Silent Fall

closet in the basement laundry room. That’s where I must have been hiding. One of the psychiatrists theorized that if my father was high, he might have forgotten about me or just given up when he couldn’t find me." She paused, taking in another breath. "For a long time I thought he’d come back and finish the job."
    "He’s the monster in your nightmares."
    Catherine nodded. "Yes, but as I got older the dreams changed. It wasn’t about that night anymore. I didn’t hear his voice or see my mother’s face. I saw other people getting killed. I heard their pleas for help. Maybe because I was tapped into that particular kind of violence, I don’t know. But as I told you before, the nightmares often make no sense at all, and I certainly haven’t been able to help anyone because of them. I couldn’t stop my mother’s murder, and I couldn’t stop anyone else’s." She paused. "There’s something else."
    "I’m almost afraid to ask."
    "My mother had visions, too. That’s what one of the neighbors said. She told me that she heard my father say more than once that there were demons inside of her. The neighbor thought maybe he tried to beat the demons out of her."
    Dylan felt sick to his stomach at the image her words brought forth, her innocent mother being brutalized by a monster. And Catherine had seen it all. No wonder she was so filled with darkness, so terrified of what the night would bring. She’d been mentally reliving the murder over and over again, racked with guilt that she hadn’t been able to get justice for her mother -- a woman who was just like her.
    "It’s not your fault, Catherine. You can’t blame yourself for what happened to your mother."
    "Everyone says that," she replied, her voice dull, her eyes bleak. "But I know the truth."
    "You couldn’t have stopped him from killing her. You were a child, little more than a baby."
    "I could have told people what I saw. I could have made him pay for what he did. I could have sent him to jail for the rest of his life."
    "I doubt that. The testimony of a six-year-old child wouldn’t have been enough to convict him, not without other evidence. You weren’t a reliable witness. And there’s always the possibility that maybe you didn’t see anything. Maybe you were hiding the whole time."
    "I’ve told myself that, too. I don’t think it’s true." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "I feel in my heart that I know what happened. But I can’t seem to release it. It’s trapped inside of me."
    "Because it’s too horrible to remember, that’s why. I’m sorry I made you tell me the story. Don’t think about it anymore." He wished he could take back the last fifteen minutes and play them over again. He didn’t know what to say now, how to begin to comfort her, so he simply put his arms around her. She rested her head on his shoulder and they stayed like that for several long minutes.
    Finally she lifted her head and pulled away. "I didn’t want to bring you into the darkness with me. I thought we could just have sex and live in the moment. I guess it didn’t work out that way."
    He gave her a smile. "Maybe it was time for you to stop facing the demons alone."
    "I tell myself they’re not real. The fears are just in my head, created by my own mind. How can I be afraid of myself? No one is trying to kill me -- well, no one was trying to kill me before tonight," she amended.
    He frowned at the reminder that there was real danger here in the present, danger he had put her in. "I shouldn’t have brought you with me."
    "It’s too late now for regrets." She let out a sigh. "So, go get your soda and I’ll get dressed, and we’ll focus on your problems instead of mine."
    Now that she was telling him to go, perversely he wanted to stay. He wanted to strip off his clothes, crawl back into bed with her, and take another shot at driving the darkness out of her. But he could see by her face that she’d already withdrawn from him, and he wouldn’t be getting back into her head or her body anytime soon. He got up and walked over to the door, then paused. "You might not have any regrets, but I do."
    "About what?" she asked warily.
    "I regret that I ever got out of bed."
    "I’ve never seen anyone get dressed so fast. I think you broke the record. Not much for cuddling, are you?"
    "I never have been," he admitted. But it