Layla
Aunt Penny stares ahead, per usual, looking at everything and nothing all at once. I turn a page in the book I’ve been reading aloud to her the past four nights. She recently started a new blood pressure medication that’s supposed to make her feel drowsy, but so far, it’s having the opposite effect. The old woman has been staring into space until 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning the past couple of nights, and I’m running out of ways to keep myself busy.
“Don’t!” I say in an exaggerated tone, lifting my voice to imitate the dainty, elegant and high-bred young debutant, the book's heroine. “Please! You know we cannot go any further, Randall. You’ll ruin me!”
I swear Aunt Penny’s mouth lifts into a ghost of a smile, her eyes softening and looking far more alive than they had only moments ago.
I drop my voice as low as it can go and continue, “You called me a rake once, Juliette…. It’s high time I showed you just how rakish I can be….” I quickly scan the rest of the page and glance up at Aunt Penny, clearing my throat. “I think that’s enough of that for the night, Aunt Penny.”
She closes her eyes as if in agreement. Finally. This poor woman has been up for hours with no relief. I set the book on top of her dresser and stretch, my back which is aching from sitting in an ancient wingback armchair for the last three hours. I walk to her bedside, glancing at the monitor, then turn off her bedside lamp. “I’ll talk to Bailey in the morning and see if we can do anything that will help you sleep better, okay?”
My only answer is her quiet, rhythmic breathing.
I smile down at my aunt, taking in the soft lines of her frail face. I can see how she was beautiful once, a real stunner, actually. It makes all of this more heartbreaking. She’d been my age once, twenty-six with nothing but her future ahead of her. But that future had been… this. Rotting away alone in this creepy-ass house.
My sneakers are silent as I cross the hall and walk to my bedroom. It’s been quiet in the house lately, which might have to do with the work Curtis has been doing on the new HVAC system, which still isn’t working. But tonight feels electric, like a storm is brewing. I can almost taste the rain, and the humidity is thicker than it’s been in days.
I pause at my door, remembering I left my water bottle in Aunt Penny’s room. I really don’t want to risk waking her up, but the thought of walking all the way to the kitchen in the dark….
I chew my lower lip and glance toward the stairwell, the darkness closing in on me with each passing second.
I’ve been here for two weeks, and I’m still not used to this place. I’ve gotten over that initial fear, of course, of the darkened corners and bumps in the night. I sleep right through it now, especially since I’m getting used to my aunt's odd sleep schedule and can sleep during the day again without issue.
But again, there’s something in the air tonight. Something that tells me I’m not entirely alone here right now.
“I just need a glass of water,” I say to the house and the ghosts that surely inhabit it then run like mad down the stairs into the foyer.
I really need to get a grip.
I feel like a scared little girl trying to find my way through the dark to my mom’s bedroom as I hug the wall and feel my way to the kitchen. The light switches in this old house are in odd places, and the one in the main hallway is right next to the kitchen door, unfortunately, meaning I have to walk the entire way in pitch black.
By the time I reach the kitchen, the rain starts. The soft evening drizzle gives way to full, thundering sheets that sweep toward the house, splashing against the windows as I enter the kitchen and turn on the light. The back porch light illuminates the rear of the house, giving new life to how hard it’s raining right now. I stare out the window over the sink as I fill a glass with water, watching the rain fall in dizzying sheets that are both terrifying and oddly soothing.
The Gulf is only a few miles away, creeping closer and closer every year. The far edge of the Gregory property is now protected marsh land, from what Curtis told me. I spent a whole afternoon sitting on the back porch while he tried to fix the lawnmower, listening to him talk about great blue heron and red knots.
Maybe one of these days I’ll explore the grounds a little bit and see for myself what kind of wildlife this place has to offer.
I smile a bit wistfully as I raise my glass to my lips. When was the last time I had time to explore any of the places I’ve worked at over the last four years? Being here, in my family’s ancestral home, gives me the sudden urge to slow down and enjoy myself, to explore, to put down roots for the first time since I left home for college.
A creaking sound directly behind me snaps me out of my head, and I whirl, expecting someone to be standing in the doorway to the kitchen. My heart rate spikes, adrenaline coursing through my veins, but there’s no one there.
The fridge kicks on, sending a near silent vibration through the room.
I know better than to start rattling off names. It’s almost 5:00 in the morning. Bailey won’t be here for a few hours, and Curtis never comes this early, especially when there’s a storm circling the property. Hell, even Vera, who only comes in on the weekends now, won’t show her face until 11:00 or 12:00 to start her shift.
I swallow past the lump in my throat and slowly turn back to the sink to rinse my glass. Lightning flashes, illuminating the cypress trees at the edge of the backyard.
My eyes catch on a shadow that hadn’t been there before. Just beyond the tree line. I squint, trying to get a better look, but the porch light only stretches so far.
Another flash of lightning lights up the sky. I rear back, my heart leaping into my throat as the blue-hued light illuminates what I am sure is someone standing amidst the trees, looking at the house.
The lightning fades, but the figure moves forward just a step, close enough I can see the outline of the hood shielding their face from view. At least, I think that’s what I see.
I feel absolutely out of my body as I wrench open the drawer next to the sink and pull out a knife, gripping the handle so tightly my knuckles turn white. I don’t know what I’m thinking when I unlock the backdoor and yank it open so hard it bounces off the wall and nearly slams into me as I step out onto the back porch. “Hey!” I shout, brandishing the knife. “Get out of here!”
The figure doesn’t move.
“I-I said get out of here! I’ll call the police!”
Nothing.
I’m starting to shake, but I stifle it, keeping my expression grave and determined. I’ve been attacked by my patients before, nothing serious, but enough to spur me into signing up for self-defense classes at the local gym. Whoever this is, they're standing far enough away that their body is still obstructed by the trees, and the rain isn’t helping me get a glimpse of their face, that’s for sure. But I could take them, right? I could defend this house, and my aunt, if necessary. “I will call the police!”
Lightning crashes overhead, followed by thunder so violent the house seems to groan in anguish. I step back, startled by the thunder, and blink.
The figure is gone, just like that.
I rush back into the house, locking the door, and run upstairs. The knife is still in my hand when I trip on the last few steps, my knees cracking against the second floor landing. “Fuck!” I hiss, not daring to close my eyes or look behind me. The house rattles against another earth-shaking clap of thunder that splits the sky in two, and I’m up again, running straight to my aunt’s room. I lock the door behind me, leaning on it as I take a ragged breath.
She’s asleep, her ECG monitor beeping quietly with each steady heartbeat it reads.
I let my breath out slowly, willing my heart to stop pounding, and begin to wonder if I overreacted. I couldn’t see shit, for one. Not in the storm. Not in the dark. Not against the tangled cypress trees and overgrown vines that choke the tree line. I’m also tired, my eyes strained from looking at the faded text of a slutty Regency romance book from the early nineties all night.
But it felt so real. Too real.
I sink into the wingback chair, facing the door, and rest the knife on my lap. I wait for what seems like hours, until my eyes grow heavy, and my head begins to nod. I fight it, but I’m pulled into the kind of depthless sleep only true exhaustion can accomplish. Somewhere in the distance, I hear that song again, the smooth jazz a far cry from the aged, crackling notes that came from the gramophone.
“Layla,” a deep male voice says in my ear. “You fell asleep here again. I should punish you for this.” I’m lifted in the air, strong arms cradling me.
“Punish me, then.”
I feel my back hit a mattress.
His hands are on my thighs, rough and demanding as his thumbs hook under my shorts, and he pulls them down.
I can taste him on my lips–sweet, spicy, salty–like he’s just finished a glass of fine scotch. I suck his lower lip into my mouth, biting down.
He nudges my legs apart, rasping, “You’re fucking soaked, Layla. Those filthy books make you wet, don’t they?”
I arch my hips as his fingers glide down over my clit, sliding through the wetness pooling between my thighs. “P-please–”
“I love it when you beg,” he whispers in my ear then bites down on my neck. He pulls my underwear to the side, and I cry out against the pain then the sudden pressure between my legs. He’s enormous, stretching me to the point where it hurts, where I’m not sure I can take him any further.
“What were you doing with this?” he whispers, his voice low and full of gravel as something cool touches the outside of my thigh.
I go rigid, his cock buried inside me.
“Layla,” he taunts, running the flat of the knife along my thigh.
I squirm, trying to get away, but he has me pinned.
“Please–”
His mouth lowers over mine as he smooths the knife up and down my thigh, then up again, slicing through my underwear. I take a deep breath as he presses his cock deeper. “Does it hurt?”
“Yes–”
“Good.”
Another thrust has me screaming, gripping the sheets as he fucks me hard and fast, using me like a toy. He rises up over me, his face obscured by shadows, and uses the knife to cut through my shirt, tearing it off my body and tossing it across the room as he pumps into me. He slams the knife down into the bed next to me, piercing the mattress. His hands rest on my breasts, squeezing them as he grinds his hips into mine until I’m babbling incoherently, the tension in my lower belly screaming for release.
I’m so close. Each thrust is more brutal than the last, and it’s exactly what I need. It’s what I’d never admit I’d like–being chased. Being used and dominated. He grips my neck, squeezing.
“Come for me,” he says in a loud, stern voice that has me quaking around him. I suck in a desperate, life giving breath….
“Holy fuck!” I peel myself off the floor in my aunt's bedroom, coated in sweat and panting as I squint into the stormy daylight pouring through the curtains. I rise, trembling, my shirt damp with sweat, and a quick glance in the mirror over her dresser reveals my hair is ruffled and my face… entirely flushed.
I creep to the door, glancing at my still sleeping aunt. The door is locked, and suddenly the events of the night come rushing back to me.
I look wildly to the chair, searching for the knife I’d brought upstairs with me. It’s nowhere to be found.
I’m immediately on edge when I return to my room, my hands trembling as I close the door behind me and try to catch my breath.
And in the glare of the sun, something shines from the center of my bed.
The knife.