🔴 HE PULLED THE NOTE FROM HIS POCKET AND SAID, “READ IT ALOUD”
I froze, the harsh kitchen light bouncing off the cheap linoleum, and knew something was terribly wrong. He never asks me to read *anything* aloud.
The paper felt slick in my shaking fingers, like it had been handled too much. The air hung thick with the smell of burnt coffee and his nervous sweat. He just stood there, face stony, waiting. “Just read it, Sarah.”
My voice cracked as I stumbled through the messy handwriting. It was a grocery list: *milk, eggs, bread, cigarettes, Sarah’s favorite flowers.* The last line wasn’t like his handwriting. And the flowers I like are lilies, but lilies kill cats.
He grabbed the paper, his knuckles white. “Who else knows about the cat?”
👇 Full story continued in the comments…
My breath hitched. “What cat?” I stammered, hoping I was misunderstanding. The question was laced with a cold fury I rarely saw.
He took a step closer, his shadow looming over me. “Don’t play coy. The cat. The one you have. The one you know I hate.”
Panic clawed at my throat. Mittens, my fluffy calico, was asleep upstairs. He’d never even *seen* her, not to my knowledge. “I… I don’t understand. Why would anyone…?”
He cut me off, voice a low growl. “The note. The flowers. Lilies. Someone knows. Someone knows about everything.” He gestured wildly with the crumpled grocery list. “Someone wants to hurt us.”
Suddenly, the picture clicked. The messy handwriting on the last line wasn’t his. This wasn’t a grocery list; it was a warning. A threat.
I swallowed hard. “Who wrote it, do you think?”
He paced the small kitchen, his agitation escalating. “I don’t know! But they know about the cat! They know about the lilies! Who knows about… us?” He stopped, his eyes blazing, as if a thought had struck him. “Your ex. That *bastard*…”
I shook my head vehemently. “No. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t know.” We hadn’t spoken to him in years.
He continued to pace, but his gaze was now more confused. “The lilies… They know about your allergies. He knew about the cats. It’s him.”
Suddenly, a crash from upstairs. My heart leaped. Mittens!
Without a word, I bolted from the kitchen, racing up the stairs. I found Mittens in the hallway. She was fine, purring against my leg. I grabbed her and hugged her close.
I heard him coming up the stairs, his steps heavy. When he reached me, he stopped and stared at me holding the cat. Then he looked back towards the bedroom. A scream.
I held the cat. There, in the bedroom, a single vase of lilies sat on the nightstand, overflowing with a scent I knew would send me into respiratory distress if I stayed there long. But the cat purred as the man dropped to his knees. His face was frozen in terror. On the bed was a note. In the same messy handwriting, “*milk, eggs, bread, cigarettes, Sarah’s favorite flowers, and the man who kills cats*”.