The Illusional Crow: A Short Story by CherAnn Wright

The Illusional Crow

I open my mouth, wanting to scream, but the dark one enters and steals the sound before it can escape. Shadows move along the walls of the dim room, shaped by the flames in the fireplace. Young Sarah squeezes my hand until my fingertips grow cold and numb. A foul smell seeps into my nostrils, swallowing the scent of the pot roast burning in the oven.

Something terrible is coming. It always does when he arrives. The dark one. The one whose eyes shift when he tilts his head to look at me. The one who waits in the shadows as if he belongs there.

I close my eyes and send my mind somewhere else, somewhere untouched. I move backward slowly, past the house, past the smell, past the waiting. Crickets hum in the distance. Night birds settle into trees. I drift further back, to the pale edge of dawn. Dew blankets the grass. Water slips over smooth stones downstream. I sit barefoot beside it, my arms wrapped around my knees. Honeysuckle lingers in the air, sweet enough to taste. I breathe it in and let it settle inside me.

Then arms wrap around me from behind. Warm. Solid.

“Good morning, my love,” Andrew says as he lowers himself into the grass, his legs bracketing my hips, his chest pressed firmly against my back.

I curl my fingers around his forearms and lean into him. The breeze brushes my skin. I breathe deeper. The darkness feels far away here. We could stay like this forever. The dark one would not touch us. We would simply be here, just like this. For a moment, I am safe.

It begins the way it always does.

First, the feeling. A tightening in my chest that doesn’t belong to the moment. Then a low hum building somewhere inside my head. It sharpens. It stretches. It becomes a scream.

The crow.

“No. Not again. You can’t take this from me.”

I open my eyes.

He lands in front of me, black wings folding in on themselves. His eyes are fixed now, deep and unblinking. The smell follows him—rotting fruit, thick and sour.

The crow never changes. Only his eyes do.

Ever since I was a little girl, it has always happened this way. First the feeling. Then the sound. Then the smell. And then something inside the men I love shifts.

“Sarah.”

My name reaches me before the room does.

The stream dissolves. The honeysuckle fades. The grass beneath me cools and hardens into tile. Fire snaps in the fireplace. The pot roast burns in the oven. The sour smell lingers.

Andrew stands in front of me. But something inside him has settled wrong.

For a moment it is my father standing there. The slope of his shoulders. The tightening of his mouth. The look that always came just before something shattered.

Then it is Andrew.

Then it's both of them, layered together so completely I can't tell where one ends and the other begins.

It is never just them. It' s the crow. It's what they let inside.

The bottle on the table catches the firelight. The liquid inside shifts quietly. The crow does not change its shape. It waits in the glass. It waits to be swallowed. And once it is inside, it wears their skin.

“You burned my food again,” he says. “Do you think I want to eat this?” The words belong to Andrew. The tone doesn't.

He sets the bottle down and the vile liquid moves inside it.

A blow lands just below my temple. Light splinters behind my eyes. I taste metal before I feel the warmth of blood. “You never learn,” he says. “You’d be nothing without me.”

His hand grips my hair and jerks my head back. The other closes around my throat. The pressure is steady. Familiar. The room narrows to his breath, sour and close.

I am small again. And I am not.

Ten-year-old Sarah’s trembling hand finds mine, her grip pleadingly tight. I look into her eyes. My eyes. I must protect her. I must end what the crow keeps creating.

With whatever strength I can gather, I shove Andrew and drive my knee between his legs. His hands fall away and he doubles over.

The knife waits on the counter.

I reach for it. The handle presses firmly into my palm. My knuckles pale as I tighten my grip.

Younger Sarah looks up at me. I nod. She nods back.

We lift the knife together.

The first strike lands shallow. The second goes deeper. After that there is no counting, only motion.

For a moment I hear my father’s voice break through the room, then it shifts, becoming Andrew’s, until they are indistinguishable.

We don't stop until he is still.

Young Sarah releases the knife first. I remain standing, staring at the body on the floor, unsure which man lies there.

Blood falls from the blade in slow drops. Drip. Drip. Drip. The sound feels louder than it should. My body trembles though the room has gone quiet. The darkness presses at the edges of the walls, and I feel it pressing inside me too.

Younger Sarah offers a fragile smile. “It had to be done,” she says softly. “The crow doesn’t let them go.”

Tears slide down both our faces.

“Maybe next time it won’t come,” she whispers.

I close my eyes and send my mind somewhere safe again. Snow blankets the ground this time, gathering along the edges of a frozen stream. A cool breeze brushes my skin. A dove coos above me.

Strong arms wrap around me from behind, steady and warm. I curl my fingers around his forearms and let myself breathe.

“We are safe here,” younger Sarah says.

I nod. I want to believe her.

But it begins again.

The feeling. The hum. The scream building inside my skull.

“No. Not again.”

My eyes snap open.

Bars frame the window in front of me. My hands clutch the thin fabric of my hospital gown. Outside, a branch trembles as the crow lands. His eye fixes on mine, green and knowing. He tilts his head, and the color shifts slowly from green to black and back again.