(Author's Note: Are you afraid of the dark? I am. I sleep with the lights on sometimes. - Lee)
Previous: 1
“Hey! Hey! Shhh!”
I felt a cold hand over my
mouth, while another was holding my wrist against what appeared to be the wall
of the coffee shop’s restroom.
“What the hell? I thought you wanted
this?”
It was jasmine-smelling girl,
with her hair all ruffled and her bra strap falling off her left shoulder,
giving me a rougher kiss than I had expected. I immediately felt my face flush
as I realized what had happened. How she came when I was reading her book, how
I gave her a smile, a quick chat, and the invitation to the coffee shop’s
restroom for a quickie.
She let go of my hand and
fixed herself up.
“I was just trying to find a
good time, you know. I should have known you were a weirdo the moment you told
me you were researching about eggs.”
With that, she left the
restroom with me in it, and her lingering jasmine scent. I was still a bit
rattled as I turned to the restroom mirror to wash my face. That was when I
noticed something on the floor, just beside the toilet bowl. It was the
pocketbook that I saw jasmine-smelling girl put on top of the table earlier,
opened in the middle, face down on the floor. I picked it up, and was shocked
to see that the opened page contained the face of the disfigured man on one
side, and mine on the other. I screamed for the second time in that restroom as
I saw the mirror reflecting the disfigured man, with his bloody eyes and
lopsided mouth, standing behind me.
“Miss, miss, wake up!”
I felt a strong hand shaking
my shoulder as I woke up with a sick
sense of disorientation in front of my laptop in a corner of the coffee shop. I
saw the coffee shop’s guard looking at me suspiciously.
“We’re about to close up, miss.
That must be some heavy article you’re writing for you to doze off like that.”
I apologized and thanked him
and shoved my things in my bag as quick as I could. I rushed down the stairs
and had my hand on the door when I heard the guard call me.
“Miss! Hey, miss! You left
something.”
I turned back and saw him extending
his hand, holding the purple pocketbook with the disfigured man on the cover.
Without saying a word, I turned my back and rushed out of there as fast as I
could. I was sweating bullets, half-running towards the taxi bay.
I was able to breathe more
regularly when I finally settled inside the taxi. I gave the taxi driver my
address and plugged in my earphones to calm me down. I kicked myself for being
too much of a nervous freak. Absolutely no more expensive bitter coffee for me!
I closed my eyes and listened
to the upbeat music. After a few moments, I opened my eyes and looked outside
that dark street barely illuminated by cheap halogen street lamps. Then, my
hairs stood on end as my nostrils caught a whiff of a familiar scent. Jasmine.
In slow-motion, I dreadfully looked at the rearview mirror and the cruel
disfigured purple face of a man with bloody eyes, lopsided mouth was the last
thing I ever saw.