[I should put a graphic disclaimer here, this one is more dark than I usually write]

April Fourth…

It had been a normal day, and that terrified her more than anything. The sense of impending doom sat heavy upon Cheryl’s shoulders as the day continued on. “Come on, make it happen already!” She kept repeating to herself over and over throughout the day. Yet the situation she expected had never came. She followed her morning routines, she drove to work, she sat at her cubicle all day and not one thing was out of the ordinary. When she got home she even checked a calendar on her fridge to make certain she had the right date, but the evidence was clear in a big red circle surrounding the box. It indeed was April Fourth.

It had all started five years ago. Back then Cheryl had not expected that anyone would try to murder her. And yet when she woke up on that date, she smelled smoke in her duplex house, and hurriedly escaped before the entire house had been set ablaze. Thankfully everyone had escaped, but the firemen pointed to signs of arson. The case was never closed, however. The following April Fourth, she had been driving to work down the highway when an old Plymouth tried to run her right off the road, causing a bad accident. That one had sent Cheryl to the hospital. Again, with no clear description of the vehicle, the police were never able to catch the person responsible. The next incident landed on the same date, again in the morning as someone pulled up to her new property and sprayed it with bullets, narrowly missing Cheryl. Once again, the police had no leads and once again Cheryl was left feeling very vulnerable. In the two years afterwords two more attempts were made on her life on the same date. So now, today, she was ready.

When she had finally made it home from work, first she nervously got out of her car. She checked around the sides of her house, expecting a hooded man to jump out at her from the bushes, but no one was there. A full inspection of the property revealed nothing. She kept her cool and tried her doorknob, turning it and bracing for some sort of explosion, but nothing happened.

“Okay girl, calm down.” She told herself as her heart raced. “Nothing’s wrong. Maybe the killer died off.”

She went inside and then checked every room of her house, including the closets, and even took a flashlight to the attic and basement. Still she found nothing out of place.

She went back to the kitchen and sat on one of the barstools that accompanied an island countertop in the middle. She let out a nervous sigh, and then bit at one of her fingernails nervously.

That was when she glanced over at the sink and noticed it. There was half a glass of water sitting next to it. A glass that she never poured.

Alarmed, she sprang up in a defensive position suddenly and reached for any sort of weapon she could find. In this case, it was an umbrella from a coatrack on the wall. She clutched it tight in both of her hands and held it out in front of her as she neared the sink.

“Still wet.” She observed of the sink’s basin.

She whipped around, putting the sink to her back now. “I know you are here!” She shouted loudly. “I have a gun!” She lied to try and scare her attacker out.

To her shock, someone answered her. “You don’t believe in guns.” Then a figure emerged from around the corner of the living room wall, holding a pistol up. It was a woman.

“Who are you!?” Cheryl barked. “Why are you trying to kill me!?”

The girl laughed. “Revenge.”

“Revenge for what!? I haven’t done anything to you! I do not even know you!”

“No, unfortunately we have never had a proper introduction. But I know everything about you.” The woman said. “My name is Penelope, and you ruined my family.”

“How!?” Cheryl began to cry, tears streaming down her face, feeling an inevitable situation. “Why are you doing this to me!? You are the one… April Fourth… Why!?”

“It is not all that complicated.” The attacker Penelope explained. “Seven years ago on April Fourth, you slept with my Husband, Rodger.”

Cheryl wiped her eyes, and her face grew pale. She remembered the man, a business type that she met in a bar. She remembered him well… but there was no wedding ring. There was no indication of his marriage.

“Rodger. Oh my god.” Cheryl said. “I did not know. I did not know he was married!”

“Don’t try to play dumb!” Penelope extended the gun further. “You are nothing but a dirty little home wrecker! Do you know what happened after that? Of course, I caught him. Its easy to smell your perfume all over his clothes. We dealt with the fighting for as long as we could. But you know, he must have really liked you, because before he killed himself right in front of me, he told me that he loved you! So I’d say you have had this coming for a long time!”

Cheryl fell to the floor in hysterics, clutching at her umbrella like it was her last lifeline. “Please, please! I had no idea!”

“Yeah, keep talking. I will shut you up forever!” Penelope spat. “You know we had children. Two boys. They both watched their father kill himself, and now I am afraid they will never be right again, and neither will I. And its all your damn fault!”

“I swear… I…”

“Say goodbye!” Penelope took a step forward, beginning to squeeze the trigger.

Suddenly the front door burst open. Penelope whipped around to see who it was. Police officers began to pour inside and they wrestled her to the ground, and the gun out of her hands.

When the dust had settled and Penelope was inside one of the many police cruisers parked outside Cheryl’s house, an officer walked over to Cheryl, who was sitting on her front porch still sobbing. He sat down next to her and handed her a small handkerchief to wipe her eyes.

“We have already gotten a confession out of her, she will be going away for a long time.” The officer assured Cheryl.

Cheryl looked up at the man. “Thank you… thank you. But how did you know?”

“April fourth.” The officer said. “Look, I have a problem with cases going unsolved, and yours bothered me. Ive been keeping an eye on you this time. I figured something might happen, so we had an undercover parked across the street. They heard shouting and called it in.”

“I… I am such a terrible person!” Cheryl burst into hysterics and buried her face in the officer’s shoulder. “I slept with her husband and I did not even know!”

“Cheryl.” The officer comforted her. “It is not your fault. You did not know. No matter what decisions a person makes in life, no matter how terrible the circumstance… when they choose violence, I get involved. And when I get involved, they do not get to walk free.”

“Maybe she should have killed me.” Cheryl mused tragically.

“Hey now.” The officer said. “Don’t talk like that. People just make mistakes sometimes. It doesn’t automatically make them a bad seed. Lord knows I am not perfect either. After all. We are only human.”