Harmony House (10 page)

Chilled, I stand, brushing the dirt off my knees.

I leave the tiny graves uncovered.

I step out into the clearing and pick up the rake and start gathering up the piles of dead weeds, trying not to think of anything—trying my best to block it all out.

I work until the sun has set.

Then I go back inside, where music plays from a vintage-looking record player in the living room by a fire my dad has built up. He sits staring at the flames—orange and red and pale yellow lapping at the blackened bricks. The light from the fire reflects like shadow puppets across my dad's weathered face and neck and arms. Tearstains are all down his cheeks—his bloodshot eyes are swollen.

And then I hear the woman's voice coming through the built-in speakers.

“I . . . fall . . . to pieces . . . each time someone speaks . . . your name.”

“Is this that record?” I ask, still standing in the doorway.

But my dad doesn't answer.

He stares straight ahead.

I walk up quietly behind him and sit on the cracked leather sofa.

The music is beautiful—haunting—and the singer's voice sounds so familiar somehow—like my mother's voice, I think.

Except my mother is dead.

And the woman singing isn't her.

“Dad,” I say again.

But he won't even look at me.

More than anything, now, I'm seized with this panic, like I have to get out of this room—away from this music.

I cover my ears with my hands and begin to run.

The voice like my mother's plays over and over in my mind.

I run up the stairs back to my room.

I close the door behind me, gasping for breath.

“What the hell was that?” I say out loud.

I try to think, was my mom ever a singer?

But, obviously, she was not.

The only logical explanation is that I'm going fucking crazy here.

I take another one of the pink oblong pills from the bag in my jacket lining and dry-swallow it and then, well, fuck it, right? I take another.

I go lie perpendicularly across the bed, staring up at the cracked and stained pink-painted ceiling. The girls from town will be coming soon. I need to shower and change. But my body feels so heavy. I can't help but close my eyes. And, with my eyes closed, I can't help but sleep—and, in sleep, to dream. And in my dream, to be back in my bed upstairs in the noxious pink room—the blankets thick and smelling of lavender. It is the middle of the night and the stars outside the window shine brilliantly. Reaching over to turn on the light next to my bed I realize that, for some reason, the lamp has disappeared. In its place is an old-fashioned oil-burning lantern and a box of matches. My nightgown, too, is old-fashioned—white—frilled around the collar.

There's a noise like scratching at the glass and as I roll onto my side I see the window start to open.

Instantly my heart pounds loud and painful in my chest and I feel sick and icy and drenched with sweat.

A figure crawls in through the open window.

It is Alex, I think, just like before.

But then the figure is on top of me and he's bigger than Alex—thick, sweating. He smells of cut grass and hay and something sour. He gets hold of my wrist and I cry out, but then his hand closes on my mouth and my voice is muffled and I struggle for breath. His body pins me down. Tears run hot down my cheeks.

The body moves on top of me.

And only then do I see his face.

It emerges from out of the shadows.

It is the father's face. The father from the family portraits at Harmony House.

Only now his eyes bulge—red-veined, terrible.

His hand moves.

And, finally, I scream.

The scream wakes me.

I'm on the bed, but not under the covers, and the sun is just starting to set over the vascular-hued sky.

Looking over at the clock on the bedside table, I see it's nearly five thirty.

I force myself up and off the bed.

I go down the hall to the bathroom and turn the shower on hot.

I let the water burn my skin red.

I stand beneath the spray coming down.

The pain is like holding my hand over the flame of a gas stove.

But I take it, and take it, and take it.

Until I can't take it anymore.

And I turn the cold water on.

And crouch down on the heels of my feet.

And hug my knees to my chest.

And wait to feel clean.

M
y dad went up to bed pretty early, thankfully, so I didn't have to be
too
totally embarrassed by him in front of Christy and Candace and Mercedes. He did make me promise, before the girls got here, to try and spread the word of God and salvation to them. He gave me a big, long, crazy lecture about how I need to lead the flock and pass on the holy word to the poor sinners of the world and blah, blah, blah. I have no idea why he's acting so totally insane these days. He even started proselytizing to the girls a little bit. Both Candace and
Mercedes had guys they wanted to invite over, but after spending a little time with my dad, and I guess hearing about everything that happened last night, they called their respective boy toys and held them off.

So now the three girls and I have made up a big bed on the floor in the back sitting room, where there's a TV and VCR. We have a fire going and we're eating microwave popcorn and drinking hot chocolate.

The girls, surprisingly to me, had not seen
The Silence of the Lambs
, so we've started with that, and they all seem pretty freaked out. That storm really must be coming, too, because it's raining hard outside and the wind is blowing the rain against the downstairs windows, making a rat-a-tat-tat sound over and over and over again.

On the television Anthony Hopkins has just ripped the prison guard's face off with his teeth and the girls all scream and I laugh at them, but just 'cause they're cute and obviously not into weird, dark shit like I am. There's a pain in my stomach, cutting in, though, not related to the movie, that makes me feel dizzy and nauseous and I have to get up from where we're sitting and go off down the hall to find the bathroom.

“Where are you going?” Candace asks me.

And Mercedes almost cries, “You can't leave us here.”

I try to smile and say, “I'm sorry. I'll be right back.”

And I go out of the room quickly, feeling the nausea rising up in my throat.

On my way to the bathroom, fighting the urge to be sick all over the floor, I hear an unfamiliar sound drifting in from the other room—the sound of a strange, rhythmic chanting—over and over—high-pitched—with something deeper and guttural underneath. I am chilled, so the nausea is momentarily forgotten.

The sudden cold makes my fingers numb.

That smell of pungent mold and mildew is almost palpable.

I pass through the foyer and the dining room and the reading library and the study, and the chanting and screaming and shrieking gets louder and louder. The house seems to swell and exhale around me—the walls and ceiling pushing in and drawing back. I wonder how the girls haven't heard anything from the other room yet.

A fire is burning again in the living room fireplace—immense, bright, casting shadows like leaves falling from the trees outside. The record player is rotating rhythmically and it looks like that record I found earlier,
the sound worse than any horror I could ever imagine—worse, even, than that scream the man screamed realizing he'd just taken another man's life with his car. The sound makes me want to tear my skin off and gouge out my eyes.

I look over at the huddled figure by the fire.

I see my father standing, hunched and rocking back and forth, sweat covering his face—his hair dripping with it—his pale skin almost translucent in the firelight.

“Dad!” I shout, startling myself.

My dad turns to stare at me, though his eyes are milky and vacant. He teeters and stands slack-jawed. Slowly he begins stepping toward me.

Unable to take it one more fucking second, I run and switch the player off.

I look up from the turntable just in time to see my dad walking dazedly out of the room, muttering to himself, babbling. I call out again, but he keeps walking. I hear him stumbling from room to room.

I turn the heavy vinyl over in my hand, then, before I can stop myself, throw it in the fire.

A cold wind tunnels through the rooms as I hear the heavy front door, swollen in its frame, pushed open—followed by more footsteps down the front stairs and out
into the night. The rain smells sweet through the open door and the wind carries fallen leaves into the front room.

My stomach lurches, and I rush back inside to the downstairs bathroom—cramped and narrow—just managing to turn the faucet on before vomiting up what feels like the entire contents of my stomach. I've been throwing up so much at this point, it feels like . . . what's that expression? Old hat? But, no, that's not true. It sucks as much as always. I choke and spit and flush the vomit down and then lie on the cool tile.

Soon there is a knocking at the door.

“Jen, are you okay?”

It's Christy's voice.

Then I hear Candace ask, “Was it the movie?”

And Mercedes says, “Can we get you anything.”

It makes me feel kind of good, honestly, that all three of them came to check on me. Though maybe it's just that none of them wanted to be left alone in this supposedly haunted fucking house. Either way I appreciate it.

“I'm all right,” I call out. “I've just been sick recently.”

“Maybe she's pregnant,” I hear Candace say.

“Yeah, right,” says Mercedes.

The thought chills me. But I shake my head and try to forget it. I get up off the bathroom floor and go open the door.

“Sorry,” I say, sweating a little. “I don't know what's wrong with me.”

“We were just worried about you,” Christy says.

I turn back to the sink and splash some water on my face and drink from the faucet before turning it off.

“You want to go get some air?” Mercedes asks. “I think it stopped raining.”

“I'd kill for a cigarette,” I say.

“I have a pack of Lucky Strikes,” says Mercedes.

“Lucky Strikes,” I say. “Those are like old-man cigarettes.”

“I stole 'em from my grandfather,” Mercedes says.

I laugh.

“All right, but if we go outside, my dad'll hear us. He's a total creeper. Let's go down in the basement. It'll be warmer anyway.”

“The basement!” Christy says, kind of horrified-sounding. “Really?”

“Why? Are you scared?” Mercedes asks her, smiling.

“No . . . yeah . . . kind of.”

“Come on,” says Candace. “It'll be all right.”

“Okay,” I say. “This way.”

I lead them down the uneven, splintered wooden stairs, turning on the bare overhead lightbulb and making my way over to a small rectangular window. Piled everywhere are cardboard boxes and more furniture covered in white linens and stacks of shelving with more boxes. The smell of mildew is overpowering. A complicated maze of different pipes and wires runs the length of the ceiling—the insulation is exposed and even falling down in places. The concrete floor is stained and cracked and there's about an inch of brackish water pooled in one corner.

“Your dad may be a creeper,” Mercedes says, “but it's pretty damn creepy down here, too.”

“It's not any warmer, either,” says Christy.

She's right, of course. The cold is penetrating. And the mildew smell is mixed with that same rotting-animal smell.

I go quickly to the window and open it.

“Here,” say Mercedes, handing me a cigarette.

She takes one herself and so does Candace. Only Christy declines.

We light the cigarettes with an orange lighter Mercedes has in her purse.

I inhale and exhale.

“What'd you guys think of the movie so far?”

“Scary,” says Christy.

“Really scary,” says Candace. “I remember my dad telling me after he and my mom saw it in the theaters he actually looked in the backseat of the car to make sure no one was hiding there before they drove home.”

I laugh.

“So are your parents still together, then?” I ask.

“Yeah,” she says.

“So are mine,” says Mercedes.

“So are mine,” says Christy.

“Well, aren't we all anomalies? I mean, my mom's dead,” I say, “but my parents never got divorced.”

We are all silent for a minute.

“Sometimes I wish mine would get divorced,” says Christy.

I turn to her, surprised.

“The way they fight,” she continues, “I think they'd be better off.”

“Mine would've been, too,” I say. “Definitely.”

“How did your mom die?” Mercedes asks, tentatively—and then adds, “You don't have to tell us.”

The cold seems to fill the room even more biting and I shiver.

“No, it's okay,” I say. “She . . . uh . . . she was an alcoholic. She asphyxiated on . . . uh . . . her own . . . you know . . . throw-up.”

“Like Jimi Hendrix,” Mercedes says.

Candace comes over and puts her hand on my shoulder.

“I'm sorry that happened to you,” she says.

“Yeah, it sucks,” I tell them.

“My parents are still together,” Mercedes says. “But . . . uhmm . . . if you wanna know the truth . . . my mom's had a lot of . . . uh . . . substance-abuse issues, too. She's been to rehab a whole bunch of times. And my dad travels all the time for work. So it's mostly my grandparents who raised me.”

“Damn,” says Candace. “My family's so normal, I feel almost bad.”

“Don't,” I tell her. “You're lucky.”

I stub my cigarette out and the other girls do, too, and I gather the three butts up and hide them under one of the piles of boxes.

“I wish we had something to drink,” says Mercedes.

“I've got Cokes up in the fridge,” I tell her.

She laughs.

“No, I mean . . . something to
drink
, drink.”

“Oh,” I tell her, laughing, too. “Well, I might be able
to steal some from my dad.”

“I'm down with that,” says Christy.

But then a gust of wind slams the window shut and we all jump and the light overhead flares bright and then pops loudly, leaving us immersed in pure, perfect blackness. Candace is standing close to me and I can hear her quick shallow breathing and I reach out and take her hand. She squeezes tight and I hold on.

“Don't worry,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady. “This happened last night, too. It's just the circuit breaker.”

The sound of Candace's breathing grows louder and more strained, like she's having an asthma attack.

“Candace. Are you okay?” I ask.

“Well, I can't see,” she says.

But her voice comes from across the room. She's not next to me at all.

My legs start to shake. I feel the hand grip me tighter.

“C-Christy?” I call out.

The hand holding mine is crushing me now.

“Ow, let go,” I yell.

And then I hear Christy.

She's not next to me, either.

“Who are you talking to?” she says.

I feel the hand release.

My heart beats so I feel dizzy, and I reach out in all directions, but no one is there.

“This isn't funny,” I say.

“What?” asks Candace.

I can't slow my breathing down. I feel like I might pass out from the panic making me tremble all over. And then that same hand is pushing me now—pushing me harder and harder.

“Please,” I say, my voice cracking. “Please. Stop it!”

“Jen, stop messing around,” Mercedes says.

But I'm being pushed by this hand up against the wall—face-first into the rough concrete.

“STOP IT!” I yell as loud as I can.

And then another pop sounds and just as suddenly as the light switched off, it comes flaring back on. We all seem to gasp collectively and blink our eyes. The wall in front of me slowly begins to take shape. A warm trickle of blood runs down from my forehead where I was pressed up against the concrete.

“What the hell was that?” Mercedes yells at me. “Was that some kind of joke?”

I turn to face her, tears welling in my eyes—spilling over, mixing with the blood.

“Jesus Christ,” she says, running over to me.

And then Candace screams.

“You guys! You guys!”

“What?” I ask, wiping my face with the back of my hand.

“Christy's gone.”

Mercedes and I both turn to look.

Candace is right.

Christy isn't there.

“Christy!” I call out.

The other girls begin looking around for her.

“Did you see her leave?” I ask stupidly.

Mercedes shakes her head. “It was dark.”

Candace wraps her arms around herself and shivers.

“Where could she have gone?” she asks.

“I didn't hear anything,” Mercedes says. “Did you?”

“No,” I say.

I can see that both girls are shaking now, the way I am.

“What the fuck
was
that?” Mercedes says.

“I just got scared,” I say, not wanting to tell either one of them the truth. “I must've gotten turned around and I ran into the wall.”

“Yeah, but where the hell is Christy?” Candace asks.

The sound of the wind coming in through the vents above us is high-pitched, like an animal whimpering.

“She must've run back upstairs,” I say.

“I didn't hear her,” Mercedes says.

“No,” I say. “But she must've.”

Candace moves toward the stairs.

“Let's get out of here,” she says.

Mercedes nods and we all start up toward the main floor together, the steps creaking beneath our weight.

“No offense, Jen, but this house seriously sucks,” Mercedes says.

“Yeah, no shit,” I say.

We reach the first-floor hallway and I shut off the basement light and close the door firmly behind me.

“Christy!” I call out, looking in both directions.

She doesn't answer, though, and I don't see her anywhere.

“Jesus Christ,” says Mercedes. “This is crazy.”

I feel my face flush red.