The silence seeped in slowly. It crawled inside, completely invading, until she was filled with it. A silence so complete that nothing, no one could get past. She never knew how it started or why. It just was. And in this silence, she saw. She saw the face of death, of terror. Images that seared themselves into her brain, images that screamed but were never heard. The silence came and she could not control it. She could no sooner will the frightening images out of her mind, than she could will them in. At odd moments, the silence would come and with it fear.
She remembered the first time the silence took over her. She had been ten, in her room with white walls and pink ruffles. A pampered little girl's room. A myriad of stuffed bears and animals were placed carefully on shelves and the cherished few carelessly on the floor. It was after midnight, the bear that started off wrapped tight in her arms now lay on the floor with it's friends. She was lying on the bed staring silently at the white ceiling. The carousal lamp casting a light orange glow on her face. She didn't remember why she woke up that night. She remembered the white ceiling and the images playing out inside her head. Silent images. She could not hear the ticking of the Bugs Bunny clock on the night stand, she could not hear the wheel of her hamster turning, she could not hear her own heavy breathing, and she could not hear the man screaming.
The image was tinged in red. Everything was covered in the color. The man's hands, his face, his clothes, the inside of his mouth. And the other one. The one that stood above him was in red as well. His blonde hair had a red halo around it, the leather jacket looked like it was dripping blood. She saw his teeth, much like a vampire's after a feast, when he opened his mouth in a silent laugh. The only other color visible in the image was silver. The silver of the blade of the knife as it sliced down towards the already silent man, over and over again. With wide unblinking gray eyes, she counted one, two, three...., as the knife rose and fell endlessly. The blonde man's mouth opened wide in laughter enjoying his work, for he did it well. And then those blue eyes, tinged in that red haze, turned and looked at her. She knew he saw her. The smile that spread across his face told her he did as well as any spoken word would have. He looked at her and winked.
"Our secret," he mouthed the words. She didn't know how but she understood him. Not what he had done, but the pleasure he took in it. Controlling someone else's life or death gave him power, intoxicating him. He smiled at her, looked straight at her, although she was completely alone in her room, and he had known that she could do nothing, because she, unlike him, was powerless. It was this sense that tore her mouth open, and she heard the first sound in over an hour. Her own scream.
CHAPTER ONE
Sixteen years later...
Anissa Alfaro sat behind a large counter on a very throne-like wooden chair with red velvet cushions, cradling a phone between her ear and her shoulder. A beautiful woman by any standards, she had almost flawless fair skin, straight black hair that fell right below her shoulders, and a body that made most people turn around for a second or a third look. Of all her attributes the one that drew the most attention were her eyes. They were gray, pale when she was relaxed and content, but they turned dark slate gray when she was angry, excited, or aroused. At the moment, her eyes were the pale gray, as she fought the urge to roll them at the person on the other end of the phone.
"Yes, Mr. Stevens, I do have an original copy of that title," resisting the urge to sigh, Anissa spoke calmly into the phone. "Yes, sir, it is very rare. I'm glad I could be of assistance, if you'll let me transfer you to the shipping department they'll take down all your information and make sure the book is delivered to you as quickly as possible."
She listened to the phone as Mr. Stevens spoke about his worries involved in shipping such an expensive and rare book. "Don't worry, sir. We'll take all the precautions necessary so that nothing happens to the merchandise during shipping, and if by some unfortunate accident something were to happen, we would gladly give you credit back on your card."
Having waylaid some of Mr. Stevens' fears, Anissa transferred the call to the shipping department. Which was nothing more than her best friend, George, a credit card machine, and a personal computer hooked up to the Internet, in a small cramped office that also served as a storage room. While George dealt with the rest of Mr. Steven's fears, Anissa put her head down, closed her eyes, and tried to remember what else she had to finish up today before she closed the store.
She had to make sure to change the display on the window, since it was one of those books which she needed to ship to Mr. Stevens. She also needed to remember to unplug the coffee maker because she couldn't afford another fire. And of course, she and George needed to sit down and figure out if this bookstore was actually making any money.
Raising her head and looking around Raven's Rare and Used Books, she smiled and looked up at the stuffed raven perched on the fake tree branch and felt good about it. She really liked this place, and wanted to keep it. Anissa decided she'd let George know that even if it wasn't being profitable at the moment, she wanted to keep the store.
The store felt right. She belonged here, Anissa thought as she started toward the display. As she stood there looking at the books already on display and wondering what books would replace those, it came to her. Staggering her, she reached to grab the back of the closest chair and leaned against it. It came in a vicious wave of incoherent images until only one image became clear.
Everything around her became silent. She put her hands up to her face, trying to get the vision to clear, or maybe to leave her alone. She stood there leaning heavily against the chair as she saw a black blur, a vehicle hit a man as he crossed the street. The man's body seemed to fly through the air, as Anissa closed her eyes tight, her breathing becoming shallow.
Slowly the vision subsided, and Anissa sat down on the chair and tried to calm herself. She noticed how her hands trembled when she brought them up to wipe the tears that had run down her cheeks. She took a few deep breathes, staring straight ahead, willing her breathing and her heart rate to become normal. After several minutes, she managed to stand once more.
Sixteen years of being plagued with images, they still left her shaken and scared. She saw no rhyme or reason to them. They came and went without her being able to control them. They had no pattern. She wasn't even sure it they were real or not. For all she knew they were just an outlet for her overactive imagination. No matter how many times she tried to convince herself that they meant nothing except that she watched too much television, she always failed miserably. She knew that the images were real. That the events she saw in them actually happened. What she didn't know was whether she saw images of the past, the present, or the future.
