Dinner Date

Julie pulled back the curtains and looked out the window for the nine hundred thousand eight hundred sixty-third time.

It was mostly dark outside and nothing moved on suburban Cranberry Street except the wind-swept trees. Absolutely nothing.

“You’re being a goose,” she muttered to herself, letting the curtain fall into place. She turned back toward the living room and paced to the sofa, sitting on the edge of the armrest. “She’ll be here. It’s not even full dark, yet. The sun’s barely set and she said she’d get here a little after sundown.”

Which held Julie for all of forty-nine seconds before she jumped up and was pacing, again, this time to the mantle which was crammed with family photos—some family’s photos—and the mirror above it.

She stared into the reflective surface for nearly a minute, in pure frustration at her own forgetfulness.

Force of habit, she thought ruefully, turning away from mirror and mantle. Then she paced to the window again, twitching the curtains aside.

Still nothing and no one.

Grumbling under her breath, Julie stalked over to the sofa once more and flopped down on it grabbing the television remote. She turned on the television and flipped through the channels without seeing them, not pausing on any one station for longer than a second, till a word from a talking head on W-KTH caught her attention:

“. . . exanguination and mutilation of the bodies. The FBI has no comment so far on what is believed to be a rash of similar serial killings all across the state.” The talking head paused to give the camera a momentarily dour and disapproving face. Then he was all smiles again. “And, in local news, a dog named Hero truly lived up to his name when—”

Julie turned the television off with a huff and stood up again, straightening her floral-print dress and smoothing her dark hair.

She was halfway to the window once more, her low heels clicking discreetly on the hard-wood floor, when the doorbell rang its merry little jingle. Repressing the urge to bound to the door like an excited puppy, Julie made her way sedately down the short front hall in a series of perfectly spaced clicks.

She took an unnecessary breath and opened the door.

There, on her porch, dressed in a black button-down shirt, black skinny jeans, and black Converse All-Stars, holding out a matte-black rose, was Cassidy Rae Duffy.

“You made it,” Julie said with barely-hidden relief, and Cassidy Rae grinned, showing off white-white teeth.

“I said I would,” she replied smoothly, running a hand through hair the exact color of the shadow under a raven’s wing. Her dark eyes scanned Julie appreciatively, and she took a step forward, as if to enter the house. Then she paused, her eyes running over the door frame before ticking back to Julie. “Gonna invite me in, babe?”

“Oh!” Julie stepped back and aside and gestured for Cassidy Rae to enter. “I invite you in,” she said with mock gravity and formality. Cassidy Rae’s smile widened and she stepped in, past Julie, bringing with her the scents of the fall night. Julie shivered, her excitement briefly taking her over before she tamped it down. It wouldn’t do to appear over-eager.

As Cassidy Rae passed Julie, she paused and presented Julie with the rose by way of a small flourish, and Julie took it with a sigh. “It’s lovely.”

“Not as lovely as you, pretty lady,” Cassidy Rae said with a suave smirk and a wink. Julie could’ve blushed, though not really. Her blushing days were long gone.

“This is a nice place,” Cassidy Rae noted as she took in the living room and Julie smiled, turning back to the door. To the night . . . the last of the light had finally gone and Julie closed her eyes, taking a deep, relieved breath.

“So, I have to ask,” Cassidy Rae called from the vicinity of the sofa, “why it was so important that I not get here before sunset?”

Julie grinned, showing white-white, sharp teeth of her own to the black-black night, before shutting the door and leaning on it. “No reason,” she said lightly, strolling down the short front hallway to the living room with more perfectly spaced clicks of her low, sensible heels. Cassidy Rae was carefully checking her dyed-black hair in the mantle mirror. Julie smiled blandly and licked her lips. “No reason at all. But you’re just in time for dinner . . . have a seat.”

END