She slipped out her earbuds—it seemed disrespectful to be listening to a song about a murder while standing in a church—and began to chafe her hands. They were already feeling a little better.
Combien est-ce que je vous dois
, she thought.
How much do I owe you?
And felt again a little stab of guilt.
She stood there a moment, and then suddenly realized she was hearing something. It was soft, almost inaudible, a sort of low mumbling sound. And then she realized it had been there ever since she’d taken out her earbuds.
She peered out in the darkened church. It seemed to be coming from there, somewhere in the pews. Mice, maybe? Or rats? No, it wasn’t quite that, but something different. More like someone whispering.
Curious, she took a step forward, out of the entranceway, through the pillars, and into the church proper. She felt suddenly vulnerable, knowing she must be outlined against the light behind her, and she stopped for a moment and listened. No, the sound hadn’t stopped. It was still there, and sounded all the more like someone whispering.
When she moved forward it was while trying to be as silent as possible. She moved down the aisle slowly, trying to follow the sound. Just a few pews up, the sound no longer seemed to be coming from in front of her but more from one side. She eased her way into the pew, began making her way down the row.
The sound grew louder and louder. Yes, definitely voices. Why would they be hiding in the dark, though?
She almost didn’t see them until she was right on top of them. They were dressed in black, faded into the darkness, and if they hadn’t
been whispering she might have walked right smack dab into them. As it was, her foot scraped and they heard her coming and stopped talking, rapidly turning to face her. Then she saw the white fabric around their faces and the faces themselves. Very hard to see, but from what she could make out in the darkness they looked really old.
“Oh hey, sisters,” said Heidi. “Sorry. I didn’t see you. Was just looking for a place to warm up from the cold.”
The two nuns regarded her without saying anything. Just stared.
“I didn’t mean to disturb you,” she said.
“You’re not disturbing us,” said the first, in a creaky old voice.
“No, you’re not disturbing us,” said the other. “We were expecting you.”
The first elbowed her.
“Expecting me,” said Heidi. “How could you be?”
“She doesn’t mean that,” said the first. “We were expecting someone, but not you. How could we be expecting you?”
“Yes,” said the second, her eyes shining in the dark. “How could we be?”
“Um,” said Heidi. “I’m warm now. I probably should go.”
She turned and started back down the pew.
“Wait,” said the second nun. “What fragrance do you wear?”
“Fragrance?” said Heidi. “Perfume, you mean? No, I’m not wearing anything.”
“But you smell so good,” said the second nun. “Almost good enough to eat.”
“Sister,” said the first nun. “Think before you speak.”
“Well,” said Heidi quickly, “I should go.”
She almost ran the rest of the way to the doors of the church and was only really comfortable once she was outside, in the cold again.
So much for a good night’s sleep
, thought Heidi. Shaking her head, she hurried the rest of the way home.
Her fingers were aching by the time she reached her front door. First it was hard to get her keys out and then, once they were out, to make her fingers find the right one and get the door open. She checked for mail, and then headed for the stairs.
Lacy’s door was wide open, light spilling out into the hallway. The sound of voices and scattered laughter came from inside. She groaned—last thing she wanted tonight was company. She’d have to go past on her way to the stairs. She’d just go quickly and quietly, she told herself, and hopefully not be seen.
She was halfway past when she risked a glance in. Lacy was there, a glass in her hand, sitting in a high-backed chair that looked almost like a throne. She was rapt, her attention turned to a sharp-nosed woman, with a huge, tangled mass of brightly dyed red hair, around Lacy’s age, sixty or so, who was speaking. On the other side of her was a cute, perky woman with short, choppy blond hair, maybe a little younger. The latter turned and looked straight at her, and smiled.
Heidi hurried past. She’d put her first foot on the step when she heard Lacy’s voice ring out.
“Heidi!” she called. “Come meet my sisters.”
Heidi took a deep breath. Last thing she needed was a landlady who wanted to be her friend, too. She gathered herself and returned to the door. She put on a fake smile, poked her head around the door frame, and waved.
“This is Megan,” said Lacy, gesturing to the woman with red hair. “And this is Sonny,” she said, gesturing to the blonde. Funny, thought Heidi, they didn’t look like Lacy’s sisters. She couldn’t see much family resemblance. Maybe Lacy was adopted?
“Hi,” said Heidi. “Nice to meet both of you.”
“Nice to meet you, too,” said Sonny. “Come on and join the party. We don’t bite.”
Megan simply nodded and held up her wineglass.
Lacy smiled. “Please come join us, Heidi,” she said.
“Oh hey, thanks,” said Heidi. “But tonight’s not so good for me. I got held up at work and I’m not feeling so great, so maybe a rain check.”
Lacy nodded. “One glass?” she said.
Well, she had told Herman and Whitey she was going to practice the red wine method, and they definitely had red wine here. But still she resisted. “I really should call it a night and get some sleep,” she said.
“One itsy-bitsy spider of a glass?” wheedled Lacy.
What?
thought Heidi.
“She broke out the good stuff for a change,” said Sonny in a stage whisper.
Heidi gave a tired smile. She was too exhausted to fight. “All right,” she said. “One drink. But first I have to feed Steve.”
She trudged up the stairs. She shouldn’t have glanced in, should have pleaded exhaustion. Probably if she hadn’t, she would have managed to get by without them calling to her. But now it was too late. She’d have to go talk to them.
At her apartment, she couldn’t help but glance down at apartment five. For a moment she thought the door was open and did a double take. But no, it wasn’t open after all. It was just the way the shadows fell. She resisted the impulse to go down the hall and check to make sure it was locked.
She opened the door on darkness, heard Steve whining.
“I know, buddy,” she said. “I’m late. I’m so sorry. Hold on, give me a second.”
She flipped the kitchen light on, but when it came on it flickered a little, and kept flickering.
Bulb must be going out,
she thought. She took off her coat and tossed it into the living room. She dropped her bag.
Steve was acting odd, whining a little. He greeted her, but not very enthusiastically, but once she filled his bowl with food he began eating right away, wolfing it down and growling as if he expected someone to take it from him.
“Stop being weird, Steve,” she said, feeling a little hurt. “I wasn’t gone all that much longer than usual.”
She watched him for a moment. Gradually, his growling seemed to fade away. Maybe she’d forgotten to feed him before she left. She grabbed a bottle of wine off the counter and opened the apartment door, stepped out into the hall.
“Okay, buddy,” she said. “I promise I’ll be back quick. I’m just going to go have a quick one with the old ladies downstairs.”
How do I get myself roped into these things?
she was wondering.
She stood in the doorway watching Steve eat a moment more and then shut the door and went out into the hall. She glanced again at the door to apartment five and again had the impression it was open, but this time stopped herself from turning around to look at it. It would be, she was sure, the same as it had been before: just an illusion. Nobody was in apartment five, she told herself. The door was certainly closed.
She continued toward the stairs without turning back around, feeling the skin prickling on the back of her neck.
But the door was open this time. And there, in the door frame, half consumed by shadow, stood a thin figure. As Heidi moved toward the stairs and down them, the figure moved out of the doorway, gliding silently down the hall.
When it came into the light it revealed itself to be so thin that its bones were showing through its skin, vividly outlined. There was no flesh to the figure. It was hard to believe that it belonged to a living body and not a corpse. There was something wrong with its face, something about the skin—it looked as though it had been torn free, torn loose, and only imperfectly reattached. It hung wrong on the skull, as if ready to slough off at any moment, and the mouth and eyes didn’t seem lined up quite right.
It seemed drawn forward, step-by-step, moving in time with Heidi’s movement down the stairs. When she stopped and rapped on the door frame of Lacy’s apartment below and said “I’m back,” it pretended to rap on Heidi’s door, mimed her speech.
“Come on in,” said Lacy downstairs, and the figure bowed low before Heidi’s door. It reached out and tried the handle, found it locked. The flesh on its hand, too, was less like skin and more like a glove, loose and pulpy, and it left damp stains on the doorknob and the door beside it.
The figure gave a strange lopsided smile. It put both hands up against the surface of the door and then pushed. For a moment the door tightened in its frame, the wood creaking, and then, suddenly, its hands slipped through the surface of the door. It thrust itself forward and the arms slid through the wood as well until its face rested against it. It pushed its face against the wood and the skin of the face stretched strangely and sloughed to the side, laying bare for one moment a raw and fleshless expanse of pinkish skull. And then with a wet squishing sound the face thrust through the door and disappeared to the other side. Neck and body followed. Slowly the figure wormed its way through and into Heidi’s apartment.
When it was done, the door was still one piece. All that was left was a wet stain the size and shape of the figure, and very quickly that began to fade away.
From inside came the sound of Steve whining. And then of him scratching at the door, trying to get out.
Just as always, one drink had become two, which had become three and then four.
Those old ladies sure can slam it back,
thought Heidi, feeling a little buzzed. She’d made short work of a plate of cheese and crackers as well, but maybe should have had another plateful, enough to soak up all the wine in her belly.
Sonny was there beside her with an inquiring look on her face, holding up the bottle, ready to pour.
What the hell?
thought Heidi.
One more won’t kill me.
She held out her glass and Sonny filled it, emptying the bottle.
“And that ought to do it,” said Lacy. “Another dead soldier.” She reached out and took the bottle from Sonny and saluted it. “Sir, you served your country well.”
“Thanks,” said Heidi. She took a sip. So far the evening had been the old ladies quizzing her down on everything under the sun, from boyfriends to her job at the radio to her Christmas plans. She’d answer a question and then be barraged by two more. But, she realized, Lacy’s sisters had said almost nothing about themselves. And Megan had said almost nothing at all.
She turned to Megan. “So what do you gals do?” she asked.
But it was Sonny who answered. “Well,” she said. “I’m what you might call a self-help guru. I guide people who are lost in the art of finding oneself.”
“I think I could use a little of that,” Heidi said. That wasn’t exactly true. She’d mostly been doing okay lately, but the last few days had been rough for some reason. She hoped it’d get better soon.
Sonny reached out and patted her hand. “Everyone can, dear…,” she said. “And Megan here… Well…”
“I read, darling,” said Megan. Her voice was sharp and powerful, deeper than you would think it would be from looking at her.
“Read?” said Heidi. “I’m sorry, I’m not sure what you mean exactly. Read books? And you get paid for it?”
But Megan didn’t answer, just kept looking at Heidi with a steady, steady gaze.
Did I say something wrong?
wondered Heidi.
There was an awkward silence, which Lacy finally broke.
“Megan is quite the palm reader,” she said.
“Oh,” said Heidi. She didn’t know what else to add.
“Most readings are surface-level observations,” said Sonny. “But Megan here… she sees very deep into the world beyond.” As she said it, she moved her hands back and forth as if pretending to cast a spell. Heidi shot a quick glance Megan’s way to see if she minded her sister teasing her, but her face remained as placid as ever.
“She’s very good at it,” said Lacy.
“Really?” said Heidi. “I’ve never had my palm read before. I always figured it was a scam.” She turned to Megan. “No offense,” she said.
“Actually, my dear,” said Megan. “I do take offense. Great offense. But not at you. At all those who demean the true gift with their false substitutes. Plastic gypsies with crystal balls and neon signs have destroyed the value of my true gift.”
At the mention of neon signs, a memory flashed up in Heidi’s mind, a flickering red neon sign that read
Jesus Saves
.
Where was that from?
she wondered. Where had she seen it?
“Give her your hand,” said Lacy.
“What?” said Heidi. “It’s late, maybe another time. I’ve got to—”
“Heidi, give her your hand,” said Lacy, a little more insistently. “Come on, it’ll be fun.” When Heidi still hesitated, Megan reached out and took it.
“Um, okay,” said Heidi.
“The hand and the brain are one,” said Megan. “The hand is controlled by over three hundred muscles, tendons, nerves, bones, and arteries. One-quarter of the motor cortex in the human brain is devoted to the hand. Did you know that, darling?”
What, now I’m getting a science lesson from a palm reader?
“No,” Heidi said. “I can honestly say I did not know that.”