The First Stage (Finished)

[Madison]

((This is a solo continuation of this thread here.))

Late September 2011

Once outside of the apartment building, it wasn’t difficult for Madison to blend into the crowd of gawkers that had formed beyond the police barriers and vehicles that cut off the alleyway. Three ambulances, several squad cars and a fire truck crammed the street making it hard for traffic to pass. Red, white and blue lights flashed across the faces of onlookers and buildings. Madison was deaf to the hushed talking of the people around her. She murmured barely intelligible apologies as she pushed through the crowd to get past the alleyway.

A slight bit of tension lifted from her as she turned the corner, leaving the flashing lights and crowds behind heading towards the park nearby. The night air was comfortable but the wind had a chill that sent shivers down Madison’s spine. She didn’t know quite where she was going to go. Her father would slam the door in her face and it was much too late to go to her aunt’s. Coastside train station was just beyond the park and it was probably best she get away from the area.

Oblivious to all that surrounded her, Madison cut across the grass to a path that wove around a small playground and then passed through a patch of trees. Her mind was blank, barely any thought processing besides the incessant urge to run. A group of teenagers sat on and around the swings, hiding their joints and bottles of filched alcohol from parents until they realized that Madison was paying no attention to them at all. One of the bolder boys called out to her, “Hey pretty lady, you want to have some fun?”

Madison just kept on walking, hardly registering that anyone had spoken to her. The boy called out to her again and received the same response. Annoyed that she had ignored him in front of his friends he changed tactics just to see if he could get a rise out of her, “Well **** you too then *****!”

Blind and deaf to everything around her, Madison just kept following the trail into a small patch of woods. Leaves rustled in the wind above her and occasionally a chipmunk ran out to cross her path. Twigs snapped behind her but Madison still didn’t bother to look and see what caused it. She kept her head down, eyes directed blankly at woodchips that marked the trail. Some part of her was still working for she caught the reflection of light in a puddle and stepped around it. Another twig snapped up ahead of her this time and Madison lifted her head just barely to look in front of her. Not even ten feet from her, one of the teenage boys stood in her path. As she neared him she moved to the far right of the path to pass him by. He sidestepped to get in her way. Lifting her head, Madison stepped to the left to pass him that way. Again he got in her way. One by one the rest of the teenagers stepped out from the woods to form a half circle around Madison.

“Didn’t you hear me talking to you *****?”

Madison stood motionless and just stared at the teen in front of her. He couldn’t be more than seventeen. He was a few inches taller than she was and broader than Mike had been in the shoulders. Expressionless, she just stared at him, waiting for him to say his piece and get out of her way.

The boy’s eyes narrowed at her, “I’m ******* talking to you. Don’t you know it’s polite to respond when someone is speaking to you? Or did all the peroxide you use on your hair suck out all the intelligence in your brain?”

Again Madison just stood there and stared at him, occasionally her eyes flitted to one of the other boys around her. The two to her left were passing a joint back and forth, more interested in getting high than the situation they were a part of. The two to her right were grinning like fools, amused by her predicament. It was the shorter of the two that spoke, “Maybe she’s a mute. You know, one of them bitches that can’t talk.”

The boy in front of her took a few steps towards her, she could smell the alcohol on his breath as he asked her, “Is that what you are *****? A mute?”

He still received no response.

There was a glimmer in his eye and a malicious smile crossed his face. He took another step towards her, putting himself square into her personal bubble. Looking to his friends, they egged him on, catching on quickly to his intent. His hand rose to touch her hair and Madison jerked back from him. A look of anger flashed across the boy’s face and he reached out quickly and grabbed her by the hair, pulling her close to him. She didn’t cry out and this encouraged him. Putting his face right up against hers, he whispered in her ear, “Too bad you’re a mute; I like it when they scream.”

Her sudden movement took them all by surprise and it took the boys surrounding her a second to realize she had pulled out her gun and had it pressed underneath the chin of the one holding her by the hair. Returning his gesture, Madison put her face against his and whispered to him, “Didn’t your mother teach you how to speak to a lady?”

The boy’s friends were already backing away from her, fear in their eyes as they debated running and leaving their friend behind. Madison pushed the boy away from her and continued to point her gun straight at his face. She glanced around her before focusing her gaze back at the one in front of her. She spoke for the first time loud enough for all of them to hear, “You have two seconds to get the **** out of my way.”

None of them needed to be told twice and all fled in different directions but none in the direction she was heading. Shoving the gun back into the waist of her jeans, Madison quickened her original pace. Within a few minutes she emerged on the other side of the woods. This side of the park was well lit and the lights from the train station could be seen down at the end of the block. She checked her watch as she left the path to cut across the grass. There was about fifteen minutes before the next train came.

[Madison]

Madison had become absorbed into the window as the train carried on. Her blue eyes stared blankly at all that passed. The spark of adrenaline was gone and all of her attentions were turned inward. The night’s events played over in her mind like a movie. But the DVD player in her brain would get stuck and skip backwards, replaying the scene of Mike getting stabbed in the chest over and over again. Sadness and despair crept over her like a veil; tears welled and fell, slowly trailing their way down her face to drip from her chin. She made no move to wipe them off, just kept staring out the window with her reflection pitifully staring back at her. Tears started to fall faster as a lump formed in her throat, her nose began to run and her breath came more quickly.

Madison tried to fight the panic building inside her but her will was damaged and she broke out into sobs that racked her body. The few other passengers that had boarded the train with her were starting to stare but she paid them no attention, her mind didn’t even register their presence. Her chest felt tight and her heart beat painfully fast within. The feeling seemed to last far too long but after a few minutes her breathing slowed and became more even. Her sobs became shallow breath and she wiped away the tears from her face. The whole night seemed like a bad dream.

“Maybe that’s what this is,” Madison thought to herself, “this is nothing more than a bad dream. None of it is real and I’m going to wake up any time now. Mike will be there and he’ll tell me how I’ve always had such a wild imagination when I tell him about this. None of this is real.”

Mike would probably get a kick out of the part where the boys had followed her into the park. He’d been the one to take her to shoot her first gun. The pistol at her back had been a gift for their second Christmas together. He had told her that not every situation required her to pull the trigger, part of having a gun was intimidation, the other was knowing how and when to use it. Madison had never clicked the safety off when she had held it to that boy’s chin. Her mind wandered, recalling memory after memory of time spent with him.

Madison was really starting to believe that the whole night had been nothing more than a bad dream and that any moment she would wake up to Mike waiting for her. She started to laugh at herself, at how panicked she had become. Fight or flight had taken over in her mind; she had been ready to fight until flight had become possible. The whole situation now seemed surreal. Her laughter drew more stares from the people on the train. They must think her crazy for going from tears to laughing in such a short period of time but what did they matter. They were just figments of her imagination.

Her laughter faded as the train pulled into the next station. The other people on the train stood from their seats and got off the train but not before a few of them threw strange looks in Madison’s direction. No one boarded after they got off. The train started moving again and Madison distracted herself by picking at the seat cushion next to her. She really should be waking up at any moment now. Her attention span was short and the loose thread on the cushion next to her had been successfully pulled from the fabric. She had watched a cup roll down the center aisle before it bumped into a pole and stopped. Her gaze drifted back to the window, now more aware of the scenery that passed. This dream was starting to get dull and very long. She stopped staring out the window and started reading the advertisements that were plastered about the train car. She had just about read them all when the train pulled into its second station since she had boarded.

A few more people boarded at this stop and Madison stared at them intently. Watching their movements and body language, trying to place some connection from where they sat to what type of personality they had. She giggled as she realized that since this was her dream, they had any type of personality she gave them. She turned her gaze back to the window after the skinny bald-headed man that she decided had an anger problem glared back at her and asked if she had a problem. His actions furthered her thinking that she truly was in a dreaming state but this dream was really becoming a strange and rather boring dream. Denial was like rose-colored glasses before her eyes. Making all the horror she had seen into something reasonable that her brain could process.

Vibrations coursed from within her pocket into her hip and Madison pulled out her cell phone and stared at it as though she didn’t know what it was for a second. Her and Mike’s friend Sam’s picture, name and phone number stared back at her as the phone vibrated once more and the little red light in the corner blinked at her. She hit the talk button and brought the phone to her ear, “Hello??”

“Maddie where the **** are you, do you know that me and Philip just left your apartment building that is still crawling with cops by the way,” Sam didn’t take a single breath as she rattled on, “you need to tell me what the hell happened. Your neighbor told me that Mike’s dead and there were cops in your apartment and where the **** are you?”

“I’m on the train,” Madison replied calmly, she’d had dreams with Sam in them before.

“The train!? Going which direction, to what station? Could you be a little more specific right now?...”

Interrupting another earful from Sam, Madison spoke quietly to her friend, “Sam…..Sam, calm down. I’m fine. I think Cherrydale is the next stop.”

“What do you mean calm down!? Mike is dead Madison! Did you hear that part?....”

“Maybe this isn’t over yet,” Madison was thinking out loud, still not relenting in her belief that this was a dream, “Maybe I’m supposed to find her.”

“Find who? What the **** are you going on about? You know what, you get your *** off the train at Cherrydale and you stay the **** there until Philip and I get there. I swear to god girl I will hunt you down …Do you understand me?”

“I understand Sam,” Madison reassured her friend, “I’ll wait for you at Cherrydale.”

[Madison]

Fifteen minutes had passed before she recognized Philip’s midnight blue Lincoln Aviator pull up to the curb. Madison stood from the bench and started to make her way towards the vehicle. Before Philip had made a complete stop, Sam was out the passenger door, leaving it wide open as she ran towards Madison. Not even a quarter of the way to the street, Sam met Madison and the shorter brunette wrapped her arms around Madison tightly.

“I can’t breathe Sam, you’re crushing my ribs.”

Sam released her death grip from around Madison and looked into the woman’s face that while streaked with dried tears seemed overly passive and calm. “Maddie, are you ok?”

“I’m fine Sam,” Madison started to walk towards the car again where Philip was now waiting outside of the car, “We just have to find her now. It can’t be that hard to find someone who looks like Brittany Spears. Wouldn’t that be something crazy if it really was Brittany Spears.”

As Madison continued on about finding the woman who resembled the pop singer, Sam looked at her friend with concern, “Maddie, what are you talking about?”

Philip joined them and took Madison into his arms and guided her towards the back seat of the SUV. Madison looked up at him and smiled, “We’re going to find her Phil, cuz you’re good at finding people. Once we find her this will all be over.”

Phil looked to Sam who just shook her head and opened the backseat door for him. Philip took Madison’s bag from her and encouraged her to get into the back seat. She obliged him and he handed her bag back to her before closing the door.

“What the **** Phil?”

“I think she’s in shock Sam, let’s get her back to the house and get her cleaned up.”

Once Sam and Phil had gotten Madison back to their house, Sam had taken her to the bathroom, given her a pair of pajama pants and a sweatshirt, told her to change and wash her face. Madison had resisted at first, demanding that finding the blonde woman was more important. Sam insisted and eventually convinced Madison to humor her and then she could tell them what happened. Sam had left the bathroom then, telling her she would be waiting in the living room when she was ready. Madison looked around the bathroom for a moment and then stared at her reflection in the mirror for awhile. She was a bit of a mess. Stripping out of her clothes, Madison folded them and put them on the counter. Turning on the faucet, Madison leaned over the sink to splash water across it, gently rubbing her hands over her face washing away the remnants of her tears. She looked at herself again in the mirror, noticing the dark circles that were starting to form under her eyes. She felt surprisingly tired and couldn’t remember ever feeling tired during a dream before. Madison dressed slowly, exhaustion starting to set in.

When she made her way to the living room, the clothes she had been wearing in her arms, Sam and Phil were on the couch talking to one another in hushed tones. They stopped talking when they became aware of Madison. Phil shifted in his seat, throwing his arm on the back of the couch so he could look at her while Sam stood and came to her, guiding her to the love seat. She took Madison’s clothes from her and set them on the coffee table before taking the spot next to Madison.

“Do you need anything Maddie? Are you hungry? Would you like some tea or coffee?”

“Tea sounds great Sam, please? I’m really tired.”

Sam stood and nodded before heading off to the kitchen. Madison brought her legs up onto the love seat and curled up against the arm of it. Phil was looking at her quietly. Beeps from Sam pushing buttons on the microwave broke the silence before the hum as she hit start.

“Were you at the apartment Madison?”

“Of course I was at the apartment,” Madison answered, pausing to yawn, “Where else would I have been? We were supposed to meet you at the restaurant. I wasn’t supposed to know you guys were going to be there but I did because Sam told me.”

“Ok Mad, but did you see what happened to Mike? Where you there when it happened?”

Madison didn’t answer his question and instead stared at the carpet. Her mind was starting to get fuzzy and her eyelids felt heavy. The sound of the microwave finishing its timer brought her attention back to Phil, “Yeah I saw what happened…”

Before she could continue Sam came back into the room with a steaming mug in her hands. She handed it carefully to Madison who played with the teabag a little. Sam then took a seat besides Phil. Madison blew across the top of the cup gently and sipped it before setting it down on the coffee table. Repositioning herself on the loveseat, Madison curled up her arms on the side of the couch and rested her head on them. Maybe if she fell asleep in her dream she would wake up to the real world and end this sooner, “I’m really tired guys, I just want to be done with this now.”

Phil and Sam looked at her before Phil nodded. He got up, leaned over and kissed the top of Madison’s head, “It’s going to be alright now Mad.”

He turned to look at Sam as he stood, “Get her a pillow and a blanket would you?”

Sam did as he asked and Phil walked out of the living room into the kitchen. Madison just stayed motionless on the couch, her eyes started to droop some, and consciousness was becoming more fleeting. Sam came back and nudged a pillow under Madison’s head before covering her with an afghan blanket. Madison watched Sam walk away from her towards the kitchen through half closed eyes and could hear Phil on the phone in the kitchen before sleep overcame her, “Yeah, we’ve got her…..Yeah she was there when Mike died, she’s pretty shaken up….No, we don’t know what happened yet, I’ll call you as soon as we know something…..Don’t tell anyone she’s here.”

[Madison]

She’d been trailing the woman for a block now, staying close enough that she never lost sight but far enough back that she believed she hadn’t been spotted. Up ahead the woman took a right turn into an alleyway. Madison began to jog to catch up, hoping she wouldn’t lose track of her now. She paused at the edge of the alley, pulling her gun out as she glanced around the wall, biding her time. The woman was several yard into the alleyway, her back to Madison. Madison stepped out of cover, started running down the alleyway and unleashing multiple rounds. A bullet struck the woman in the shoulder; the force twisted her around and knocked her off balance so that she fell to the pavement. She tried to push herself up off the ground but Madison emptied the rest of her clip at her. Another two bullets hit the woman in the stomach and side. Once more the woman collapsed but this time was still. Madison reloaded her gun with a new clip as she walked up to where the woman lay face down on the ground, pools of blood starting to form from her various wounds. Madison knelt beside the woman, careful to avoid the blood and reached down to turn the woman over…..

Eyelids fluttered still heavy with sleep as Madison slowly woke. The scent of coffee lingered in the air and she became increasingly aware of how uncomfortable and stiff she was. The muscles in her legs ached, her right arm was completely numb underneath her, and her head and neck were at an odd angle. She turned on the cramped loveseat trying to provide relief to the aches and pains of her body. Sunlight poured down upon her from an eastern facing window. Her eyes opened and squinted, both hands coming up to her face to rub the sleep that had crusted around her eyes while she slept. Madison took a look around then, realizing that she wasn’t at home.

Water was running in the sink in the kitchen and the sounds of dishes clicking against one another could be heard faintly. Madison rose from the couch and stretched out her sore muscles before shuffling her way into the kitchen doorway. Sam was at the sink, her hands in dishwater and she paused and looked up at Madison. She smiled softly and dried her hands off on a dish towel, “Hey Maddie, you want some coffee?”
Madison stared at Sam, tears started to form in her eyes, “Last night wasn’t a dream, was it?”

The look Sam gave her was one of mixed sympathy, pity and concern. The dam broke inside of Madison and she began to cry in earnest. She collapsed onto her knees as sobs shook her core. Within moments Sam was beside her on the floor, wrapping her arms around Madison tightly and rocking her gently, murmuring words of comfort, “It’s going to be alright Madison; it’s going to be ok.”

Eventually Sam had calmed the distraught woman and gotten her seated at the kitchen table with a mug of hot coffee. Madison was quiet now, staring blankly into her cup as she stirred a spoon through it, watching how the liquid swirled around the cup. She looked up as Sam came to the table with some buttered toast on a plate and set it in front of Madison before taking a seat herself.

Madison pushed the plate away from her, “I’m not hungry.”

Sam pushed it back, “You need to eat something hun.”

Not having the will to fight, Madison pulled the plate closer to her and picked up a piece of toast. She stared at it for a moment before taking a small bite. The coarse texture seemed overly dry in her mouth even though it had been buttered. She tried to swallow and felt like she may choke on the small bit of bread. She took a sip of coffee to wash it down. Sam watched her diligently, giving her a small nod of approval and encouraged her to eat more. The pair sat silently for some time like this, Madison nibbling and choking down the food followed by coffee and Sam just watching. After the first piece of toast had been eaten, Madison pushed the plate away from her again.

“Where’s Phil?” she asked.

“He took your keys and went back to the apartment to get some of your stuff. We figured the cops would be gone by now and you didn’t have much clothing in your bag.”

Madison nodded, her attention turned back to her half-empty coffee cup at first. She looked up at Sam when she mentioned her backpack, “You went through my stuff?”

Sam was quick to reassure, “Just to see what you had already grabbed. And Phil was asking about some of Mike’s stuff, we didn’t know if you had it or not.”

“Some of Mike’s stuff?”

Madison was confused. What would Phil have need of anything of Mike’s for? Her brow furrowed as she tried to think, “Why would Phil need anything of Mike’s?”

“I don’t know,” Sam shrugged and took a sip of her own coffee before continuing, “I think they were working on something together. Something important. Everything’s all hush-hush and almost everyone is in a tizzy about Mike’s death….”

Mike’s death….

The words repeated themselves in Madison’s mind. It had been the first time since she had woken up that anyone had mentioned the fact that Mike was dead. The small hope that the previous night had all been a bad nightmare had been shattered when she found herself still in Sam and Phil’s apartment. Madison retreated into her own mind and she was once again staring blankly at the coffee cup in her hands. Sam’s hand entered her vision and gently touched one of her own.

“I’m really sorry Maddie but Phil is going to be home soon and he’s going to want to ask you a lot of questions. The more we know the sooner, the better the chances of finding the ******** that did this to him.”

Madison looked up at Sam, “Can I take a shower?”

[Madison]

Water cascaded down upon Madison who stood motionless beneath the shower head, slowly turning the hot water knob up until the water started to scald her skin. Steam rose around her and filled the shower, billowing out into the bathroom from over the top. The air became thick, almost hard to breath when condensed with so much moisture. Within a few minutes she had turned the entire bathroom into a sauna.
Her skin acclimated to the temperature of the water; it no longer sent prickles of pain as it hit her though now she was much rosier in complexion. Madison found herself huddling beneath the spray, arms wrapped around her as she turned her body around so that it hit her back instead of her arms and chest. The warmth that surrounded her was comforting, more comforting than Sam had been. She tried to let it relax her muscles, hoping to ease her mind from some of the physical aches and pains she had woken with. But even under the soothing fall of water, Madison was tense. She knew that by the time she was done showering that Philip would be home. He and Sam would be waiting for her when she exited the bathroom, wanting to know every single detail. She was in no rush to finish this shower.

After fifteen minutes or so, Madison noticed a significant decrease in the water’s temperature. She cranked the hot water knob as far as it would go, hoping she hadn’t used all of the hot water already. The water warmed a bit but not to the degree it had held before. Never been one to like cold showers, Madison eyed Sam’s shower products, wanting to at least get her hair washed before she ran out of hot water. She made quick work of her long blonde locks, not bothering to shampoo a second time before saturating the bottom half of her hair with rosemary mint scented conditioner. While the conditioner sat in her hair, Madison quickly scrubbed down with the loofah Sam had provided her and Sam’s white lily and jasmine body wash. The water dropped in temperature again as she did this and Madison hurried with harsh strokes of the loofah. By the time Madison was in the process of rinsing the conditioner out of her hair the water turned cold, sending shivers throughout her entire body. She finished rinsing her hair quickly and turned the water off, letting water drip from her puckered skin.

A chilled breeze found its way around the shower curtain to caress her dampened flesh and send a shiver through her that caused goose bumps to rise in its wake. Madison reached for her towel and wrapped it about herself before moving the shower curtain and stepping out of the tub. She stood quietly for a moment, listening for sounds of Phil and Sam but could only hear the television. She knew she was taking much too long to dry off and dress. Already she was surprised neither of them had come knocking on the bathroom door asking her to hurry. Knowing it was time to stop procrastinating, Madison finished toweling off and got dressed, wrapping her hair into the towel that she twisted so that it sat upon her head without needing to be held. She paused as her hand reached for the doorknob; she took a deep breath and exited the bathroom.

As she entered the living room both Phil and Sam looked up at her, Sam with an obvious expression of relief as she jumped to her feet, “Holy hell Mad, if you had taken any longer I might have pissed myself.”

Madison stepped out of Sam’s way as she bee-lined for the bathroom. Phil smiled at her and motioned for her to take a seat, “Do you need anything Maddie?”

Madison shook her head as she sat down upon the loveseat, “No, I’m alright, thanks.”

The television was still on and Madison turned her attention to that. The news was on and Blaine Walsh was giving his daily news report. It was the same old **** day after day but she zoned out on it anyways, watching but not really listening. Sam came back from the bathroom after a few minutes and took her spot on the couch next to Phil, “Did I miss anything?”

Madison looked to her friend and simply shook her head no but Sam was looking to Phil who looked back at her and then looked to Madison. Now they both were staring at her, both looking uneasy.
“I know this is probably the last thing you want to talk about Madison,” Phil started, pausing to look at Sam again, “but the sooner we know what happened to Mike the sooner we can track down who did this.”

Madison nodded and took a moment before she began to tell her story. Sam and Phil hung to her every word, occasionally stopping her to ask questions here or there. She tried her best to give them as detailed of a description as she could of the blonde woman who had single-handedly taken out three men, two of them armed. Details were lacking though. One could only see so much from a fourth story window. Tears were cried and tissues were filled and crumpled all around her by the time she finished telling them what had transpired.

“That’s really all I can tell you guys. I grabbed Mike’s lockbox, our guns, some clothes and other things of importance and then I got out of there as fast as I could.”

“You did what you could Mad,” Sam came to sit next to her and pulled her friend in her embrace, “There wasn’t anything else you could of done.”

“We will get this taken care of Maddie,” Phil stood from his spot on the couch, “Sam you look after her, I’m going to go make a few phone calls. Oh and Mad, I need the combination for Mike’s lockbox.”

Madison looked up at him, “Its 11-25-42, his mother’s birthday.”

Phil scribbled that down on his hand before leaving the two woman alone in the living room. Sam stayed next to Madison and kept on running her hand over Madison’s back to try and comfort her, “You can stay with us for as long as you need to babe. Phil and the others will find this *****.”

Leaning into her friend, Madison could only bury her head into Sam’s shoulder and nod. She didn’t believe their chances of finding this woman to be very good. Her description was vague at best, anyone else could have easily said that it was Madison they saw taking out the gangsters. She was relatively tall, blonde and of similar build to the female that she had seen. But she clung on strongly to the slim possibility that her gang would indeed find this killer and take out their vengeance upon her.

[Madison]

Storyline continuation: The Second Stage