The Prediction, page 2
“Sherry resurrects the game every year.” Monroe mocked. “She writes all the comments down from the previous year and reads them back to us on the first of the following year.”
“Harmless fun,” Luke said.
Thea kept her inclination to disagree to herself. “Do the same people play the game every year?”
“All of us here tonight played the past two years. I started the game at a party fifteen years ago and haven’t missed,” Sherry said, hugging a notebook to herself.
Something purple stained the plain blue cover. No writing on the outside indicated what the pages held. Then Sherry set the notebook in front of her and opened it. The inside contained more stains and Sherry’s barely legible handwriting. “Some day I want to get this entered into my computer.”
She flipped several pages forward and stopped. “These are the predictions from last year. Melissa predicted Hilary Clinton would become president. Since it wasn’t an election year, Melissa was so wrong.”
“I don’t think you wrote down exactly what I said,” Melissa said. “I said sometime she would become president.”
“Which doesn’t follow the rules of the game. The predictions have to happen within the year.” Sherry continued, “Melissa also said Charlie would get divorced.”
Luke laughed. “Instead, Charlie and Sarah have a baby and are glued together.”
The rest of the group joined in the laugh, except for Melissa, who muttered, “In spite of the affair he had.”
Thea started to enjoy herself and relaxed against the couch cushion. The game was just a lark to them, nothing to get upset over. They couldn’t really make predictions.
Sherry flipped a page in the notebook. “The next prediction was Luke’s.”
“I have no idea what I said.”
“You rarely do, since you’re always wrong.” Sherry smirked. “You said you’d sell this house, which we’re partying in right now. Which also went against the rules. You aren’t supposed to predict anything about yourself because you can influence the outcome.”
“You have more rules than the government,” Keith told her, exchanging his empty Diet Coke for a fresh one.
Sherry ignored him. “And Luke said we’d get an inch of rain on August twentieth. We had one hundred degrees and no moisture all week.”
“What a stupid thing to predict,” Keith said. “Rain in August, here in the dry Midwest. Buddy, get a grip.” He took another swig of soda and then took a handful of pretzels from a bag on his lap.
Luke leaned forward and jabbed him in the shoulder. “Oh, yeah? Let’s hear what brilliant ideas Keithy-boy came up with last year.”
“Keith said we’d have a record one hundred inches of snow. We didn’t come close to setting a record.”
“You guys are as good as the weather people,” Thea said. “Is that the best you can do?”
Luke put his arm around her shoulders. “This year’s going to be different. Wait and see. I’ll be two for two.”
“In your dreams, man,” Keith said.
Luke smiled, and Thea missed the recital of Keith’s other prediction as she admired the gleam of Luke’s smile.
“Sherry, it’s your turn,” Melissa said. “Listen to this, Thea. Sherry’s guesses are way off the wall.”
“They are not,” Sherry said. She brought the notebook up to her chest in a protective hug.
Keith winked at Thea. “Let Thea decide.”
Melissa hit his shoulder.
Sherry didn’t laugh with the rest of them. She bent over the notebook, as if ready to unveil some great revelation. “I said the US would discover aliens exist.”
They all groaned.
She appealed to Thea. “They do exist. There have been lots of studies. What about the one...”
Keith patted Sherry’s shoulder. “She thinks she comes from aliens.”
Sherry’s eyebrow ring sparkled in the light, making Thea want to blink in time. Thea could easily picture her with scrawny green men with odd-shaped heads and long, skinny fingers.
“I do not. But I do think they exist.”
“She could be right, you know,” Monroe said, his green eyes glittering.
Keith threw a pretzel at Monroe. “Yeah, right!”
Luke’s arm tightened around Thea. She enjoyed the warmth and the weight, and leaned against him, wondering what the deal was with Monroe. Luke said they’d been friends since grade school and that Monroe had been a private investigator before becoming a doctor. She found the change in careers intriguing. He seemed intense but nice enough. Maybe he could do some investigative work for her, or guide her on how to find out who will threaten her father’s life.
Melissa filled in the silence. “What else did you predict, Sherry? Like we don’t already know.”
Sherry pretended to read her notes. “I said a...”
“A new species of butterfly will be discovered,” Melissa, Keith, and Luke chorused.
“She says that every year,” Luke told Thea.
“I say we add a new rule,” Keith said. “Sherry can’t say anything about aliens or butterflies in her predictions.”
“Agreed,” Monroe said. The glitter in his eyes turned a glowing emerald.
Thea forgot all about Luke’s warm brown eyes for a minute.
They all laughed, and she jumped.
Monroe winked at her, and she dropped her gaze from his, cursing the blush that crept across her cheeks. What was wrong with her tonight? She couldn’t possibly be attracted to both Monroe and Luke.
Sherry tapped her pen against the open notebook pages. “Drum roll, please. We have a winner this year.”
“What?” Luke asked. “Impossible. We’ve never had a winner.”
“This year we do.” Sherry paused. “And the winner is...Monroe.”
They all stared at him, except Thea. She finally gave in and stared along with the others. Searching his expression, she realized Monroe’s pained smile didn’t reflect victory.
When she noticed him watching her, staring at her, mocking her and himself, she suddenly needed to get away. She slipped out of Luke’s hold. “I have to go to the little girl’s room,”
Melissa yelled over Keith’s and Luke’s whistles and jokes. “What did he predict?”
Thea didn’t turn back, didn’t hear the response. She was in the bathroom puking.
CHAPTER 3
Luke knocked on the bathroom door. “Thea! Are you all right? Come on. We’re waiting.”
Thea paused in her search for a washcloth in the huge cabinet behind the door. “Go ahead without me.”
“What?”
She felt silly talking through the door. “I said, start without me. I’m not feeling very well.”
“What can I get for you?” His concern touched her.
“Nothing. It’s been a long day, and I’m just tired. Give me a few minutes.”
“Okay. Let me know if you need something, Sweetie.”
Thea heard the floor squeak as he walked away. She found a washcloth and ran cold water over it.
Sweetie? What had she done? Why had she come to this party? She should have gone home as usual. She squeezed the excess water from the cloth, held it to her forehead, and sat down on the closed toilet lid. The emerald carpeted floor was luxurious under her feet. Luke’s bathroom was bigger than her living room. She felt like she was swirling in a sea of green, and the dizziness didn’t help.
She couldn’t believe she was sitting in Luke’s bathroom during a New Year’s Eve party. Her stomach took a turn, and she patted her cheeks with the cool washcloth, wondering how she’d gotten into this position. Yesterday, she and Luke were just friends, but he’d made his feelings clear last night when he’d almost kissed her.
And the predictions game. She couldn’t play. They’d find out about her, even though she’d been so careful. Thea patted her hot cheeks again.
Horror stories her father told her flooded her mind. They would lock her up, study her, and watch every move she made while they tried to figure out how she could predict the future. She never knew who they were. Their hazy nebulous form made them more frightening than if they’d been identified. Which was ridiculous. She was a grown woman. A psychologist. She knew the workings of the mental health mind.
As a psychiatrist, her father would know too, but they hadn’t discussed anything much in years. He hadn’t wanted her to speak of predictions and visions, so she’d kept her mouth shut for years. Now she was going to have to talk to him about the vision she’d had about him. How did a person tell their father they’d seen him murdered? She snorted out a mirthless laugh.
Getting hysterical wouldn’t accomplish anything. She’d better get back to the party. She got up and rummaged for toothpaste, knowing Luke wouldn’t care about her petty pilfering. Finding some, she rubbed it against her teeth to get rid of the vomit taste. A quick rinse of water, and she was good to go. She remained standing there, looking in the mirror at her pale complexion.
What about Monroe? Could she trust him? He appeared to have made an accurate predication, but for all she knew it had been some obvious event. She wished she had stayed and listened instead of running away.
Did Monroe guess, or could he make predictions too? She’d never met anyone who could do what she did. At least not that she knew of anyway.
She needed to stay calm, avoid playing the game, and go home. She didn’t feel well. No one knew anything about her visions. No one. She simply didn’t feel well. She repeated it a few more times while she stood on shaky legs. Ignoring the queasy feeling in her stomach, she washed her hands, keeping the water on cold.
“Thea!” Luke called from the other side of the door.
“I’ll be out in a minute.” She found him waiting for her when she opened the door.
“Are you okay?”
“Sure. I’m fine.” She smiled as brightly as she could. “Let’s go.”
No one knew, she convinced herself, until she reached the living room and saw Monroe. He wasn’t smiling. His forehead creased in a slight frown and his eyes were a gray-green instead of the bright emerald hue of earlier in the evening.
Sherry pounced. “We’re all waiting for you to take your turn.”
“I’m not feeling well. Luke, thanks for a nice evening. I’ll get my coat and go. Goodnight everyone.” She gave a general wave and started walking out of the living room.
“You can’t leave. Not without making your predictions,” Sherry yelled after her.
“Let her go,” Monroe said. “It’s only a game, and Thea is sick.”
Thea thought she was the only one to notice his somber tone.
“I don’t think...”
Thea didn’t hear any more of what Sherry said because she’d reached the bedroom where she’d left her coat hours ago.
“I’ll get your coat,” Luke said behind her. He held it for her. A chivalrous act she could have done without at the moment. She allowed him to help and gave him a quick hug, moving away before he could respond.
“Are you well enough to drive?” he asked.
“Yes. Some sleep and I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. I only live a few blocks away.”
“Fourteen.” He followed her to the front door.
Where Sherry waited. “Thea...”
Luke exploded. “What is your problem? It’s only a game!”
Aware of the others standing at the end of the hallway by the living room, Thea felt sorry for Sherry. She didn’t deserve to be yelled at by Luke. Thea couldn’t stand the hint of tears and the redness of Sherry’s eyes though. All because of her. “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not,” Luke insisted.
“She wants to keep the tradition going, that’s all.”
“She’s being rude, that’s all.” He mimicked her.
Thea had had enough. “Don’t you make fun of me.”
She turned to Sherry. “There’s going to be a two-vehicle accident within the week. Two people killed, one critically injured, and one person will be seen at the hospital and then released.” She heard a groan from the hallway and knew it was Monroe. Before anyone could react, she ran out of the door to her car. She drove home too fast.
#
Thea’s cat, Tobias, greeted her as she entered her home. His tendency to wander around at odd hours of the night irritated her because he consistently knocked over her one decent potted plant. Whether his clumsiness was intentional or not, she hadn’t figured out yet. She fed him some Nibbles and settled on the couch. The beige cloth upholstery’s emerald velvet leaves embraced her, and the dark rose background soothed her. She rubbed one of the soft leaves with her fingers, and Tobias jumped into her lap. She stroked his soft white fur and closed her eyes.
She tried to relax but the hurt look on Luke’s face when she’d snapped at him bothered her. They’d been friends, nothing more. Until tonight. Would the almost kiss change their relationship? She was a fool to think otherwise, and she didn’t know where she wanted their relationship to go.
She thought about Monroe. Because he’d made an accurate prediction didn’t mean he had the same abilities she did. Secrets led to paranoia. She started suspecting everyone had their own secrets and read meaning into a normal guy’s harmless actions. As a private investigator, Monroe would be the perfect one to talk to about her vision and help her search for her father’s would-be killer.
She expected to worry all night, but her shoulders sagged and her breathing evened out. She fell into a light doze on the couch.
And then the vision came.
The blur of a white shirt, a curtain twitching, a cornflower blue, silk bedspread. Her father fell again. The red bloom on his shirt seemed bigger this time as she watched from a distance. Her mother still screamed that horrible inhumane screech. Then the vision ended. She sat up, waiting for the images to recede.
When her head started to pound, she stood on shaky legs to find her migraine medication. She welcomed the relief from pain and the drowsiness the medication brought. As she got into bed, she kept thinking of contacting Monroe to see if his investigative skills might help her. The more she thought of it, the more the idea stuck. Returning to her parents’ house tomorrow for a confrontation was inevitable. She couldn’t let her father be murdered just because he didn’t want to hear about her visions.
#
The ringing of the phone woke her. When she opened her eyes, the sunlight from the south window of her bedroom caused her to blink. She groped for the phone. “Hello?”
“Thea?”
“Hi, Luke.”
“Are we speaking?”
“Sounds like we are.” Wide awake now, she scrambled around in her brain, searching for a way to appease him. “I was out of line last night. I guess I was tired, and you were only trying to help.”
“I’m sorry things got out of hand.” The relief in Luke’s voice was evident.
Today things didn’t look so horrible to her, and she couldn’t believe last night she’d exaggerated everything until a nervous breakdown appeared imminent. “Yes. Me, too. Let’s forget everything and move on.”
Thea got out of bed and stood on the carpet running her free hand through her tangled hair.
“Everything?” He sounded hurt.
Strong, confident Luke, hurt? “Maybe not forget everything.”
“How about we finish the kiss?”
He’s back, which made her feel rushed. She didn’t want to hurt Luke again, but she had to be careful to not let things move too fast. If he found out about her visions, he’d freak. In spite of herself, she said, “You know we should get to know each other first.”
“How about now? I could come over.”
“Well...the phone woke me up,” Thea said, walking toward the kitchen for something to drink.
“I’m sorry. I...”
“No apology necessary but I do need to take a shower and run some errands. I fell asleep practically the minute I got home last night.” Luke didn’t need to know about her visions. Yet.
“You must have been tired. The afternoon is half over. It’s already two o’clock.”
“I had a migraine, and the medicine knocked me out. It’s been a long week with extra patients. I guess everything caught up with me.” She got to the kitchen and rested her hand on the fridge door.
“How about later?”
“How about next weekend? I’m not putting you off, Luke, I’m not. But I have something that came up with my parents, and I need to take care of it today.” His silence told her he was disappointed.
“Okay,” he finally said.
“I wish I could see your face and know it’s okay,” Thea said softly.
“It’s okay. Next Friday? Dinner and a movie?”
“Sure?” she said. Luke’s laugh sounded happy, and she knew they were fine.
“About last night...the accident...What made you predict that?”
“Does it matter? I was only playing the game.” What would they all think when it came true? Trying to sound casual and keep the desperation out of her voice, she changed the subject. “I have a question about your friend Monroe. I wondered about the detective work he used to do. How long was he a private investigator?”
“He was in business for about five years. It paid his way through med school, so he did well enough. Why?”
“A friend is looking for some help. I’ll let her know. I’ve got to go.”
“Next weekend,” he reminded, and hung up.
Part of her was relieved at his quick acceptance of them being friends only; the other part wondered at his easy relinquishment of the subject.
Thea got a glass of juice and had just put the phone back on the charger in her bedroom when it rang again. Looking at the caller display, she saw it was Clarissa. She picked it up. “Hi. Happy New Year.”
“Happy New Year to you too, sleepy head.” Clarissa always sounded like she was smiling and today was no exception.
Thea looked at her reflection in the mirror above her dresser. Not good. “How do you know I slept late?”
“Your curtains were closed when I drove by an hour ago. I decided to give you until two o’clock before I called. Fortunately for me when I tried the first time your line was busy. I knew you would be awake now,” Clarissa said.
