Chapter 3: Meadow Saffrons

April

Cali and Margot sat in silence, they both watched over the girl as she slept. She had long since woken up from the injuries and the bloodloss, but she was far from ready to live in the waking world. She was still far from taking that leap of faith. “She doesn’t have any family.” Cali whispered more to herself than to Margot.

“She’ll probably have to go into the system.” Margot turned her head, her worried and furrowed expression spoke loud enough for her. Neither of them wanted this girl to have to go through more than she already has. She was just a kid, not yet out of high school.

“She can’t.” Cali put her cheek in her hand “I can’t let that happen.” 

“What did your wife say?” Margot’s head tilted, she already knew the answer to her question. She knew the answer before Cali could ask.

“She…” Cali’s nose crinkled and scrunched as her hand ran over her face. “I tried to talk to her about it but…”

“She said no.”

“She said no…” Cali could feel her chin buckle and her eyes warm as they fogged over. Margot placed a gentle hand on her shoulder as she watched the tears stream down her face. They couldn’t let her go.

“What about Hanes?” Margot spoke soft and tender, they needed someone. They needed to find her a home they knew she would be safe in, a home that was simple, comfortable, easy to adapt to with the new life she would be given.

“He can’t. He has his own kids to worry about.” Cali choked through her words, her voice brittle and barely holding it’s quiet temper together.

There was a silence as they watched the girl shift in her hospital bed. Cali wiped her face and leaned back in her seat, her eyes red and puffy. “Michael?” Margot said with a tone that was more subconscious, as if it were a thought that had escaped her mind.

“Michael?” Cali’s head turned. “I don’t know if he can handle this, he killed her dad.”

“No, he killed her killer.” Margot’s brows furrowed. “He wasn’t a father. A father doesn’t murder his family simply because he’s afraid of getting caught.” She exhaled all the air in her lungs. “If he didn’t do what he did, she wouldn’t be here.” Cali frowned.

“Let’s hope she’s as grateful as you think she is.” Cali’s attention shifted to the girl as her body stretched and recoiled in on itself. Their solemn and melancholic expression quickly took a warmer and kinder look.

Elizabeth Stevens, she was short, kind faced with eyes that leaned wide and fawn like. Yet those eyes stared at the wall with a lack of give. She stared with a lack of love for life. “How are you feeling?” Margot spoke up, her voice coated with sugar and honey to ease her into the thought of living again. 

Elizabeth was quiet for a long time before she sat up slowly. She was dull and lacked anything more than a tired gaze that yearned for something that had long since passed her. “Better.” What better meant in this situation wasn’t based on how she was feeling, but more how she was feeling. Was her body able to stand, was it able to walk, yes. Was her mind all there and well? No. “Better…” She repeated with a much softer voice.

“Do you want to go outside? It’s gonna be nice out today.” Cali gave her a smile that did it’s best to reassure her. The girl held her arms close to her body, pulling them as if they would run away had she let go. 

“Sure.” Even though she would have been fine committing to sloth, the idea of seeing the sky once again made her chest shiver, and her heart tried to flee from it’s cage, if only to touch the sky.

As the three stood in the sun, dappled by leaves shading them, Cali and Margot could see a glimmer of the girl Elizabeth used to be. As she stood under the warmth, under the freshly golden light, she could breathe. While she couldn’t get herself to bathe, to change, to brush her teeth or brush her hair, she could stand in the strands of comfort. She felt her lungs fill with the smell of a cruel and beautiful world, one she now questioned as it had taken everything from her. In this warmth, in this comfort knowing she was alive, she felt her stomach and heart rise into her throat. She felt her face heat up, she felt her lungs struggle to keep the heaves of desperation in. And suddenly, like a dam had fallen down, she began to sob. It wasn’t only a sob, but it was the deafening sound of a child mourning it’s happiest days. 

Seeing Elizabeth sob so visceral, seeing her wail and cry with her whole being caught both Cali and Margot so violently off guard that they too felt their eyes water. Margot held Elizabeth as she felt the girl’s body convulse and tense in on itself. They couldn’t let her go, they couldn’t let her steep further into this pit she had found herself in. Margot and Cali shared a passing look, they had to try Michael. They couldn’t let her go.

“What if it was my fault?” Elizabeth spoke with a torn and brittle voice that came out between fits of hyperventilation. Cali put her hand on Margot’s shoulder as the woman held onto the child.

“It was never your fault.” She didn’t know exactly what to say, what would someone say in this situation? Would they say anything at all? “He was supposed to be your dad, and he betrayed that trust, that role.” Her eyebrows furrowed into a bow.

“But he was my dad!” Elizabeth couldn’t see, the blurry figures of the women she had begun thinking to be her guardian angels stood close, yet her eyes faded them to look far away. “He was my dad…” The warmth of the sun on her face as she heaved and gasped for any air grounded her in this reality. This reality she oh so hoped wasn’t true. Her mind wanted to stay in that house, the house where she spent days of laughter and childish joy. She wanted to feel that joy, she wanted to dream of it, to find herself falling asleep content with the possibility she wouldn’t wake up from the everlasting dream.

Anderson sat at his desk, in silence he had begun to reflect on the sessions he and Dr.Grohm had the previous month. His face was held firmly in his hands as his eyes gazed with furrowed brows through the window, he couldn’t place if he was pretentious or simply eloquently spoken. 

Everything he said was like it was written somewhere in a poem, how he could describe those crime scenes as works of art and beauty and not think it to be any sort of wrong. He could hear his voice call those bodies Roman Statues, he could feel him looming over him. He could feel the mere presence as the long boney fingers slid over his shoulders and delicately around his neck. He leaned back in his seat as feathers scratched his skin, as the smell of rotting meat filled his nose and head. He hung his head back and closed his eyes, this house haunted him, the malformed animalistic skull that had no defining traits seemed to glare at him without eyes.

Anderson only opened his eyes when he heard a knock on the door, and suddenly the sun had begun to set. He rubbed his face and stared at the time for a moment on his phone, 7:46pm. He jumped at the sound of a more aggressive knock followed by a voice “Michael? Are you home?” Margot’s voice muffled through the door. 

She jolted as he swung the door open, he looked a mess, however when didn’t he these days? She sood with her hands folded neatly against her skirt, it couldn’t have been long since she ended her last session for the day. “What’s, uhm, what’s going on?” Anderson spoke, his voice cracking into gravled whispers.

“I want to talk to you about something.” She paused, how would she phrase it? How did you ask someone for something like this? “It’s important.” Anderson blinked a few times, not fully aware of the situation.

He stepped aside and made way as his, debatable, friend passed him by almost as if this were her own home. She stood in the archway that separated the livingroom and the mudroom, staring at the state of the home. Things hadn’t been properly put away, there were coats and thick overshirts draped over the back of the couch and even one of the dining table chairs. “So, what’d you want to talk about?” Anderson’s voice came from behind her.

“How has, therapy been?” Margot walked through the living room, visually picking apart every little thing. To her, some clothing tossed about in one’s own home made them a messy person, when in reality Anderson kept the home relatively clean. The mud room had no mud, the kitchen had no dishes left in the sink, and his desk had only papers and notes strung about the surface. 

“You came here to ask me about therapy?” Anderson leaned against the archway. “It’s been fine.” his tone was more than suspicious of Margot. There was something else stirring in her head, he could see it in her eyes, he could see it in her hands and how they scratched at her purse’s handle.

“Dr.Grohm hasn’t been giving you any trouble?” Her smile was awkward and forced, along with her concern. 

Anderson exhaled roughly through his nose, more in a grumbled huff. “He’s a character, pretentious, but a character.” His brows furrowed and the corners of his mouth had pulled into a frown. “Margot.” He paused, watching her false concern turn into guilt. “What happened.”

“It’s, Elizabeth.” She finally released the air held in her lungs. “She has no family that can take her in. Both parents were only children, and her grandparents have been deceased for years.” Anderson’s thumb and index came to his forehead as he let out a groan. “I know this is asking a lot of you- Especially since you-”

“I can’t.”

Margot went quiet. Her jaw clenched, he could, and she was sure of it. “You can.”

“Excuse me?”

“You can.”

“Margot, I’m not taking in a kid who-”

“You are. You are going to clean yourself up, you’re going to clean this house up, and you are going to make that girl- Who lost everything, feel like she has a place in this world.” The two stood there in silence, Anderson’s eyes had widened with some kind of fear towards Margot. She had him wrapped around her finger when push came to shove. He was so susceptible to her sternness and her more commanding side that he didn’t dare go against her word. 

Anderson let out a frustrated sigh, he rubbed his face and ran his hands through to his hair. “What do you want me to do, she doesn’t know me- I killed her dad. Most people wouldn’t want to even meet that person.” He already knew that there wasn’t much of a way out of this. And if there was? It was packaged and wrapped with a bow of guilt. 

His brows furrowed into a bow as he waited for a response from Margot, he could see the world of thoughts behind her eyes and how they threatened to flow out like water from a dam. “We won’t sugar coat things for her. She’ll understand what happened and why it happened, but we’re going to make you likable.” He rolled his eyes and turned. “You’re going to clean up nice, wear- something nicer, and you’re going to ditch that god awful aftershave and get something-”

“Nicer?” He spoke with an exasperated tone. “You’ve made it abundantly clear that I’m not nice enough, so why are you still set on this? We can’t even guarantee she’ll forgive me even after we help her understand what happened. We don’t know if she’ll ever understand!” His voice raised as his face found itself with a smile laced with the venom of anger, the kind you get when you’re in such a bewildered state of frustration that you can’t help but feel in some way amused by the situation. 

“Because you are our last option Michael. You aren’t the first person I’ve asked.” 

“Then why don’t you take her in? It’s not like you’ve got anything going on!” 

“I’m not home enough to take care of a god damn child Michael! I’m barely home enough to have a cat!” 

The two stood there, Anderson took a deep breath that curled his lips in. Was he really the second, third, fourth option? Was he truly that insignificant? Was he too rude, or messy? Was he too far away? Was he off putting? His angered and dark expression had waltzed it’s way into defeat, she always made him feel defeated. She always made him feel worse about who he was, about how he lived, how he ate, how he existed. 

“Remember what we talked about.” Margot and Anderson sat in her car, sitting in front of the hospital. Cali leaned in from the back seat, her elbows on the center console as she stared at Andeson.

“You’ll do fine. She’s a good kid.” Her smile was warm, if not excited for the two to finally meet proper. Her optimism was her only flaw in Anderson’s eyes, she couldn’t think how this could possibly go wrong or sour, she couldn’t fathom Anderson and Elizabeth in a situation where they didn’t get along. However Margot expected this to go incredibly bad.