Deathbed (Suspense, Crime Scene Investigation, Thrill) Chapter 3

Chapter 3

When I arrived at the café, Amber was sitting at one of the tables, tapping her feet to a fast tempo. Her eyes appeared squinted and concentrated, but were clouded with mysterious worry. As the bell hanging from the entrance door tinkled, Amber looked up and sighed heavily with relief. “Thank God!” Amber exclaimed as she suddenly ran up to me. I was stunned when she gave me a terribly suffocating hug. “You came back! Alive!” She pulled back grinning. Then she started robotically patting me around my legs and arms like a guard at the airport. “Oh God, they left you in one piece!”

I broke out loud laughter. Immediately, I covered my mouth and turned red. Amber laughed warmly. “Why are you so worried about me?” I asked her curiously, “It’s not like they’d sacrifice me to the gods of something.”

Amber’s face turned distressing. “Well, a police guy called mah cell, and you know the whole…” She did hand gestures at me, “…yeah. Let’s just say… I don’t think he was convinced at all.”  Amber said guiltily, “I thought they would not let you come back and put me in jail for lying!”

“Well, all I need to do is turn in my clothes from yesterday and it’ll all be over, so don’t worry,” I said softly, trying to comfort her. Amber nodded. I saw David walked in the room from the stairs in the back.

David rushed to me and put his hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. They just asked me for my clothes,” I half-lied. I thought it’d be awkward if I told him they asked me to take off my shirt.

David nodded, “Okay.” He glanced down to my pants. “I bet Amber has some pants that might fit you.”

Amber smiled, “Yeah,” she turned to me, “Don’t get scared of mah pants, skinny.” I laughed. We went upstairs and Amber handed me a pair of jeans from her wardrobe. “Here. Like I said, you’re skinny, so don’t go blaming me if it’s too loose,” Amber joked. I laughed a little. I put on the pants, and, as Amber predicted, it was slightly loose around my waist.

“Do you have any twine or belts?” I asked.

Amber shook her head, “Nope, not at all.” Amber thought for a minute. “There’s this store a couple blocks from here called ‘Lai Goods’. I bet they have some string or twine or whatever,” Amber said, handing me five dollars, “Its run by these Catholic Chinese people and dey’re kind of crazy, so be careful and don’t mess with them.” I nodded. Amber sighed heavily as she looked at her alarm clock on her desk. “Geez, it’s 8:31 and I haven’t done any of my freaking homework!” She vented to herself. I realized that I had put her behind in her studies… again.

I said sheepishly and apologetically, “I’m so sorry! It’s all my fault…”

Amber laughed, catching me off guard, “Nah! Don’t worry ‘bout anything right now Mel. Go get yer twine and a candy or something while I start my homework, okay?” She grinned. I smiled and nodded.

“Thanks!” I thanked her as I left her room. I heard her sigh heavily when I started going down the stairs. I knew she did mind me delaying her homework time, but she pitied me too much to say it. My heart ached with guilt. I swiftly left the café before David got to say anything, my mind too filled with worry. I looked around when I reached the other side of the street. I never did ask Amber where exactly the shop is.

I walked aimlessly through the streets, hanging on to bare hope that I’d happen to find Lai Goods sitting around next to one of these shaggy shops. I thought for a moment that maybe I could find a shop that sells twine or a cheap belt, but I did not want to wander into suspicious shops owned by suspicious people, especially in a huge place like New York City. It just sent a chill up my spine when I come into a place I’m not familiar with.

I chuckled at my own thoughts. How ironic that I’d run away from home into a mysterious world I was completely unfamiliar with. Then I thought deeper. Why did I run away then? Was it because I felt like I didn’t have a choice anymore? Was it because I was scared? Or was my own home lonelier than being alone? Tears jerked on my last thought. Yes… That must have been it.

I looked up and found myself in front of Lai Goods. That was fast, I thought. As I walked in, bells, like at Amber’s café, tinkled and I observed the store. It was obviously worn down, with chipped paint and written graffiti in pen on the wall and shelves. The shelves were perfectly spaced from each other on the left side of the entrance and on the right, there seemed to be a bakery. A Chinese lady at the cashier smiled at me. “Welcome!” She said invitingly, “Is there anything you want in particular?” I was surprised. First, she seems perfectly normal. Second, I didn’t sense a Chinese accent at all; her words came out as smooth as velvet.

“Um, yes,” I started, “do you have twine?” The woman nodded. She got out a spool of twine and put it on the counter.

“That’d be four dollars please.” I gave her my five dollar bill. She gave me a dollar in return and smiled again. “Have a great day, miss!” I gave a small smile back. Her expression changed from happy to dumbfound.

I asked confused, “What’s wrong?”

“Yo-Your that girl!!” the lady exclaimed excitingly, “The girl on TV this morning! You saved Ms. Julie! Wow, that’s amazing!!” I blushed.

“It wasn’t much…” I murmured. Then I realized that cameras were actually there right after I brought the woman that the lady called Ms. Julie to the cafe. My stomach sank. I must have looked terrible!! I felt butterflies in my stomach.

The Chinese woman laughed loudly and said, “You’re so modest.” We heard a tinkling sound coming from the store entrance and both of us turned around. The new male customer had a very gangster and rebellious flare to his outfit, with the backwards hat and low baggy pants. He had light skin and hair. The store lady leaned up close to my ear. “That man, I heard, is a drug dealer.” Then, a tall skinny woman walked into the store. “That’s probably his new wife. So be careful while you leave.” Then she grinned and said in a normal voice, “Hope you come by again soon!”

I smiled slightly back. “Bye!”

“Oh yeah,” The woman said suddenly, “I’m Demi by the way! Nice to meet you Melissa!”

I waved as I left the store. Either Amber sees Demi when she’s in a bad mood, or Demi was hiding her true self because I was a customer and a sudden local hero. After I got to the crosswalk, I realized that I didn’t know how to get back to the café.

When I was outside the shop entrance I heard a scream from inside. Fear struck me, and naturally my first thought was to run away. Yet, for some reason, I didn’t want to abandon Demi. So, I quietly snuck inside and hid behind a shelf.

I heard Demi moan, “No… Don’t…” The man that had entered before muttered something indistinctive. “No… No…!”

Then, I heard the man command his wife, “Go close the door and turn off the lights!” I hastily change the side of the self I was on. I heard the door slam, a loud clunk, and the tinkling of the door bells shortly followed. Small bells have never sounded so frightening before.

After the lights clicked off, I took a few quiet steps closer to the edge of the shelf and leaned over a little to see what was going on.

It was horrifying. Dark red blood was spilt all over the pale yellow tile. It was seeping from Demi’s right arm, which was very bady cut up. At one point, I could see her bone. I could see a wide grin on the man, and his wife watched him tear Demi apart like it was nothing.

I shuttered, and my eyes watered at the memory that the blood and its smell had recalled. It reminded me of the alley; how the deep voice of the man is going to haunt me for the rest of my life… and how much of a thrill it was to knock him unconscious. But I knew I couldn’t get close to this man unless I wrestle with his full grown wife.  I was about to withdraw back to the entrance, but stopped myself. How am I supposed to get a hold of the police before Demi dies?

That’s when I remembered I was holding twine. Ideas rushed through my head quickly, and I hastily put them together. Now, my fingers were excited, though my body was still shaking. I sneaked up behind the mysterious man’s wife, and she wasn’t wearing sneakers, but high heels. Luckily, though unhuman, she was so in tune with her husband’s gory actions, that I assumed that she wouldn’t feel any tugging on her heel. I stealthily put a very loose knot around the woman’s shoes’ heels. I tied the remaining twine to the shelf behind the criminal’s wife.

I knocked on the shelf, and the woman was immediately alarmed. I heard her rapid walking to the entrance, and pulled the twine. My stomach tightened as I watched the woman trip over forwards. She hit her head—hard. I saw her, sprawled on the floor, twitching, trying to escape unconsciousness. My fingers were stinging with guilt, but I knew this was the only way to get past the man’s wife. Then my mind froze of fear and realization. Startling footsteps was coming toward us, and I was unprepared.

I hadn’t thought of this plan all the way through.

I tried to walk away, but my feet were stuck onto the floor, as if they had been attached to it with hot glue. My terror had overcome my feeling of helplessness that urged me on last time. It was like living in a horror movie.

The dark man walked up to his unconscious wife and his eyes widened. He first looked at the shop entrance, and then he saw me. He shot me a blood-thirsty glare. Even though it was dark because his wife had turned off the lights earlier, I saw such anger, pain, and mystery in his eyes.

I shakily stepped backwards, as he started to breathe heavier and dug his eyes into mine, burning with anger. My thought at that moment was how Death was going to greet me.

All the sudden, the man started sprinting toward me, his knife stuck out as if to stab me. Fear grabbed onto my entire body, but adrenaline pumped through my veins and convinced my legs to run.

The chase was incredibly scary. With every step I took, another violent step behind me followed. I felt as if the walls were closing in, and as if the air was going to be soaked in more blood than it already is. And it was going to be mine.

We went all around the store a couple times, until finally I got ahead enough for him to be on one side of a shelf and me on the other. I pushed the metal shelf on him with all the energy I had left in me, and I knew that was just enough to keep him there for a minute. One minute was all I needed to call 911.

I looked for a phone desperately. I had stupidly left mine at Amber’s house, though it would probably be out of battery if I had brought it. Finally, I spotted a black phone hanging on the wall. Hastily I punched in 911, and waited a few long seconds for the woman to pick up.

“Hello, this is an emergency—“

“Hello?! I need help, pronto! There’s a woman dying, and there’s a murderer who’s going to kill me!!” I blurted out in one breath, trying not to breathe in too much of the smell of murder.

“Okay, please try to stay calm. Where are you?”

I started to breathe more evenly. “Lai Goods.”

The woman replied, “Okay, I’m sending help right away. Stay on the line, please.”

“Okay,” I agreed. I heard a rough groan from under the fallen shelf. My eyes widened as the shelf started to clumsily move back upwards. “Never mind. Sorry, I have to go.”

I left the phone suspending above the group by its wire, and I slammed myself on the shelf before the man could bring it completely upwards. I fought against his surviving strength; it was much stronger than my nearly depleted one. Finally, my muscles were unable to stand the pressure any longer, and this time, the shelf fell on me. The fall hurt my right shoulder first, and then hit the back of my head. The shelves hit my stomach, neck, thighs, and calf, and from the force of the impact, I knew at least one of them was fractured.

I heard a deep, loud, joyless laugh, and I could already picture what the man had in store for me. He was just like the Man, as far as I could tell; he loved to watch his victims be torn apart alive, from flesh, to muscle, to bone. I shuttered. I never thought I had to deal with this kind of situation when I ran away, I thought. Do I have to have the same fate as Demi? If I do, do I still have a chance at changing it?

Footsteps went toward my trembling body. I saw his grubby hands start to wrap around the shelf’s sides so he could take it off of me and start his gory entertainment. But right then, I heard someone kick down the door and a sudden ‘ugh!’ as the shelf fell on top of me again.

“Get him, and take him to the car.” I heard a voice order as many hurried footsteps filled the room. “Take these two to the ambulance.” I assumed they were talking about the man’s wife and Demi. I felt relieved. Then, my eyes widened when I realized I might be left here if I didn’t do anything.

“Help…” I managed to slip through my lips.

“One second, no one move,” I heard the voice say. The footsteps stopped.

I tried again, “..elp.. me…” For some reason my voice had a really hard time speaking up. I wasn’t sure if it was because of the shelf at my neck, or the fact that only a few moments ago, I was a minute away from brutal, gruesome torture; if that was it, fear was still stuck in my throat.

“Someone else is in here. Make sure the ambulance doesn’t leave yet. We might have a hard time getting another one,” the man orders again. Footsteps exit the room.

I slowly moved my hand toward the edge of the shelf, and moved my fingers sloppily to somehow catch his attention. It did.

“He’s under here,” the voice said to, perhaps, a police officer. I heard footsteps scatter around me, and then the shelf’s pressure slowly release off of me. “Well, well, well… It’s nice to see you again, Melissa.” As I slowly opened my eyes, it was a blurred Jeremy York. I didn’t even realize I was crying until now. “I’ll question you after you get yourself fixed up.” I closed my eyes, let the men take me to the hospital. My mind circled with pictures of what had happened. They’re pictures instead of movies, because I decided I didn’t want them to move.