Dominion

By Marian Pike

When a timid and distraught woman in her early twenties first comes to visit psychiatrist Clarence Evans, he notices a profound sadness in her eyes. But after Jasmine Kinkade claims to have been abducted by extraterrestrials and reveals she is in contact with an extra-dimensional intelligence she calls Ashtar, Dr. Evans attempts to persuade her otherwise. Convinced beyond a doubt that Ashtar is an alternate personality, Dr. Evans is about to receive the biggest surprise of his career.

When Jasmine begins to display unexplainable telekinetic phenomenon, Dr. Evans seeks assistance from a specialized group of doctors. Together with the doctors help, Jasmine discovers she is an extraterrestrial from a race that created human beings based on their own DNA. After Jasmine and Dr. Evans are contacted by extraterrestrials to help prepare for upcoming changes on earth, they and the rest of the human race must take on the global transformations conducted by the highly intelligent and malevolent race of planetary rulers.

But Jasmine, Dr. Evans, and the rest of the human race have no idea that the extraterrestrials are about to reveal a secret that will change the course of their futureforever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 14, 2011
• ISBN: 9781450277136

Marian Pike

Marian Pike is a university student studying communications. In her spare time, she studies languages; in addition to English, is fluent in German, French, and Spanish. She lives in Florida with her Siamese cat, Kali; she enjoys yoga, physics, and literature. This is her first book.

Book preview

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

About the Author.

Chapter One

October 4, 2011

Albuquerque, New Mexico

Private office of Dr. Evan’s Psychiatric Practice

Dr. Evans, Are you going to be seeing Jasmine today? She’s here in the waiting room said the secretary. Clarence Evans hesitated. He held his Samsung mini tape recorder in his hand and poised it at his mouth. He was lost for words as he reclined in his black leather swivel chair. The dark, cherry, oak desk was deluged with files of Jasmine’s records. The abnormal unkemptness of the office distorted his usual organizational skills. The dark hue of the office furniture seemed to add gloom to his morose demeanor. It set off an ominous luminescence throughout his once vibrant workspace. Stubble now covered his once clean shaven face and dark circles began to chisel under his high cheek bones. Most people would agree that he was handsome. He was a self-assured and confident man; he wore well-cut expensive suits and had an impressive array of degrees on the wall behind him.

Okay, Meredith, give me fifteen minutes. I have to finish this, he said. He sat the tape recorder down on the hollow wood. The solace in his office was like a monastery. His deft fingers pushed down the little red button.

I just don’t know what to do anymore he said, listlessly and stared up at the ceiling fan.

Session ka-billion and thirty-five, he said, into the tape recorder sarcastically. He rolled his eyes laughing.

No, strike that later. Then, he rubbed his temples with much agitation.

"This is a prelude to the session on October 4, 2011, 11:32 a.m. The patient is Jasmine Kinkade.

A 27-year-old, Caucasian, female; 5’7 and currently 135 pounds. Her eating and sleeping habits are still normal, and her physical activity and social behaviors also appear stable. However, the subject has been treated by me for the past four years and has yet to show signs of improvement.

Her schizophrenia remains active, and she still experiences auditory and visual hallucinations with occasional petite-mal seizures. I am now considering the possibility of additional and probable disorders that I have yet diagnosed. The subject believes that she is not real, and she claims to be living in a holographic world. She defends this theory despite years of treatment. She also claims to have been abducted by extraterrestrials. She believes she is in contact with an extra-dimensional intelligence that she calls Ashtar. However, I believe that Ashtar is an alternate personality. So far, none of the medications prescribed have been effective. I am considering recommendation to another facility after this session today." Clarence reported as he pressed the off button sharply on his tape recorder.

He signed her transfer documents in solitude and secretly regretted the choice to send her away. He had not only enjoyed her company over the years, but she was also an undeniably attractive woman. Jasmine came to him completely distraught four years ago. When she arrived for their first session, she was a timid twenty-four year old woman that had such a profound sadness in her eyes that it struck him. It devastated him to the point that he would often think about her afterhours when he ruminated over all of the things she told him. He still remembered the first time he saw her face and the first time they met. She was wearing a thin black sweater and a tight fuchsia business skirt that showed off her fabulous legs.

It was really her long legs that he had admired first before her face. She had walked in his office wearing classical black heels that only slimmed her perfect legs and her long, shiny, sable-colored hair took his breath away. It was draped over the side of her face when she first walked in and he was dying with suspense to see if her face matched the rest of her physical beauty. When she sat down and faced him he had then seen how beautiful her face was and how strikingly sullen her eyes were in that instant. She said hello plaintively to him in her melancholy voice for the first time and since then he was completely taken with her but knew he couldn’t show it. He just sat shocked and holding his ballpoint pen for she was the loveliest woman he had ever had in his office in all of his years. He didn’t know how to act, how to approach her or what to say.

He was intimidated by her. If it wasn’t for her soft attitude and the benign way she carried herself he would have let her physical appearance taunt him for the remainder of their sessions together. His beginning focus was asking what made her happy and what she liked to do in her spare time. He considered himself lucky to be able to ask her such questions. He wasn’t surprised when he found out she loved to be outdoors, in nature and that taking care of animals had always been what had cheered her up. And like all other doctors he suggested she’d do more of just that. He found out that she was adopted. It was something Clarence felt she used as a crutch to lean on throughout her adult life. She spoke for hours over a painful breakup in a recent relationship with a boyfriend. She had never been married but had been with him for several years. She shared her deepest secrets and thoughts with her boyfriend and when he left her he had absolutely mocked her. He thought she was insane for some of the intimate things she shared with him and Clarence would always frown to himself when he heard that Jasmine, such a lovely woman, had to face such bleak severity. She told him that she thought she had been abducted and told him she believed it was by extraterrestrials. Since then on, Jasmine was suffering from everyone in her social circle labeling her as insane and unfit to talk to. Her frustrations only grew with everyone she was once close to while she was going through the changes.

Those closest to her tried to convince her nothing was happening to her and she spoke painfully of having many arguments with her loved ones, over them not believing or understanding her. Everyone she was dear to grew intolerable of her and tried to shut her out when she attempted to go to an abductee support group around Roswell. Finally, her boyfriend had given up with her and threatened that if she went there he would leave her unless she sought normal counseling. He left her anyways, saying he wanted the old her back and told her there were no such things as extraterrestrials, and that it was a silly, childish idea of hers. Their first session was overwhelming. Throughout the years Clarence argued with her. He tried to convince her that she created fantastical extraterrestrial abductee stories as a way to cope with the emptiness and rejection that she was adopted. Someone who was supposed to care for her left her and it was more magical and appealing to make herself believe that she had contact with aliens who loved her. It was the only thing plausible to him that could have caused her to accept those beliefs. And for years he was unable of slowly suggesting to her his psychoanalytical view of her reality which she always stubbornly refused. She threatened to leave but always came back. He would smile to himself every time he heard her rattling engine pull into the parking lot of his private study. And see her through his blinds smoking a cigarette as she walked towards the front door. He worked with her respectfully even through the regressive therapy which he had always found disturbing. Jasmine would share about her feelings and then he would share his, but he never outwardly abated or disrespected her. Not like everyone else she had felt she could trust at one time. They had shared their philosophies of life together, their trivia, and everything else and even through all of the different tactics he had tried, it was now the end of the road for him. He now had no choice but to refer her to someone else.

Clarence looked up cautiously, alerted by the sound of determined footsteps approaching his office door. The sound of stiletto heels clapped on the oak floors. The silhouette of his distraught patient materialized like a phantom. He watched her through the blinds of his widow door. Here we go again, he said. He closed the transfer files quickly in the manila folder. He listened to her frantic pacing and knew that today was one of those many days where she was in a bad mood. He twirled his swivel chair around simultaneously as the door slammed open. Jasmine thundered inside. Her usual serenity couldn’t be found, and her lips were pursed cruelly like the ravaging Huns he vividly remembered and admired watching on the History Channel. Never before had he in all of these years seen her possess such a rage. She was always so humble. Her personal humility beguiled him as the cause of the retardation of her cure.

Clarence choked on his saliva. He gasped for words, and held his throat as he gagged much to his own embarrassment. The pure sight of her had caught him off guard.

Meredith is out at lunch, Jasmine said, bluntly. She closed the door staunchly and eyed Clarence deviously like a cheetah, stalking the gazelle on the rich plains of the African Savannah. The fan stopped circulating and Clarence already knew that Jasmine would proclaim it was because of her so-called powers. The New Mexico heat wave began to roll off of the dark walls in the room Why are you locking the door? He stood up abruptly and his wheelie chair dawdled behind him. Is everything alright? He asked again, she threw him a dangerous look over her shoulder and continued to pace his office with the similitude of predators before they pummeled at the jugulars of their victims. In silence, she stared him down territorially.

So, what’s wrong with you today? He asked, indifferently. He folded his arms and his wrists brushed the soft wool of his Brookes Brother’s sleeve.

Doctor, Jasmine began, sardonically. I left emergency messages with your answering service last night, and they never contacted me back, Jasmine said. Clarence quirked an eyebrow.

Why are you not answering me?

Something is happening to me!

Nothing is happening to you, Clarence interrupted. He fumbled around in his desk drawer.

Okay, before we begin today, take this sedative, he said, offering a couple of white pills to her.

Fine, but I’ll need some water, she said, with a long reluctant pause. Clarence gave a nod, and he turned around to the Aquafina water dispenser. He filled the paper cup obediently. Jasmine walked behind him while he was bent over. While his back was turned, she moved agilely and with strange overwhelming strength, pushing him headfirst into the hardwood floor. He squirmed as she grunted—handcuffing his hands behind his back. With unusual sudden power she dragged him, and lifted him onto the patients’ sofa—the one she had lain on humiliatingly for years. His head dangled off of the couch, round and full like a pumpkin. She stuffed his mouth with one of her fine trouser socks, and secured the duct tape over his mouth.

Oh my god. I should have seen this coming, Clarence thought. He stared wide-eyed and cautiously at his lunatic captor. Jasmine zipped her purse back up crisply, and placed it neatly on his desk. She turned around and stared at him intently. He watched as she unplugged the lamps cord from the electrical outlet on the wall. He tasted the hot fluids of acid reflux in his throat, thinking she was going to beat him savagely with the prong of the cord. He felt his stomach boil and a quick gush of foreign wind entered him and then sucked out violently. As what seemed the last breath he could manage, everything in his vision grew fuzzy and black. He noticed his chest heaved uncontrollably. He could hear the beating of his heart, escalating like runners climbing up flights of stairs. His breaths grew shallower, and he recognized at that moment that he was at the beginning stages of a panic attack.

Now, doctor, you have no choice but to put aside your arrogant beliefs and listen to me!

I told you that something is happening to me, and now I am going to show you!

Clarence furrowed his eyebrows curiously. He watched his patient shut her eyes in concentration, and he pondered her next move. At any moment now, another personality was on the verge of breaking out of her--tying him up was just the casual introductory.

It was only assumable. Jasmine had lamented for years about being an adopted child. He suggested that she created unfathomable and exaggerative personalities in the absence and neglect of the original parenting she needed. Especially, the one she called Ashtar. The lights and the lamp she unplugged began to click on and off. She smiled a wicked smile and stared at him with the most inhuman gaze. The expression in her eyes was cold and empty. They remained in darkness for a few moments.

Now, she said, as the lights flicked on and they stayed in silence for a minute.

Now, repeated Jasmine. The lights clicked off. Another moment went by, and Clarence remained in a state of confusion. Now, she said, as the light clicked back on again. He watched as she motioned her hand and suddenly his swivel chair swayed like a magnet across the floor and guided underneath her palm. She sat in it, and gave him that definite, alienated gaze.

He questioned himself incredulously. Childhood memories of his church choir flashed through his mind, and his preacher’s voice rang in his head, reciting old scriptures telling him that what he had just seen was impossible. It was impossible but her powers were very real, and very scary. He knew if she wanted to hurt him, she would have already.

His hyperventilating had calmed, and his train of thought was broken by the sound of muffled sobbing. He turned his stiff neck to the image of his patient, fragilely curled into a fetal position on the floor. He watched the small of her back quiver and heave like his heart had in his chest only moments before. She was crying miserably and like a little child. He felt his world crumble as he glanced around his office. He then looked at all of his degrees that hung pompously on the wall. Family and college memories flooded his mind, as well as the memories from all of the years of his life where he had followed a direct and complete reality—or so he had thought. His entire system was shattered and he was now at loss for any rational explanations. Clarence let himself cry remorsefully as Jasmine had let herself cry.

If I let you go, please don’t scream. I need someone to listen to me—to talk to me. I won’t do anything. I need for someone to stay with me, Jasmine pleaded.

Clarence just nodded his head in accordance. He waited eagerly to be released from the uncomfortable position he was forced into. It was causing his neck and back to ache. Clarence stood up, and he felt lightheaded. He suddenly became aware of a migraine. He shielded his eyes from the light that grew brighter in her presence like the sun itself shining down on them in the room. It was like a private light show of the universe.

Clarence filled a paper cup of water from his personal water dispenser. He heard the bell on the door ring, someone was coming and it was most likely Meredith. He could hear her chatting with the postal guy. He could hear the little bell on the tip of the door jingle as she closed it in the front office. Before he knew it, her red bushy head poked through his office door.

Is everything ok? You have appointments for later today. I just came in to check on you.

Clarence sipped the water hurriedly. He assumed that he and Jasmine both looked haggard and probably looked like they were in the aftermath of an upsetting argument.

Something has come up. Ring in the other patients scheduled and tell them I have had an emergency. When you are done, you can go on home, he said. He reached for his brown coat. He then retracted to the sound of the comment. Meredith would probably think that he and Jasmine were going on a date and sharing a passionate affair behind the closed doors of his office. Yet, he knew that he couldn’t tell anyone about what he had just seen. They would all call him crazy, instead of just Jasmine this time.

Are you feeling sick? Meredith asked. She approached Clarence and placed her hand on his shoulder amiably. Over the years their professional teamwork was flawless. There was no matter in the office that Clarence never shared with her. He turned around to face her.

It’s just a bad headache. I also have something really urgent to tend to. With that he signaled for Jasmine to follow as he walked steadfastly out of his office. Meredith gave Jasmine an unsteady look; she locked eyes with her as she followed Clarence out of the room.

You know what? I don’t feel like driving at all. Let’s just get a taxi until we both can figure out what can be done for you, he said.

I don’t want to be alone tonight, please. Just for tonight, and you will never have to deal with me again, I promise, she said. It was another one of Jasmine’s untimely pleas, the ones where she swore up and down that extraterrestrials broke into her house at night. And he would always listen to her with empathy, thinking that it was one of her rabid hallucinations causing her midnight panics.

Jasmine, what are you saying? I just witnessed the most spectacular thing of my entire career. I am sorry if I made you feel that way or contributed to your trouble all of these years. Before, I would never have considered this. I want to be a part of finding a solution for you. I will call my wife at her office and let her know we are having a guest tonight. She and her practice partner, Dr. Jannings may also want to help. He has a lot of connections with many professionals in New York. It will be fine. I promise, he assured. Clarence waved down a taxi cutting a sharp corner.

He held the car door open for Jasmine, and then took out his blackberry phone and pushed the call button to his wife’s practice. He had not for the past couple of days seen or spoken to her. Their marriage operated on such work levels and different schedules throughout its entire duration. Judith was an obstetrician and she was always getting emergency calls to deliver babies. They worked opposing schedules, but made up for lost time when they took long European vacations. Last year they had vacationed to Corsica and stayed for three weeks. It was nothing less than paradise. There were high-curved walls of rock that were as tall as four story buildings and they emerged into enchanting high-edged cliffs all throughout the island. The sands of the beaches were glistening white. Clarence had enjoyed the strangely colored birds in the trees and the freshwater falls from some of the steep cliffs near the coastline of the beaches. He loved the way the Mediterranean townhouses looked as if they were folded inside the embrace of the mountainous island whenever he would glance back towards the city on the sail boat he rented. Clarence loved sailing and would have considered it a hobby and genuine past time of his if he had had enough time to pursue hobbies in between his busy life. Corsica was their favorite vacation spot even though they often interchanged between Tuscany, Venice, and Monaco over the years. Judith thought that Corsica was the most romantic place in the world. No matter how rough their year had been with patients or what level of scarcely measured intimacy they shared between each other, visiting Corsica was always enough to reinvigorate the lost romantic spark in their marriage. Their summer European vacations were the highlight of their lives and were more like escape routes. It was the only time both of them could drop all of their duties and be completely careless. Their everyday life was too stressful.

Although, both of them had been remarkably successful in both of their careers they regretted the marks of ambition they had mapped out as a team to achieve. The two of them were exceedingly ambitious people. In their early life they had complications with partners they went steady with for years who didn’t share the same idealistic drive and lifestyle Clarence and Judith pursued. However, the never dying streak of ambition left holes in other areas of their marriage. They saw their partnership as more goal-oriented, working for similar material achievements in life. They possessed matched interests and life goals to pursue and they delighted each other with all of the things they had in common. Their relationship was based solely on the mutual grounding of the emotional and intellectual understanding of what both of them wanted to make out of life for themselves.

They had both attended Harvard Medical School. When Clarence met Judith he thought she was the smartest woman he had ever known. Her intellect enticed him to make the most brilliant, and beautiful woman of their university his own when he started courting her. It was the unfolding plans of their future--the drive to manifest everything they wanted to achieve in life that magnetized them to each other during their undergraduate years. Clarence was very rational, serious, and dedicated and Judith had liked that about him, when they first met at a school function at their university during their junior year. He had had optimized plans for his future and knew what he was going to do once he graduated. He was going to continue to pursue his education in Psychiatry and open his own private practice after he claimed the title of a doctor. Judith wanted to open her own medical practice as well and it had been something that was instilled in her during her upbringing. She came from a family of physicians and her father was a very respected and renowned physician in Massachusetts with his own practice. Both of their families were from Massachusetts and they seemed to fit each other perfectly in so many ways. Her family lived in the quaint coastal town of Marblehead, Massachusetts. Clarence loved visiting her father during spring; her father would let Clarence and Judith borrow his yacht to sail on during spring-break. Judith’s father was a very generous and family-oriented man and even loved to extend the family annual get-together with Clarence’s parents. All of them would drive to his parents’ house in Cape Cod and together everyone would share a fancy sea-food dinner celebrating the success and anniversary of their family, at their favorite coastal side restaurant. Clarence’s father and mother were both retired lawyers and would stand up to make toasts to Judith and Clarence and all of their wonderful achievements to everyone in the entire restaurant. Clarence’s parents were very proud of the doctorate practice their son had managed to own and operate at such a young age and were equally proud of their daughter-in-law. Judith’s father adored Clarence and always praised him as the sensible, practical, and secure man he had always envisioned was the perfect husband for his daughter. Throughout their relationship neither party was ever pressured into giving up their careers. Clarence and Judith were accommodating to one another, and it made what time they had together more meaningful than ever. They had been married for fifteen years. Children hadn’t been on their agenda, even though Clarence had thought about it every once in awhile especially in the first five years of their marriage. He kept in close contact with their friends and colleagues from Harvard Medical School and was slightly ashamed that over the years all of their friends had given birth to healthy children. It made him feel like they had missed an important step in their life. Although, they had everything else, success, marriage, and family—they hadn’t yet had any children. It was a heady issue between them. Judith loved children but said she wasn’t ready for them. She dealt with all of the travesties of pregnancy and childbirth other women had throughout her career and every time they brought the idea to the forefront it daunted her. She always dismissed it dispassionately and said she wasn’t ready for it. She loved Clarence and the passion they had for each other’s work and the fulfilling life they had created for themselves. But she didn’t want to put her life on hold to nurture children of their own. Taking care of other people’s children was enough to fulfill her maternal instincts. She said that if they had children it would have caused major gaps in all of the medical projects they helped each other with, and the yacht vacations with their families in Massachusetts. She told him that she was happy with the way their life was. Clarence agreed with her despite their families’ wishes of grandchildren. But he couldn’t imagine having more people dependent on him than the patients he already had. So, he just passively accepted Judith’s wishes and sympathized with her amount of stress during her never ending workload of pregnant women.

There were many days Clarence would stare out of his office window after Jasmine would leave and think about just driving away. It didn’t matter about the destination. He just wanted a break; he knew where he was going to be everyday of his life—for the rest of his life until his retirement. Every day he would be in his dimly lit office, listening to another patient talk about the daily struggle with suicide and losing the will to go on. He would be there from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday until his hair turned gray. He had dealt with so many suicidal people in his work; it always left him mentally drained more so than he should have been. But he actually cared about his patients, and he often checked up on them even after they stopped paying for sessions with him.

He collected depression and morose feelings from his patents. They would come to him and spill their guts. By the time they would leave, they would feel lighter and he would feel heavier. He was like a sponge that soaked up all of the darkness that they had pushed down inside of them—only for them to return the next time with even more baggage. The more he listened to them, the more he absorbed from them. He was pushed under this weight everyday all day long, and Jasmine only made it worse when she would act impulsively and argue with him. Judith wanted to build a sold life for them. But she always had a celebrant attitude by the time he would see her when she returned home—on the rare occasions when he would actually get to see her. She would talk on and on about the wonderful progress of the pregnant mothers. And all of the times when she helped deliver a baby, and how successful it had been. She would rant about how happy everyone was, and how beautiful the infant was when she first saw it.

He never had anything great to share. Her work was like daylight and his was the dark night. Her work dealt with life and joy, and his dealt with death and depression. They were complete opposites in every way. At times, his patients would call him when he was off work, and they would continue to engage in their routine chatter. Clarence had been absorbed in the lives of his patients, especially the most dysfunctional parts of their lives. He distanced himself from Judith completely for his most interesting and needy patients. It was entertaining, yet depressing, and there were fun times with Jasmine when they would exchange sarcastic conversations with each other. He just wanted a break—just long enough away from all of the stressful people who were his clients and codependent on him. And now, he finally had the chance and the excuse to take one.

Jasmine usually worried about the animals at her work. She was a junior at her university, and she would have her Bachelors of Veterinary Science and Animal Husbandry next year. She talked relentlessly about them being in kennels and how she wanted to set them free. She would compare the caged animals to her own self in a Shakespearian fashion. Always, saying that she felt caged inside. She was the only one out of all of his patients he enjoyed listening to for hours. They normally started their sessions with her telling him about her day at work. How bad the stench was in a certain kennel she had to clean and he never pointed out to her that they basically had the same opening conversation four times a week but he never grew tired of it. She was deeply sensitive to the pains of animals—almost as sensitive in the way he was to humans. She was embarrassed when she first met him. He remembered every detail from that day four years ago. The color of her lipstick was a soft magenta color and he guessed that it was from Revlon. He knew these types of things being married to Judith. Jasmine was a brand new Veterinary Assistant, and she shied away from him after seeing his Harvard degree. Before their first session she told him she would be going to a university the following year. Their first conversation was eclectic and almost normal. He looked forward to seeing her during the week—every week. Still, he couldn’t believe what was happening now but he felt lucky that Jasmine entrusted him enough to share her unique abilities with him. He had never felt so guilty in his whole life as he did now, lamenting on all of the times he told her that she was crazy, and all of the times her beautiful eyes would shine back to him a certain brokenness he couldn’t repair.

Jannings and Evans. How can I help you? Answered the secretary. Her voice snapped him back to the present moment and Clarence adjusted the volume on his cell phone to hear her better.

Marylou! Clarence exclaimed. Normally, he could not get in touch with her.

Dr. Evans, how are you doing? It has been awhile, Marylou asked, she was upbeat today.

Marylou, is there anyway that I can speak to my wife for a minute?

Dr. Evans, Judith and Dr. Jannings went to a workshop for two days. Neither of them have been seeing patients all week. Didn’t she tell you?

Clarence replied with a stutter. Hmmm, maybe she did and I forgot. I have been busy. I have just been crammed with files this week. Thanks Marylou, I will keep trying her cell.

Let’s go to my house and relax until we can figure out what to do. I’m sure that she’ll call soon, Clarence assured. He felt an uneasy feeling in the pit of his stomach swell up as the taxi turned them onto his street. He didn’t feel uncomfortable about brining Jasmine to his home, their relationship over the years had a good-natured and sympathetic aftertaste—she only told him everything.

Chapter Two

Jasmine closed the taxi door shut. She scoped out the perimeter of Clarence’s house. She had always wondered to herself what kind of lifestyle Clarence had, when he wasn’t sitting behind his desk or when she wasn’t listening to his voice over the phone. Jasmine admired the well-trimmed Juniper bushes lining underneath the French style Baroque windows. Although, red brick wasn’t her forte, it seemed to suit the entire drabbiness of Clarence’s obstinate personality. It was a two-story house. The big and luxurious type she had seen on the drama sitcoms. The house looked like it belonged in Greenwich, Connecticut more so than Albuquerque. It held an upscale look, and was the sort of house where the family on the TV shows always had more space than they actually needed. From the outside, the house looked as if it didn’t have anyone living inside. It appeared bereft of life—except for a few cars parked in the impressively long driveway. As she made her way across the graveled stone path towards the front door, she took notice of Clarence’s energy conservationist yard lamps spread out over his lawn. It was the type that environmentally conscious people put out for solar energy. Clarence also had solar panels on his roof. It was odd to know he was too good to pay for regular electricity, even though he could well manage those types of bills.

Wait, that’s Dr. Jannings car and Judith, they’re already here. See, I told you everything would work out, Clarence said. There was a tint of optimism in his voice--at least for today he wasn’t being so horribly analytical and dubious.

Jasmine followed Clarence up the perfect winding sidewalk. The neatness of the yard sickened her. He was always so uptight when it came to organization. He was compulsive about every little thing. Clarence was too much for her to handle at times. She watched his cowlick blow along with the breeze; his chestnut brown hair matched the extravagantly, carved wooden door. He was at least two inches shorter than her, although he weighed more than her naturally being male. She admired the intricate stained glass panels built into the door as Clarence fumbled with the keyhole. He pushed it open, and she walked in, it was oddly dark inside like she had seen from the outside moments before.

Where’s your wife? She asked, as her flip flop embraced the bland colorless carpet. It only looked so exquisite from the outside.