The Sun Rose Anyways

Coagulated blood churned on the floor, running around my knees, slipping into the open basin of the pool with thick, heavy drips that matched the tempo of the roaring in my ears. In my mind, I could only picture three things: that man's illuminated figure, his bulging eyeballs, and Junie's empty, open skull. My legs were stuck to the floor. From midnight to now, my life had changed irreversibly.

The sun rose anyways.

____________________________________

The day before that night, she was on one of her tangents.

"I know this sounds, crazy, seriously, I do! But come on, Ema, you have to believe me! You're looking at me like you don't, but listen. Something's wrong with him. He says it's sleepwalking, and that he's been diagnosed since he was a kid- and that's what my Aunt Mei says too- but I know that's wrong. His eyes are always open, like weirdly. He's always looking at me. Through my bedroom window. In the middle of the night!"

At this, I laughed a little. I first met Junie when we were mutual friends of a controversial girl in college, whom we met to exchange snide gossip about. Much to my chagrin, we ended up friends. Such close friends, in fact, that it seemed as if I was the only person she could confide in.

Especially about her nuanced family, and the man that she says is watching her at night.

"Of course I believe you, Junie," I said, lying. "But isn't he your cousin? Why would he be doing something like that?"

"So you don't believe me?"

"What did I just say?"

Junie cast furtive glances over her shoulder before leaning in to whisper in my ear.

"He's not actually my cousin, Ema," She hissed, breath hitting my ears and making me flinch at the impact. "You don't understand. He's just a ward that my aunt and uncle had taken in when they were younger. Before he was murdered, my grandfather was the only one who knew where they got him from. And we all live in the same house, so I don't know how that's possible!"

This was astonishing. Up until then, Junie had only ever said uninteresting, unimportant anecdotes about her family: her mother was using their new stove to make a disgusting chicken soup that she'll have to drink for the next few days; she'd forgotten the assignment that was due a full week ago.

"Your grandfather was murdered?" I leaned in enough to match her energy, and it seemed as if -most likely because I was finally showing interest in something that she'd said- Junie lit up.

"Yes! It's still unsolved, actually- the police ruled it as an accidental death, but my mother insists on foul play. It was a couple years ago. He was only around late sixties, too, so it was really unexpected."

At this point, I'm fully invested. Ashamedly, I admit I love true crime. Perhaps its morally incorrect, especially involving my tentative best friend's grandfather, but she seemed happy enough to indulge me, so what was I to do?

"So, one day, when I was 15, one of the maids in my house screamed. It was ear-piercing, seriously. I'd never heard anything like it. She sounded really devastated. My grandfather was apparently on the floor in front of my pool, with blood around his head, and his skull was open- she said cranial fluid and blood were spilling into the pool. I think that's true, because when I went to look, the pool was red. The banister of my grandfather's room was broken. It was splintered and everything, and there was already blood on it. And apparently brain matter. They thought he hit his head on the edge of the pool, because the wound was kind of straight, and less, um, smashed."

She gulped, and began to sink back into her seat.

"My mom's really not giving up on the 'he was murdered' theory, but I'm just not sure who could do that and why. No one's been in my grandfather's room since then, either, so, if we went in, we could probably look around-"

I cut her off.

"Seriously? You would let me come and sneak around your granddad's room with you?!" I definitely knew that wasn't her proposition, but she was like a lapdog, always looking for attention. She perked up again.

"Oh, yeah! For sure. My mother always wants me to go in there, because my aunt never lets her, but I guess I'm just a bit freaked out. But if you were with me, then I'd totally go."

God, wasn't this amazing. A first-person encounter with a real unsolved murder?

"I would love to."

_________________

It took quite a bit of time to make it to Junie's house. We'd left at around noon, and ended up there six hours later.

Junie's house was astounding. Enormous and grand, it splayed across such a large amount of land, it would have taken me ages to run one lap from one end to the other. She nodded to the woman holding the door open for us, and we were met with an extravagant foyer, with two adjacent staircases. I gaped. I'm not one to gape, but I gaped.

By the time we'd finished our dinner and she'd finished showing me around, it was nearing midnight. I took another moment to gaze at the chandelier that arched above the marble floors, twinkling brightly in contrast to the darkness outside.

Junie pulled at my arm and tugged me away, towards the guest rooms.

"This one's yours, Ema." With this bedroom, I had a rather stark view of the pool in which her grandfather supposedly passed. At this time of night, the pool was dark, and I could almost imagine that the water was the crimson red Junie must have seen.

Great.

She shuffled awkwardly.

"If you want, we can go look at my grandfather's room now, or we can wait until tomorrow, or, I guess, later-"

"Now is great," I said.

We pattered up to the third floor, feet intentionally light and breaths consciously held. As we reached the closed door, with dust settled in a thin carpet on the doorknob and a telling absence of footprints on the floor leading to the it, my heartbeat crescendo-ed.

As we got closer, Junie began to fret. She pulled at the loose thread on her sweater and sweat beaded at her hairline. This was a different Junie than I'd ever seen before- worried and anxious, not chatty and obnoxious. I was glad for the change.

I reached for the dust-covered doorknob, and balled my hand into a fist in excitemen-

"Excuse me."

Junie and I startled. On the other side of the hall, looking coldly upon our guilty figures, was a tall, intimidating woman. She looked down her nose at us, landing on me first, before sliding over to Junie, who had now stood up straight, a blank expression laid carefully across her features.

"Aunt Mei," she greeted.

"Juniper," came the response. "And who is this?"

"Um, this is Ema. She's my friend, from college." I bowed. It seemed appropriate, and Mei seemed to appreciate it. She nodded.

"If you see Hugh anywhere, let me know. I've been looking for him for a while. And watch yourselves, will you?"

On that ominous note, she took her leave, sheer dress billowing away after her. As soon as she turned away, Junie frowned.

"That was odd," she muttered. "I was expecting her to say something about us opening the door."

"No news is good news, isn't it?"

"I suppose."

"Oh, and who's Hugh?"

Junie grimaced.

"My cousin. The one I talked about."

And with that, I laid my hand on the round knob. The dust lifted, catching the rays of light flickering on the walls from the candles that seemed to line the corners of each hallway. The door slowly creaked open, and we stepped onto the hard wooden floor. Junie closed the door behind us.

To the right, a large wardrobe, filled only with empty hangers.

To the left, an oak desk, grain stained a dark brown, and on top, a hefty, leather-bound book.

I raised an eyebrow. Very inconspicuously, the book was completely void of dust.

Junie lifted the cover- and let out a sharp gasp.

On the front page, scrawled with shaky fingers, were undecipherable scribbles.

"Are you serious?" I said, scowling.

Junie wrung her hands a little sheepishly, looking up and off to the side.

"Sorry. He must have been loosing his mind a little, since he was so old."

"Wasn't he only in his late sixties, though?"

She remained silent.

"Junie?"

Still nothing.

"Junie-"

"Shhh!"

Heavy, dragging footsteps sunk into the carpet in the hallway just outside. The clock atop the desk read 12:44 A.M.

"Who is that?! It's almost one!"

"It's Hugh!" Junie hissed.

"What the hell are you-!"

With swift haste, Junie slapped her palm over my mouth, used her other hand to grab my shoulder, and stuffed us both into the wardrobe, closing the door behind us.

She grabbed a hanger, and put it over the handles inside the closet, barricading us in it.

"Junie, seriously, what are you doing?!"

"Seriously, Ema, please! Just be quiet!"

Just as she finished that sentence, footsteps stopped right outside of the room.

Then they found their way inside, on the hard wood floor. They passed the wardrobe, towards the desk. It was then I remembered that we left the journal open. I dug my nails into my palms. The footsteps stopped suddenly, and there came a loud bang. 'Hugh' slamming the journal closed, assumedly.

The footsteps began to shuffle back towards the door, before pausing at the wardrobe. Through a small gap between the doors, I managed to catch a glimpse of the perpetrator, and was barely able to stifle a gasp.

The first things that caught my eyes were his. They were large, red-rimmed, and bulging. Each eye seemed to glisten with tears that never fell, and were crusted with rheum. Without them, I would have called him attractive, but with them, he was the most unsettling person I'd ever seen.

They offset his face greatly, and it froze the blood in my veins. He turned his head slowly towards the wardrobe, and seemed to catch my eyes. I jerked away and into Junie, who let out a small grunt. We both froze.

Much to our luck, Hugh set towards the door, which creaked open and slammed closed, and we let out breaths of relief.

Junie lifted shaking hands and removed the hanger, and pushed open the doors, and-

In place of the leather-bound journal was a knife. It's tip was buried in the wooden desk, and handle engraved with a single letter: a cursive H.

Junie groaned, sinking to her knees.

"I told you he was weird! And I told you, his eyes- his eyes!"

"I didn't think you meant his eyes were inhuman! He looks crazy!"

"Shhh!! What if he's still outside?"

I began to regret my decision.

"Junie, maybe we shouldn't-"

"We're already here, Ema. Don't say you're getting cold feet now," she said, from on the floor. Hypocrite.

I swallowed.

"Okay." He had taken the journal, which could have held some clues, so we were instead only left with the balcony.

Junie opened the balcony, door and led me to the still shattered banister railings. They were wooden and splintered, and dark brown stains marred the top.

"That's weird," I said. "Why didn't you guys ever clean or repair this?"

"Hugh wouldn't let us," replied Junie. "And Aunt Mei agreed. She said it didn't matter, since no one was gonna go in here anyways."

My eyebrows furrowed. It was as if he had something to hide here. A sentence that was substantiated by the fact that he'd taken the journal, as well.

Junie and I bent down and inspected the columns of the banister. They were untouched where they should have been untouched, and splintered where they should have been.

"But why is there blood on here if your granddad died on impact down there?"

"I don't know," Junie said, worrying her lip with her front teeth. "Maybe he was bleeding already?"

"Why would he be-"

I stopped abruptly. Down at the pool, again, was Hugh. He was observing it, kicking at the surface of the water.

"What is he doing down there?" Junie scowled. "This is about the time he should be looking through my windows."

Hugh whipped around and laid his distended eyes on us. This time, he really had seen us. A dangerous glint ran through his irises, and in his hand, flashing with the outdoor candles, was a long, sheathed machete.

My blood ran cold.

"Junie, you said your grandfather's wound was straight, right? Was it maybe," I licked my suddenly dry, cracked lips. "Maybe a laceration? Was it, um, a linear skull fracture?"

Junie raised her eyes from the menacing figure, illuminated from behind.

"Yes. Yes to all of that. Ema, what are you talking about?"

"I think I know how that happened. And I think I know who did it. I think you know too."

She let out a breath, never taking her eyes off my face.

"Yes, I think I do."

Hugh finally began to move. Faster than I could comprehend, he turned towards the door that would lead back into the house, and began to run.

I let out an embarassing shriek. Junie yelped, and pulled me to my feet, dragging me towards the door.

"We have to go, we have to go! He's going to kill us!"

"Oh my god, don't say that! Where is the nearest phone?! We have to call the police!"

Junie squeezed her eyes shut.

"All the phones are off! Aunt Mei says to keep them off during the night so no one gets disturbed by a late night call! We're going to die. We're going to die!"

She burst through her granddad's room's door, and we ran down the hallway.

"Where are we going?!"

"Aunt Mei's room! She's the only other person on this floor!"

It took 15 seconds to run down that hallway and reach Mei's door. We banged on it, the door shaking on its hinges. But even with our bare palms leaving the door teetering from where it stood, Mei never answered.

"Aunt Mei! Aunt Mei, please! Hugh- Hugh's got a big knife, and he's coming up here! Aunt Mei!"

Junie kept looking behind her, face growing paler and paler as seconds continued to pass.

"Miss Mei! Hello?! Are you there?!"

No response ever came.

Tears began to streak down Junie's face, and she got wobbly in the knees. I held her up by her shoulders.

"Junie. Juniper! We have to go. Mei's not coming. We have to go!"

With that, I grabbed her by the hand, and tugged her towards the stairs. She got on her own two feet, and we sprinted to the left stairs, the ones that led to the foyer.

Step-by-step-by-step we ran, and ran, and ran- and for the first time since I came here, I cursed the expanse of the house.

Junie was fully crying now, sniveling and letting out wet gasps. We finally reached the bottom of the staircase, only to be met with-

I screamed.

Hugh's eyes as disgusting as ever- bulbous and grimy. His mouth stretched into a gruesome imitation of a smile, and he lifted his sheathed machete above his head, aiming right for the top of mine. Selfishly, I let go of Junie's arm to scatter to the right, letting her fall to the stairs, and scrambling away from our assailant.

Tears bubbled up in my eyes too, throat constricting and snot beginning to run from my nose.

I ran, and ran, and ran, and I didn't know where Junie was and I didn't know where Hugh was, and all I knew was that the door was here, to the right, and oh my god, no, this is the pool, and-

Is that Junie, up on that balcony? That balcony, with it's splintered wood and dark brown stains, and Junie, not just Junie, but a man, that man, and his machete over his head again, and-

"Junie, no!"

I could hear the fleshy crack from three stories down.

and Junie fell,

and she fell,

and fell,

and then-

at my feet, her eyes, once pretty and placed properly in her skull, were red rimmed and blank, were looking at me.

They weren't looking at me, they were looking through me. they weren't looking at anything.

They couldn't look at anything.

I fell to my knees. Pulled her head into my lap. Blood began to pool around me and my knees. Junie's blood. I was at the edge of the pool. It started to drip into the water.

My breath stuttered and stopped. Began again, shallow and unsatisfying.

"Oh my god," I cried in earnest. I hated Junie. She was so annoying. Always talking, and no other friends. But that was Junie. My Junie. I didn't know her full name was Juniper until today.

Fragments of white, her skull, were on my thighs. I planned to keep them. So she'd be with me always. I forgot about Hugh, and I forgot about the machete.

I sat there, in the dark. Her blood began to congeal. I kept staring at her exposed brain.

The drips of her blood into the pool was in five-eight time. She had once said it was the worst time signature ever. I can now hear why.

I didn't want to let her go. I wanted to stay here with her forever. This was my fault anyways. Curiosity kills the cat. or maybe the cat's tentative best friend.

His brimming, bulging eyes were all that was at the front of my mind.

I missed her already.

The sun rose anyways.