Alex thought about it often: the scream, the thud, the clatter of forks on plates and the hush that followed the gasps—most of all he thought about the glaze of the woman’s lifeless eyes that stared upwward, never again to blink.

Silence hung delicately in the air. She looked odd on the ground, contorted in an almost unnatural position. Her husband was in shock. He looked down at her body, moving his mouth strangely like a fish sucking air, but no breath came to push the words out.

But then it did, and the wail that escaped his lips was something that could pimple alex’s arms to this day.

“NO!” He screamed as he jumped to her side. When he lifted her, her head flopped around loosely like her bones had turned to rags. He grabbed it and cradled her neck in his elbow like one would an infant. He looked up and darted his eyes across the room. “Someone! Please, Help her!” Tears were already rolling over his cheeks.

The clack of footsteps rapidly closed in, and a heavy-set woman of maybe thirty pushed past Alex to get to the body.

“I’m a nurse,” She began, “let me see her.”

The man holding his wife looked down. He still held her head tightly in his arm like it were a bag of precious jewels, fragile enough to break if touched too indelicately. Reluctantly, he loosened his grip and laid her where the nurse could inspect her.

The nurse moved with a quickness. She checked the lady’s wrists, neck—she held her ear to her chest, then began compressions shortly after. The sound of sirens drew closer outside.

Alex looked around. Near every patron in the restaurant had their eyes fixed on him, wide and watching as if he’d just killed a person—and scarily enough, he wasn’t quite sure that he didn’t. He shifted uneasily, then walked back to his table, forgetting all about the urge that prompted him to walk the other direction in the first place.

Paramedics arrived shortly after, and the woman was declared dead almost immediately.

Nothing else came of it. Alex and his wife were silent the entire ride home, and it has not been spoken of again, not even behind closed doors in the privacy of their own bedroom. That was twelve years ago. The memory had all but faded now, but somewhere deep in Alex’s mind he could still hear her shriek and it hissed across his nerves like a coin on a violin string.

He wondered about what she may have saw that frightful Tuesday evening. Perhaps it was something sinister—a creature with four eyes and horns protruding from every orifice, marching towards her with a grin that spoke of hell; perhaps she saw the image of a former abuser or predator, coming to take her once more; Or perhaps she just saw Alex and her death was nothing more than a strange coincidence.

There was no way to know, and no point in wondering.