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“Three is a number of power. It is mystical; magical.” Erica said, almost excitedly. “It even has the word “magical” spelled without the 'k'!”
Ryan chuckled slightly at his wife's words. He did hate it when people spelled it with a 'k'. He glanced over at her, her nose was buried in a book as usual. This time, her book of choice was a book of folklore taken from a dusty shelf in an equally dusty used and rare bookstore. It didn't cost much and it made her happy, so Ryan was perfectly fine with that. He liked to make her happy, especially if it didn't chew a hole through the wallet too badly.
He turned back to the television and to the baseball game. He usually didn't care too much for any sport, but it was the Playoffs; this was different.
Ryan focused on the game and let his wife read her book.
“Thrice they've come, 'round and 'round.” she muttered.
Ryan jerked his head in her direction. “What?”
Erica looked up, confused. “Huh?”
“What did you say?”
She looked back down at her book. “ 'Thrice they've come, 'round and 'round'. “
“Yeah, why'd you say it?”
She shrugged. “I dunno. I just liked the way it sounded.”
“Okay, so what's it mean? Round like a ball or---?”
“Nope.” she shook her head. “'round like 'around'.”
Ryan's brow knitted together. “What? Three times who has come around?”
“Death.”
The eyebrow went up.
She hated that eyebrow. It was there whenever she wanted anything that he thought would break the bank. It was there when she wanted to watch one of her UFO conspiracy specials. For Christ's sake! It was even there when she wanted to try new things in bed!
“Don't give me that look!”
“Well, then explain it better!”
She spit out her tongue at him and turned back to the book. “Okay, it says that the lore itself is taken from several countries, including the United States. I guess it came with the immigrants, huh?”
“I guess.” Ryan said, impatiently. “Go on.”
Erica shot him a stern, yet playful look, then went on. “The one odd thing is that all of the lore is the same, hardly a single variation to---”
“Erica! Christ! I want to hear the story, not the history of the world!”
She threw both hands up into the air—dropping the opened book onto her lap—and waved them, dramatically. “Sorry! Sorry! I just thought I'd teach you something.”
“Baby,” he said with a exasperated sigh. “I was in school for over twenty years. I'm sick and tired of being taught. Just tell the story.”
Hot fury flashed into Erica's eyes. Ryan could be so stubborn and ignorant at times. She was surprised that he would want to hear anything that was written in one of her books, despite how big of an ass her was being at the moment.
When they married while still in college five years ago, he had still been bright-eyed about everything that the world had to offer. In such a short time, she watched him fall into a routine of work and watched him become more and more bitter with the world around him. That desk and cubicle that he worked from had enslaved him and was draining the life from him.
Still, it wasn't anything that she would divorce him over, just something that she quietly wished would change.
Just another quirk in the long list of quirks that came with marriedlife.
“Fine.” Erica decided to give in. A story wasn't worth fighting over. Definately not worth sleeping alone over! “Anyway, the story goes that death, or rather, messengers of death come to the houses of the people who are going to die and knock three times. This one family in Virginia, it says, heard a carriage come around their house at midnight and someone came to their door, pounding away. Who ever it was knocked three times and went away. By the time anyone could reach the front door, they heard the carriage leaving. Funny thing is, they heard it but never saw it.
“The next ight, it happened again. This time, no one even bothered to go to the door since they figured that it was a prank.
“Third night, at midnight, the carriage was heard pulling up to the house again. By this time, the man of the house had had enough of the antics. He considered it all to be the work of pranksters. Possibly someone who had a grudge against him. He waited all night by the door until the carriage came around. The rest of the household laid awake in their beds, hoping to hear him catch the culprit or culprits.
“Well, he did in a way. When the knock came, they heard him throw open the door ...and nothing else. Moments later, the carriage drove away as usual.”
“So, what happened?”
“I'm getting to that.” She flipped the page. “They found him in the dorrway, laying on the floor, stone dead. It seemed like a heart attack, I guess. They never heard the carriage again.”
Ryan was quiet.
Erica paused then went on. “The other stories are the same for the most part, but there is a connecting legend to them all. It's one that warns that Death will visit a family who has just had a funeral and will knock at the door. That first family that I told you about had a death in their family. An aunt.”
“So, what happens if someone answers the door? They die, too?”
Erica shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. Aside from that one man, no one else has ever done it.”
“I wonder why.”
She laughed. “Honey, if you heard the stories, would you?”
He punced on her, nipping her neck, gently. “Of course, I would!”
“Stop it!” she cried, but he went on to tickle her furiously.
Erica tried to fight back, laughing at the top of her lungs. He went on tickling and kissing.
The book slid off of he lap and fell to the floor. Forgotten.

Something woke Erica. She stirred in their bed, rolling over to look at the clock. It read 12:01 AM.
She looked around sleepily. Ryan wasn't moving. She always teased him about sleeping like the dead, that he could sleep through a hurricane.
If he was still asleep and his nightly trips to the bathroom hadn't wakened her, then what had?
She sat up and strained her ears. There was a low rumbling sound outside. A car?
Erica crawled out of bed and walked to the window, peeking out. There was no car in sight.
“The the fuck is this?” she breathed. She looked over at Ryan, thinking that she at least try to wake him up. She left that idea cold. It would take her forever just to do that. By then, what ever was making the noise would be long gone.
She threw on her robe and headed downstairs. She could still hear the engine but could see no car in their driveway. Not even one in front of their house.
Erica frowned to herself. Maybe there wasn't a car in front of the hosue but further down the block and the sounds were just carrying funny. The other houses on the block looked quiet and sleeping, no one was pulling up there to drop off or pick up anyone.
She drew back from the windows, allowing the crutains to drift back into place.
“Weird.” she whispered to herself and padded softly back up to their bedroom. The sound of the engine carried itself down the block as the car drove away. Erica smiled to herself and drifted back off to sleep.

The next day was a Saturday. Ryan spent the day on the couch flipping through the channels. Erica was in the backyard, hard at work on their garden.
It was theirs despite the fact that Ryan hardly spent any time working on it. He did the heavy lifting and that was it. He always joked that he had a “black thumb of death” when it came to plants. It had started off as a joke, but was proven to be reality when he killed off her first batch of roses and even the small bonsai that she had given him as a relaxation gift. Erica could never wrap her mind around he could kill of a bonsai.
Looking to his left, he could see her at work, digging up soil and translplanting the marigolds she bought the day before into the earth of the yard.
Their yard.
They bought the house together nearly two years after they were married. He surprised her with it, actually. He had quietly saved away money and worked out loans behind her back and drove her to the house when she thought they were only going out for a bite to eat.
Looking at the joy on her face now—the dirt on her worn gloves, the sunlight making her long blond locks look like spun gold—she looked much like she did that day.
She left the bay doors open so Ryan could get some fresh air. The warm summer breeze drifted in, carrying the scent of roses with it.
He smiled to himself and snapped out of his daydream when he heard Erica call him.
“Honey?”
Ryan blinked. “Huh?”
She strode into the livingroom, pulling off her dirty gloves. “I said that I have to run back to the nursery and pick up more fertilizer. Wanna come with?”
He smirked. “Nah, you know me and those places. I'll fall asleep before I get through the doors.”
Erica snickered. “Or kill all the plants when you walk past them.”
“Funny.”
“That's why you married me.” she said, picking her car keys and purse from off of the table. “Need anything while I'm out?”
“Nope. I'm set.”
“Remember you said that!” she joked. “Love you!”
“Love you, too, babe!” he called after her.
And Erica was out the door, in her car and away.
Ryan sat on the couch, still smiling right up until the police called.

She was dead. Erica was dead.
Ryan kept that memory of her in the backyard—their backyard: Her hair all golden in the sunlight, smiling up at her roses and down at her marigolds. What would her flowers do now that she was gone?
She died with blood and fertilizer in her golden hair, in a heap of broken glass and twisted metal.
Kids having themselves a wild joyride—in broad daylight of all places!--ended her life. Ended their life. His life died, too, in that wreck.
The kids walked away from the crash scrapped up, but alive, while his wife died with most of her car inside of her and crushed to more than half her natural height.It wasn't fair.
Life—the lives of others—blurred past him as he identified her runied body down in that cold, sterile morgue. As he met with her parents—sweet people—to make the funeral arrangements.
They laughed, they smiled, they loved. Erica would do none of those things anymore and he knew that he would never love as passionately as he had with her.
The funeral was over and the wake followed in its footsteps. Food and condolences were offered to him. He swallowed both down bitterly.
When the last person waled out of the door, he was finally alone ...and he hated it.
He hated that she was gone. Hated that he could never touch her, smell her, taste her again. Erica was gone from him and he was alone.
Ryan walked through the house, remembering her, almost seeing her there now with him in his mind.
He hated himself for every arguement they had, for every harsh tone he had in his voice for her, for not buying her all of the things that she ever wanted.
He slowly made his way back into the livingroom when something caught his eyes, stuck half-way under the couch.
Ryan got on his hands and knees and fished it out. It was that book of folklore that he bought for her only a few days ago. The day before she died.
He touched the pages, thinking that he was touching one of the last things that she had touched before she was killed.
Ryan paused, his mind racing. He flipped through the book until he found it. He read it, re-read it and then, he waited.

Eleven fifty-two, read the clock.
Anytime now, they will be here. Ryan thought, sitting on the couch, the book laying closed on his lap.
He thought of Erica while he waited and remembered her words on that night.
Eleven fifty-seven.
He stood up and waited by the door. He watched outside throught the windows, patiently.
Midnight.
He heard the car approach though there was no car in sight. He heard it pull up into the driveway, still unseen. He kept waiting.
The first knock came.
Erica asked him if he would do it.
The second knock.
He said that he would.
The third knock.
They wouldn't have to come three times for him.
He breathed in deeply, hand on the doorknob.
He exhaled.
He opened the door.

© 12-14-04

Description
“Three is a number of power. It is mystical; magical.” Erica said, almost excitedly. “It even has the word “magical” spelled without the 'k'!”
Ryan chuckled slightly at his wife's words. He did hate it when people spelled it with a 'k'. He glanced over at her, her nose was buried in a book as usual. This time, her book of choice was a book of folklore taken from a dusty shelf in an equally dusty used and rare bookstore. It didn't cost much and it made her happy, so Ryan was perfectly fine with that. He liked to make her happy, especially if it didn't chew a hole through the wallet too badly.
He turned back to the television and to the baseball game. He usually didn't care too much for any sport, but it was the Playoffs; this was different.
Ryan focused on the game and let his wife read her book.
“Thrice they've come, 'round and 'round.” she muttered.
Ryan jerked his head in her direction. “What?”
Erica looked up, confused. “Huh?”
“What did you say?”
She looked back down at her book. “ 'Thrice they've come, 'round and 'round'. “
“Yeah, why'd you say it?”
She shrugged. “I dunno. I just liked the way it sounded.”
“Okay, so what's it mean? Round like a ball or---?”
“Nope.” she shook her head. “'round like 'around'.”
Ryan's brow knitted together. “What? Three times who has come around?”
“Death.”
The eyebrow went up.
She hated that eyebrow. It was there whenever she wanted anything that he thought would break the bank. It was there when she wanted to watch one of her UFO conspiracy specials. For Christ's sake! It was even there when she wanted to try new things in bed!
“Don't give me that look!”
“Well, then explain it better!”
She spit out her tongue at him and turned back to the book. “Okay, it says that the lore itself is taken from several countries, including the United States. I guess it came with the immigrants, huh?”
“I guess.” Ryan said, impatiently. “Go on.”
Erica shot him a stern, yet playful look, then went on. “The one odd thing is that all of the lore is the same, hardly a single variation to---”
“Erica! Christ! I want to hear the story, not the history of the world!”
She threw both hands up into the air—dropping the opened book onto her lap—and waved them, dramatically. “Sorry! Sorry! I just thought I'd teach you something.”
“Baby,” he said with a exasperated sigh. “I was in school for over twenty years. I'm sick and tired of being taught. Just tell the story.”
Hot fury flashed into Erica's eyes. Ryan could be so stubborn and ignorant at times. She was surprised that he would want to hear anything that was written in one of her books, despite how big of an ass her was being at the moment.
When they married while still in college five years ago, he had still been bright-eyed about everything that the world had to offer. In such a short time, she watched him fall into a routine of work and watched him become more and more bitter with the world around him. That desk and cubicle that he worked from had enslaved him and was draining the life from him.
Still, it wasn't anything that she would divorce him over, just something that she quietly wished would change.
Just another quirk in the long list of quirks that came with marriedlife.
“Fine.” Erica decided to give in. A story wasn't worth fighting over. Definately not worth sleeping alone over! “Anyway, the story goes that death, or rather, messengers of death come to the houses of the people who are going to die and knock three times. This one family in Virginia, it says, heard a carriage come around their house at midnight and someone came to their door, pounding away. Who ever it was knocked three times and went away. By the time anyone could reach the front door, they heard the carriage leaving. Funny thing is, they heard it but never saw it.
“The next ight, it happened again. This time, no one even bothered to go to the door since they figured that it was a prank.
“Third night, at midnight, the carriage was heard pulling up to the house again. By this time, the man of the house had had enough of the antics. He considered it all to be the work of pranksters. Possibly someone who had a grudge against him. He waited all night by the door until the carriage came around. The rest of the household laid awake in their beds, hoping to hear him catch the culprit or culprits.
“Well, he did in a way. When the knock came, they heard him throw open the door ...and nothing else. Moments later, the carriage drove away as usual.”
“So, what happened?”
“I'm getting to that.” She flipped the page. “They found him in the dorrway, laying on the floor, stone dead. It seemed like a heart attack, I guess. They never heard the carriage again.”
Ryan was quiet.
Erica paused then went on. “The other stories are the same for the most part, but there is a connecting legend to them all. It's one that warns that Death will visit a family who has just had a funeral and will knock at the door. That first family that I told you about had a death in their family. An aunt.”
“So, what happens if someone answers the door? They die, too?”
Erica shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. Aside from that one man, no one else has ever done it.”
“I wonder why.”
She laughed. “Honey, if you heard the stories, would you?”
He punced on her, nipping her neck, gently. “Of course, I would!”
“Stop it!” she cried, but he went on to tickle her furiously.
Erica tried to fight back, laughing at the top of her lungs. He went on tickling and kissing.
The book slid off of he lap and fell to the floor. Forgotten.

Something woke Erica. She stirred in their bed, rolling over to look at the clock. It read 12:01 AM.
She looked around sleepily. Ryan wasn't moving. She always teased him about sleeping like the dead, that he could sleep through a hurricane.
If he was still asleep and his nightly trips to the bathroom hadn't wakened her, then what had?
She sat up and strained her ears. There was a low rumbling sound outside. A car?
Erica crawled out of bed and walked to the window, peeking out. There was no car in sight.
“The the fuck is this?” she breathed. She looked over at Ryan, thinking that she at least try to wake him up. She left that idea cold. It would take her forever just to do that. By then, what ever was making the noise would be long gone.
She threw on her robe and headed downstairs. She could still hear the engine but could see no car in their driveway. Not even one in front of their house.
Erica frowned to herself. Maybe there wasn't a car in front of the hosue but further down the block and the sounds were just carrying funny. The other houses on the block looked quiet and sleeping, no one was pulling up there to drop off or pick up anyone.
She drew back from the windows, allowing the crutains to drift back into place.
“Weird.” she whispered to herself and padded softly back up to their bedroom. The sound of the engine carried itself down the block as the car drove away. Erica smiled to herself and drifted back off to sleep.

The next day was a Saturday. Ryan spent the day on the couch flipping through the channels. Erica was in the backyard, hard at work on their garden.
It was theirs despite the fact that Ryan hardly spent any time working on it. He did the heavy lifting and that was it. He always joked that he had a “black thumb of death” when it came to plants. It had started off as a joke, but was proven to be reality when he killed off her first batch of roses and even the small bonsai that she had given him as a relaxation gift. Erica could never wrap her mind around he could kill of a bonsai.
Looking to his left, he could see her at work, digging up soil and translplanting the marigolds she bought the day before into the earth of the yard.
Their yard.
They bought the house together nearly two years after they were married. He surprised her with it, actually. He had quietly saved away money and worked out loans behind her back and drove her to the house when she thought they were only going out for a bite to eat.
Looking at the joy on her face now—the dirt on her worn gloves, the sunlight making her long blond locks look like spun gold—she looked much like she did that day.
She left the bay doors open so Ryan could get some fresh air. The warm summer breeze drifted in, carrying the scent of roses with it.
He smiled to himself and snapped out of his daydream when he heard Erica call him.
“Honey?”
Ryan blinked. “Huh?”
She strode into the livingroom, pulling off her dirty gloves. “I said that I have to run back to the nursery and pick up more fertilizer. Wanna come with?”
He smirked. “Nah, you know me and those places. I'll fall asleep before I get through the doors.”
Erica snickered. “Or kill all the plants when you walk past them.”
“Funny.”
“That's why you married me.” she said, picking her car keys and purse from off of the table. “Need anything while I'm out?”
“Nope. I'm set.”
“Remember you said that!” she joked. “Love you!”
“Love you, too, babe!” he called after her.
And Erica was out the door, in her car and away.
Ryan sat on the couch, still smiling right up until the police called.

She was dead. Erica was dead.
Ryan kept that memory of her in the backyard—their backyard: Her hair all golden in the sunlight, smiling up at her roses and down at her marigolds. What would her flowers do now that she was gone?
She died with blood and fertilizer in her golden hair, in a heap of broken glass and twisted metal.
Kids having themselves a wild joyride—in broad daylight of all places!--ended her life. Ended their life. His life died, too, in that wreck.
The kids walked away from the crash scrapped up, but alive, while his wife died with most of her car inside of her and crushed to more than half her natural height.It wasn't fair.
Life—the lives of others—blurred past him as he identified her runied body down in that cold, sterile morgue. As he met with her parents—sweet people—to make the funeral arrangements.
They laughed, they smiled, they loved. Erica would do none of those things anymore and he knew that he would never love as passionately as he had with her.
The funeral was over and the wake followed in its footsteps. Food and condolences were offered to him. He swallowed both down bitterly.
When the last person waled out of the door, he was finally alone ...and he hated it.
He hated that she was gone. Hated that he could never touch her, smell her, taste her again. Erica was gone from him and he was alone.
Ryan walked through the house, remembering her, almost seeing her there now with him in his mind.
He hated himself for every arguement they had, for every harsh tone he had in his voice for her, for not buying her all of the things that she ever wanted.
He slowly made his way back into the livingroom when something caught his eyes, stuck half-way under the couch.
Ryan got on his hands and knees and fished it out. It was that book of folklore that he bought for her only a few days ago. The day before she died.
He touched the pages, thinking that he was touching one of the last things that she had touched before she was killed.
Ryan paused, his mind racing. He flipped through the book until he found it. He read it, re-read it and then, he waited.

Eleven fifty-two, read the clock.
Anytime now, they will be here. Ryan thought, sitting on the couch, the book laying closed on his lap.
He thought of Erica while he waited and remembered her words on that night.
Eleven fifty-seven.
He stood up and waited by the door. He watched outside throught the windows, patiently.
Midnight.
He heard the car approach though there was no car in sight. He heard it pull up into the driveway, still unseen. He kept waiting.
The first knock came.
Erica asked him if he would do it.
The second knock.
He said that he would.
The third knock.
They wouldn't have to come three times for him.
He breathed in deeply, hand on the doorknob.
He exhaled.
He opened the door.

© 12-14-04