Down The Line
by
David King
© David King 2014
Cover Design by David King © 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author/publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, products, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
After everybody, except for her brother, had left the house after her husband’s funeral, Elizabeth Brown sat in the garden and watched the evening breeze gently rustle the tops of the apple trees that stood in a group at the far end of the lawn. She dabbed at her eyes with the crumpled handkerchief that she had been clutching all day and breathed a sigh of relief at the silence that now fell through her home.
She was pleased at the number of people that had turned up for Johnny’s funeral but she was equally pleased that they had now gone. She sighed again as her brother, Ray, emerged through the back door with two mugs of tea in his hands.
“Here you go,” he said gently and offered her one of the mugs.
“Thanks,” she replied and took the mug from him.
Ray sat down in the plastic chair next to her and placed his mug down on the floor. Silence fell heavily between them as they both watched the dancing trees at the other end of the garden.
“Why did he do it, Ray?”
“Do what?”
Of course he knew what she was talking about but he asked her anyway – he thought it would be a good way to get her to open up a bit as she hadn’t said very much about the accident at all since it happened.
“You know – why did he make that call?”
Johnny Brown was driving home from work when he decided to call his wife on his mobile. Elizabeth heard him say hello, then he swore loudly, and then came a loud metallic grinding noise. She called Johnny’s name but a loud bang came down the phone and the line went silent.
According to the police report, Johnny dropped his phone, causing him to crash his car into the metal barrier that ran down the middle of the motorway. The car then spun around before it bounced back out into the path of an oncoming lorry.
Elizabeth had listened to the whole thing.
“I don't know,” Ray answered. “Maybe there was something he needed to speak to you about.”
“But I told him so many times not to use his phone while driving, and he still did it. And now he’s gone...”
Ray placed an arm around his sister and she leaned her head against him while she wiped her tears with the crumpled handkerchief. Ray felt his arm move up and down with her shoulders as she fought against the sobs that were climbing up from her chest.
“Don't worry yourself about that now. Why don't you go for a lie down, it's been a long day,” he said.
“I don't know if I can sleep.”
“I know,” Ray said. “But at least try. It'd do you some good if you did.”
She looked up at her brother with wet eyes, nodded at him and then slowly walked through towards the back door.
When she was gone, Ray took a deep breath and wiped away his own tears that only dared to show themselves while he was alone.
*
Elizabeth woke up to the sound of her mobile buzzing like a demented wasp on the bedside table. She blinked and rubbed her eyes before trying to focus on the red LED display of her alarm clock. She rubbed them again when she saw it was 3 o'clock in the morning. She wondered who could be calling her at such an ungodly hour and grabbed the phone. It carried on vibrating in her grasp and she stared down at the display to see who the mystery caller was.
When she saw the name, her mouth fell open.
There, in bright white letters, were the words 'Johnny calling...'
She couldn't believe it. Her first thought was that she was dreaming, but the phone felt too real in her hands. She then wondered if somebody else was calling her from Johnny's phone but she remembered that it had been destroyed in the accident. Her hands trembled as she pushed the answer button with her thumb and placed the phone to her ear.
“Hello?” she whispered nervously.
There was silence at first but, eventually, a voice came through the phone.
“Lizzie, is that you?”
Tears ran down her cheeks like miniature glass snakes and her entire body shook as she sobbed when she recognised the caller's voice. It was definitely the voice of her husband.
“Yes,” she managed to answer. “I'm here, Johnny.”
“Good,” he replied. “I thought I'd lost the signal for a moment.”
“No, it's fine. Where are you?”
“I'm not sure. It's very dark here and really cold.”
“But you must know where you are,” she whispered.
“No, I don’t. One minute, I was driving home and then – nothing. Now I’m alone in the dark.”
“You’re alone?”
“Yes. Come and get me. Please.”
“But I don’t know how I…”
A strange noise came down the phone - it sounded to her like a growl of some unknown animal and not a sound that any human could make.
Then there was silence.
“Johnny?”
Still silence.
“Johnny!”
Still nothing.
A moment later her door opened and Ray stepped into the room.
“Are you OK?” he asked her. “I heard you talking to someone.”
She sat up in the bed and held the phone out to her brother.
“It was Johnny,” she said. “He was calling me.”
Ray took the phone, sat down on the bed next to Elizabeth and folded his arms around her.
“It was just a dream,” he said.
“I know. It’s just that… it seemed so real.”
“Yeah,” he replied. “Dreams are like that sometimes.”
He released his sister from his embrace and pushed a couple of things on the mobile’s screen. Then he flipped the phone around to show Elizabeth.
“See?” he said, pointing at the call logs. “No calls from Johnny.”
She looked at the screen and then at Ray as she wiped the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand.
“Now get some sleep,” Ray continued. “You need the rest.”
She nodded and lay down on the bed. Ray placed the phone back on the bedside table and walked to the door.
“Call me if you have any more bad dreams.”
“I will,” she replied. “Good night.”
“Good night,” he replied, smiling. He watched her settle down in the bed and then left the room.
When the door clicked shut, Elizabeth grabbed the phone and placed it on the bed next to her.
She stared at it for the best part of an hour before she finally went to sleep.