Death Until The Moon Rises

She loved to walk after dinner to get exercise because she sat at a desk all day long, hearing her boss’ voice drone on about how he wanted his letter to sound. Telephone had been going off all day long about orders that had gone to the wrong place and orders that should have already been sent out. She heard her boss cussing and yelling at people to do their jobs right, all day long about how much a screw up some people that he had on the payroll were. He had talked about firing two people that were on his payroll, one which was in charge of his warehouse and the other she wasn’t too sure what he did for a job for the business. Mr. Higgins was the one she wasn’t too sure about what he did and Sasha shivered whenever she thought about him. He had informed her that if she didn’t get out of his face she would regret it for the rest of her short life. Knowing that it was a threat on her life, she had reported him in hopes he would be fired. Nothing was done except a slap on the wrist, he was not liked by anyone in the workforce for this business. Two of her tires had been slashed after she had reported him for the threats which made the police question him.

She thought he had lived at the factory for a while because he was always there. Always watching whatever went on throughout the building, when she approached the situation with Mr. Jones, her boss, he just laughed and said that no one lived at this business. Feeling better about the situation, she watched as Mr. Higgins get in his car and drive off for his home. She even went as far as to follow him one night to see where he went and let a sign of relief when he pulled into a garage of a white house. Laughing, she knew that she was stalking the man and promised herself to act friendly toward him, no matter what it took. Being friendly to a man that was, so mean to her was going to take all the faith and trust that God could give her.

Her stomach was full from dinner. She had ordered a large pizza of mushroom, hamburgers, double cheese, and onions. Plus, she had ordered cheese sticks and onion rings thinking that most of it was going to be leftovers for lunch, she had eaten more than she had planned. The pizza was half gone with the cheese sticks and her stomach was screaming that she didn’t put anymore in it. Walking was going to ease the fullness of her stomach and hopefully move some of the food around, so she wouldn’t feel like an idiot for eating so much. The food had been delicious and she had been involved in a mystery that they were showing on television, she hadn’t watched how much she was eating. She always stressed ate when she was watching or listening to something spooky like the movie was.

Sasha walked on further than she usual went on her walks, when she suddenly heard someone screaming at another person. It sounded like it was two men doing the fighting and one man was very upset about a situation that involved a woman sticking her nose where it didn’t belong. Maybe she could somehow avoid the two men that were doing the fighting by taking a different route around them on her walk.  She was getting scared as she got closer to the spot where she heard the voices being raised. Trying to stay calm and relaxed, she kept walking forward until the voices sounded like they were just around the bend. She stopped to see if she could hear the men and prayed that they had moved onward. 

Turning the bend, she could see two men standing ahead of her on the path unaware that she was there. Or not even caring that she was there because they were deep in conservation, arguing heatedly about this woman and whatever the situation was that she had stuck her nose in. Some woman just didn’t know when to stop being curiosity about things that were going on in other people’s lives. Taking a few steps, she didn’t know what to do about going around them because they were blocking the whole path with their bodies. One of the men were very angry as was evidence in the tone of his voice and he had started to shovel the other man who was trying to calm him down.

The sun was starting to set and it was leaving the path ahead in a weird, eerie feeling. Sasha had been standing there watching the whole situation when the one man that was angry started to beat the other man up. It was like an angry, dark feeling was surrounding him to make him feel like no one was listening to him. That the woman who was causing him the trouble was to fault and he was taking his angry out on the only man that was within arm’s reach. The only person that was standing near enough for him to reach out and take out his frustrates on. She could hear the other man yelling for him to stop, he was swinging back at the other man, but it was like a fly landing on a cement wall. Nothing seemed to be getting through to this angry man.

Tears were flowing out of Sasha’s eyes as she realized how scared of the situation, she was becoming. She wanted to run up there to help the one man that was getting the stuffing beat out of him and she knew deep down that if she didn’t do something, the one man would end up being dead. Somewhere, somehow she started to run toward the situation ahead, yelling to get off that man and to leave him alone. After a few seconds, the man that was so angry knew that someone had witness him beating up the other man and he took off running away as fast as his feet could take him. Blood was everywhere and she knew not to move the man that was hurt. Her hands felt for her cell phone and she cussed as she realized that she was going to have to run home to make any phone calls for help. This man would be dead by the time she got back, but she also knew that there was no other way since she had been the stupid one to forget her phone at home when she had left.

Kneeling by the man who was hurt, she told him that she had forgotten her phone and would be right back with help. She watched as the man nodded that he understood what she was saying and she ran toward her home. Stumbling a few times, she arrived in a short time to call for help and grabbing a blanket and some towels to apply to the open wounds. She started to run back to the spot with sirens going off in the distances, she was praying that somehow she would get wings on her feet and be able to get back in time to prevent the man from dying alone.

Rounding the bend on shaking legs, she stopped short as she realized the man was gone. Where had he gone in such a mess? How had he gone somewhere? Standing there, she realized the police and the ambulance was coming her way and she had no body to back up her story of two men fighting on the path. What was she going to do? What was she going to show them that would make the police believe her story? She felt scared that there was no body to show them, no body to make them believe she hadn’t made up the whole situation, a body that was alive and could verify her story. 

The policeman stood there looking at her as unbelief settled on his face and she knew that he didn’t believe a word she was saying. The ambulance had been dispatched to another scene of a car accident with a lone occupant going off the road; she wanted to yell at the officer. Knowing that probably wouldn’t help the situation that he was trying hard to believe. There was no evidence that the fight had occurred, no other witness since this was out of the way path going through some woods, and the blood that had seemed to be everywhere was nowhere to be seen. Nowhere to bag as evidence for the police to have some kind of evidence that the fight had actually happened, nowhere to be seen, to be found, to be shows signs that a fight had actually happened. She saw this fight and how on God’s green Earth was she going to make the police believe what she was saying. Heaven, help her make these police know that she wasn’t lying.

The days after the fiasco with the police were spent standing looking out her front room window wondering what was going to happen with that situation. The police officer had said that he would be in contact to tell her what was going to happen. Was she going to jail, prison for lying? Was she going to jail for trying to help that man who had suffered at the hands of another man? Tears flowed several times as the spirit of fear overtook her body and she could see herself as cell mates with another woman was making advances toward her. She prayed silently as God Almighty would help her in this situation so she would not go to prison for something she hadn’t done. She prayed to God that evidence would be found for the police to believe her. Driving by the place where it had happened, she saw squad cars sitting along the road and she knew they were combing the place to hopefully find some type of evidence to back up her version of what had happened.

Feeling scared, she prayed that she would hear anything, so that she would know where she stood with the police. They had phoned her to come in to answer some more of the questions that they had for her. They had gone as far as to ask her how much she had drank that day before going on her so-called walk.  Tomorrow, she planned to go back to work and wished by then the whole situation was over and done. She had promised to come into the station at four to answer question about what she had seen. She was scared that they were going to lock her up and throw away the key.

Sitting in the waiting room at the station, she watched as two men were standing talking on the other side of the door and glancing in her direction as they talked in hushed tones. The one was the police officer from the day of the mess and the other was the detective assigned to her case. They were not smiling as they talked and she knew without a doubt she was going to prison for years.

“Miss Newston, we are going to be frank with you as to tell you that no one believed your story that a fight had gone on. Since that day, we have learned that you were telling the truth and we are here to say that we are sorry for not believing you. You see, we have learned that Mr. Jones hated the fact that you were always complaining about Mr. Higgins to him. He was getting madder and madder at Mr. Higgins for being a problem, so they agreed to meet out of work that night to talk over the problem you had with him. Do you remember the day of the accident that the ambulance was sent to another scene? Well, after getting beat up, Mr. Higgins walked from the scene to cause his death in a car accident. When the lab looked at the body, they knew someone had beaten him pretty bad.” Pausing to let this bit of news sink in before continuing with “We questioned Mr. Jones about who might have a problem with Mr. Higgins which said that you were the only one causing him problems. He wanted us to believe that you beat up Mr. Higgins. We also noticed that whenever we were questioning him, he would hide his hands underneath something, away from our sight. When we asked to see his hands, his hands was bruised and cut up from the fight. We arrested him after the second visit. He admitted to the fight and beating up Mr. Higgins.”