#25

There was a crash in the kitchen, like the sound of a bowl breaking.

The syringe was just millimeters from Penelope’s arm, just moments from sweet relief, when the sound caused her to jump, sending the serum flying across the room. It rolled under the radiator.

“Dammit,” she hissed.

She’d put Danny to bed three hours ago. What was he doing awake and roaming and breaking things in the middle of the night?

Penelope sighed as she pulled on her robe. Then she tiptoed down the hall toward the kitchen.

Danny’s door was closed. She put her hand on the doorknob and thought of looking in, just to make sure he wasn’t there, when she heard another sound from down the hall. A creaking sound, more like a footstep.

The kitchen was dark. In the moonlight, the sheer curtains that hung around the window above the sink wafted inward. Had she left the window open? She couldn’t remember.

As her eyes adjusted, Penelope realized there was a figure standing by her little kitchen desk, rummaging through some papers. She took a step backward and the floor creaked. The figure froze.

It was now or never. Penelope flipped on the light. The intruder just stood there looking at her, a gaping hole where his mouth should have been.

“Harold?”

“Do – do I know you?” Harold stammered.

Penelope was taken aback. “Of course, we just met on the bus a few hours ago. Oh, wait – ” Penelope’s hands went to her face. “I don’t look like myself.” She ran away down the hallway and into her bedroom. Then she reached under the radiator and retrieved the syringe, singing to herself as the needle slipped into her arm.

A moment later, she was back. Her lips were red, her eyes ice blue, her blond hair perfectly coifed.

Harold still hadn’t said a word, although he had seated himself at the kitchen table, hands folded, waiting for the lady to return.

He recognized her immediately. “Penelope!”

Penelope hushed him and padding over to the table giggling. “My son is asleep in the other room.”

“Oh, sorry,” Harold said. “I just didn’t recognize you before. You look so different now.”

“That’s a little secret I have, and a lady never reveals her secrets.” Then, Penelope realized that, in the excitement of seeing Harold again, she’d forgotten something very important. “Hey, what are you doing here?”

About Prompt-A-Day: The rules are simple. Every day, I generate a prompt using Story Shack’s awesome writing prompt generator. Then I set a timer for one hour. At the end of the hour, I post what I’ve got. Sometimes it’s decent. Sometimes it sucks. Sometimes I fail at the prompt. Sometimes I do okay. I do not edit, unless I find a typo, because I can’t help fixing those. Feel free to join in and post a link to your writing in the comments.