The Divine Whisper (10 page)

“No.
If you would have given me a chance, I would have told you that before you came in.” The stopping on the steps behind her made her quicken her pace to make it to an open area.

Waving as if it was no big deal, she started to take in her surroundings.
“No need. I’ll just have a look around, and then we can talk some.”

Hearing a door slam in the hallway behind her, she turned to see Ben’s wife hobble out of a room, and head in their direction.
“Hello Evelyn.”

“What is
she
doing here?” she sneered in Nicole’s direction while passing to get to the living room.

Before she could answer, Benjamin walked passed her, and moved into the living room as well.
“She’s snooping again.”

“It is a random house check, and I do this for the welfare of Shane.”
She defended herself and watched as they pushed magazines to the side and onto the floor so they could sit down.

Picking up a remote, Evelyn started flipping channels.
“Shane’s fine. He’s not here, so you can come back another time.”

“I tried to tell her that, but she said that she still needs to look around.”
Benjamin tried to explain.

Evelyn turned her gaze once more toward Nicole.
“Maybe we should sue you for harassment.”

Taking out her forms, Nicole made her way into the kitchen to look around.
Out of sight, she finally let into the urge, and rolled her eyes. “You go right ahead with that.” There was no response, and the only sound was from the television, so she continued on.

The kitchen looked good enough.
Dirty dishes in the sink and the counters needing wiped down were not indiscretions. Opening the fridge, she noticed that everything looked in place, but there was not as much food as she would have liked to have seen. Walking over to the cupboards, she opened them up, and saw the lack of food in there as well. Taking note, she moved on.

Walking down the hall, she peered into the open bathroom and spare room only to be impressed on how picked up they were.
Turning the nob to the Master Bedroom, she opened the door and was stunned at what was found. Clothes were scattered on the floor, cigarette burns were on the bed and carpet, and a part of a slice of pizza was seen upside down and halfway under the bed. The stench reminded her of a urinal; so bad that she had to quickly step back out into the hallway and shut the door.

With one hand still on the handle, she shut her eyes and threw her other hand over her mouth and nose.
Don’t get sick! Not here
, she thought. Once the initial wave of nausea passed, she looked down at her paperwork, and took comfort in the order and precision of them. Holding onto that feeling, she clicked open her pen.

Making more notes on things to talk with them about, she turned around to move to the basement.
When she made her way to the stairs, she had to pass the living room, and saw the couple was engrossed in what they were watching. “Where is Shane, anyway?”

The question made them jump, as if they had forgotten she was there.
They glanced at each other before Evelyn looked back in her direction. “He’s at a friend’s house.”

“Okay.”
Nodding in understanding, Nicole turned to go down the stairs. Something was off, she could feel it. It was the same feeling that she’d gotten three months ago when she first came here.

The stairs creaked as she walked down the first set of steps, then again on the second.
The smell of mildew and must slowly increased the farther down she made it, and the damp air in the basement, she guessed, was the reason why.

Opening the door to the left, she shivered at the cold air that had seeped into the garage.
Looking around, she saw the cars parked in the garage, but nothing else of great importance. Shutting the door, she turned to make her way into the laundry room. At closer inspection, she noticed water around the base and behind the washing machine. By the looks of it, the thing had been leaking for a while. She peered over the top, and noticed the black on the floor and on the wall. If her guess was correct, this was what the cause of the mildew smell throughout the house was.

Leaving the laundry room, she grabbed the doorknob to the last room she had to inspect, and it was locked.
What the hell? Knowing that this was Shane’s room, she jiggled the handle once more and whispered his name. When nothing happened, she stopped to listen for any noise upstairs. When everything was silent except for the slight hum of the television, she reached up to pull a hair pin from her hair, and stuck it into the hole on the nob to try to get it open.

Picking locks was a talent that she had acquired earlier on in life, before she made it into the system.
It was nothing extravagant, and she could only do it with simple household locks, but once in a while it came in handy, like now.

Once she got the lock popped, she pulled back the strand of hair that had fallen and put the pin back in her hair, precisely where it had been before.

Carefully opening the door, she looked around to take it all in.
The room was picked up of all clutter, and was fairly clean. “Shane?”

She said his name, but she could tell that he wasn’t there.
The room was too put together, and nothing looked disturbed. What drew her eyes to the back of the room was the gigantic mural that took up two different walls. It was dark and somewhat disturbing.

The way it was painted; one wall preceded the other.
From left to right, the mural depicted a battle on one end, with figures she couldn’t quite make out, and moved to the next wall that showed a field painted in red. She was assuming that the red was there to represent the blood from the carnage going on in the scene.

In the far right was a massive wave of water that looked as if it would crash into the field at any moment.
Vaguely, she wondered what the field would look like once washed away by the wave. Would it be completely destroyed or would it look as if nothing had ever happened there?

Taking out her phone, she held it out and took a few shots of the mural, some close and others far away.
It was a magnificent piece of work, and she wished Shane was here to talk with her about it. Putting her phone away, a spot of white on the wall caught her eye, and she was drawn in to take a closer look. In the field, there was a man standing tall with his long white hair blowing in the wind. He was not old by any means, but in fact looked to be in his mid-thirties, and was pointing in the direction of another man. The other man’s face was contorted with anger and his hand was raised as if to strike. In front of him was a disturbing vision of a woman and child, kneeling and cowering in fear.

Quickly, Nicole looked away from the trio, and returned her attention to the man with the white hair.
He looked almost angry himself.
He must be ordering that man to stop what he was doing
, she guessed. Taking her hand, she lightly ran it over the painting where the unknown man stood.

“Kind of eerie, isn’t it?”

The deep voice behind her made her yelp and jump back from the wall.
Smoothing a hand down her skirt to regain her composure, she turned to see Benjamin standing close, a little too close, behind her. She had let down her guard, and that was something she never did it these situations.

Sidestepping away from him, she made it to the center of the room before she spoke.
“Yes, well… it’s actually quite remarkable that a ten year old did all of this. You have a very talented son.”

He said nothing, but instead showed his distaste of the walls.

“Anyways, we have a few things to talk about before I’m on my way.”

Completely ignoring her statement, he took a step in her direction, and looked at her quizzically.
“You know… I could have sworn this room was locked.”

Not missing a beat, she scrunched her eyebrows down, and looked mildly shocked.
“Really? I just walked right in.” It wasn’t a lie, so much as omitting the fact that she had to unlock it before “walking right in”. Not letting him say another word, she turned and gestured towards the laundry room. “Now, we need to talk about a few things.”

She led him into the laundry room, and showed him the problem with the water.
Once he grudgingly agreed to have someone come in and look at it, they left the room to head back up to the stairs.

Halfway up the first set of stairs, Nicole heard a subtle commotion in the garage, and stopped where she was.
“What was that?”

“That?
It’s nothing. Could just be a mouse got in there, is all.” Benjamin, who almost ran into her when she stopped, nudged her forward a little to get her to move. Instead of moving up though, she turned around to go back downstairs.

Once she was turned, she was almost nose to nose with the large man, and he looked as if he wasn’t going to let her back down there.
“Why don’t we take another look, just in case?”

Glaring at her, he slowly stepped to the side so she could pass, but his eyes never left her face.
The effect was instantaneous, and as she passed by him on the steps, she released a slight shiver at the close contact. This man made her skin crawl, and she hated it.

This time when she opened the garage door, she stepped inside and made her way around the large SUV.
There was still nothing there that was out of the ordinary. Through the entire visit, she had felt as if they were hiding something. Maybe she had been wrong. Maybe they were really turning around.

As she made her way around the second car, she noticed a movement by the wall.
Walking all the way around, she saw a young boy, sitting on the small concrete ledge against the wall. In his hands was a small thick rope that Nicole knew was used as his security object. He always fiddled with it when his emotions were too strong to handle.

“Shane!
What are you doing in here?” Nicole walked up and hunched in front of him. When she put her hand on his arm to get his attention, she felt how cold he was. “Oh my! You’re freezing; let’s get you in the house.”

With a slight pull upwards, she tried to get him to stand.
He looked up at her, quickly darted his gaze to his dad, then to the floor as he stood up.

“When did you get home from your friend’s, son?”

At the sound of his father’s voice, he shrugged off her hold on him to stand on his own.
Still staring at the floor, he mumbled, “Just a few minutes ago.”

“Well, let’s all get back inside the house.
It’s too cold to stay in here.” Nicole let Shane go first, but quickly followed to keep Benjamin behind them.

Once they were back in the house, Shane looked perplexed as to where to go next.
At first, he was about to go up the steps, but then changed his mind to go to his room.

“Shane, why don’t you come upstairs with us?” she stopped him.
“That way, we can all talk together.”

Shane darted a questioning look to his father but quickly masked it before looking back at her.
“Um… okay?”

His reluctance was not lost on her, and once again she wondered what was going on in the house.

All three of them made their way into the living room where Evelyn was gazing at the TV.

“Evelyn.”
Nicole tried to get her attention, but her attention never wavered from the screen. Looking over, she saw that there was an infomercial for a new steam mop on. What was so fascinating? Trying once again, Nicole spoke louder this time. “Evelyn!”

When there was still no response, she looked exasperatedly over at Benjamin, asking for help in an unspoken way.

Looking put out; he let out a loud sigh, and stomped over to his wife. Leaning down, he nudged her, and successfully made her snap out of her musings.

“What?
What I miss?” Evelyn sat up straighter, glancing back and forth, looking in a sort of panic. When her gaze landed on Shane, that was then sitting on their couch, she scowled. When her gaze hit Nicole though, she quickly smiled before looking back to her son. “Home already, Shane?”

“Yeah.”

Does he always mumble when he speaks, or is it just around me
, Nicole thought? Looking him over, she saw how his t-shirt and jeans had seen better days, and were worn almost to nothing in spots. Noticing the goose bumps on his forearms, and taking in his hunched posture, she grabbed the blanket from the back of the couch, and wrapped it around him.

“Isn’t your heat on?”
Nicole was chilly in her coat, and knew this boy had to be freezing.

“Furnace is broken.
We’ve been using space heaters until we have enough money saved to get it fixed.” Benjamin’s response had Nicole looking around, and she finally noticed the small heater in the corner of the room.

“Where are the other ones?”
Nicole wasn’t looking at him, still concentrating on getting Shane warmed up.

“Our bedroom and the kitchen.”

“How long has it been out?”