What if you knew that horrific events were coming and you figured out a way to protect your home and the ones you love, would you do it?
Yes? Then come along and read When Worlds Collide.
First to arrive for their lunch date, Aimee stood on the sidewalk outside of the Mexicali Rosa's restaurant at 58 Pitt Street, in downtown Cornwall. Every time she drove by this spot over the last ten years, she had wished they'd bring it back. Now, here it was and she was eager to go inside.
It looked pretty much the same on the outside after all this time because the building was the same, but it was still different. "Just like my dream," she thought out loud, "the same woods, but not." Aimee took a deep breath and stepped through the door for the first time since the restaurant's re-opening.
After being quickly greeted and seated, she sat looking around, trying to take it all in as she waited for her friends. Her eyes darted all over, from the walls to the ceiling, the floor to the windows. This place had seen a few different incarnations since it had last been a Mexi's back in the early 2000s, but she was more than glad it had made a comeback. As her gaze drifted over the vivid sugar skulls style murals, she hoped the food was the same, even if the decor was different.
"Yep, same, but different," she repeated, as her dream haunted her mind once again. She just couldn't get it out of her head. She remembered how real it felt, like it wasn't just a dream.
All the details came back to her, the utter quietness, the golden hue, the falling seed fluff, and the way it was all so very, very green. It reminded her of being in an 80s fantasy movie. It was all so... she searched for the right word... sublime, she thought. Yes, she remembered all of it, especially the wolf.
There was something strange about it though that she couldn't quite put her finger on. But those eyes... She'll never forget how they glowed an intense red, and then switched instantly to electric blue when it heard the Call, like flicking on a neon sign. Why had it responded that way? she wondered. And that strange Call... She could still hear it singing in her memory even now. Smiling dreamily, she found it oddly comforting.
"Aimee!"
Breaking out of her reverie, Aimee looked up to see two smiling faces.
"Hi! You remember my cousin, Heather, don't you?" Stacey asked, draping her jacket over the back of a chair, and then sitting down across from her best friend.
"I do, yes. Hi!" Aimee smiled, acknowledging them both, and then to Heather, "you went to high school with us; a year younger?"
"Two," Heather replied, taking the seat beside her cousin.
As the ladies settled in, the server approached and set complimentary fresh-made corn chips and salsa in the middle of the table and handed out menus.
"Yes, taco bowl!" Stacey quickly found what she wanted, so shifted her focus to her surroundings. "Wow, it looks great in here. Remember when we used to come here back in the 90s?"
Heather nodded. "Mmhm. Lots of good times in this place," and then turned to Aimee, who was still studying the menu with a small frown. "Are you still in town? Riverdale, right?"
"Right, yes. But I'm alone now." She looked up and reached to dip a chip in the salsa. "Been divorced for four years."
"Oh," Heather put her hand up to her heart, "I'm sorry to hear about that."
"Don't be; I'm not." Aimee gave her a nonchalant wave, and then asked, "and you? Are you just visiting?"
"No, I was out west in Alberta for about ten years, but I've come back now. I just bought a cute, older, red brick home on York Street a few months ago. It's like..." Just then, Heather paused, as the server came with their drinks and to take their order. After both she and Aimee opted for the fajitas and the server had moved on to another table, she leaned in and continued. "It's weird, but it's like I was drawn back home. I kept having these dreams and I was so homesick. I just couldn't take it anymore. I had to come back."
This plucked up Aimee's courage as she saw the opportunity to share her dream with her friends. As Stacey poured their first round of sangria, she spoke up. "Well, since you mentioned dreams, I had the weirdest one last night that I have to tell you about."
So while they sipped and nibbled, Aimee told them both all about last night's dream in full detail. When she got to the part about the Call at the end, she shivered and said, "it sounded somewhere between a Tarzan call, a rock star singing, and a wolf howl all mixed together."
"Weird." Stacey mumbled between munches.
"But beautiful though," Aimee admitted, shivering again and rubbing her arms, "still gives me chills." After taking a long sip of sangria, she added, "the odd, and kind of scary, thing though is that when I woke up, my closet door clicked shut... on its own."
"Wait," Heather stopped her. "What was that? What did you say about your closet?"
"It closed on its own," Aimee repeated.
"Me too!" Heather set her glass down so quickly that her drink sloshed up and over the rim. "Well kind of. I wasn't going to tell anyone but," she said, sopping up the small mess with a napkin, "I've got something going on at the house. I think it's haunted."
She then told her friends how strange activity began a week after settling into her new home. "It's an old house so the floors creak in certain spots," she recounted. "Well, those spots would often make noise like someone was creeping by. But with no one there. And sometimes I would hear the cupboards in the kitchen open and close on their own."
"Do you live alone?" asked Aimee.
"Yep, just me," Heather confirmed, topping up her drink from the pitcher. "Then things picked up and got a bit scarier. Like, I would find finger marks through the fog on the bathroom mirror after a shower. And at night, when I'd be in bed, my closet door would make a light bang noise, and then a few minutes later I'd feel my bed move, like when someone is standing beside it and bumps it intentionally."
"Oh wow," Aimee whispered, enthralled by Heather's tale.
"Then, about a month ago, I started to see shadow figures. I don't know if it's the same one or several different ones, but they like to just stand there and watch me." Heather paused and looked around, as though trying to see if the dark figures had followed her to the restaurant. "Especially in my bedroom doorway, just standing there... watching me."
"Does it creep you out?" Aimee asked and glanced at Stacey who was staring into her glass, lost in her own thoughts.
Heather followed her gaze as she replied, "sometimes." She shrugged, taking a sip of her drink and added, "I kinda got used to it. What about you, Stacey?" She then turned to her cousin, "you've been kind of quiet since you picked me up."
"Yeah, you look like you want to say something, but are afraid to," Aimee chimed in.
Stacey slowly looked up and realized it was her turn to tell her story. "Well, okay. On the subject of wolves," she looked at Aimee, "I've got something strange to share as well." She then proceeded to tell them about what had happened on her drive home last night.
"Holy crap!" Both Aimee and Heather blurted out at the same time.
"I asked the hubby if there were any wolves in our area and he said it was probably just a coyote or a coywolf. Yeah no," Stacey let out an incredulous laugh. "This thing was keeping up with me and ran even faster when it veered off up ahead, and" she emphasized, "it had to look down to be eye to eye with me... in the SUV!" She quickly covered her mouth, embarrassed by how loud she was getting and continued in a lower tone. "Oh, and it was big. Like the size of a horse! But the weirdest thing..." Stacey stopped herself. She looked her friends in the eyes, afraid they wouldn't believe her.
"What?" Heather softened her gaze and reached out to gently squeeze her cousin's hand.
"It didn't look like a regular wolf." Stacey looked around before continuing. "It looked like it had shoulders. Like people shoulders. And a chest!"
"Yes! That's it." Aimee slapped the table, finally realizing what was odd about her dream wolf.
Heather, meanwhile, prodded her cousin for more, "Was it, like, skinny? Narrow?"
Stacey searched her memory for a moment, then replied, "At the waist, yeah. But shoulders, no. The shoulders were big. Like hockey player, big."
Aimee nodded in agreement.
"With the shoulder pads?" Heather asked.
Now that she had recounted her experience out loud to others, it hit Stacey just how bizarre and frightening it actually was, as she squeaked out the word, "yeah".
"Right, like an athlete!" Aimee exclaimed, grateful for the shared description. "Lean, but muscular."
The ladies fell silent amid the clatter and chatter of the bustling restaurant. Then, all reaching for their glasses, they each muttered, "weird," in unison, and together took a long drink of sangria.
© 2021 by Linda Casselman
Last: What's in the Closet?
Next: Lurking in the Backyard
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Did You Hear The Call?
Become a Shield Warrior-in-Training
