Don't Sleep Just Yet | Chapter 7

            It took until around 11:20 for Darcy to finally figure out where Ansel had gone. He had been the unintended recipient of a call from the younger man’s employer, who was anxious that he wasn’t coming, and, knowing Ansel, was concerned about that. The employer, a musical/acting director, hadn’t heard from Ansel yet, but Darcy decided to take his chances anyway. As he was running out of the apartment, he grabbed his coat, but failed to find his scarf. He searched for it for a moment before violently giving up.

            “F**k it!” He shouted to himself, exasperated, then rushed to the parking lot. He had the same bad feeling in his chest that he’d had that morning, and that time, his mother had been found dead shortly after. It could have just been a coincidence, but the doctor wasn’t about to take any chances, especially not when Ansel’s wellbeing was on the line. When he jumped into his car, he turned the key in the ignition. He forgot to fasten his seatbelt until he was at a red light two minutes away.

            What would have been a twenty minute walk was only a ten minute drive at most, and when he parked, he leapt out of his car and dashed into the building in front of him. The building in question was some sort of office/warehouse combo, but it had a conference room on the top floor that was doubling as a theater, being rented out by a director and a choir of young actors for a Christmas show. Ansel was working for the director, so Darcy could only assume that meant he was upstairs. However, exactly where upstairs wasn’t as clear to the doctor, so once he made it up to the third floor, he started to speed-walk down the many branching hallways.

            He was walking in big squares around the outer hallways, planning to work his way to the center, when he passed by a set of double doors. He didn’t process that he’d seen what could have been Ansel’s hoodie in his peripheral vision until he had already walked at least half a foot past it, and when he did, he whipped around and returned to the black twin doors.

            Through the small rectangular windows, Darcy could see Ansel standing on a wooden stage. He stood upon a large wooden box, using it as a stepping stool to touch up a pine tree he was painting on the set. The young man was tilted somewhat, half facing the window Darcy was gazing at him from, but he had his full attention on the wall of the set. As he watched, the doctor noticed his dark blue scarf was in fact around his best friend’s neck.

            Besides being relieved to discover that Ansel was alright, he couldn’t deny that he was oddly entranced, and he found himself stepping a bit closer to the glass, trying to see Ansel better. The insomniac rarely looked so focused. He seemed content with the work he was doing. Seeing the gentle way he ran his brush against the wall, combined with the pure purpose he wore on his face, awoke some unspoken feeling in Darcy as he realized how much he enjoyed the sight before him; Ansel had something to do, something that he appeared to enjoy. He had known Ansel to be many things, but for some reason “artist” had never been a title that had occurred to him until that moment. The doctor did not speak or move. Instead, he found himself just watching his friend paint. It put him at such ease to see Ansel so at peace.

            The young man pulled back from the wall when he’d finished with the top pines’ touch-ups, and Darcy watched him sigh before pinching the top of the scarf with the clean fingers of his paint-covered left hand, bringing it up over his mouth and seeming to take a delicate smell of it. Then, apparently fueled with a new sense of purpose, he raised the brush again. Darcy wasn’t entirely sure how seeing Ansel use his scent as means to keep himself focused made him feel, but it was a passionate feeling, whatever it was.

            However, the man just stared at the wall for a long moment. He huffed once more before his shoulders drooped, then he turned away from the wall altogether and stepped down from the box. Darcy twitched when his friend looked up, catching full sight of his face in the window, but the insomniac’s mildly surprised expression dropped into a solemn-yet-casual gaze upon recognizing who was watching him. Blindly, Darcy reached for a handle to pull open the door, but when he realized that he was grabbing at air, he looked down�"there were no handles on the door. He could not open it. So, he looked back up at Ansel, who, noticing the doctor’s confusion, slowly but bluntly tilted his head back, gesturing at another set of doors across the room. Darcy didn’t understand. Ansel realized that after a moment, then proceeded to point at the doors.

            “Go around,” he seemed to mouth.

            For a second, the doctor looked to his left and right and tried to figure out which way around would be shorter, but he quickly realized it didn’t matter, so he jogged to the left, turned two corners, and stopped in front of the other two doors. He ripped the right door open before quickly stepping inside. Ansel stood upon the stage, his hands clasped as he paced slowly toward him�"to the edge of the stage before stopping.

            “Hey.” The weary young man spoke in a low voice.

            “Hey,” Darcy breathed back as he stepped closer, walking around to the center of the stage. Noticing that he was looking at the trees, Ansel glanced back at them and let out a small laugh.

            “Yeah, they’re not very good.” He admit to his opinion. “I mean, I’m no landscape artist.”

            “I like them.” Darcy told him regardless.

            “Thanks, I guess.”

            Darcy stepped up onto the stage, and the two of them slowly and silently paced in circles around each other. Ansel played vacantly with his sleeves, an unconscious action that Darcy had witnessed him do whenever he was in an awkward situation, and Darcy himself just kept his hands in the pockets of his coat, though he could feel his thumbs rubbing between different fingers randomly: his own quirk when nervous. Something odd was lingering in the air between the duo�"Ansel seemed upset about something, and Darcy felt strangely passionate, though more in a negative sense.

            “So,” Ansel finally tried to break the ice, “what brings you here?”

            “Your boss called.” Darcy answered in a flat voice, not looking at Ansel as they continued to pace. “She was worried. So was I.”

            “Whoops.” Ansel reached down to the table his coat was on, picking it up before pacing back to stage right.

            “I mean, I find out that someone’s killing everyone I love, and then my best friend runs off on his own, so really, I’m not sure how you expected me to react.”

            “You knew where I was going.” Ansel muttered as he disappeared backstage through one of the arches on the set. Darcy stared at the walls, following Ansel’s approximate location with his eyes by listening to the young man’s boots against the hollow wood they stood upon.

            “I would be at home panicking if your boss hadn’t called.” Darcy argued, trying to hide the frustration he was beginning to feel rising in his chest.

            “Why? It’s not like I’d be a big target or anything.” Ansel stepped out through the arch to Darcy’s right�"stage left�"lowering his hood down onto the back of his coat, which he now wore. “I’m sure you’ve got extended family you should be more concerned about.”

            “You son of a b***h.”

            Ansel finally looked at Darcy, surprised by the sheer degree of biting emotion in the doctor’s quivering voice. He didn’t move when his older friend took a step closer, his lips trembling as he pointed his finger at Ansel.

            “You don’t think you’re family to me?” He snapped, his eyes beginning to well up against his will. “You don’t think that you mean the goddamn world to me? I don’t think I’ve cared for anyone as much as I care about you. Hell, I loved my own mother less than I love you!”

            Ansel, admittedly, was stunned, but Darcy failed to notice the shock on his face since it was a subtle change, and he was too overcome with emotion to pay attention to detail.

            “If anything ever happened to you�"anything that I knew I could have prevented�"anything that I knew was my fault�"I would… I’d…” The doctor lowered and shook his head, his messy hair following along somewhat delayed. “It would kill me.” He cried quietly, allowing a tear to roll down either cheek. “You mean so much to me. I don’t want to lose you too.”

            The insomniac tried to find something to say, but he was speechless. He briefly raised his hand, considering stepping closer and placing it onto his friend’s gently trembling shoulders, but he closed his fingers into a loose fist and lowered it instead. “Darcy…” He finally mumbled, apologetically. “I… don’t know what to say.”

            “Just say you’ll stay by me.” Darcy begged. “That you won’t do anything stupid or reckless like running off on your own again, at least not until we know the killer has been stopped.”

            Ansel sighed quietly. “It’s just… No one’s ever said anything like that to me before.”

            “Like what?” Darcy slightly lifted his head.

            “That they love me more than their own mother.” He answered with a small, touched smile on his lips.

            Darcy’s face flushed with what could have been embarrassment, but he said nothing, instead turning his eyes back down to the floor in silence. Ansel did the same, and though he wanted to return the sentiment, he found himself too nervous to do so, since he wasn’t so sentimental by nature. He expressed his love through witty banter and occasional indirect gestures of kindness, not by direct words and passionate emotions. So, instead, he opted to use the latter of his own options: a kind gesture of obedience.

            “I’ll stay by you, Peanut. I won’t move unless you say so… But what am I supposed to tell the director?”

---

 

            Downstairs in one of the backrooms used by janitors, Darcy sat on a stool closer to the door, watching as Ansel, hunched over the deep metal sink, scrubbed his paintbrush clean with his own fingers under the running tap. They remained this way in silence for a while, since Ansel was almost abnormally distant, and Darcy was too busy watching Ansel.

            He was still embarrassed about confessing to just how much he cared for the other man, but it felt good to have it off of his chest. All he could hope was that his confession would at least be taken as an indication that Ansel’s selflessness was greatly appreciated, as it was, and he had yet to find an appropriate time to properly thank the younger man. “So,” he finally spoke, after clearing his throat, “Were you alright on the way here?”

            Offhandedly, Ansel responded, “If you’re asking whether or not I felt like anyone was watching me on the walk here, the answer is no.”

            “You seem shaken, is all.”

            Ansel shook his head, but didn’t say anything immediately.

            “Ansel?”

            “I was hearing things.”

            Darcy quickly sat upright, intrigued and slightly alarmed, but Ansel just kept casually washing the brush. “Like what?”

            “Knocking on the windows, like someone wanted in.” Ansel chuckled lowly. “I thought it was Jay at first, but every time I looked, no one was there. Jay’s not quick enough nor light enough on his feet to get away that fast. But, you know, I haven’t slept in three days, so there’s that.”

            Darcy’s heart raced. His father’s final warning to him echoed in his head. “Did you open the door?”

            “Of course I opened the door. I had to check, didn’t I?”

            The doctor lowered his head, burying it in his right palm. “D****t, Ansel…”

            Ansel turned to look at him. “Why, was that wrong?” He questioned.

            “I think I know what my dad meant now.” Darcy announced. “The words he whispered to me.”

            Ansel tilted his head. His best friend glanced up at him with a face contorted by what might have been grief.

            “Maybe whatever’s doing this�"”

            “�"whoever�"”

            “�"is done with me. Maybe it moved along, to… to you.”

            “I don’t get it.” Ansel told him. “What are you saying?”

            “Who do you love, Ansel?”

            The doctor watched his friend’s vaguely playful expression abruptly change into one of mild, restrained fear. He didn’t say anything in response, but his face alone showed that he understood what Darcy was implying.

            “Who?” Darcy insisted. “We have to protect them.”

            Ansel blinked slowly, then his face changed again, displaying his sardonicism. Clearly, he understood, but thought that Darcy was joking. “Wait, okay, let me get this straight.” He gibed lightheartedly. “So not only do you think that the killer is after my loved ones now instead of yours, but also that they’re not human?”

            “Look, I know it sounds crazy�"”

            “You’re damn right it sounds crazy, Darc,”

            “What, so you don’t believe me?”

            “What I think, Peanut, is that you’ve been through a lot of stress.” Ansel replied. “I’ve been there, believe me, and I know what it’s like. I nearly went crazy trying to get away from Jay.”

            Darcy stood up. “Ansel, you saw that recording. That was me there; it was me who killed my father, and if there were any security cameras, you’d probably see that it was me who killed my mother, too!”

            Ansel rolled his eyes. “Oh, not this again. Darc, I already explained why that doesn’t work.”

            “But it was me!”

            “But it couldn’t have been.”

            “Exactly!”

            The younger man huffed. “So, what, you think this thing is wearing your skin like some sort of doppelgänger and trying to frame you for two or more counts of first-degree murder?”

            “I don’t know what it’s trying to do. But I think it’s after you. Whether it’s after you personally, or just whoever you love, I don’t know, but it came to me, too.”

            “I don’t follow.”

            “It came to me as you on Friday morning. I let it in. So did you, by opening the door!”

            “Darcy, you’re forgetting something.” Ansel argued. “If you’re talking about what I think you’re talking about, your dad was already dead. ‘It’ coming to you as me had nothing to do with that.”

            The doctor felt the blood drain from his face as his heart sunk to his chest. It hadn’t occurred to him up until that very moment that, perhaps, his bad feeling hadn’t been about Ansel. It could have been about someone else. “Oh God…”

            “Uh. You okay, Peanut? You’re… really pale all of the sudden.”

            “Just tell me who you love, Ansel.”

            The young man seemed to shrink under Darcy’s gaze. With a degree of shyness that didn’t become him, he slowly shook his head.

            “Ansel, someone could be dead! Tell me!”

            “You wouldn’t understand,” Ansel stammered quietly, averting his eyes from Darcy. He seemed quite uncomfortable, and possibly even frightened, which was very unusual. He buried his face down into Darcy’s scarf, his mouth sewn shut into a tight frown as he stared off at nothing with wide dark brown eyes.

            Darcy sighed, then stepped closer, placing his hands gently onto Ansel’s shoulders, causing him to glance up to meet his eyes. “Poppet,” He spoke gently, then paused, waiting for Ansel to interject with how much he hated that pet name, but no such thing happened, so he continued. “You don’t have to be nervous. What’s your dad’s name?”

            Ansel shook his head in disagreement, but said nothing.

            “Your mother?”

            Again, he shook his head.

            “You don’t love your parents?” There was yet another lack of a verbal response, so Darcy calmly insisted, “Just give me a name, please. I’ll call the hospital and ask, just to check if they’re okay.”

            “I can’t, really.” Ansel mumbled. “I can’t give you a name.”

            “Ansel, come on. You can trust me. If it’s a secret, it’ll be safe with me.”

            “Darcy, please.” The tone was vaguely demanding, but mostly desperate. “Look, there’s… really only one person I care about, and I know they’re safe.”

            “Let me make sure.” The doctor pleaded, hiding the disappointment that had arisen in his chest when he assumed that his sentiment towards Ansel didn’t seem to be reciprocated.

            “I am ninety-nine point nine percent certain that they’re absolutely fine.”

            “How?”

            “Because they’re standing right in front of me.” After realizing what he’d said, Ansel quickly and shakily turned back to the sink, resuming washing the brush despite it already being clean. Darcy, on the other hand, kept standing there. He was relieved, but also, surprisingly… well, surprised. “Well? Are you going to sit back down or are you going to keep staring at me like a weirdo?” Ansel nervously joked.

            “I’m…” The doctor struggled to find words, so he decided to use Ansel’s. “I’m the only person you care about?”

            “What can I say, I, uh, am a lonely guy.”

            “What about your family? Friends?”

            “My only other friend turned out to be a nutjob.” Ansel answered. “Can we change the subject?”

            “Sure, Poppet.” Darcy breathed.

            “I f****n’ hate that name.” Ansel groaned under his breath.

            The doctor knew he shouldn’t have been as elated as he was, especially not with his parents dead and his friend’s former friend turning out to be a little bit more than crazy, but he couldn’t help it. Almost without thinking, he stepped forward, wrapping his arms around Ansel, who tensed up at the sudden embrace.

            “Um.”

            “I love you, man.”

            “Sure. Thanks. I mean, you too. I… Err-um. Uah. Wow. I have no clue what to say.”

            “We’ll work on that.” Darcy laughed. He soon pulled away, and Ansel stood still for a few seconds more before idly resuming the task he had completed at least five minutes earlier. Darcy still wanted to call the hospital, though. “Hey, could I borrow your phone?”

            “What for?”

            “I want to call Dr. Park, just to check on her. I had a bad feeling, and I’m a bit worried.”

            “Whatever floats your boat, lover boy.” Ansel carefully pulled his phone from his pocket, handing it back to the doctor.

            However, when Darcy turned on the phone, he noticed that it had no service. “Huh. No connection.”

            “Go out in the hallway and stand by the windows. You’ll get a bar or two, probably.”

            “Thanks.” Taking his friend’s advice, Darcy walked out into the hallway. Sure enough, the closer he got to the windows, the better service he got. When he was confident with the amount of bars he had, he leaned against the windowsill and made the call. Ryan answered, so he did his best not to roll his eyes. “Hey, it’s me, Dr. Adair. Could you put me through to Dr. Park?”

            “Uhhh…” Ryan moaned awkwardly. “I thought she was with you.”

            Darcy furrowed his brows, confused. “What?”

            “Yeah, she just went to meet you. In the parking lot. Like, five minutes ago.”

            “Ryan, I’ve been with Ansel this whole time, forty minutes away.” Darcy told him. “Now stop kidding around.”

            “You called me only a few minutes ago, don’t you remember? I put you through to her. She left to go meet you.”

            Darcy began to feel a frightened flutter in his chest. “This isn’t funny anymore.” He warned. “I’ve been through a lot. Don’t joke around with me like this right now.”

            “You mean you really don’t remember?”