Peach Bellini

For the third time in a week, Brit peeked in the window after dark. She couldn’t help herself, really. The glow looked too inviting, too enticing for her to ignore.

“Where are you, miss Catherine?” Brit muttered as she peered over the sill. “Your candle is lit, your Netflix is on… but where are you?”

Brit shifted on her knees. She built up a little pile of leaves to act as a cushion, but it was getting late in the season, so the leaves had lost their crunchiness and simply gone soggy. The damp seeped through the knees of her jeans, but Brit usually stopped feeling discomfort the moment Catherine was settled in her bedroom.

It was her favorite pastime, sitting at Catherine’s window. She’d started during her first organic chemistry class. Her roommate had just moved out abruptly and it had her feeling off-balance. When she went for a walk to clear her head, it was Catherine’s window that caught her eye. And now, to Brit’s knowledge, Catherine liked to come home every day at five-thirty and head to her bedroom for an evening of reality TV with a candle burning by the window. Brit could smell the scented candle when the wind blew the right and the candle window was her favorite window.

She could smell it now. Peach bellini. A new show was auto-playing and cast the room in a wash of bright, shifting blue.

But… no Catherine. Brit shifted her weight again. It wasn’t unusual for Catherine to skip dinner and have a shower instead, but she never left the candle unattended.

“What are you doing, Catherine? Where are you?”

Brit pulled on the ties on the hood of her university sweatshirt to keep some of the cool breeze off her face. She wasn’t technically allowed to be wearing the jacket anymore, per her agreement with the university, but she’d ignored most of the stipulations. She kept her favorite lucky sweater and wore it religiously whenever she visited her friend.

From her spot by the window, Brit could see Catherine’s degree framed on the far wall and her chest swelled with pride. Catherine successfully earned her degree, secured a job, and progressed into a proper career in just a few years. Despite not having moved on from her first apartment and Brit’s discomfort with her living on the first floor, Catherine seemed to manage just fine. 

The warm haze of pride ebbed from Brit’s vision as she focused again. Not knowing where Catherine was was beginning to worry her. She rarely strayed from her habits and routine. Brit scanned the room again, looking for any sign of her friend, when a car turned down the street with its high beams on.

“Ugh,” she scoffed. “Asshole. Turn your brights off.”

The car’s headlights illuminated Brit’s hiding spot in the side yard briefly before turning into the apartment complex drive and parking crookedly in one of the Visitor Only spots. The driver had barely turned off the car before he was nearly sprinting to Catherine’s door.

“Addison!”

Bang! Bang! Bang!

He slammed his fist on the door so forcefully and suddenly that Brit jumped. “Addy! Addy, open the door!”

Who the hell was Addy?

Brit had to stop herself from hopping up and insisting the man lower his voice. She knew Catherine just wanted her evenings to be relaxing, and this man was anything but.

“Addison!”

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Just as Brit was about to stand and speak, Catherine appeared at the door. She flung it open with a look of admirable resolution, and Brit was glad that her friend would give this guy a piece of her mind.

“Nate,” Catherine said breathlessly. “What are you doing here?”

Did she know this bozo?

“I know who it is!” Nate said, rushing to get the words out before Catherine could slam the door in his face. “I know who she is, Addy. Her name is Brittany Locke.”

Well… fuck.

Brit’s heart plummeted and found itself somewhere near her small intestines. As she knelt by the window, she began to lose feeling in her legs. She had remained hidden between the hydrangea bushes but would need to move so her feet didn’t go completely numb. Nate and Catherine were just feet away, though. She couldn’t afford to make any noise.

“Brittany Locke?” Catherine asked. “How do you—I don’t even know who that is.”

“She’s the only person who went to school at the same time as you who got complaints about stalking. It was her roommate, so they couldn’t really prove it since they lived together, but the roommate left campus altogether. Fully had to escape in the middle of the night. She’s a suspect in two other cases just like yours. She’s a nut job, Addy.”

Catherine let out a huge breath, shoulders slumped. Brit thought her friend had aged ten years in the time it took for Nate to finish his sentence.

“Come on,” Nate said, his voice softened considerably. “Let’s get you a bag, you can stay at my place tonight.”

Brit was swimming in panic. They knew her name. But she wasn’t on campus! It should be fine! She was just checking on Catherine and making sure she was okay!

Catherine threw clothes into a backpack while Brit watched, frozen, until Nate had driven her friend away in the dark sedan, high beams blazing.

Ten minutes. Less than ten minutes for Nate, whoever he was, to take Brit’s best friend from her. She felt cold, her hands clammy and skin pimpled, and glanced back at the window.

She’d left the candle burning. In her hurry to leave, Catherine forgot to blow it out.

Brit reached up, cracked her knuckles, and slid the window up in one swift movement. She slid her gaze over to the parking lot to ensure they were gone.

Once satisfied, Brit reached in, tipped the candle over with one finger, and made sure the curtains caught. When she was sure the linen was going to go up, she slid the window back into place.

And she ran.