Page 20 of Devious Delusions

“Police,” he says before the operator has even spoken.

“What’s the issue, sir?”

“Someone broke into my house and attacked my wife.”

He tenses as he relays the information I gave him. His fingers dig into my hip, and he pulls me even closer. The inside of my cheek molds around my teeth, but he doesn’t loosen as he pulls me with him to go downstairs.

We walk slowly, and awkwardly, still attached to each other. He pauses at the top of the stairs and holds his phone to his ear with his shoulder as he bands his arm around my thighs and picks me up. I automatically wrap around him.

The childhood memories of the first time he picked me up comfort me as we descend the stairs. I wrap my arms around his neck and play with the short hairs above his nape to call more nostalgia forward.

10

DELILAH

Glass crunches under the booted feet of the officers. It doesn’t stop me from overhearing their conversation after Asher left me in the living room.

“Is there anything missing, Mr. Newman?” the officer asks.

“Not that I know of. None of the security alerts were triggered, but my wife…” He pauses, and I turn to see him run his fingers through his hair before he continues. “My wife has issues. Her knees are scraped and there’s blood on the glass at the bottom of the stairs, so she could have fallen.”

I don’t have issues. I have one, singular—the freak who chased me. He said he believed me, but now he’s acting like I’m crazy to the people who are supposed to help.

The officer looks up from his shitty little notepad and I stand, refusing to let them assume I’m some delusional idiot that doesn’t know what reality is. My steps slap off the floor and anger tightens every muscle in my body until I’m standing in front of them both.

“I didn’t fall inside the house,” I say with conviction.

The detective gives me a tight-lipped smile that shows he doesn’t believe me. It’s been the same bullshit since I showedthem all the points the freak had touched, and what had been changed while I was unconscious. The table I knocked over was back in the correct place and Asher didn’t move anything.

Before either of them can call me crazy without actually saying the word, I point out the obvious thing they’re both missing.

“What if he’s living in the building next door?” The officer looks to Asher, and I add, “You said it’s not linked to the house but there’s a walkway upstairs. He could have come through it.”

I stand there smug as the officer rounds up his dumb colleagues to check the building. Asher follows them as he takes out a set of keys. I need to see the freak be apprehended so I join their search party. The first thing that makes me pause is the driveway.

The flat surface should be disturbed with deep grooves in it from my struggle. Asher’s car is parked at the side in the opposite direction of where I was tackled. The police cars are behind it, so the grooves should still be there. I wasn’t unconscious for days, it was only twelve hours, so why are the grooves missing?

The officers shout through the door as they open it and pull me back from examining each piece of gravel. The smell hits me before I’m even close to the threshold. Stale air and dust. Little particles glimmer in the light from the midday sun and Asher holds my hand, stopping me from entering.

Every surface is covered in a thick layer of dust that the officers disturb on their journey through the building. The windows are boarded from the inside and thin strips of light stream through. I know it was used as a studio by the previous owners, but the mask sitting on the workbench looks out of place.

A gas mask.

The black straps are gray from how long it has sat there unused, and the lens is covered in grey too. Spray paint bottles are lined up at the back of the workbench against the wall. The caps are broken or missing entirely. But I can’t stop staring at the mask. My eyes narrow and I look through the space, trying to find the memory my mind is associating with it.

Nothing.

There’s no memory, yet I can’t rid myself of the feeling that the mask is significant.

Asher pulls me closer to his side and kisses the top of my head. Stroking down my arm, he attempts to comfort me in a bullshit soothing tone because he thinks I’m crazy.

“It’s okay, Lilo, there’s no one there.”

“Did I fucking say there was?” I snap back and push him away from me.

I don’t look at him as I storm back to the house. I’m not crazy or seeing things. The house was a suggestion, not a fact.

But there’s nothing out of place like it should be. The glass is at the bottom of the stairs, when I dropped it in the kitchen. There’s no gravel inside the house, when it was scraping against the floor.

---