My one eyelid unsticks, and I squint through the crust in my eye to see daylight fill my bedroom. I'm laying flat on my back, and letting the morning seep into my consciousness; birds chirping outside of my window, the fan blowing in the corner of the room, and the clock ticking.
I turn my head.
It's still very early.
I try to sit up, but my foot snags on the bedsheet. I open my other eye, and wiggle up into a sitting position. I am exhausted. My foot is still stuck to the sheet, so I throw my comforter back so I can investigate the situation.
There is a reddy-brown splotch on the sheet. I peel the sheet back, and unglue it from the inside of my left foot.
Must have cut my foot last night as I was walking in...
My foot must have bled a lot because there are streaks of blood on the bed and the floor.
Gross.
I limp backwards across the path of the blood-stained splotches on the floor, but then I realize that I don't need to limp because my feet aren't sore.
Weird.
I open my bedroom door and hear what sounds like a commotion out in the courtyard. There are more splotches of blood on the floor through my living room, and so I follow them into the front foyer.
I hear a muffled voice over some sort of two-way radio, and then a loud knock on the door. The walls shake for a moment.
"Open up." I hear. It's a man's voice. He sounds stern.
I open the door. A police officer stands there with more of a concerned look on his face. Then relief.
"Ma'am," he starts, "are you alright?"
I look down at my feet, then back at him. I'm confused.
"Yes." I say. My mouth is really dry, and so my voice is barely above a whisper when I speak with him.
"Ma'am," says the police officer, "come inside, we don't want you to see this."
"See what?" I say to him. I realize as I speak that there is a lot of commotion in the courtyard. He steps closer towards me. His shoulders block my view.
"Ma'am, please step inside. You shouldn't see this." he says and uses the breadth of his torso to push me back into the foyer.
By now, I've been startled sober. There are swarms of police in the courtyard. I can't see them, but I can hear them. Camera flashes. People's radio voices being half cut-off.
Something bad happened.
"What's going on?" I say. I'm angered now. This officer has steamrolled me back into my foyer, there is chaos just outside my front door, and my feet are covered with...
Deandra!
"Get out of my way!" I seethe at him. He grabs me with both arms, and pushes me further back into the foyer towards my living room.
"Ma'am, you must stay here until one of the Detectives can come and speak with you." he says.
"Moove!" I scream at him, and with a rush of adrenaline I shove him to the ground and run towards my half-open front door. My heart is pounding. There are frantic tears in my eyes as I open it and see...
...the unthinkable.
There is blood everywhere. Charlie is floating in the pool, and it's red. I fall on my knees as the tears flow endlessly out of my eyes. My heart has stopped beating.
Body parts are strewn all over the courtyard. Neighbors peer out of their windows. Their faces are white. I look to the steps that lead up to my front door; and see more bloody splotches.
I didn't cut my foot on the glass...
I know at this point as I frantically take in what I am seeing, that I am screaming. My throat ripples from the strain I am putting on it -- but I can't hear a thing. I scream and scream and scream as the tears gush out of the outer corners of my eyes and down the front of me. I scream and scream until I feel the police officer behind me put his hand on my left shoulder. I scream because I can see Consuela down by the pool patting Deandra's blonde hair as if to tell her everything is going to be alright; despite the fact that her leg is resting a few feet away and her arm is on the other side of the pool.
