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the lurker
The wind gently rustled the leaves of the large Elm, enticing him to listen. A light mist covered the ground, causing the street lights to shine off the pavement, lending an odd incandescent glow to the shadows playing across it. The branches of the tree canted easily, creeping across the sidewalk in the wake of the shadows leading them.
He stopped walking momentarily and closed his eyes, attending to the sound of the leaves dancing at the whim of the breeze. Everything was subject to the whim of something. Everyone was vulnerable to someone. It was the natural order of things, he knew this. And yet, the events of the day had still managed to shock him.
His head shook lightly at his own musings, and he moved on. He had taken the walk thinking that it would clear his mind, but now it seemed unlikely. He quietly strolled along the empty street, allowing his thoughts to continue to ruminate. He had seen no one, save for a lone woman, walking a rather large dog. They had surreptitiously crossed the street upon spotting him; whether it was fear for what he might do, or the dog, Sydney couldn’t say.
It had been a close call that day. Far too close. Jarod had been playing the game too fast for some time, and today it had nearly crashed down upon him; upon all of them. Sydney had looked on in abject horror as two of the people he loved the most almost killed each other. He swallowed hard; it had been far too close.
On more than one occasion recently, Jarod had been too cocky, not according Parker with the respect which was her due. Sometimes the pretender lost sight of the fact that Miss Parker was intellectually gifted in her own right; someday it would be his downfall. He had led them to an abandoned warehouse as he had done countless times before; but he had made a critical error in timing, anticipating that it would take Parker ten more hours than it actually did to locate it.
They had walked in on Jarod, who was still setting up his next set of tormenting clues. Startled, the pretender had taken off at a run, with Miss Parker fast on his heels. Sydney had followed at a slower pace, and could do nothing as Parker chased her prize onto the catwalks above the main storage area of the warehouse, drawing her gun as she climbed up a ladder. His heart had dropped to the floor as several rungs on the ladder shattered, and she lost her footing.
Stubbornly she refused to drop the weapon, keeping it trained on Jarod, who had turned when he heard the ladder give way. She hung by one hand, swinging a good fifteen feet above the nearest catwalk. Sydney knew if she let go, there was a good chance she’d miss the narrow walkway and plummet to the floor of the building. Jarod had approached and reached down from the catwalk above, quietly asking her to take his hand. In answer, Parker had cocked the gun, training it at the pretender’s head.
Sydney had yelled to her, begging her to drop the damn gun and take Jarod’s hand, but she wouldn’t listen. Jarod leaned further over the side of the narrow catwalk he was on, trying to get her to reach for his hand. Sydney watched her dangle while Jarod tried to talk sense into her, all the while, the older man climbed as quickly as he could toward the walkway below her. He listened to them argue the points; she was impossibly stubborn, and so was Jarod. It would someday do them both in, Sydney was certain.
Just as the psychiatrist arrived on the catwalk below, Jarod’s walkway had given way, causing Parker’s ladder to wrench off the railing. In a split second of reality, Sydney knew he could save only one. He gambled that one of them had the skill to survive, and he grabbed for Parker as she hit the rail of the catwalk, missing it with her hand. Sydney grabbed her arm with both his hands, holding on with all his might.
Sydney had held his breath, watching Jarod catch a rope as he fell, swinging to the safety of another walkway. The pretender had waited until Sydney pulled Parker to safety, then he quickly and quietly disappeared from the premises, somehow evading the sweepers outside.
She had said not a word to him as he picked her up and carried her out of the warehouse. She had simply hid her face in the crook of his neck, trying to hide her tears from the world. He knew she would say they were tears of anger; that once again Jarod had escaped. But Sydney knew the truth: They had been tears of anguish with the realization that Jarod would have given up his freedom to save her, and even in the face of that truth, she had been unable to give in to her heart.
Not a word had been exchanged as they rode back to Blue Cove. She had continued to lean on Sydney, silently reaching for comfort from the one person who could still console her. Upon their arrival at the Centre, the silence continued, even as he lifted her from the car, carried her to his car, and placed her in the passenger seat. She hadn’t even questioned where they were going; she already knew. He had carried her into her house, up the stairs and gently placed her on her bed, covering her with several blankets and a comforter.
The sadness in her eyes had spoken louder than any words she could have uttered. Sydney had leaned down, kissed her lightly on the forehead, shut off the light and closed the door as he headed down stairs. It was then that he had decided he needed to clear his head, and he had taken himself for a walk.
He shivered slightly. Even though it was late May, the spring had not yet warmed to summer, and it was in the mid-50’s, too cold really for the suit he was wearing. His footsteps echoed along the pavement as his long strides quickly carried him back toward Miss Parker’s house. As he neared, the wind picked up, and once more rattled the leaves in a dance he couldn’t comprehend. The street lamps continued to cast shadows across the damp sidewalk and the houses along it, as the mist crawled across the lawns.
He noted the patterns that the leaves made as they danced along the sidewalk; and then he saw a much larger shadow cast against the front of Miss Parker’s house. It didn’t look like a leaf, a tree, nor a street light; it looked like a man. It was the shadow of a man staring up at Miss Parker’s bedroom window. Sydney’s steps quieted as he prepared to surprise the intruder, and then as he drew closer, a smile of relief spread across his features.
His voice was a bare whisper toward the dark bushes, “Jarod?”
The shadow stepped out from the dark, “Sydney.”
Sydney moved a little closer, inspecting his protegée, “You’re okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine. How is Miss Parker?”
“She’ll be all right after a few days of rest. She bruised herself a bit, but I suspect the biggest contusion was her lacerated pride.”
“She could have been killed, and all because of her own stubbornness.”
The psychiatrist gently grasped the pretender by the arms, “It took both of you to become tangled in that mess. The game you play with each other has always been on the edge, Jarod, but today......” Sydney’s voice grew soft, “Jarod, I was really scared that I would lose one or both of you.”
“I saw the rope as I fell..... how did you know to reach for her?”
“I didn’t.” Jarod looked at his mentor sharply, “It was an instinct Jarod; I reached for the one I felt was most vulnerable.”
“A parental instinct, Sydney?”
The older man looked away, “Just intuition.”
Jarod nodded, and broke from Sydney’s grasp, “Of course.”
After a moment, Sydney turned to him, “Jarod?”
And he was gone. Sydney looked down the street, but there was no sign of Jarod, nor were there any shadows swiftly moving through the darkness. Sydney shivered, and was once again reminded that it was unseasonably cold. After taking one more look down the street, he went into the house and up the stairs, quietly opening the door to her bedroom. He peered in, to find her curled up under the comforter. Softly, he closed the door and padded back down the stairs. He went to the linen closet, pulled out a pillow and blanket, and headed into the living room. Within minutes he was stretched out on the couch, sound asleep.
As soon as she had heard the door to her bedroom close, Parker pulled herself out of the bed, and once again, she peeked out the window. She had seen him step out of the darkness, and witnessed the conversation he had with Sydney. Why had he come? To laugh at her failure? To taunt her?
A rueful smile tugged at her lips; she knew Jarod’s appearance at her house was for neither of those reasons. She gazed out the window, and into the eerie haze shrouding the road. There was a light fog rolling in; it covered the ground with its blanket of dullness, making clarity that much more elusive. Still, she thought she saw a shadow in the mist, near the tree. She fancied that it smiled up at her.
fin
