A Knock at the Door

        The chill filled the air and traveled through her bones. The bed whined slightly as she turned over. She couldn’t bear to look at the ceiling one second more on this sleepless night. Her current view, her nightstand, was not much better. As she stared at the picture of an elated bride and groom, she could not help but to notice the hopeful gleam in their eyes shone brightly. Their smiles stretched across their faces to an almost painful degree. She could no longer recognize those people in that photo. It had been a long time since she felt even remotely happy, and the photo was driving the point home. She reached for the cellphone that laid beside the photo. Before her fingers could brush across the screen, a knock at the door disturbed her silence.

               As she descended the stairs with her phone in hand, the knocks grew more and more frantic. “Baby, please open the door,” said the voice from the other side. She stopped her descent immediately and sat down on a stair. “Sweetie, it’s me,” he called to her. She remained silent. “Please open the door and let me in. We need to talk about everything,” he begged. “I know you are very angry at me, and you have every right to be. Please talk to me.” When he received no response, he sighed heavily, leaned forward, and propped his forehead against the door. “Do you remember our first date? I had the absolute perfect picnic set up, but you warned me that it going to rain. I didn’t want to believe you, but there we were, just a couple of hours later, caught in possibly the worst downpour I had ever seen. The only thing keeping us dry was the massive leaves of the only tree in the park. I gave you my jacket to cover your head. You did not want your shoes to get wet. So, I had you to climb upon my back and carried you home. Man, it felt like miles, but what I wouldn’t give to do that all over again,” he said as a small smile crept across his face.

               “Our wedding day was something else, wasn’t it?” he continued to reminisce. “We halted the entire ceremony because you lost your necklace. I even came out the groom’s quarters to help you look for it. There we were, you in your gown and me in my tuxedo, crawling on the ground and making sure we never caught a glimpse of each other. I wanted to peek at you, but I was so worried about that superstition. Seeing you walk down the aisle, radiant and blushing, was worth the wait. We were such a great team. We still are,” he said. The small golden Celtic cross pendant glistened as she toyed with it in nervousness and mild frustration. “You’ve kept our wedding photo on the nightstand despite everything, and I know for a fact that you are still wearing that very necklace. All this tells me is that you feel the same for me as I do you,” he argued. As he pressed his ear against the door, he could hear some slight shuffling. She made her way to the front door and pressed herself against it. He swore he could feel her warmth and energy through the door. The feeling was intoxicating for him.

               “Do you realize how far back you had to go find any good memories?” she answered. “The saddest part was that those stories weren’t happy, at least not for me. When you carried me home, you constantly complained about your wet suede jacket. Your jacket was going to get wet regardless of who was using it, but that did not stop you from guilting me into buying you a brand new one. I saved it for our anniversary, but what did I get in return? You bought me a $5 necklace from a thrift store only because you passed the store on your way home. It’s the thought that counts, right?”

               “On our wedding day, bad luck due to seeing me in wedding dress before the ceremony was far from your mind. You were afraid to look at me because you were worried that I would notice how hungover you were,” she said. He drew a sharp intake of breath, hoping that she didn’t hear it. She continued, “I threw my necklace across the room in a rage. The blush in my cheeks was from the humiliation of finding out that you cheated on me during your bachelor party. I searched for that necklace because I had to buy time to convince myself that our relationship was worth the hassle. I made so many excuses for you throughout our entire marriage. All this cheap jewelry ended up being was an ornate albatross around my neck.”

          In a panic, he responded, “Forget about everything! Throw the necklace away! Please just open the door. Let me in and we can start completely over. I cannot lose you. I will not lose you.” She trembled with silent anger. “So, after all this time, you show up on my doorstep to beg for forgiveness. You can’t or won’t bring yourself to say the words ‘I’m sorry’, and I’m just supposed to grant you another chance because you feel entitled to it?  I do not have any chances left to give you. Your verbal and emotional attacks chewed away at my mind, body, and soul. I refuse to go back to the late nights, waiting for you to come home. I refuse to go back to smelling another woman’s perfume in your clothes and on your pillow. I refuse to go back to cleaning up all the blood that dripped onto the bathroom sink and the floor from the marks on neck and from the scratches down your back. When I confronted you about your affair, your lies were like a stake through my heart. And like the broken record of empty promises and undeserved absolution, you’ve come crawling back to me because your lover grew bored with you and found another victim,” she said. “I have thought about this moment for a very long time, not knowing if I would ever see you again. Do I choose to move on, or do I choose to go back to my life with you? What I have chosen to do is…” He could hear her rummage through the drawer of the end table by the door. Hope rose within him as he heard the locks click. He beamed as she opened the door. “To return the favor,” she finished as she shoved a stake through his stake. His fanged face contorted with a look of pained horror as he clutched the stake and collapsed on her porch.

               The moonlight, acting as a supernatural spotlight, shone upon his corpse. She ripped her necklace from her neck and dropped it upon his body. She gazed upon him as the cross pendant seared into his flesh. The buzzing of her phone pulled her attention away from ex-husband. “News Alert” flashed across her screen.

               Breaking News: Graves and mausoleums vandalized. Rise in bodies drained of blood. Stay indoors! Updates to come.

               She swiped away the message and snapped a photo of his face, still frozen in a state shock. His mouth was agape; his fangs glistened from the illumination of the moon. Noticing all the fresh dirt and mud that seemed to have traveled with him from his grave, she walked to the closet under her stairs and pulled out a broom and dustpan. She hovered over him and declared, “I can bury you 6ft underground, but you’ll somehow manage to come back to me, only to leave me to clean up your mess.”