seymoure

Chapter 43
“The Third”

Harriett Dante was aware of the mustiness of the room. There was dusty clutter everywhere, and light peeked from under the door at the far end of the room.

Her knee hit something that clattered across the room with a tinny clang. She froze and listened.

When nothing answered the raucous noise with action, she moved to the door. Tentatively she reached for the knob. Cautiously her hand moved towards the metal ball, and she let the tips of her fingers brush against it. When no electricity jumped out and met her digits she grabbed the door knob and turned.

As though there were nothing else to be done, the door opened, without the slightest creak.

She recognized this place.

To her right was a Men’s room. She had seen it, just before she entered it and vanished. She was back in that same Diner. Or was she?

There was no one here.

She walked to the counter, leaned across and took a pot of coffee and a cup. She scanned the entirety of what was visible and no one was there.

She sat and drank and wondered where everyone was, and why she had returned here.

She continued to think as she wolfed down a piece of pie. She hadn’t realized that she was hungry, but the food reminded her.

The mirror behind the pie case showed her that she was no longer a walking mummy. Not only was she not bandaged, she was no longer injured.

This whole thing was a new start, but she had to be careful. This monster was not to be trusted for a second.

She would never feel completely clean after what he did to her in the library. She had been sorry to treat Aubrey Stillwell so angrily, but there was really nothing for it. Anything that would remind her of that hideous experience was not to be tolerated.

She reached under her coat and found her 45’s. Upon inspection they were found to be operational and fully loaded.

Then she saw something beside the booth by the door. On the floor was her “bag of violence.”

That, also, was fully loaded.

Out the door she saw her car.

There were cars up and down the street, but no people to drive them. The clock by the grill said it was noon.

This place should have been full.

So, it only looked like the diner she had visited.

She wondered what this place would be like at midnight.