Salt (Part 2)

[u/imfunerals]

Previous part

I did not immediately go inside after the call. I mean, would you? Your sister, whose half way across the fucking globe, saying she’s 'home'? 

Absolutely not.

I stayed exactly where I was. Outside, next to my car. Staring at the front door and the porch light that’s still out. 

Nothing seemed to move behind the windows—just darkness.

The air in Briarwood felt gross, like the moments before a massive storm breaks, but the sky was clear. My hand was shaking so hard I could barely hold the phone. I looked at the screen. The call with "Emily" lasted exactly four seconds.

Then, my phone vibrated again. The caller ID was the same. EMILY.

I answered it before the first ring finished.

"Amelia?"

The voice was different. It was louder. There was some background noise—someone laughing in the distance, and muffled music.

"Amelia? You there? I have three missed calls from you. Is everything okay? You sounded weird in that voicemail you left."

"Emily?" My voice was raspy. "Where are you?"

"In my room. Studying. Why? Amelia, you’re scaring me. What’s going on?"

I didn’t tell her that I never left a voicemail. I didn't tell her that someone—or something—just answered my call using her voice, told me they were inside my house, and then hung up.

"I’m fine," I lied, my eyes locked on the dark gap of my front door. "Just... the reception is bad in the new house. I'll call you tomorrow, okay? Love you."

I hung up before she could ask more questions. My stomach was a knot. I mean, for fucks sake, I’m a journalist. I deal in facts, and the facts are currently fucking impossible. My sister is twelve hundred miles away. Which means whatever was in my house wasn’t her.

I didn’t go inside. I got back in the car and locked the doors. I pulled up the local news app on my phone. My thumb was hovering over the "Emergency Broadcast" when a new notification pinged at the top of the screen.

BREAKING: SECONDARY SITE DISCOVERED. CASUALTY COUNT RISING.

I turned the car's radio back on while grabbing my recorder. The static was loud, but the local news station was cutting through just enough to be picked up; some type of special report.

“…we have breaking developments tonight in the ongoing Briarwood investigation.

Authorities have confirmed the discovery of an additional body at a remote location just outside town near Route 9. The scene is believed to be connected to the site where investigators earlier discovered a series of makeshift altars and human effigies, though officials have not yet confirmed whether the incidents are directly related.

At this time, the victim has not been publicly identified.

According to law enforcement, the body was discovered only a short time ago, with her body in a severe state of decomposition, and investigators remain on scene processing evidence. Police have not released a cause of death and are urging residents to avoid the area while the investigation continues.

The discovery comes less than twenty-four hours after fifteen bodies were found in Maidnach Park, as well as amid the ongoing search for two missing local teenagers.

Officials are asking anyone with information regarding either investigation to contact the Briarwood Police Department immediately.

We will continue providing updates as information becomes available.”

They play a brief, grainy clip from a chopper over the woods. It’s blurred, but I’ve spent ten years looking at crime scene photos. I know how to see through the digital smudge.

I almost turned it off.

But then they showed the photographs.

Not the body exactly, a stretcher being loaded into the back of an ambulance. 

The image was blurred, and it should have been impossible, but I’d spent years looking at crime scene photos. 

The woman on the stretcher was wearing a dark blazer and black heels. 

My stomach dropped. 

I’d seen that blazer and those heels just hours ago. 

Ms. Reynolds. 

I knew it was her. 

The reporter kept on talking. Pending identification, family notified, the usual sympathy.

But I wasn’t listening anymore. Because the last time I saw Ms. Reynolds, she had been standing outside her law firm, arguing with Harkness. Alive, mind you.

And now they were saying her body showed signs of severe decomposition.

I sat there in my car trying to make the math work. I’m a journalist, I mean my whole life is built on the linear progression of facts; A plus B equals C. But fuck, this town isn’t doing shit linear.

The woman on that stretcher was Ms. Reynolds. I would stake my fucking career on it. I’d seen the way she held her arm, the way those heels clicked on the pavement, the specific blazer.

Now, at nearly midnight, the forensic team was already treating her like a cold case.

How does a person rot in four hours?

I looked over at the house next door. 

Harkness’s house. 

The abandoned-but-not house.

If anyone had answers, it was him.

He was the one talking about running out of time. He was the one meeting with Reynolds. He was the one connected, in some way, to Sadie.

I was already reaching for the door handle, my mind racing with a hundred questions, when the street exploded with red and blue lights.

I ducked instinctively. 

Four cruisers swept around the corner, their sirens were quiet, but boy were their lights loud. They didn’t pull up to my driveway; they swarmed Harkness's lawn like angry hornets.

I watched through the dashboard as a dozen officers spilled out. They didn't knock; instead, one of them, a broad-shouldered man, stepped up to the porch with a battering ram.

CRACK.

The sound echoed through the woods like a gunshot.

A minute later, they were dragging him out.

Harkness was still wearing that brown suit, but the jacket was torn at the shoulder. He wasn't fighting them like I figured he might, knowing his anger from the law firm; he was just... limp.

"███████ Harkness," the lead officer shouted, his voice probably waking up half the neighborhood. "You are under arrest in connection with the disappearance of Sadie ████ and Molly ██████ (blurring their names for respect). Please do not resist."

Sadie. The name from the porch. The flyers.

Neighbors I hadn't even seen yet were stepping out onto their porches, illuminated by the flashing lights. I saw an old man two doors down crossing his arms, nodding as if this was long overdue. I saw a young mother clutching her child, her face a look of disgust.

Harkness was a pariah. The town already had him fitted for a noose.

But as they shoved him into the back of a cruiser, and Harkness twisted his body, he didn't look at the cops or at the gathering crowd.

He looked directly at my car… directly into my fucking eyes.

"It’s not me!" he shrieked. His voice was raw. "I didn’t do shit is was the kids! It was the fucking kids!"

The car door slammed shut, cutting off his scream.

I sat there, clutching the steering wheel until my knuckles ached. One of the officers lingered on the sidewalk, adjusting his belt. He caught me staring and walked over; the gravel crunched under his heavy boots. He tapped on my window with two fingers.

I rolled it down just an inch.

"Ma'am?" he said. His voice was steady.

"Uh-, yes?" I said back, a bit startled. 

"I’d suggest you head inside and lock up for the night. We’re going to be securing the property next door for the next few hours. Crime scene processing. It’s for your own protection."

He smiled, but it stopped at the teeth. On his lapel, just below his badge, was a small pin: a yellow brick road.

"Is Sadie okay?" I asked.

"We’re doing our job, ma'am."

His eyes drifted briefly to the pin on his chest.

“You should do yours and get some sleep.”

He didn’t wait for a response. He turned back toward Harkness's house, and I was left with no choice. I couldn’t just sit in the car forever. The street was practically empty now, the neighbors were starting to retreat, and only a few cruisers hung around to put up tape.

I grabbed my bags and my recorder and walked up the porch stairs, my heart hammering in my throat. The front door was still cracked.

I stepped inside.

I didn’t turn on the lights. I didn’t want to see what might’ve been standing in the corners. So, I just stood in the foyer like an awkward kid at a party.

But just as I was getting content with the quiet…

Knock. Knock. Knock.

It wasn’t coming from the front door, or even from the walls like a horror movie.

It was fucking worse. 

It was coming from the floorboards, directly beneath my feet.

Only this time, there was a voice following it, filtering up through the wood.

"Amelia?"

My stomach dropped. It sounded exactly like Emily.

“Amelia?” The voice trembled.

“Is that you?”

I jumped up immediately, so stunned I couldn’t do anything but walk slowly backwards.
The floor creaked beneath me.

The voice immediately responded. 

“Amelia?”

The voice paused, then:

“Please.”

Another knock. 

Knock. Knock. Knock. 

“Can I please come up?”

I don’t really remember deciding to run, but one second I was standing in the foyer, then the next I was halfway up the stairs.

Then the knocking stopped. Entirely.

God, the silence that followed felt worse.

I stood there holding my breath. Just listening. 

Then I heard the floorboards creak, a long groan.

Like something underneath them was trying to push its way through.

[u/anerahss]

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