BARE HUNTER

What a perfect day, I thought, pulling into my driveway around 11:30. An afternoon with Timmy and the evening with Sharon. Maybe my life was finally looking up. All I had to do was get through this shit with Greg and keep the peace with him. I popped a Zoloft and washed it down with OJ. Then, I climbed into bed with my clothes on, too tired to change. At 3 AM, I awoke to an argument outside my bedroom window.

“Fucking bitch! I saw you with him. What were you doing? What were you doing?”

“Stop. Stop, Lloyd. Nothing. We didn’t do anything. Stop it!”

“I told you that you were mine. You thought you were so smart. I finally found you and you’re coming home with me.”

“No, I’m not. I have a new life. New friends, new house. I don’t belong to you. Let go of me!”

“Our marriage license says I have the right to beat the shit out of you and fuck you anytime I want. You broke that contract and now you’re gonna pay.”

I tried to see past the fog on the window out to the driveway, where the voices came from. Slaps and sharp cries accompanied the yelling. I couldn’t see anything. I pulled on my jacket and boots, storming outside to look at the driveway. Nothing. The voices had a tinny quality, so I didn’t recognize them. Neighbors fighting, maybe? All the houses around mine were dark and no activity was apparent. The voices stopped. A nightmare? A new one. I went inside and washed my face, reached into the medicine cabinet for my Paroxetine, popped two, and went to the kitchen for a slug of juice.

The sun was shining. There was a bee in my head. I kept swatting at it, trying to kill it before it stung my brain. Bzzzzzz, bzzzzzzz, bzzzzzz, bzzzzzz. It wouldn’t leave. I tipped my head to one side and tried to shake it out, but it didn’t budge. It just kept buzzing until I thought I’d lose my mind. Bzzzzzz, bzzzzzz, bzzzzzz, bzzzzzz. The bee was relentlessly stalking me. In my dream, I sprayed bug poison on it until it finally died. Thank God. It had been driving me crazy.

Then, I opened my eyes, and the buzzing began all over again. I ducked my head and jumped out of bed, ready to battle the winged demon that had interrupted my sleep. I grabbed a sock off my nightstand, then realized it was the wrong tool for the job. Laughing at myself, I realized my phone was buzzing. I checked the number, and it was work, “Hey, where are you? It’s me, Greg. Are you and Sharon together?”

“What? Sharon? No. Why?”

“Because it’s 10 AM, and you’re both no-shows.”

“Oh, man! Seriously?”

“Yes, seriously. What did you two do all night?”

“We didn’t do anything all night, Greg. If we did, it wouldn’t be any of your business. I’m home. I must have taken too many anxiety meds last night. Dude. I am so sorry. I’ll be right in.”

“That doesn’t help me figure out where Sharon is. She’s not answering her cell and she is never, ever late,” Greg insisted.

“Hey, I’ll swing by her place on the way in and check on her. I’ll text you.”

That was not good. What the heck? I quickly showered to wash the nightmare off my body and glugged down some juice with a few cookies for breakfast. Then, I drove as fast as I dared to Sharon’s house. Her car was in the driveway. Maybe she slept in like I did. I bounded up her porch steps and rapped on the door. No answer. I looked into her living room and saw paint cans overturned and apricot-colored footprints leading to the hallway where the bedrooms were. I immediately hit 911 on my phone and reported a disturbance at a home and gave them the address.

Then, I called Greg. “Hey, Greg, this looks bad. I just called the cops. Her car is here. From what I can see, there’s no answer at the door and it looks like there was a struggle in her living room.”

Lloyd. Her ex-husband. That was the only explanation. How did he find her? Why now? It made no sense. Prickles rose up my neck as I recalled the nightmare last night. It was so real. Was I telepathically connected to Sharon and could hear her struggle with Lloyd? Was that what I heard in my driveway? How? Exhaustion washed over me as I collapsed onto the porch steps, gripping the railing to keep from falling over. A cruiser pulled into the yard with its lights on. An officer exited the car and came up to the porch. “Sir. Sir. Do you need an ambulance?”

“No. I’m just dizzy. My co-worker lives here, and she didn’t report for work this morning. The boss sent me to check on her. I think something’s wrong.”

He took a notebook and wrote quickly while peeking into the living room window, as I had. Then, he touched the radio on his shoulder to call for backup.

“Sir, is that your SUV?”

“Yes.”

“Please go back to your vehicle, but don’t leave. I’m going to take a look around back. Please stay inside your vehicle.”

While I sat, befuddled and numb, another cruiser pulled up beside the first, and two cops got out. One approached my car and asked what I was doing there. I repeated my story and both officers joined the first when he returned to the front. They huddled and conferred, then, I could see him calling on his radio again.

All three pulled their weapons and carefully approached my SUV from three sides. “Step out of the vehicle, sir, with your hands on the hood.”

Knowing better than arguing and knowing I had nothing to worry about, I did as I was told slowly and carefully.

The first responding officer said, “Place one hand at a time behind your head, please, sir.”

He cuffed, then Mirandized me, as his fellow officers opened my SUV, and combed it quickly. Neighbors began peeking out of windows and gesturing behind windowpanes. A nosy Karen in a bathrobe came waddling down the street and motioned to the officers about twenty feet from my vehicle. I couldn’t hear their conversation. But she kept pointing to my SUV and waving her arms around.

One of the officers took my arm and said,” Sir, please come with me and sit in my cruiser while we inspect the property.” He shut the door and locked it, leaving me with more questions than answers.

By that time, a crowd of rubberneckers were huddling under umbrellas, watching their neighborhood real estate plummet in value. Some short guy in a dirty T-shirt and running shorts yelled, “That’s the guy. Hey! That’s the guy. He was here last night.”

I took all this in stride until an ambulance plowed into the muddy grass, left soggy by all the rain. An ambulance? Was Sharon hurt? No one had entered the premises yet. An emergency fire vehicle pulled up next and firemen took out a heavy metal pole with welded handles on either end. They charged up the porch steps and battered the door down. The police officers, with guns drawn, entered in a stacked formation.

I puked my OJ and cookies onto the cruiser's floor, and my head began to swim. Not Sharon. Not Sharon. She didn’t deserve to be hurt by anyone. I prayed her ex-husband hadn’t found her after all these years.