River Rose

She approached her castle, that little cabin that was her world, she felt that warm feeling of home. The thoughts of a warm brandy and a fire in the fireplace almost took away all the thoughts of recent events. Almost.
     It still bothered her about the jeep. Coincidences. What was the old saying from most detectives? No such thing as coincidences.
    That thought brought a smile to her face. Detectives. She laughed to herself almost aloud. If someone had been watching, most would think her mad as the Hatter. She shook her head, feeling so much better now that she was thinking in her usual ways.
    She had such a good feeling now. A day of hard work behind her, on her way to recovery from the strange events of the last day. God, it felt good to feel like herself again.
    As she stepped onto the wooden steps of her little paradise, all her good thoughts, all her happiness at her recovery disappeared in the blink of an eye.
    There on the pane of the window in the door, as large and noticeable as a neon sign on the Las Vegas strip was a word.
    A single word.
 Her knees felt like buckling again, her hands took on the tremble that she thought had vanished from the day before.
    Just one word.
    It seemed like everything in the world vanished for one moment, everything but that one word that had been traced into the frosted on the window.
    One word.
    Kati.
    She looked around her through the falling snow. Up and down the vacant street. Across the street. She ran into the street, looking for the one who had written her name. No one in sight as far as the night would let her see. She felt her breathing deepen. Anxiety. Don’t let it get you girl.
    She looked again at the door, the windowpane. The word plain to see even from where she stood in the street.
    She knew it was anxiety that made it look like a large billboard.
    She felt her knees buckle again, that same sick feeling from the previous morning. She tried to stop it but it was a force with which she was no match. She melted into the street as easily as wax melts under a flame. That eerie darkness stole into her again, stealing the faint light of the evening from her. Stealing the good thoughts she had smiled about on her walk from work to home. A fear invited itself in, a fear she did not know, nor did she want to know it.
    All she felt was numbness and all she saw and thought was that name on her window.
    Kati.