I didn’t sleep for two days.
I put cameras outside my apartment door and also across the street. That way, if the freak returned, I would have evidence.
It had happened. It fucking happened.
I got myself a knife that I carried on me at all times. I wasn’t using pepper spray if that guy got close to me.
I would stab him in the heart and go to jail for it.
I’d rather spend a life sentence in jail for murder than let him touch me.
I had my performance on Friday night, so I had to get some sleep. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even be able to remember the dance moves. I considered letting my understudy take over, but if I didn’t dance, I didn’t get paid. And I’d already spent a lot of my savings on the camera system.
But I had a feeling something would happen tonight.
I just knew it.
And if it did, I would call the police.
I sat at my vanity and waited for the show to go on, looking in the mirror at my pale and sunken face. Bags hung under my eyes, and there was a lifeless look to my entire appearance. My sleepless nights were spent in anxiety, and my slumber was filled with nightmares.
I stared at myself and suddenly remembered the man who had been here a week ago.
Asking about a woman…and his daughter.
She was a dancer…I’m a dancer.
She’s missing…and the police are of no help.
I lifted my gaze and looked at my face in the mirror, staring at my own expression of disbelief. I gazed at my pained and disturbed expression, seeing all the emotions written on my face like words of a horror story.
I had to find the man with the photo.
Who was he?
What was his name? Had he told me that?
Why didn’t I ask more questions?
I left the vanity and turned to my stage manager. “Mark, you remember that guy who was asking about a missing woman and child?”
He spoke into his headset then flipped the mic up. “What?”
“The guy asking about his missing daughter. He was tall, blond, attractive… Do you know his name?”
He still looked confused by the question. “Do you realize we’re about to go on in less than a minute, Constance? Can we talk about this later?”
“Do you know his name or not?” I snapped. “Just answer the question.”
Now he truly looked irritated. “Can you do this or not, Constance? Because I need to tell Lily to get her wings on if she’s taking your place. The girls have told me you’ve been off lately.”
“There’s a guy who’s been stalking me. I’m not off. I’m fucking afraid.” Why didn’t anyone take this seriously? I was an intelligent and pragmatic person whom people respected, but the second I voiced my concerns, people considered me unstable. “A guy just came here looking for other girls who are missing. You don’t find that to be a coincidence?”
He pulled the mic down and spoke to the technical team. “Jim, give me a second.” He flipped it up again. “We’ll talk about this later, alright? We have literally thirty seconds. We can track down this guy and do whatever the fuck you want, but I need your ass on that stage right now. Can you do that?”
I got what I wanted, so I finally let it go. “I’m on it.”
He didn’t appear during my solo.
Now that Mark would help me track down the guy, I felt less terrified. All I had to do was find him, we’d head to the police, and then they would take me more seriously. One woman and her daughter were gone, and I’d be next if we didn’t find a solution.
The music halted as we finished the show, everyone taking their final poses, waiting for the applause to erupt. I stared into the sea of people, keeping my smile and my stance, my chest aching every time I breathed because the costume was tight, and I sucked in big breaths.
Before the applause began, men stood up from their seats, all positioned on the aisles.
All dressed in black.
All standing out from the rest of the audience that remained seated.
Because they wore cattle skulls on their heads.
My smile immediately dropped, and so did my pose.
Their arms were by their sides, rigid and still, and since the audience was focused on us, no one noticed the terrifying moment happening right in front of them.
And the man with the smile was there too—dead center.
The rest of the audience rose to their feet and began to clap, whistling and cheering us on.
The men in the cattle skulls walked off and headed to the exits, disappearing before anyone noticed.
The man in the center remained, grinning widely at me, everyone around him applauding.
His eyes on me.
His smile was bigger than it’d ever been.
“Look! Right fucking there!” I pointed at the cameras in the security room in the lobby of the ballet. “What the fuck is this shit? Wearing animal skulls and then just ducking out? You’re telling me this isn’t messed up?”
The officer watched the playback a couple times, silently processing the information.
“You believe me now, huh?” I pressed. “I call this evidence.”
He played the feed over and over again, checking the different cameras and angles. There was never a good shot of the guy in the center of the theatre, one that actually showed his face. “I hate to break it to you, but guys wearing skulls doesn’t give us a lot to go on. And the guy in the center…can’t make anything out.” He changed the cameras. “There are no recordings of these guys leaving through the entrances, so they must have slipped out a back way…where there are no cameras.”
“But now people actually believe me.” I wasn’t overreacting. I wasn’t making anything up in my head. There was some seriously disturbing shit going on—and it was aimed at me. “What should I do now? Do you guys have a protective agency or some place where I can hide?” I took a seat and watched him click through the cameras again.
He shook his head. “I’m sorry, we don’t.”
“Maybe a couple officers who can accompany me wherever I go?” I asked hopefully.
He turned in his chair and looked at me. “Not to be insensitive, but we aren’t a private security company. Our job is to investigate crimes and solve them. Right now, there’s no crime to solve. We have no idea what these guys want.”
“Well, I doubt they want to give me a high five.”
“I suggest you hire a private company if that will make you feel better.”
“Oh, with what money?” I asked incredulously. “I’m a dancer. I barely make rent every month.”
“Then stay with someone,” he argued.
“And put them at risk?” I snapped.
“You could leave the country,” the other officer said.
“And go where?” I asked. “I’ve got barely two thousand euros in my savings account.”
The first officer shrugged and looked through the feed. “I’m sorry, Constance. Really, I am.”
I’d finally gotten these guys on the radar, but I was no closer to sleeping well at night. I had a couple friends, but there was no way they’d let me crash on their couch with this going on. And I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if something happened to anyone because of me. “Do you have that guy’s name? The one with the missing woman and child?” He was the only lifeline I had right now. He might be able to tell me something about how they disappeared, or at least I could tell him that these weird-ass bull skulls were probably responsible for what happened. We could use each other to get what we wanted.