Author: Chelsea Yates
Minka preferred to be called M.K. Remember that. It was important; almost as important as taking the cellar door and coming up through the kitchen. “Front doors were never meant to be used because they were too public,” she said. “I like the privates,” her lips would purr the last part. She would slink her calloused fingers around him and start swaying, her voice slow so his eyes would linger on her lips and the humming cadence of her voice, “Private Eyes. Watching you.”
Henrick remembered going into the cellar, waiting for his eyes to adjust, and just feeling this indescribable darkness. He just needed to go up the stairs and into the kitchen, but if he moved, the maw of the cellar would devour him whole. Something crunched under his boots and he froze. Down in the stillness he was an animal pinpointed by the gleaming, bullet point eyes of the kitchen door.
The door was closed before, wasn’t it? Now light spilled forth emitting sharp beams into the darkness. It reminded him of M.K.’s eyes, framed by both the overly large hoodie she always wore and any escaping coffee curls.
In his overzealousness to rush for the door, Henrick overcompensated the distance of the cellar. The gallon pump tumbled from his hands as long legs went sprawling over something. Its oily surface gleamed behind him, clattering a short distance away. Blinking away the spots still in his vision, his eyes zeroed in on the gun and on the table that had an assortment of weapons, all polished to a fine sheen.
Then, his gaze lingered on the huge screens on either side of him. One showcased the surrounding area around M.K.’s house while the other appeared to be more of a computer equipped with keyboard and mouse. He couldn’t decipher what was on that screen, not that he needed to.
Several times, Henrick had visited the elusive M.K. for routine check-ups that were always the same. He would come down through the cellar, blindly find his way up towards the kitchen, and spray insect repellent for her. She would always ask-- no, tempt him into staying by hoisting her lithe body onto the countertop and winding her legs around his back, caging him in. She was insistent, desperate for company, but he resisted.
Never once had he flicked on a light to make traipsing through the cellar easier nor did he ask her why she was holed up in this house or what she was afraid of everyone seeing. They were such easy, little one sentence questions. Regardless, he never even thought about asking her until now; those questions were her own business.
But god, she had a whole arsenal down here. What was she looking to do: hack into Central Intelligence, espionage the shit out of the government, maybe snipe a couple of white dudes off the street for kicks and giggles? If he was in the house of a wanted criminal, it became his problem.
What Henrick was drawn to most, was the vivid array of crushed rose petals scattered in a single line across the floor. Private Eyes. Watching you. The stairs creaked.
Henrick dived for cover under the expanse of shadows, hoping to meld with the shifting darkness. His heartbeat sped up when he heard her shoes descend. They were near his head now. She still hadn’t seen him.
He took a step backwards. The sound was soft. In this small space the noise echoed.
“Game over, Hen,” M.K.’s silver eyes pierced through to him, “If this was hide and seek, I won.”
The dark obscured the half-hearted shrug he gave her, “I wasn’t doing anything. I just saw a bug and for your safety thought you wanted me to exterminate it. I am an exterminator.”
“Oh? You left your equipment by the door,” He flushed when she called him out, but she acted as if cowering behind the stairs was natural, “Come on and grab your gear. I need you to spray my kitchen.”
Doing as she asked, Henrick meekly retrieved the pump, trotted behind her up into glaring brightness, and nearly stumbled back down again because at the top of the stairs stacks upon stacks of canned goods littered the floor. He stepped across a can of peas, gaze skipping from displaced equipment: a lone pair of wooly socks hung haphazardly upon a chair, a first-aid kit was propped against the kitchen sink along with a tub full of ramen, more cameras than last time watched him from atop shelves and beams, and the one clean space happened to be a table set for two.
“Close the door, Hen; don’t want anyone to hear us,” M.K. headed to the window to peek through closed blinds while Henrick tried closing the door with all of the cans in the way. One rolled down the stairs, the metallic clank fading when it hit bottom. At the sound she turned, “So, did you bring the goods?”
M.K. made bug-spray sound like a deal gone shady, “For the bugs. That is my job.”
“Well, that is another name for them,” M.K ushered him into a seat while she prepared a bowl of noodles in the microwave, “Extraterrestrials, aliens, foreign beings from planet out of this world: they’re everywhere. Even keeping watch on us at this very second.”
Henrick needed the money or he would have flat-out laughed. Instead his customer service mantra kicked in, don’t make a scene or argue with the customer because even if they were crazy, like right at this very moment, they were always right, “Um, yeah. I wouldn’t go that far, but gotta hate them spineless termites.”
The microwave dinged. With a pair of mitts, M.K. set a bowl of steaming hot ramen and a crusty, soiled piece of bread before him. Okay. Bon appetite.
“They abducted Cat the other day,” Nervously she stuck a cuticle in her mouth, “Just took him right from his crib. I got it on camera.”
“I highly doubt that,” She gave him a look that sent Henrick backpedaling, “I mean shouldn’t it be the other way around? Cat’s probably more than half the size of any ant I’ve seen.”
Her pale hand latched onto his arm, stopping his hand mid-bite. He could see the blue veins poking out through her wrist, “Ants, what are going on about? We’re talking alien invasion. They took Cat; what’s to say they won’t take you or me to do a little U.F.O probing.”
“Little green men with antennas?” Henrick looked over at his insect repellant, “Um, I don’t have a spray for that. We do bugs. Did you see our website?”
An accusing finger pointed at him, “You think I’m crazy too; don’t you? And I thought we had something.”
Retreating down the hallway, she disappeared into a room, as he called out to her, “What are you doing? I can give you a refund.”
“I’m getting you proof!”
Three raps on the front door were heard. Henrick slowly rose from his chair. M.K.’s warning flashed through his head about never opening the front door. He dismissed her ramblings as paranoia and a lack of fresh air. Besides, it could be important.
Another lock snapped open. Henrick fiddled with the last one.
M.K.’s footfalls were heavy as she tried to reach for him, “Don’t open the door. Hen, don’t.”
The door swung open. Mr. Trotter from next door raised a hand in greeting, “Good evening. I found your cat on my lawn. The poor thing just wanted to be returned to her owner.”
An orange tabby slunk through the crack in the doorway. Padded paws skulked towards M.K. The fur on the tabby’s back stood on end. M.K. didn’t move, but hugged the far corner of the wall, eyeing the door to the cellar.
“Might I come in?” Mr. Trotter asked.
Henrick mumbled a reply. His Southern hospitality taught him to return good deed with good deed. He didn’t know what he could offer him. After all, this was M.K.’s house and her cat, but still it was good to be friendly.
Mr. Trotter swept on past him to stand in the center of the room. At first nothing happened. On his face an entirely polite and perfectly human smile graced his features; yet that smile held no warmth. Especially when someone looked him right in the eye, something peeked out behind the surface and occasionally when he would blink his eyelid would flip back. That could be explained, right? By floppy eyelid syndrome? That’s a thing.
But then, Mr. Trotter started to change along with the cat. Skin peeled back from the scalp to reveal some type of mucus membrane. Out of the pulp a long, piston tongue gravitated towards Henrick’s collapsing form. Layer by layer the human suit was stripped off replaced with a bulky grey being. Without the host’s auditory senses, the creature was reduced to this strange slurping sound from the back of its throat.
M.K.’s voice finally cut through the tension, “I knew our neighbors were evil,” Cat watched her, eyes unblinking, as she took a step towards the cellar; “I mean, housewarming gifts and annual barbecues, who does that?”
Aliens, apparently.