That night Marilyn couldn't sleep again. But this time it wasn't the thoughts of Brian, Peter and Thomas, that haunted her. Lying in bed, she wondered where Michael might be. Was he alright? Was he maybe feeling sick, again? Was he in pain from his injuries? She wished she knew. She wished she could do something for him. Anything, really. But she didn't know what that could be.

Marilyn turned over.

Everyone around her was so... so... She had the feeling that they were intruding upon her, suffocating her, not leaving her any space to breathe. Her classmates, her parents... Michael had been different. He seemed to be rather focusing on himself. And then again, that wasn't really it. It was just that he didn't seem to mind her. He had held her, hugged her to his chest, when she had been crying her eyes out like a baby. He hadn't minded touching her, ugly-Edmond, the toad. She had made a mess of his shirt, and he hadn't minded. She had been destroyed and ugly and decried - and he hadn't minded.

Marilyn turned over again.

Maybe he was out there right now, on his way to or from wherever he had been going the other night, as well?

The thought started to gnaw at Marilyn. What if? What if lying in bed meant that she missed the chance to see him again? She wanted to see him again. Especially after the unpleasant encounter with Samantha and Brina earlier that day, she so wanted to see him again. But he had said nothing along that line. Suddenly she found herself in a hurry to get dressed. She didn't have time to lose, so it was just pants and a shirt-blouse and a pair of sneakers, and off she was, sneaking out of the house so her father wouldn't hear.

She didn't wonder for a moment where to start looking for Michael. She would go to the bend in the street where he had almost run her over the first time. Wherever he was going, he would probably pass through that street again.

Knowing where she wanted to go, it didn't take her long. Soon she reached the street that climbed towards that fatal turn. She half expected the bike to come around the bend again as she stood there in the middle of the street, but it didn't. Everything remained quiet. Because he wasn't allowed to do anything like that at the moment. He was injured. He had a concussion. And so she sat down on the curb and waited.

She didn't know how long she had been sitting there alone in the night, but at some point the atmosphere had changed. She hadn't really noticed it happening, she only noticed that it had happened. The crickets had stopped singing and the wind from the pacific, that was almost omnipresent, was blowing more forcefully now. Suddenly it occurred to her that Michael wasn't coming. And after all, what if he did come and found her sitting on the curb? What would he think? What would she tell him? Wouldn't it be an awfully embarrassing moment? She brushed herself off and felt forlorn.

Where had he actually been coming from at that time of night? It was quite some way off Hayvenhurst Avenue to just be going to a 7-Eleven for a sandwich or something. And he probably didn't buy sandwiches anyway. Where had he been coming from?

A girl-friend's house?

Marilyn tried to push that thought away, but it proved surprisingly persistent. Nagging, even.

After a moment of standing around, she realized that she didn't know what came after the bend in the street. And for some reason she wanted to see what he had seen. Maybe she could find out where he had been coming from, or maybe she would even meet him, if she looked around the area. She followed the street round the bend looking at the houses she passed, all still and dark.

For some time there were no crossings or side streets, so Michael had seen those houses as he had come by here, and knowing that made her feel closer to him. He had seen the huge, black silhouette of the giant tree that canopied the entire front yard of the house to her left. He had seen the house with the little alcove, that looked misplaced, as if it somehow didn't belong. He had certainly noticed the oddly shaped bushes on her right.

But then another street crossed hers, and she stopped. Which way had Michael been coming? She looked at each street, and tried to reason, somehow hoping to find a clue, but it was pointless. She had not the slightest chance of knowing. Finally, she decided by what felt more right and turned to follow the crossing street.

It wasn't the last crossing, and every time she came to a new one, she looked down each street hoping to maybe see Michael somewhere, and then deciding which way to follow. But no matter which decision she made, with each crossing and each decision the chances of still walking the way Michael had come, became slimmer, and it felt as if there was less and less of his presence in her walk.

Finally, a gust of wind blowing down a crossroad hit her, and it was as if that wind took the last of Michael away. Suddenly, Marilyn felt awfully alone in the dark, empty streets, creeped out by the black windows, moving shadows of bushes in the wind and the whistling and rustling of the wind itself. She had the feeling that there was someone behind her and spun around, but the street was empty except for a cat that peered at her from under a bush, and whose eyes flared up in the light of a nearby street lamp just before the animal flitted away. Marilyn tried a calming breath. Just a cat! What her father had said about strange people wandering around the streets at night was having an impact on her. But as much as she tried to tell herself that it was just this, she still couldn't shake it off. It was time to go home. Most definitely! So Marilyn turned on her heel and with brisk strides walked back the way she had come.

Or so she thought. But it wasn't. Or was it? She didn't recognize the houses. Had she gone wrong somewhere? But where? Marilyn tried going back to find out where she had made a mistake. But she couldn't find the right turn. The wind became increasingly unfriendly, pulling on her blouse. She walked even faster, staring at the houses and front yards. Houses after houses. All alien and dark and cold. She wanted to go home. The blind windows glared back at her. Unease crept up on her. Then fear. She turned this way and that. Headless. She was lost. Exhaustion came on. She wanted her bed, warm and soft. How could she be so lost? How come she didn't know any of these streets? Wasn't this her neighborhood? Where in the name of the Lord was she?

Dimly lit as it was, the telephone booth still looked like an angel sent from heaven as she spotted it glowing yellow on a street corner, and Marilyn hastened towards it as if it could just disappear into thin air. But she didn't feel as safe inside the booth as she had thought she would. The refection of the yellowish light in the scratched windows made it impossible to see her surroundings outside beyond a couple of feet, while Marilyn inside was painfully aware that she could be seen from yards away. Against her wish she imagined some insane person to suddenly jump up close and press their distorted face against the glass. How childish, she told herself and turned trying to focus on the phone.

She didn't have any money on her, but she could still call up the operator.

"Where are you, Marilyn?" asked the friendly voice of a lady, who had introduced herself as Nancy, and Marilyn strained her eyes to make out the street sign through the old, damaged glass of the booth's windows.

Nancy sent Marilyn walking in a totally different direction from what all her insides told her was right. But after about 15 minutes, she suddenly came to a street she knew. From one moment to the next she knew where she was, again. She turned into the next street. It wasn't far, now.

And that was when she noticed the man.

Marilyn knew it was a man at the very first moment she made out his shadow. Everything about the way he carried himself was male, the stride, the shoulders, the hands that seemed to be in the pockets of his jacket. And in contrast to when she had spotted the cat under the streetlight, this time she didn't turn around. Because she knew he was real. He was really there. He wasn't a monster with glowing eyes that would disappear, would be treduced to a stray cat, the moment she looked straight at it. He was a man of flesh and blood - all too real in the dead of night.

Marilyn glanced back, but she didn't turn. How long had he been behind her already? Had it been his presence she had sensed earlier and had then put down to her wild imagination? She didn't know. If she had only noticed him before, she would have made a different decision and walked a different way, that was slightly longer but not as lonely. Now it was too late. There was no going back.

Keep calm and keep walking.

Was he really following her, or was it her fantasy? The figure was too far away for her to see his face. Marilyn picked up her pace. And for a moment it was as if the distance between her and him grew, but only for a moment. Then his strides became longer, and the distance between them stopped growing.

Marilyn turned the next corner, and the figure was out of side. Maybe she was imagining things, and he was just another pedestrian on his way home. She looked back, and couldn't see anyone, just the street, the parked cars along the pavement, the bushes in the front yards of the houses she passed. She was walking fast now. She so wished that he was gone. Every time she looked over her shoulder she was scared to see him. But she didn't. Until she did.

It was maybe the third or fourth time that she scanned the street behind her, when she saw him at the corner. He popped up from behind the hedge that grew there, stopping short for a split-second, his head turning sharply as if in search of something. And then he walked her way, a dark shadow floating along the sidewalk behind her.

Marilyn could hear her heart beating frantically in her ears. Her hands felt cold, her muscles tingled with the urge to run.

Had he noticed that she had spotted him? She walked on, fumbling in her pocket for her key and clenching it in her fist so the sharp end stuck out. What did he want? To rob her? She had no money or anything valuable on her. But of course he couldn't know that. And what would he do, when he found out? Or was he after something else? Was he just waiting for a good, quiet corner to ambush her? Was this the night that would change her life forever? Would he kill her? Was it meant to be that way for her?

Marilyn wished Michael were there. Or even Brian, Peter and Thomas. Although she had been frightened by them, when they had come to her house, she still thought they were too much of men to let anyone harm her, now that she was in real distress. They wouldn't walk her home, but they would allow her to come near them in search of protection. She wouldn't mind begging them to let her be near them, now. And not being alone would probably, in itself, be enough. And if it wasn't, she couldn't imagine them standing by, when someone really did her harm. They wouldn't do it nicely, but she wouldn't mind. She imagined what they would say. "Man, we're actually doing you a favor. You really don't want that one! You'll just catch some disease, when you touch her. Ugh, you don't want that!"

Marilyn glanced back once again. The shadow was closer now, only about the width of one front yard behind her. She looked ahead. Her parents' house was in the street parallel to the one she was hastening down now, and she could see the crossing street, that connected both, only four or five houses in front of her. She wasn't far from home, but the man, who followed her, couldn't know that. If he was looking for a good place to attack her, she could make it home before he found one that suited his needs, if only he didn't realize that she had noticed him. She would make it, she told herself. She would make it.

She decided to cross the street. About half way to the other side she looked back for her follower. He was crossing the street, too, a little way behind her. She saw him - and he saw her looking at him. In the middle of the street he changed direction, made a sharp turn towards her. That was all it took. Marilyn opted for flight.

Her fear ignited like fire springing to life on fuel. It ran through her, and she took off like a jet plane, her chopped hair flying around her head as her sneakers beat down on the pavement. She didn't know, if the man followed her. She didn't look left or right. She dashed through between the parked cars and down the opposite sidewalk. Any moment she was sure to feel him breathing down her neck, to feel his hand at her back as he reached for her, his fingers grasping at her blouse. Her fright was burning into speed. And Marilyn was a fast runner. She had been in track for years - actually, until just this very school year - and although she was probably out of condition, she was still a better runner than most.

She reached the end of the street and flew around the corner, passed the three houses that faced the other street, and shot around the next corner, holding on to a lamp post that stood there the way she had done countless times as a little girl, when being late for dinner returning from a friend's house - a friend she hadn't seen or talked to in years, now. Her lungs burned. The street she lived in was sloping slightly. As a child she had always felt it in her knees as she had run along here, but now she felt nothing. Only her lungs and the hard ground underfoot and the groping hands of the shadow-man only inches behind her.

Marilyn didn't waste time or energy to look behind herself until she reached her parents' house. Just before she turned into her driveway she glanced over her shoulder to see, if she was facing a fight, the key clenched so tightly in her fist that it hurt. But there was nobody. She spun around childishly thinking he would be standing right behind her. The dark figure was nowhere to be seen. Not knowing where he was felt even worse. Had he taken some shortcut and would just step out from behind a tree, when she turned to unlock the door? She told herself there were no shortcuts, but the feeling wouldn't pass. She was shaky and breathless and her chest felt tight as she scanned her surroundings.

And then she noticed him. He stood far away under the street lamp on the corner. He didn't come after her. Actually, he wasn't moving at all as far as Marilyn could tell. From the distance she didn't know, if he was even looking her way, or if he was just waiting for someone or something. Maybe he was looking for another victim. Or maybe he was just waiting for a cab. Marilyn stood on the sidewalk and looked at the dark figure under the lamp far down the street. And the longer she stood there and looked at him, the more she was sure that he was indeed looking her way.

When Marilyn came home the following afternoon, she couldn't wait to turn Michael's music on. Loud! School had been dreadful. Not only had she been tired after spending half the night wandering around the streets of Encino, lost, but she hadn't done her homework, either. Of course, normally there would have been a good chance to get by one time, but the teacher had decided to give the class an unannounced test on the subject that very day. It was just Marilyn's luck. She didn't want to think about the outcome of that test. No, absolutely not. She just wanted to forget about it all and drown herself in the music, and so she turned the speakers up until the glasses in the cupboard started to chink, and just sat on the flokati rug propped up against the living room sofa allowing the songs to wash over her.

She would have had no chance of hearing the phone ringing, if the side of the record she was playing hadn't just come to an end. Shaken out of her trance, she jumped up and ran to the nearest phone in the kitchen, almost slipping on the tiled floor as she dashed around the corner.

"Hello?" She was a little breathless.

"Hello," came the voice of a young man from the other end. "Am I speaking with Marilyn Edmond?"

"Yes," Marilyn answered suspiciously. "Who is this?"

"This is Michael. How ya doin'?"

Ugly-Edmond, where's your boyfriend?

Marilyn glared at the unseen speaker. "Michael? What Michael?"

"Michael! Michael Jackson! What Michael?" The other end broke into a light-hearted giggle. "How many do you know?!?"

"Michael Jackson" is a star! That was what she had wanted to say, that was what she had wanted to throw at whomever was having a joke at her expense this time around, but she didn't get beyond the name. The rest of the sentence never got passed her lips as she realized half way through that it was really him. It was the first time in Marilyn's life that she had to sit down because her legs wouldn't carry her.

"Yes," said the joyful voice on the other end, seemingly totally oblivious of her utter shock. "Yes. Do you remember now?"

"Oh, hi! Yes, of course I remember." Marilyn was sitting on a random kitchen chair that had been standing nearby and tried to collect her racing thoughts without letting Michael notice how floored she was by his call. "I just didn't think... How did you get this number?"

"Erm... Telephone book."

"Oh, yes, right, right. Of course! I'm sorry, I thought it was one of my classmates calling, you know..."

"Oh, no. I'm sorry. No, it's not. Did I disturb you? Are you waiting for a call?"

"No, no, no! Not at all! No, like, I was thinking someone was doing a prank on me. Just forget about it. How are you?"

"I'm okay," he said, dropping the subject of her classmates instantly. "The sun is shining. I'm on a sun lounger in the shade. Everybody has work to do. Everybody is busy with something, but I'm not allowed to do anything. I'm just out here with a bored snake lying on my knees. So I thought I'd call you and ask you how your day's been."

"Nothing special." Marilyn tried frantically to think of something to say about her day, but there wasn't anything. At least nothing she felt like telling him about. "I had school, and then I walked home and listened to some music. And then you called. My day was boring, too." And terrible at school.

"Two things I'm not allowed to do. So your day has been significantly more interesting than mine!"

"Did you just say something about a bored snake being on the sun lounger with you?" Only now did the odd line strike Marilyn.

"Yes."

"Should that worry me?"

"Not the snake itself. He's my pet, and he's cool! But probably the fact that he's bored!"

"How do you know he's bored? What does a snake look like, when it's bored?"

"Well, I don't know... It's just the way he's... hanging out there!" His voice was thick with amusement, and Marilyn laughed. It wasn't even that funny, but it still made her laugh. She imagined him and a snake that was hanging over his legs like a wet towel. Michael on the other end giggled along with her.

"That night I almost ran you over..." he went on after a moment, "What were you up to? I mean, I guess, I spoiled it."

"I wasn't going anywhere special. I was just... you know... walking." Marilyn shrugged even though there was nobody around to see it.

"Odd time of the day for a walk."

"Yeah." She wished she had an interesting story to tell him about what she had been doing, if only to keep the conversation going, but she hadn't. She felt she was awful at making conversation. He most certainly would never call her again.

"Do you do that a lot? Walking at night?" he went on without hesitation.

"Every now and then," said Marilyn, even though it wasn't really true, and she had done it only two times in her whole life.

"Maybe we could walk together? That way I couldn't run you over a second time, and one time is really enough!" he chuckled, "And also it's not safe for a girl to be out alone at night, I don't think. 'Cause you never know. Or do you want to be alone?"

Everything around Marilyn seemed to light up. The walls, the kitchen furniture, the floor, everything became a brighter shade. The sun outside the window seemed to emit more light. The day at school suddenly didn't feel bad anymore. Not even the test. All felt weightless. She felt weightless. "Oh, no! I'd love to! That would be perfect, really." Then she thought of the dark figure at the street corner and shivered. "And you're right, better not to be alone in the dead of night.

~~~~~

Hey, guys!

Here's a belated Easter egg!

This chapter has 3,781 words.

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It's 4:30 in the morning.

I'm dead.

Good night.

I love you.

Birdie

~~~~~

By the way...

As you all know by now, this is a Requested Story for MarilynEdmond. I'm normally a Short Story writer, and this is actually my first time seriously trying my luck with something longer.

In contrast to that, Marilyn writes novels with multiple sequels easily. But she has lately written a really cute Short Story for me! :) It's called 'In Love with Greensleeves', and if you have a moment to spare, why don't you have a look at it? :D