Eyes of the Serpent

It had been a long, tough day for Josie. Talking to the police about their discovery of the dead body of Sid Barker was one thing; trying to tell the police about the strange silent man dressed in a suit from the 1800\'s was quite another. Sure, she really couldn\'t admit she was sorry Sid was gone; but how he had gone, she would have wished on no one. It also struck really close to home for everyone in Half-Plate; if Sid was killed here, who else was going to be murdered?



"They think I\'m crazy." Josie-Rae said point blank, pulling off a tattered old duffel bag from her shoulder. It was filled with her clothing. She did not feel safe at home by herself, and had decided to take Remmy up on his offer to let him stay at his place. She still hadn\'t met his mother; the woman was out this morning when they woke up. Remmy had made Josie breakfast, and she got to thank him for the effort, but still had yet to be able to thank Mrs Torlain for opening up her door to some waitress from the diner. Everyone around Half-Plate knew almost everyone else, but sometimes, there were a few missed connections.



"No they don\'t. I think it\'s just the bizarreness of the whole situation, where the only lead is some fashion depraved mute creeper that stands outside of cafes staring at girls. I saw the guy too and was creeped out too. Does that make me crazy?" Remmy replied, trying to comfort her. By the frowning expression on her face, he had failed.



"They DO think I\'m crazy. Did you see the look that constable gave me when I finished my description? They think I\'m nuts."



"Hey, the only crazy one allowed around here is me!" he grinned, flopping down on his bed. "Don\'t you know that? I\'m the one everyone is afraid I\'m going to prophesy their deaths. At least you\'re just seeing strange mute men in old suits!" Josie managed a light, genuine giggle.



"I guess you\'re right. You\'re far crazier than me."



"That\'s right, you\'re not one BIT cra--heeeey!" he started, finally realizing her comment. "Oh come on, give yourself a little more credit then that. I bet they think they might know where the guy is, and that was the look. Maybe other people have sent in descriptions of the same guy, and don\'t know where to start." Josie smiled. Maybe she was being a little over-sensitive. She was safe now, at any rate, and wasn\'t going to go back to work any time soon. She\'d called in that morning to let them know she\'d be late, and was informed that the old couple decided to close up until \'the funny business was over\'.



"So, where will I be sleeping? I mean, there isn\'t a guest bedroom...Did you want me to sleep on the couch?" she asked, half trying to change the topic of conversation.



"No, you can have my room. I think I\'d rather be close to the front door; you know - just in case."



"I guess that makes sense. I can bolt out the window if I hear you scream." she teased, sticking her tongue out.



"Awww, hey..." he crooned, acting hurt. "I am not THAT bad at fighting. I could save you, if I needed to..."



"I\'m sure you could." she grinned back.



Then, a quiet silence fell over them. What would happen if the creepy man DID find them, and DID try to break in? WOULD Remmy be strong enough to keep her safe? He was thin and lanky - but then again, some guys were impossibly strong even with a lean body. Images flashed through her mind; the strange man breaking the door in, and Remmy jumping up to beat him up, but failing, and the man biting a massive chunk out of --



"Whoa, hey..." Remmy interrupted, leaning forward off the bed to stand in front of her, not liking the expression on her face. "Don\'t think about him. Don\'t even worry about him." her eyes snapped up away from her daydream and over to Remmy.



"How did you..." she trailed off, then remembered almost as suddenly as it came out that he was psychic. Maybe he COULD read her mind like that.



"I just know these things. I can\'t tell you how. It hardly ever makes sense to even me. Sometimes I don\'t even know I\'m talking; I just sort of blank out and when I come to, I\'m all of a sudden in your cafe and yammering about Woe. It just happens."



"So it\'s not really you when that stuff happens?" she asked, tilting her head.



"In a sense it is. I think it\'s just the psychic part of my brain talking out loud. I haven\'t totally figured it out yet. Mom thinks it\'s from my father."



"Your father?" she asked quizzically. She\'d never actually heard anything about his parents.



"He was a very....gifted man." Remmy answered, casting his eyes out the bedroom window to the setting late spring sun. "He could see things that made no sense to anyone but him, and he said things in many languages. He was constantly connected to another world it seemed. I\'m surprised you haven\'t heard stories about Remmy Senior."



"...He must have been a hunter." Josie commented, glancing down at the bear-skin rug at the foot of the bed.



"Hmm? Oh that. He brought that back for me when I was a little boy. It was the last thing he did for me, actually..." his eyes never moved from the sunset outside. It didn\'t take a psychic to know that something had happened to the man. Josie sat down beside him, and placed a gentle hand on his back.



"What happened?" Remmy tensed. He should have seen that question coming.



"I really don\'t want to get in to it...he was killed, and that\'s all that\'s really key..."



"I\'m sorry, I don\'t really know what it\'s like to lose anyone close to me. My mother left daddy when I was a little girl, so I never really knew her. I won\'t bug you to tell me what happened. But if you ever want to talk..."



"I can\'t talk about it, to anyone. No one can know." he said, rather coldly, and headed for the door "Use the TV if you like - I\'m getting a shower."



"No one can know what? Remmy?" Josie exclaimed, walking after him down the hall.



"Let him go." a female voice from behind her spoke. Josie whirled around, and found herself face to face with a familiar looking woman. Her hair was long and silver, reaching down to her mid back in a ponytail. Her eyes almost matched her hair in color. She wore clothes of a younger generation.



"Jean? You\'re Remmy\'s--"



"Mother? No. He calls me that, but that\'s only because he\'s been here since his parents were killed. I\'m his mother\'s older sister - his Aunt. But let the boy relax a while. He still hasn\'t come to terms with their murder. Don\'t ask him too many questions about it, and he\'ll explain it to you when he\'s good and ready. He needs to trust you with it first." that made sense. She also wouldn\'t tell anyone something as deep as that without knowing if she could trust them first, no matter how much she liked them.



"He said no one can know. What did he mean by that?" A strange expression came over Jean\'s face.



"I\'m sure he said \'No one knows\'. Are you sure you heard him correctly?" Josie opened her mouth to rebutt, when a loud ding came from downstairs. "Oh, my muffins. Come on down for a muffin, hmm? I bet you haven\'t eaten a thing all day." Deciding to drop the argument at the hungry growl of her stomach, she shrugged, and trailed after Jean into the kitchen.



Her thoughts drifted back to Remmy; why was he so hung up on her, and yet so defensive of the past? He liked her, and yet, he couldn\'t trust her? "He even has a photo of me in his bedroom..." she mumbled, her mind flashing back to the early morning. She hadn\'t intended on saying it out loud, but it was far too late when it came out. Jean placed the muffins on the stove top and turned to her, taking off her oven mitts as she sat at the table.



"He has liked you even before he took that photo." the woman replied, giving her a serious look. "Can I give you some advice? I know my nephew like I would my own son. He won\'t settle for \'just friends\', and I think you know that." Oh great, not the \'don\'t hurt my son\' conversation. She was so uncertain about everything right now, including her own life; how could she even think about men? Her last boyfriend was back in New York and likely had dropped out of high school with dreams of becoming some heart throb musician. She was nowhere near in the state to consider anything else.



"Jean, I honestly can\'t process much right now, with what\'s been happening the last few days. I\'ve got so much to process, I can\'t even think about Remmy\'s crush on me right now."



"But, you have the ability to think about his parents, or your work? About muffins? I think you\'re skirting the issue. Don\'t you think that you\'ve been ignoring it long enough? He\'s been hovering around you for a good set of years now; you haven\'t paid him much attention, until the last few months. I know the way you look at him, and maybe you haven\'t realized it yet, but you do like him. Remmy is a good man, he knows how to take care of you; but he will do insane if you decide to do this \'friend\' thing with him. Imagine being so starved, and seeing a burger just out of your reach, you can\'t quite get it....it will do the same thing to Remmy. Think about what I\'ve said; just don\'t hurt him." Jean picked a cooing muffin out of the tin, and placed it in front of Josie-Rae.



"Jean, you\'re not hearing me. I never said whether I did or didn\'t like him, I haven\'t had time to even process anything. In the last week, I\'ve been propositioned by Sid Barker, told of a new loan policy that would make me fall bankrupt and owing a great sum of money, and blackmailed by Sid to date him and his friends. I\'ve had a creepy man stare at me through the cafe window, and even enter the cafe and not say a thing, like he\'s been watching me for a long time, THEN on the way home, we find a dead body in the park. Where in all this would you like me to think about love?"



"Probably between the muffin and Remmy going insane, I should think." Josie fumed. There was nothing worse than someone pushing their own point, not listening.



"Look, I\'m not ready to talk about it, stop being such a scootch." she growled, grasping the chocolate chip muffin before heading back upstairs without another word. Jean frowned after her, pondering the meaning of the New York slang term, \'scootch\'.



* * * * *



Evening turned in to night, and Josie had fallen asleep watching a TV movie. Remmy had wandered back to get his clothes after his shower, but after changing, had stayed to watch her sleep. He sighed inwardly, wishing he could just crawl in there with her and hold her all night. He frowned at himself; he lost his temper at her, and probably hated him now. He wanted to tell her everything, but he just couldn\'t. He couldn\'t even think of where to begin. Back at the beginning? Where WAS the beginning? He wiped his face of nothing, and turned away to find his spot on the couch downstairs, when a faint thump echoed through the house from downstairs. His eyes immediately shifted to the spot on the floor where the sound had come from, and gave a faint sniff. What the hell had that been? Curious, he prowled down the stairs at a cat-like speed and silence, eyes darting everywhere around him in the dark to take in every angle.



"Who\'s there?" he said, masking his voice with a false depth, making himself sound big and angry. "Who\'s there?" he repeated, as no response came. His face lit with suspicion; Jean would have replied immediately. He stalked over to the front door; it was closed and locked, as it had been all along. Frowning, he relaxed. Maybe Jean had knocked something over in her sleep. He decided he would go and check on her. He moved to the room beside the kitchen, and pushed open the door, slowly. Strange; the window was open, and a vase of flowers on the sill had toppled over. He shook his head; that wasn\'t like her. She hated drafts. Maybe she\'d forgotten it, but that too wasn\'t like her. He slid the window silently shut, locked it, and bent to pick up the flowers. A quick glance over at Jean said she was just fine, but merely asleep.



Something was amiss, but everything SEEMED fine. Just to be safe, he would go up and stay by Josie. He shut the door quietly behind him, and heaved a sigh. The woman was getting old; maybe she was beginning to lose her faculties.



Then, a scream ripped through the house from upstairs.



"Josie." he barked, and tore up the stairs at an inhuman speed. He flew into the room, fists bared, ready to kill anyone that dared to come near her. A few seconds of his eyes flying around the room made him realize no one was there. He flicked his glance to Josie, who was in his bed, flailing about, still asleep. He let his tension flee him, as he realized she was having a nightmare. Quickly, he sat beside her, and pulled him in to his arms. She was crying hysterically in her sleep, and tried to beat Remmy away from her.



"Shhh shhh, you\'re okay now..." he cooed to her, petting her hair, trying to soothe her. Slowly it begun to work, as he rocked her in his arms. "You\'re okay, Remmy is here..."



Her eyes flicked open, and she jumped a little, but soon realized she was awake. "Wh-what..." she groaned, relaxing tiredly into Remmy\'s embrace. "It was horrible;" she started, shaking her head as if to try and shake away the images. "The creepy man broke in, and was trying to eat Jean, she--"



"Shhhh, shh..." he interrupted, trying to focus his energy onto her. He willed her nightmare to go away, he used his energy to force the horrors away. It was working, and soon, she was mumbling, then finally asleep again. He smiled, but then realized he couldn\'t leave - she was asleep ON him. Shrugging inwardly, he settled himself down, and contentedly curled his arms around her, and fell asleep.