The Change - Chapter 1 & 2

Chapter 11

Kicking the small rock in front of her, Sara wrapped her jacket tighter around her body to fight off the chill that came from nowhere but inside herself. She wasn’t even sure why she’d taken the side road. She never walked this way home. The sun was low on the horizon, turning the air a golden color and the low breeze stirred her hair. The air tasted like she should be lying in a hammock somewhere drinking lemonade. Instead she was walking down this creepy street, with its empty storefronts. Glancing around nervously Sara looks at the stores again. She’d swear that it felt like someone was watching her.2

Slowly the day was getting darker and the street lights switched on, one by one. A sound behind her brought her entire body into hyper awareness. All her senses now straining to detect something. A movement. A sound. Something that would tell her what it was. Sara had watched too many horror movies to want to turn around. When you turned around that’s when whatever was out there would get you. Sara trembled with the effort not to turn and look. Another sound, the scraping of something against the ground. Like a foot. Sara repeated over and over in her head, “It’s nothing, don’t look.” But unable to stand the suspense anymore, she whirled around and her breath escaped her in a slow sigh. Nothing. There was nothing there. Sara laughed at herself and turned back around, she was almost at the end of the road now and she had to force herself to walk. Even though there wasn’t any reason to run, every nerve ending was urging her to do just that.3

Sara stopped short as out of the newly formed shadows an extremely large animal stalked into the middle of the road. She found herself blinking a few times as her brain tried to process that there was a cougar the size of a small pony standing between her and the end of the street. Instinctively Sara took a few steps back, swallowing hard as the cat moved towards her. Freezing, she took a deep breath and whispered “Nice kitty”. Sara stared into its startling amethyst colored eyes. Biting her lip, she tried to make sense of what was happening. The cougar had to have gotten loose from one of the houses up on Freemond Hill. The occupants had a tendency to be eccentric as well as rich. Studying its immaculate tawny-colored fur and sleek muscles she could see it was well cared for. Maybe it was even a little tame. Holding out her hand, Sara took a few steps towards the large cat and said a little louder “Here kitty, I won’t hurt you” but stopped dead in her tracks as the cat bared its fangs and hissed.4

Sara had no idea what she was supposed to do; she couldn’t run from the thing. Running was supposed to be bad. She’d read somewhere that if you ran the big cats looked at you as prey. But looking into the cats empty eyes, Sara knew she was already prey. Sara’s heart started racing as the large cat screamed, the sound reminding her of a woman screaming. Her nerve broke and she bolted the other way, knowing she wouldn’t be fast enough but still not able to stop herself from trying to get away. Easily the cat caught up to her, its claws pierced her thigh and hip as it pounced on her. Sara screamed as she fell to the ground, her body twisting so that the cat’s weight pinned her back against the concrete. Sara screamed again as the cougar’s teeth cut into the arm she put up to fend the animal off. Her vision bled in streamers and blackness ate at the edge of her vision as she struggled to remain conscious, screaming again as fiery pain jolted through her from the claws that pierced her sides. Dimly she was aware of shouts and the massive jaws released her arm, then she sunk into the blackness and wasn’t aware of anything else.5

Chapter 26

The first thing Sara was aware of was that her head felt like someone had taken a very large wrench and smacked her around and that her mouth tasted like she had licked yesterdays gym socks. Lifting her hand up required more strength then she thought she might have, so instead she cracked open her eyes. Closing them quickly, Sara groaned as the stark white of the room and the bright lights sent daggers directly into her brain. The sound must have alerted the nurse because the next thing she knew a cool hand was laid across her forehead.7

“How are you feeling?” The nurse spoke softly, although it sounded like she was screaming directly into Sara’s ear.8

Sara mumbled the only thing she could think of “Water, please”.9

After she drank some of the water the nurse held to her mouth, Sara tried to sit up. Pain, sharp and immediate, made her aware that it was more than just her head that felt like a wrench had been taken to it. Inhaling sharply, she laid very still; hoping that if she didn’t move anything it would go away. The nurse clucked over her and adjusted a knob on the IV running into Sara’s arm. Within a few minutes the world started going fuzzy and Sara slipped back into unconsciousness.10

Sara woke up to the skin crawling feeling of being watched. Turning her head slowly, she jerked fully awake as she met the amber colored gaze of the dark haired man sitting beside her bed.11

Sitting upright he tapped a pen against his hand “I didn’t mean to startle you, they told me I could wait here until you woke up. I wanted to speak with you about the events that happened two nights ago.”12

Sara’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “Two nights? Are you sure it’s been that long?”13

The man’s mouth twisted in a wry smile “Yes, Miss Thompson. I’m very sure it has been that long. From what I’ve been told, you were badly injured and they’ve been keeping you heavily sedated due to the pain. Do you remember anything that happened to you?”14

“Exactly who are you?” Sara studied the man sitting in front of her, from the top of his carefully styled hair to his immaculately shiny shoes he looked every inch professional and business like. Sara was guessing he was a lawyer. Probably for whatever upstanding rich crackpot had a cougar that they let wander the streets, mangling poor helpless women.15

“I’m sorry, I didn’t introduce myself. I’m Nicholas, a local business owner. I’m the head of a local…group and we’re very interested in learning the details of your attack. Perhaps we could even assist you, with medical bills or questions you may have.”16

Sara frowned “I don’t see why you would be interested. I appreciate your offer of help and your concern, but I have medical insurance and I doubt if you would be able to answer any questions. I got attacked by a cougar, Mr., ummm... Nicholas. That’s all there was to it. Now if you don’t mind I’d like you to leave, I don’t really feel up to talking about what happened.”17

Nicholas stood and placed a business card on the edge of the table beside the hospital bed. “If you should change your mind, please give me a call.” Before Sara had a chance to answer Nicholas strode quickly out of the room and shut the hallway door behind him.18

Sara picked up the card and examined it; all it had was a first name and a telephone number. She laid her head back on the pillow and her last thoughts before drifting off to sleep again were wondering if her week could get any weirder.19