Dead Reflections (17 page)

Tanya felt Gina’s hand stiffen around hers for a moment, then the girl let go of her hand and ran towards someone stepping towards her.

“Grandma Dewar!” Gina cried out.

Tanya wept with relief and joy when a great-grandfather came forward for the baby.

“Thank you for looking out for her,” the man said, his eyes a kind dark blue.

“I’m always a mother,” Tanya told him.

“Are you joining us?”

“I have something else to do first, and then I will.”

* * *

“What is that mirror?” Robbie sat Cory on the edge of his bed. “I’m not angry at you, son. But Mom’s gone now and we need to get her back. You have to tell me how that mirror works.”

Cory cried a little. He thought of Jeffrey’s words:
he can go home, if you wish to stay instead.
“He told Mom that I could go if she stayed instead. He won’t let her go.”

“
Who
won’t let Mom go?”

“Jeffrey.”

“Who’s Jeffrey?”

Cory looked at his father. “I don’t know. He’s an old man who lives in that mirror, with his family. They invite new people to stay with them, but I didn’t want to live there. It felt weird, even if I could visit our old house.”

Robbie shuddered at the words. “What do you mean you could visit our old house?”

“When you go through Jeffrey’s back door, you can imagine being any place you want to be, and suddenly you’re there. Except the people there can’t see you.”

Robbie’s forehead beaded into a sweat as new fright overtook him.

“And what did Mom say when Jeffrey told her this?”

“She told me to come home and said she’d always be with me.”

Robbie’s fingers tightened into clenched fists.

“Come downstairs with me. You’re to stay right beside me at all times, do you understand?”

Cory nodded. “What’s wrong, Dad? Mom will come back here. I always did, even though they didn’t want me to go.”

It was now almost 6 AM in the morning. Robbie didn’t care about the time. He found Des Hawkins’ business card and dialed the man’s number, letting the phone ring until Hawkins’ picked up.

“It’s Rob Parker calling. I’ve had an incident at my house and now I want some clear answers out of you. Did this house ever belong to an old man by the name of Jeffrey or Jeffries?”

A long silence on the phone, then Hawkins said, “Yes, it did. Why do you ask?”

“There’s a mirror in our spare bathroom, and something’s not right with it,” Robbie stormed.

“Jesus,” Hawkins’ said. “I’ll be right over.”

Hawkins hadn’t shaved and his eyes had the scared look of a rabbit in the road with a tractor-trailer bearing down upon it.

“He was the second owner of the house,” Hawkins explained. He recited the story to Robbie. “His wife, his daughter, and finally him, the first two murdered by him, his wife when she tried to leave and he thought she might talk…as for him, some say it was an accident. Others around here say he might have committed suicide. A few even say he was pushed.”

“Pushed by whom?”

“His angry family?” Hawkins’ countered. “Yes, the house has a history. Nothing you can prove, nothing tangible that science can place a cool, laboratory finger on. People buy the place and something happens. Something that frightens them and they leave. Often, someone in the family dies. A crib death, a barn fall, a slip from a roof while laying shingles, a kitchen fire one time. I’ve sold the place twice. Other agents have sold it a few times. Most agents won’t touch it. They won’t even walk in here.”

“So why do you keep selling it again and again when these things continue to happen?” Robbie forced himself not to yell. “Now my wife’s missing. You may think I’m crazy, but our son somehow passed through that mirror in the spare bathroom. My wife had him by the ankles and he still
floated
through the thing. He doesn’t understand how or why. He’s just a kid. What is wrong with that mirror? Where’s the hidden device that opens something near it?”

Hawkins’ looked like he wished he was in a bar, throwing back tequilas.

“I don’t understand the mirror,” he said. “I know that other owners hated it. They would try to take it down, and it would go right back up on its own. They’d remove it from the house…one family even carried it out to the barn and left it there, and it was back up in the bathroom the next morning, fully secured to the wall. The woman with the baby, the last family, wanted the house put up for sale when the woman walked into that room with the baby one morning—she’d been rocking the baby and she heard voices in the room. Her husband was at work. As soon as she and the child looked into the mirror, she said she saw the faces of other people looking back at her and the baby. Someone in the mirror, a woman from another era said to her ‘what a sweet baby.’ The woman almost fainted as she ran from the house with the baby, terrified. Her husband coaxed her back inside. When he went and examined the mirror, he saw nothing; experienced nothing. He tried to convince her that she’d imagined things because of her fatigue being up half the night with a newborn.

“And then the child got caught between the crib mattress and the bars a few days later. They were hysterical, naturally. The woman kept ranting about how she could still hear the child cooing in that room, and how, when she’d go to see the mirror, she’d see the other woman holding her baby and saying ‘Melissa’s fine. She likes it here.’ They put the house up for sale that same week. The woman had a nervous breakdown. She still thinks her baby is somewhere in this house.”

Robbie fell back hard against the chair. He pulled Cory to him.

“Why did you agree to sell the house?”

“What else are we going to do with it, Mr. Parker? No family is going to walk away without getting their down payment back. I have no right to walk in here and burn it down or condemn it. Nobody does. You try talking about this stuff outside of superstitious gossip circles or séances and people think you are crazy. What would you have me do? The family wanted the house up for sale. They wanted to be gone, pronto. I did what they asked. And I know you’re going to ask the same thing of me, aren’t you?”

“I can’t live here anymore,” Robbie admitted. “Yes, we want to put it back up for sale, but I’m going to take my family out of here while we wait for it to sell. We’ll stay with my parents. I don’t even want our furniture. I’ll auction it off. I want nothing that has been inside this house. It’s wrong. It’s evil. No one else should fall victim to it. What you’re telling me confirms that, Mr. Hawkins.”

Hawkins reached inside his coat pocket and extracted a package of cigarettes. “I’m going to step outside to have a smoke. I’ll list it for sale this afternoon. You may take a bit of a loss on the property or you may just break even on your costs.”

“I don’t care at this point. I just want out of here. Now…what do I do about finding my wife? Where the hell in this house do people go?”

Hawkins’ looked at him. “I can’t answer that for you, Mr. Parker. I haven’t a fucking clue and, frankly, I’m not sure that I would want to know. You might want to ask a psychic or a priest. No one’s ever been able to get rid of that mirror.”

They stared at each other.

“I’m sorry,” Hawkins continued. “I’m just the real estate agent.”

* * *

Hawkins was good to his word. He had the house listed for the same price they’d purchased it and a ‘House for Sale’ sign up on the front lawn by late that afternoon. Robbie signed all necessary paperwork. Hawkins was also right about the mirror. After Hawkins left, Robbie had gone back into the spare bathroom. The mirror was fully mounted again on its wall, as if it had never been pried loose.

“Did you two put the mirror back up, Cole?” Robbie asked his older sons. He looked at Cole, then Chris who appeared surprised.

“No,” Cole said. “We never touched it.”

“Neither did I,” Robbie murmured. “We’re leaving. You’re all going to Grandma and Grandpa Parker’s house this afternoon. The place is up for sale again.”

“
What?
” Chris spat, his eyebrows raised. “Why? What about Mom? Where the hell is she anyway?

“Because the place is bad,” Robbie said. “We’re moving. Pack what you need for the next little while and start loading it into the car. No questions asked. Just do it.

As for Mom, I don’t know,” Robbie said, “but I’m going to find her. In the meantime, you and your brothers will be away from here.”

“You and she aren’t having problems…” Cole asked. “Like marriage type stuff?”

“No!” Robbie exploded.

“Why would she just go away then?”

“She went into the mirror to get me,” Cory said, matter-of-factly.

“Oh, for frig sake, more nonsense with that stupid mirror!” Chris fumed, spinning and walking away from the bathroom. “That is so stupid. It’s a mirror, not a door. Is everyone going nuts in this house? You need your head examined, Cory!”

“You saw it for yourself last night,” Robbie shot back as Chris bore into his bedroom. “You saw your brother’s feet slide through!”

“I saw nothing,” Chris yelled back. “It was a bad dream. We were all mostly asleep.”

Cole looked at Robbie and his face registered both disgust and fright.

“What’s going on in this house, Dad?”

“I don’t know, son. I feel like I’m going crazy. I promise you, I am going to find your mother. You boys are staying with my folks. Let’s get going. No more excuses, no more hesitating. Now!”

“Okay!” Cole scowled, but he and Chris began packing their bags.

“You stay right with me,” Robbie hauled Cory along by his hand.

He called his parents next.

“Yes, for a few weeks, possibly longer until this place sells.” He spoke firmly. “I know, I know, but the house was a mistake. I can’t explain right now. I appreciate your being able to take us in. I’ll tell you more when we get there.”

He dropped the boys off just over two hours later. Chris and Cole stormed away from him, hauling their bags with them, refusing to look at him.

“What’s wrong with the boys?” Doug Parker wanted to know.

“It’s a long story, Dad. Keep the little one close to you. Do not let any of them wander off. Promise me.”

“Robbie, what the hell is going on here? Are you and Tanya having…difficulties? Where is she?”

Robbie looked at the ground. He gripped the car keys in his fist, then forced himself to look at his father.

“I don’t know where she is. I’m going back to look for her.”

“Isn’t she at the house?”

“Maybe,” he said and walked away, ignoring the expression of confusion on his father’s face.

* * *

Even with all the furniture in place, the house felt almost sticky with anticipation as he let himself inside. It waited. Somewhere in here he felt determined to find his wife, his love of over twenty years. He shut the door and did a cursory search through the basement, and then main floor, feeling watched as he did so.

“Tanya?”

Angry, he raced up the stairs, pausing to look at their marital bed where she’d slept beside him only hours earlier. His heart ached and his throat felt tight with panic.

He stepped into the empty spare bedroom and looked at the door leading to the bathroom. He saw a person’s shadow move across the wall facing him and his hair stood up on end.

“Tanya?” He rushed into the bathroom, to find her standing in the mirror, clear as stones on a clean river bottom, facing him. She smiled at him, the same warm, enticing smile she’d always given him…the smile that had attracted him in the first place, and one hand up against the glass so that he could see her fingertips compress.

“I love you,” she told him.

“Tanya…please come out of there.”

“I can’t, honey. Even they don’t know I’m here right now. I got the children home safely—Cory’s back with you; Gina is with her grandfather and the baby is with extended family.”

“What baby?”

“The baby who’d died here; the ones they—” and here she nodded over her shoulder, “had taken for its fresh young energy. They are energy vampires. They take from the living to replenish themselves. It’s a form of feeding and revitalizing.”

“The Hopkins,” Robbie said.

“Yes. They want to be here, in this house. It’s a dark pocket between life and death. They killed the father after he killed them; shoved him down the stairs in this house, but the father’s a control freak, even here. Jeffrey Hopkins. They’ve just re-created their own misery because they can’t let go of it, and they’re drawn to whoever lives or comes in this house. This mirror is their doorway between here and there.”

“Then step out of the doorway!” Robbie pleaded. “Cory came back. He’s safe with Chris and Cole at my parents’ house. Just come home, sweetheart. Please.”

He touched his hand to hers and for a moment, just a moment, he thought he could feel the heat from her fingers moving into his. She gave him that soft smile again.

“I can’t,” she said. “I’m already dead. I had to do it in order to save the children from them, otherwise they would have kept Cory, and Gina and the baby would have never been able to move into Heaven. I know you’ll love the boys and raise them well, and I’ll always be looking over you all.”

“Tanya!” Robbie screamed. “What are you talking about? Then where’s your body, if that’s the case.”

“Step outside and you’ll see,” she said. “I need to leave my body so that the law won’t believe that I’ve just disappeared. I’ll be following Gina and Melissa. I have loved ones there, waiting for me. My death will be deemed a terrible accident. You and the boys go on. I love you. I always will love you. When I’m gone, paint the mirror black. Use the paint in the basement. Paint it out and leave the house. You can’t destroy the mirror. Cover it instead. You won’t see me in it again. Go on…step outside to the front porch.”

She faded out from the mirror, leaving only the silver glass reflecting the window back at him. Robbie wept, her words ringing in his ears. He hurried downstairs and onto the porch just as Hawkins’ pulled up in his car again, another set of papers in his hands.

“I thought I’d bring you some copies of the listing agreement…” he stopped as the sound of glass smashing came from behind them. They both whirled in time to see Tanya’s form plunge from the window that overlooked the loft in the barn. She hit the ground hard, bounced once, and was still.