Gifts from the Past: Apartment 744

     Serenity was woken with knocking at the door. "Oh, dear," Dympna sighed. "What do the police want now?" She climbed out of bed, pulling a robe tight around herself and shuffling towards the door. The light blinded Serenity for a second, and then...
     "Chief Buc?"
     "Oh, great." grumbled Braeden.
     "We have a warrant to search your apartment, Serenity."
     "I, um..." Three men pushed past Serenity at the door and started the search.
     "Don't worry, we already have your medication listed among the stuff they should leave here" Chief Buc said, thinking that was Serenity's only worry. Serenity slid down the wall and curled in on herself.
     "Is there any chance I could get some now?" She asked quietly.
     "You should wait outside while we search." Chief Buc was quiet. Serenity tucked her head on her knees. "I'll see if I can get you some of that medicine."
     Serenity heard him walk away, calling for one of the other officers. Was it Jared? Gareth?
     "Jeremy." Braeden whispered. "Serenity, why don't you pay attention?"
     Chief Buc returned, holding the pill bottle. Serenity eagerly accepted it.
     "That's an... interesting sack you got in that drawer. What's in it?" Chief Buc asked.
     "Some coins my great-grandfather left for me in his will."
     "Drachma." Dympna said. "They're called drachma."
     "All clear, Chief." One of the police officers said.
     "Excellent. Call it in, Jeremy?" The policeman nodded.
     Serenity nodded at Chief Buc, then stood and reentered her apartment. While returning to her bathroom to put the pills away, her gaze fell on the bag of drachma, with the golden embroidery that read Ακριβώς σε περίπτωση. Just in case.
     Serenity couldn't remember her great-grandfather. In fact, he wasn't alive at anytime during her lifetime. But Serenity remembered her mother handing her the bag on her eighteenth birthday, saying that Serenity's great-grandfather, who she had never met before, had left this for her in his will.
     Maybe he's who the crazy came from.
     Running. Running would help. Serenity was awake, anyway. No surprise there. She changed quickly, then left, closing her apartment.
     "That poor old man..." Braeden sighed. Serenity shook her head, dismissing the thought.
     "So close, so close, so close..." She almost missed the door. There was an old man kneeling on the floor, some officers in his apartment. He looked like he could cry, staring at a gun and a flag on his bed as if they were tearing him up on the inside. Then he turned to look at her, and it was almost as if Serenity could feel his mortification and agony.
     Wanting to give the man his privacy, Serenity continued, running out onto the snow-covered streets.

A Different Perspective

            Serenity kept her head down, arms wrapped tightly around her body as she stumbled from the humid air of outside into the lobby of Dreamwood Terrace. It was almost deserted. Only the receptionist was at the desk. He didn’t even spare her a glance, used to strange people coming in at six. He probably just assumed that she had gotten off of a shift at work, or something.

Serenity’s head pounded. She made it to the elevator, blindly pushing a button that felt like the button to the seventh floor. Leaning against the wall, next to the poster advertising some author coming to the local bookshop, she tried to push the voices to the back of her head and take deep breaths, like her mom used to tell her to do whenever Serenity had an episode and her mom freaked out.

She was glad her mom wasn’t here right now.

            When the elevator dinged, Serenity moved swiftly out, heading down the hall and hoping that she could get to her apartment before it all became too much and her neighbor found her sitting against the wall, like she had the last few times. She was so intent on reaching her apartment that she didn’t see the person coming out of their apartment before they ran into each other.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there, I’m so sorry, really I am, I just….” Serenity trailed off when the stranger reached out and grasped her chin, looking her straight in the eyes.

The stranger seemed to be an older woman, wearing clothes similar to that of an old fortune-teller.

            “I’m really sorry” Serenity tried again, one more time. The woman smiled, then turned Serenity’s head from side to side before speaking.

“How strange it must be for you, my dear.” Serenity stared at her. “To think one thing and be another.” The woman smiled, turning Serenity around and giving her a push back towards the elevator. The doors closed, hiding the woman from view, and the elevator continued its ascent to the seventh floor.