ONE

She entered the pawnshop, wearing large sunglasses that didn’t quite conceal all the bruises of her last beating.

 Tall and blond, her hair hung past the collar of her long-sleeved white shirt. A shirt that seemed out of place on a hot day like this. Although her soul didn’t leave the usual traces of self harm, it shimmered in the colors of sadness, loathing, and premeditation of murder.

After the door closed behind her, I left the cool comfort of the car I’d borrowed from my parents, and entered the sweltering day. I prefer the northern cold to this southern sweat bath, but for now, it’s home. I wasn’t sure why the woman was there, but the sign proclaimed GUNS and PAWN. I didn’t think the shimmering amber of premeditation meant she was going to utilize the pawn-side of the shop.

After a minute of standing in the sauna, I entered, and a blast of cold hit me as I opened the door. Never had the smell of grease and oil from used power tools been so welcoming. The woman stood at a case of pistols,and the balding gentleman behind the counter smiled as he handed her a large revolver. I thought she’d want a smaller one.

She handled it with an ease that spoke of much practice. The colors of fear, anger, premeditation, and the bruises pointed me in the direction of what she planned.

I pretended to look at a case filled with laptop computers of lesser quality than mine, and waited until she made her purchase. The background check took  close to an hour, at which point she paid for the revolver and slid the case and the complimentary box of ammunition into her brown oversized purse. A second later, she slipped out the door.

         I gave her twenty seconds before I left. The wet heat took my breath away. I didn’t know where she’d parked, so I stood outside the entrance, waiting to see what she would do. She watched for traffic, crossed the street, and began walking north, keeping to the sidewalk.
        I crossed the street and followed.

Her head continually swiveled, watching for some unseen danger that I, even with my ability, could not predict. I wasn’t worried about losing her.  Even at long-range, the shimmer would be visible to me, unless she broke line of sight, or got so far away that her shimmer blended with the heat.

She continued down the walk, and passed another row of stores. I stopped, pretended to window shop as she continued on. When she had sufficiently widened the distance between us, I followed once more. Her path took her into a neighborhood that lined one side of the grocery store lot.

After cutting through one of the neighborhood yards, she came out in the side lot of the store. Ignoring the cars in the parking lot, she walked quickly to the rear of the building. I didn’t follow her across the parking lot, as my current line of sight from the yard gave me a clear view of the side and rear of the building.

As I waited at the back edge of the yard, my eyes flicked from her to the large sliding glass door of the house whose yard I was trespassing in. I didn’t want anyone to come out the back door and raise a ruckus. From the thin dirt line in the grass, I guessed people cutting through the yard was common.

She walked up to the back entrance, a large one with flaps on it, and slipped into the store. Her familiarity with the place spoke of someone who worked there. I hoped the lack of dripping traces meant whatever her plan was, it would not come to a conclusion here.

Going around to the front corner of the store, I leaned against one of the brick walls and waited. She would have to come out of the store eventually. The thought had crossed my mind that she could go back out the way she came, and head back towards the neighborhood’s back way, but where I stood at the corner of the building allowed me to glance around, and see that side of the lot.

I could’ve gone inside and looked for her, but in that over-sized building she could slip out before I could find her. Soul-sight doesn’t penetrate walls, or aisles. The spirit world has rules, just like the physical one.

Fifteen minutes went by, then twenty. Chancing a few moments of possibly missing
her if she went out the back, I’d purchased a cola from the machine. By the time she exited the building, I downed the whole thing.

She went down the handicap slope, and wheeled a cart full of groceries out into the parking lot. I followed. By the time she arrived at the car, I’d nearly reached her. She glanced at me, opened the back of her black SUV, and began to cram the bags into the back. I stopped a few yards from her, hoping to convey the fact that I was no threat.

“Ma’am,” I said. I wasn’t sure what I was going to say to her, but that seemed a good way to start.

“Yeah, what do you want?” She asked. Her curly blond hair flounced as she flung the bags into the cargo space of the vehicle.

“I know what you’re going to do,” I said, “and it won’t help. You’ll just go to jail.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. She went back to abusing her shopping bags.

“The revolver,” I said.

She stopped throwing bags, and her chin met her chest. Slowly, she removed her sunglasses. From my angle I could see a large purple bruise on the side of her face, surrounding the eye. My heart wrenched, acidic fury boiled its way into my throat. She looked at me, eyes wide with fear, face distorted in self-loathing, and I wondered if she’d be able to see what hid behind my sunglasses. What hid behind my eyes. I forced it down.

The premeditation was still there, the amber flickering through her soul as if taunting me with its presence. If I let her leave the parking lot, she would go wherever she planned to go, and the end result was something I couldn’t live with.

Concentrating, I reached out, my hand touching her shoulder, a light, feather touch, but that was all I needed. Sometimes when I try, I can touch a soul in a way that can either heal, or harm.

Tears began to stream down her face, and she leaned against the bumper of her vehicle, her face in her hands to hide the tears. I too, leaned against it, waiting for her pain to subside.

She seemed like a gentle person, unsuited to the situation she’d been saddled with. I wanted to help her, because often, kindness can turn the tide, just as easily as violence.

And because somewhere down deep, I wanted to kill the bastard who’d done this to her.

“I... I’m sorry,” she sobbed.

“You don’t owe me an apology,” I said.

She looked up at me then, the tears streamed down her face, and a surge of pity roped within my chest. “How did you know?” She asked.

I shrugged, shoved my hands in the pockets of my jeans. “I just guessed.”
        “You must have known. How could you know? Have you been following me? Did my husband hire you?” She asked, her voice rising, her hand shoved in her purse.

Probably gripping that revolver, I thought. I put my hands up a bit, hoping to placate her. “Today was the first time I saw you,” I said. “I don’t know your husband, but I can see what he does to you.” My anger stirred again.

She relaxed visibly, her hand came out of her purse. “My husband... he, he beats me,” she whispered. “I was going to end it today.”

”I nodded. “You were going to kill him,” I said.

She shook her head. “No.” She stared at me as if the pain in her eyes would convey the knowledge of her next words with just the look.

“I was going to kill myself.”