The Strangest is Yet to Come

05.

You know that stage when you're not quite asleep and you're not quite awake? Yeah, that was where Samantha was when Nancy came crashing through her bedroom door.

"Jesus!" she yelps, resting her head back against the pillows as she takes a look out of her window - it was dark.

How long had she been sleeping?

"Nance, what the hell..." she forces herself to sit up, trailing off at the sight of her cousin's face, "What's wrong?"

"Will you come with me to the hospital?" she asks and Samantha feels her stomach drop.

"The hospital?" she repeats as her cousin leaves the room and she scrambles to follow her, "Nancy, wait! Who's in the hospital? Is someone hurt? Nancy!"

She pulls her shoes on and races downstairs, calling an 'I'll be back later' to her parents as she runs by the door to the living room.

Nancy's already in her mom's car and she barely gives Samantha any time to get in before she's starting the engine and taking off, leaving her cousin to fumble for her seatbelt.

And they say she's the bad driver.

"Um, Nance?" she begins slowly, "Not that I don't love an impromptu roadtrip in the dark, can you please tell me what's going on? Is Mike okay? Holly?"

"They're fine," she assures urgently.

"Then what's going on?"

"Jonathan and I, we've been checking out this story. A woman, Mrs Driscoll, she lives out on Cornwallis Road. Anyway, she called the paper to complain about rabid rats."

"Rabid rats?"

"Yes. So I decided that I would look into it without telling anyone so Jonathan and I, we went to her house and there was this rat and it was acting strange an-"

"Nancy," Samantha interupts softly, "Why are we going to the hospital?"

"We went back last night to get the rat," she continues, "When we got there, we found her in the basement."

"Did she fall?"

"She was eating fertilizer," Nancy looks at her for a second, "When I say eating, it was as if she was a woman starved. We called the police and they got in touch with the paramedics who took her in."

"Did you call Jonathan?" Samantha asks, "Before you came out here? I mean, would he not want to know if she was alright?"

"He's mad at me," she admits, "Tom Holloway, our boss, he caught wind of what we were doing and fired us."

Samantha's eyes widen, "Jesus Christ."

"When they were putting her into the ambulance, she kept screaming that she wanted to go back."

"Back where?"

"I don't know," Nancy shakes her head, "But I'm hoping that by going to see her, we might be able to get some answers."

It falls silent between the two of them and Samantha looks out of the window, watching the lights of the houses and the outlines of trees go by, looking at Nancy once more when she says her name, "Yeah?"

"About the other night, the whole thing with Jonathan,"

Her face turns red, "You heard that?"

"I think the whole street did."

Shit. "What about it?"

"I just...I hope I didn't cause it. I mean, I caused it but I just want you to know that I didn't mean it. I didn't know that the two of you had plans - he never said anything."