DarkWalker Read Free Page B

cubicle, though half her space doubled as the copy room and mail bin.
    It was thoroughly unfulfilling.
    She lived in a small apartment downtown. The rent was high but affordable. Her car was a few years old; she hoped to keep it long enough to save the money to make a sizable down payment on a Mercedes.
    Paintings hung on the walls, real oils on canvases done by some of the better local artists. She didn’t hate prints; she just didn’t see the point. Keeping Monet and Picasso on the wall only reminded her she’d never afford the originals.
    Her bedroom was just large enough for her king-sized bed, a dresser, and enough walking space to reach her closet.
    The kitchen, dining room, and living room were lumped into a single, multifunctional area. Big enough for one. She never threw parties.
    On the coffee table, where she propped her feet in the morning while sipping cream and sugar (with a splash of coffee), a single magazine could be found. Sometimes Entertainment Weekly , sometimes The New Yorker , just as often something like Weird Tales or Popular Science . She kept maybe two dozen books on the shelf, but borrowed most of what she read from the library.
    She loved her apartment. Three walls were red. The short hall to the front door was silver. Her L-shaped couch was stacked with comfortable, usable pillows. A stereo sat on an entertainment stand where a television might be; more than five hundred CDs lined the shelves.
    She went out regularly. Dancing. But if she disappeared, the office would notice first.
    Shortly after
midnight
, she slept fitfully. She kicked, flailed her arms more than once, and whimpered. By dawn, she’d have forgotten the nature of her dreams, but the sheets would need to be fixed. Again.
    2.
     
    Lisa kept a dream journal by her bed and scribbled down what few images remained when she woke. Fields of flowers, rainbows, horses . . . typical, non-nightmarish things. And when she dreamt of the dark, she was surrounded by cats and owls, friends and lovers. The moon was always bright; the lights never failed.
    She sometimes dreamt about men who worked in her office, but when her dreams turned sexual her partners were always anonymous strangers, someone she’d seen while dancing, or passed on the highway—a guy she’d never met, often the same guy, or someone like him. She wished she had those dreams more often, and recorded every possible detail in her journal.
    The nightmares sometimes woke her. She’d turn on the light, get a drink of water, look at the clock and wonder why in hell she was up at
5:00 a.m.
    This was one of those mornings. The time was
4:47
.
    Lisa Sparrow yawned and filled a glass from the tap. She’d been dancing till late. If she believed every guy who ever tried to get in her pants, she was beautiful. But before dawn, without make-up, her hair askew, she didn’t feel beautiful.
    She rinsed her face, swallowed two gulps of water, and looked out the window.
    It was like a painting. The window was almost as big as the wall—three panes, separated by thin black strips, looking down on Lake Eola . She saw trees, other buildings, but no streets. Not from her fifth floor apartment. It was as much landscape as cityscape from here, and she was able to forget the troubles of the world—and the troubles of unremembered nightmares.
    She was awake. There was no going back to bed, not for just another sixty minutes. She started the coffee machine, removed her robe, and stretched on the hardwood floor.
    She lowered into a full split, then bent at the waist to touch her t oes on either side. She worked her arms and neck, did a few dozen crunches, then changed into jogging clothes.
    The path around the lake was almost one mile exactly. She could circle it four times before coming back to shower and get ready for work. She’d pay for it later; she should have been sleeping, but she could always get to bed early tonight.
    At least, that’s how she planned it.
    3.
     
    At
5:30
in the