Becoming The Part - Chapter Five

A few weeks have passed and normality has quickly re-entered their lives. Connor is going back to school for the first time and Robyn has finally got a job that she started a week ago. Her parents have been going back to work too and there haven’t been any murderous occurrences recently. Of course, the nightmare still lives on in Robyn’s dreams but every night seems slightly more bearable.

Robyn comes down the stairs in her work uniform for the café down the road from her house, and enters the kitchen where her family are already having breakfast.

“Morning.” Robyn smiles as she sits at the table and begins to eat.

Her mother smiles. “How did you sleep?”

“Better than I have.” She replies and sips at her glass of apple juice.

“Would you be able to walk Connor to school? We’re running late for work.” Her father stands up and puts his jacket on as her mother follows.

Robyn nods. “Yeah, of course. It’s on my way to work anyway.”

“Thank you.” Mrs Miller smiles as she and Mr Miller leave for work.

Robyn stands up and begins to tidy up the table. “Right, come on then. We’d better set off if you want to be on time.”

“Well I don’t want to be on time.” Connor smirks.

Robyn sighs and pulls him up from the chair by his elbow. “Well you have to be. Would you rather be in detention this afternoon or at home?”

Connor looks at Robyn and laughs a little. “You’re going to be a great mum.”

“Then you’re lucky you’re not my son.” Robyn smiles as she drags Connor out the door and they begin their walk.

“I just don’t understand why mum and dad want you to walk me to school. I’ve been walking to school by myself for years.” Connor sighs and slouches slightly.

Robyn shrugs. “I guess they’re just being more cautious after everything that happened.”

“Yeah, I suppose.” Connor goes quiet for a second. “How are you holding up after everything, by the way?”

“I’m alright. I’m sleeping more and more every night but I still have nightmares about it.” Robyn admits. “What about you? You haven’t had a night terror for a couple of nights now.”

Connor nods. “Yeah but I’m terrified of falling asleep. I’m okay, though. We’ll get through this together I suppose.”

They soon arrive at Connor’s school and Robyn smiles and waves him goodbye as he runs up the steps, into the large double doors that slide closed after him. Robyn’s smile drops and she turns to walk in the completely opposite direction to where she works, instead finding herself at a taxi bank, hopping into one of the taxis.

The taxi soon pulls up outside the prison and Robyn throws the driver some cash before getting out and slamming the door behind her, the taxi pulling away. She takes a deep breath and walks inside, ready to meet him.

Robyn is sat in the visitor’s centre, behind a pane of glass where a phone sits on the wall, connecting her to the other side of the glass. She looks around at the curious people who are surrounding her. Many families have come to visit their loved ones. Some have come to see their friends. But Robyn, on the other hand, has come to see the man who ruined her life. Of course, she mastered up a plan that would allow her the ability to visit him.

After moments of Robyn waiting, her leg shaking and her lip quivering as the anxiety builds up, the murderer enters the centre and sits down in front of her, lifting the phone off the wall to speak to her. Robyn does the same, reaching for the phone and putting it to her ear.

“Well this is a surprise.” He smiles that horrid, murderous smile that spreads his lips across his face, showing his disgusting teeth.

Robyn has to hold back the urge to spit at him. “I’m not quite sure why I’m here.”

“Of course you are.” He tilts his head. “Because we’re connected, you and I. More than you think.”

“We’re not connected in any way.” Robyn argues. “I’m not a murderer.”

He smiles again. “Not yet.”

Robyn is taken aback by this. She holds the phone away from her ear for a second, hoping that would stop him from what he was saying. Then she puts it to her ear again and speaks into it. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I saw the look in your eye that night. Many people might perceive it as fear, hell you might have even perceived it as horror. But oh no, it was something much different. It was curiosity. You wondered how it felt to kill. You wanted to feel it.”

“No.” Robyn shakes her head. “No, that’s not it at all.”

He curls his lip, knowing full well that he’s getting to Robyn. “So you’ve just come to see me for no reason at all? It’s not curiosity?”

“Well yes, a little curiosity.” Robyn spits. “As to why you could do such a horrific thing. And whether it was you at the hotel.”

He tilts his head and cracks his neck. “The hotel?”

“Yes. The receptionist was killed.” Robyn tells him.

“Oh.” He laughs. He actually laughs. Right in Robyn’s face. “No, that wasn’t me. But let me guess, you questioned whether it was you for a split second?”

Robyn parts her lips slightly. How does he know? Perhaps he read her mind. And then a terrifying thought enters her head. What if everyone can hear her thoughts? Maybe they are being broadcasted to the whole room.

“Ah so you did.” He smirks. “I want to tell you something about myself that might make you understand what’s going on here. I have antisocial personality disorder.”

“So you’re a psychopath, basically.” Robyn interjects.

He holds up a finger as if to warn her not to interrupt again. “What I’m saying is that crime can sometimes come from a mental disorder. Not always, but sometimes. Perhaps you have a disorder that you don’t know about yet which is causing you to think as I do.”

“I would never think like you!” Robyn argues. “And I don’t have a mental disorder. I’m perfectly fine!”

“Well it doesn’t look that way, sweetheart.” He sits back in his chair.

“So what are you saying? That I have antisocial personality disorder like you?” Robyn asks.

“Oh no. This is something more.” He replies. “I don’t know what it is but I can tell there is something there behind those pretty eyes of yours. I can help you.”

“You’re sick, you creep!” Robyn slams the phone onto the wall and stands up abruptly from her chair, causing many people to glance at her.

She stares at the murderer and he just calmly puts the phone back and leans on the back of his chair, crossing his arms over his chest as he looks back at her. Then after a few moments, he stands up and nods at a guard to take him back through to the prison, as if he’d never had the conversation with Robyn. She turns on her heel and leaves, wishing that she had just gone straight to work.

Robyn can’t help but think about her conversation with the murderer the whole time she is at work. The only time she is taken out of her trance is when her boss yells at one of her co-workers for not paying attention to the customer next in line. He was watching someone in the corner of the coffee shop and lost his train of thought. She relates to that. She can’t seem to concentrate. She can’t get what he said out of her head.

“Hey.” Her boss walks over to her with his eyebrows knitted together. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Why?” Robyn masks her concern.

“You just looked troubled, that’s all.” Her boss says but then shrugs and walks away. Robyn has always found her boss odd: the kind of person who starts a conversation randomly and then ends it at a weird point all of a sudden.

Robyn wonders whether the murderer was right. What if she does have some sort of mental disorder? The police even asked if she did in the hotel. No. She’s just being paranoid. But this thought doesn’t leave her mind for the rest of her shift.

“Can you take over for me on Wednesday?” Her co-worker is stood in front of her. She’s never spoken to him before and she doesn’t know his name. But he is around the same age as her. He has fair skin which contrasts with his dark hair. He has a kind face and a smile that makes him endearing, like someone you can easily make friends with from one conversation.

“Err yeah, sure.” Robyn smiles.

“Thank you!” He replies.

Robyn tilts her head slightly. “Can I ask why you can’t do your shift then?”

He shrugs. “I’m just busy.”

Robyn nods. “I see. So it has nothing to do with the girl you were staring at a while ago?”

“I–” Her co-worker stops and looks at her. “I’m just trying to figure something out, alright? Don’t worry about it.”

“Alright.” Robyn looks down. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.” But when she looks back up, he’s gone. She sighs. This is why she finds it difficult to make friends. Because she always seems to upset them in some kind of way.

Robyn finds herself deep in thought on the walk home. Maybe there is something wrong with her. Maybe that’s why she seems to think everybody is out to get her. Maybe that’s why she can’t make any friends. She arrives home at approximately three o’clock in the afternoon. Nobody will be home yet. She takes her key out of her pocket and puts it into the lock, attempting to twist it to unlock the door. But it’s already unlocked. Someone is in the house.

Robyn carefully pushes the door open, her hand trembling uncontrollably. “Hello?” She doesn’t know why she calls out for someone like she expects them to answer.

But they do. “In here!” She hears from the kitchen. But she recognises the voice. Her mother’s voice. She sighs in relief and relaxes her shoulders as she makes her way into the kitchen to find her mother at the counter.

“How come you’re home so early?” Robyn asks.

“Because I finished work early…” Her mother stops talking and is looking down at something just below Robyn’s shoulder.

Robyn frowns. “What? What is it?”

Mrs Miller walks towards her and reaches for whatever she is looking at, taking it off Robyn’s work uniform. She holds it up to Robyn with a raised eyebrow. Then Robyn realises she never took the visitor’s badge off when she left the prison.

“Why do you have a prison visitor’s badge?”

“Because I wanted to know why everything happened.” Robyn finds herself saying before she even has the ability to stop herself.

Her mother steps back. “You went to see him? Why?”

“I don’t know. I guess I just wanted to make sure he was really there.” Robyn shrugs.

“My god, you’re obsessed.” Mrs Miller shakes her head.

“What do you mean?” Robyn frowns, confused as to what her mother means by this. How is she obsessed?

“Well you were adamant that he wasn’t arrested and then you started talking in your sleep about him coming back and now you actually go to visit him just to make sure he’s there?” Her mother half-yells. “This has to stop. It’s over.”

Robyn looks down and shakes her head, tears forming in her eyes. “But what if it’s not? What if everything goes back to normal and then something worse happens?”

“I keep telling you this.” Her mother wraps a comforting arm around her. “You can’t live in fear of what might happen.”

That night the whole family sit down for dinner. Everyone chats away as they eat but not Robyn. Robyn finds herself lost in thought, staring down at her plate where she moves her food around with her fork. She can’t stop thinking about her visit to the prison. What if everything he said is in fact true? What if there is a dark side to her?

“Hey,” her mother rests her hand on Robyn’s, snapping her out of her trance, “are you okay?”

Robyn nods. “Yeah. Yeah, of course.”

“So then Mr Erickson gave him detention.” Robyn seems to tune in to the end of Connor’s story. “It was a pretty great first day back.”

“Well that’s great to hear.” Mr Miller smiles. “See, everything is exactly as it should be and we have nothing to worry about anymore.”

“That’s not guaranteed.” Robyn blurts out.

Her whole family look at her. “What do you mean?” Her mother questions.

“What if…” Robyn tries to find the words that might make sense to them. “Well, we’re not guaranteed to live a perfect life. What if somewhere along the way, someone we trust turns out to be… not who they really are?”

Mr Miller frowns and shakes his head. “I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at.”

“Well that murderer would have been a normal child, loved by a family just like ours. And then one day, maybe something inside him snapped. How do we know that the people around us are people we can trust?” Robyn explains.

“Sweetheart, you’re obsessed with this whole thing.” Mrs Miller states. “You need to stop overthinking it and get on with your life. Yes, you went through something traumatic but it’s over now. He can’t hurt you anymore.”

Robyn looks down at her food and starts moving it around the plate with her fork again. She still hasn’t eaten anything. She’s completely lost her appetite. “Not physically anyway.” She murmurs.

“What was that?” Mr Miller asks.

Robyn looks up and shakes her head. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter.”

Because it doesn’t matter. Not to them anyway. They all seem to have returned to their lives with ease, like nothing happened at all. But Robyn hasn’t. She can’t.