.
Vera stood and smiled at him. "I'm afraid we're not quite open, sir, but if you'd like to wait a few minutes we would be glad to help you."
"Actually, I'm just a little lost," he admitted as he leaned on the raised counter. "I had planned to meet a friend last night, but he never showed up."
Vera pursed her lips and raised an eyebrow. "Where did you plan to meet?" she asked him.
"Over on two-hundred and seventh street a few blocks from the small grocery store on the corner," he replied.
I jerked back and my eyes widened. That was my street, and the grocery store he talked about could only have been the one owned by Bellamy. The man turned his dark eyes on me and suddenly his bright smile wasn't so bright.
"What's wrong?" he asked me as he leaned over the counter. There was only a very short foot and a half between us. His dark eyes studied me like Osman had studied me during his fit of paranoia, and his words made my blood run cold. "You look like you've seen a ghost."
My shaking hands gripped the edge of the desk and I leaned away from him. "I-I wouldn't know," I answered.
His smile widened into a grin. "No, I suppose you wouldn't."
"Really, sir, this is most unusual," Vera spoke up.
The man pushed off from the desk and stepped back towards the doors. "Sorry about that. I really thought one of you could help me. Thanks for your time, and have a good day."
He swept his arm over his chest and bowed his head towards us. I noticed his eyes fell on me for a long second before he turned away and left.
"You should be more careful with the door," Vera scolded me as she walked around the desk to the door.
"But I didn't unlock it," I swore.
Vera grabbed the handle and pulled. The locked door didn't open. She blinked before she furrowed her brow.
"How strange. It is locked," she concurred. She shrugged and unlocked the door. "Well, I suppose it was open just a bit. Anyway, it's time for us to open."
Vera brushed off the incident like it was an accident, but I'd had too many strange accidents lately to take it as a glitch in my life. I sat down to a long, tense day of waiting for the next trouble. The day didn't disappoint.
CHAPTER 6
The clinic closed at the usual five o'clock, and by that time the sun was low in the eastern sky. Other then some of the residential staff who rotated out of their shifts at odd hours, the office staff was always the last to leave. I shut down my computer and pulled on my coat. The unsettling feeling I'd had all day was still in the back of my mind as I grabbed my purse and slung the strap over my shoulder.
Vera flipped off the lights and cast the room in dark shadows. Only a few emergency lights and a single bulb over the doors prevented us from stumbling into the furniture and over the rugs. Vera and I met at the doors and, as usual, she appointed herself the last to leave and shut the doors behind us. She locked the door and it rattled when she tested it.
"Nice and firm," she approved. She pocketed her key and turned to me. "I hope you enjoy your weekend, Miss Runa."
"I'm sure I will," I replied.
We went our separate ways, Vera to her car and me to the nearest bus stop. My feet clacked against the sidewalk as I walked the half block to the bus sign. A small glass shelter with a few metal benches stood on the sidewalk in front of the bus stop. It was dinner time on a Saturday night so the area was empty. I sat down on a bench and looked up in time to see the street lights flicker on. A cool breeze blew some leaves past the open front of the shelter.
I shuddered and gripped the collar of my coat tighter around my throat. "Nothing scary about this place, Enid. You've sat here a hundred times without anything going wrong. . ." I murmured to myself.
Those hundred times weren't the day after a hair-raising close encounter of the paranormal kind. A noise behind me made me swivel around. There was an alley behind and to the right of the shelter. A can rolled out of its dark depths and onto the sidewalk. It came to a stop when it clinked lightly against the side of the shelter. I stared between the can and the darkness, and it stared back.
The darkness, that is, not the can.
I jumped to my feet and stepped back towards the road. The darkness really did stare back. A familiar pair of red eyes peered from the black depths of the alley. A figure floated from the side street and the closest street light illuminated its shadowy cloak. The phantom from last night. Osman hadn't destroyed it.
My heart picked up the tempo to a roaring flamenco as I stumbled away from the tall, cloaked figure. Its eyes narrowed, and as it floated towards me it stretched out one of its pale hands. I retreated a few more steps and one of my heels slipped over the edge of the sidewalk.
A horn blared, and the phantom and I whipped our heads down the road. The bus barreled towards me and the driver honked their horn. I stepped out of the way and narrowly avoided becoming an integral part of the grill. The bus screeched to a stop and the door opened. The lady bus driver glared down at me.