The bedroom was as brightly illuminated as the rest of the house and as precisely neat and tidy, so for a moment he did not even register that the bed was occupied. Jillian lay on her side atop the richly detailed red-and-gold floral spread, curled in a fetal position. Though she was still dressed in her work clothes, her hair was wild and unkempt and her shirt was untucked from her skirt, which rode up well above her thighs, exposing the tops of her pantyhose. There was nothing titillating about this.
Jilly made no sound except that of her own breath coming ragged and too quick. She was moving almost imperceptibly, not even enough to shake the bed, rocking herself the way she had on the night they had spent in a romantic lodge in Vermont, when she had gotten food poisoning.
Michael took a step into the room. The floor creaked there as well.
With a hissing intake of breath, Jillian sat up and spun toward him. Michael recoiled in horror at the sight of her. Her shirt was open and streaked with blood, her bra was undone and hanging loosely beneath her arms. For a moment he feared some assault, but then he saw that there was blood on her hands, on her fingers, and that it had come from long furrows that had been clawed in the flesh of her breasts and the skin between and below them. The wounds were fresh. And she had made them herself.
The time for thinking was past. This was his baby, his love, his wife. “Jilly, oh, my God,” he whispered as he started toward her.
She did not wait for him.
Eyes lost in a darkness that came from within, lips curled in a scowl of pure disgust and hate, she lunged from the bed. Michael held up his hands to urge her back even as she hit him the first time. Her fist connected with his cheek with enough force to jar his teeth and send a jolt of pain through the muscles of his jaw. The next blow struck his chest, and the next, and the one after that. So stunned was Michael that it took him all of that time to react. He tried to grasp her wrists, but Jillian was fueled by rage. Her right hand escaped and she grabbed his throat with her bloody fingers and drove him backward. Michael was in a tumult of emotion and confusion and too slow to save himself from falling. He tumbled to the floor and his wife rode him to the ground.
“Jilly, please, stop it!” he said, tearing her clutching hand away. He could not stop his mind from recalling those images that had soaked into his mind from contact with the hollow women, stolen fragments of Jillian's life.
“Why?” she shrieked, tears springing to her eyes. Drops of fresh blood spilled from the gashes on her scarlet-stained breasts and dripped onto his chest and face. Her tears followed. One tear landed on his lips, and he tasted the tang of salt even as she pounded her fists down onto him again, pummeling him.
“Why what?” he shouted, frantic.
She grabbed his head with both hands, her fingers slipping into his hair, and shrieked again, spittle flying from her mouth. Her eyes were wide with fury and anguish.
“Why do you care?” Her voice was raw and ragged, collapsing in upon itself, even as she began to falter, the strength running out of her with her blood and tears.
Michael grabbed her wrists and tried to connect with his eyes, locking his gaze with hers. “Because I love you, Jilly. How can you ask that? Because I love you.”
Her expression was wretched. Her eyes darted back and forth, and he could see she was lost. Misery in her every aspect, she shuddered and shook her head and leaned close to look into his eyes.
“But how do you love, Michael?
How
do you love? I can't remember.”
Then she collapsed upon him and he cradled her there, singing softly to his love, her blood soaking into his shirt. Michael rocked her and stared, wide-eyed, at the ceiling of their bedroom, more afraid now than he had ever been before.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In time, Jillian fell asleep in Michael's arms. She had spent the better part of an hour wavering between distraught and furious, and he had endured cruel taunts and barbs right up until the moment her eyes began to flutter and close. Soon her breathing had deepened and he knew that she slept. Only then could he allow himself to feel the sting from her words. For several minutes longer he just held her, gently. She did not know what she had lost . . . only that she had lost it.
But that was a beginning, at least.
Michael slid a pillow under her head and extricated himself, making sure not to disturb her. He pulled back her bloodstained shirt and studied the long scratches she had clawed into her chest. Relief flooded him. They were mostly superficial. Warm water to clean the drying blood and some antibacterial ointment and she'd be all right. But now wasn't the time. Not while she was sleeping.
He shut off the lights and paused at the open door of the bedroom to look back in at her, limned by the moonlight that spilled in through the windows. Jillian was a petite woman; curled there on the bed, she seemed almost like a girl again. Gazing at her there in the dark hush of the bedroom, she seemed so peaceful that he was reminded of the way things had been
before.
Once upon a time. Seeing her like that was a kind of window into the past, a view back to a place he could never return to. Whatever happened next, nothing would ever be the same.
He went downstairs and into the kitchen, leaving all the lights burning. She had found some solace in that, keeping the darkness at bay, and Michael did not want to take that away. The answering machine was blinking with new messages, but he had neither the time nor the inclination to listen to them. Jillian had probably blazed a trail of resentment and anger today, and it would only sadden him to hear the results of her behavior.
Focus.
Jillian's address book sat beside the microwave, stuffed to overflowing with scraps of notepaper and index cards scrawled with cooking recipes. He found Hannah's number easily enough and dialed her right away, leaning against the dishwasher. A stale, dirty smell emanated from it; even as he listened to the phone ring, he opened the cabinet and withdrew a box of dish-washing crystals.
There was a click as Hannah answered the phone.
“I don't want to talk to you,” she said in a clipped tone.
“Hannah?”
“Michael? What do you want? What's going on? Did she make you call me, because I'm not going to forgive her this time. She's got a lot of explaining to—”
“Hannah, please,” Michael said. “Just listen.”
Something in his voice, in the soft tone he took, must have reached her. Hannah had obviously seen on her caller ID that the call was coming from his house and assumed it was Jillian; if his wife had torn a destructive path through her day, Hannah had clearly been one of the casualties.
“What is it?” Hannah asked, unable to hide her concern.
“Look, whatever she did or said to you today, she's not herself.”
“Well, no shit. She's my sister, Michael. I still want to know what you did to set her off like that.”
He sighed and banged his head on the wall, cradling the phone to his ear. “Jesus, Hannah. I didn't do anything. Could you just for one second stop thinking you have all the answers and listen to me?”
Dead silence on the line. Then: “You've got a lot of fucking nerve. The two of you. I swear to God, if this is how you treat people now, you deserve each other. I'm not your wife, Michael. You can't talk to me—”
“Hannah!” He cursed under his breath and glanced up as though he might be able to see through the ceiling to find out if he'd disturbed Jillian. When he spoke again, his voice was low. Emotion clogged his throat as he tried to put into words why he had called.
“Look, she's not herself, I told you. She's not . . . she's not well. It goes a lot further than her just being kind of bitchy. She's sort of delusional, Hannah. She's having trouble with her memory. There's someone I need to go see. Someone I think can help, but—”
“What do you mean, delusional? Is she on drugs or something? Ecstasy? She always told me you two stayed away from that stuff.”
It was all he could do not to shriek at her. Instead he drew a breath and let it out quickly. “We do. It isn't drugs. She's
having these . . . episodes. Weird behavior. I think I can help, but I don't want to leave her alone. I'm afraid she might hurt herself.”
Or someone else,
he thought. But he didn't dare say the words.
“Wait, you want me to come there?”
She sounded so incredulous that Michael had to pause a moment. “Well, yeah. I . . . she's just in a bad way right now, and—”
“I can't. Not that I'm sure I'd be willing to, even if I could. I live two hours away, Michael, never mind that I've got to be at the hospital early in the morning.”
Michael frowned. “The hospital? What—”
“My mammogram showed something that isn't supposed to be there. They need to do a biopsy.”
“Damn. Hannah, I'm sorry. I didn't know.”
“Why would you? I've been trying to tell Jilly for days, but all she does is cuss me out.” Hannah sighed. “Is she
puking?”
“What?” He shook his head, and began pacing the kitchen.
“Throwing up, Michael. Is she throwing up? Is she physically wounded in some way? Convulsing?”
“No, but—”
“No. And if she was, you'd bring her to the hospital. So, I'm sorry, but whatever it is, I can't handle it right now. Not on top of this, and not when she's been treating me the way she's been treating me. When she feels able to use the phone, she can call me with an apology, and then if she needs to be baby-sat you can bring her here. I don't know what's wrong with you two, but I suggest therapy.”
Hannah hung up on him.
Blinking in amazement, Michael held the phone away from him and stared at it. Whatever Jillian had said to Hannah earlier, it must have been pretty nasty.
“Christ,” he whispered as he continued to pace. He put his hands behind his neck, stretching to his full height, racking his brain. No way was he going to leave Jillian home alone at this point, but if Hannah couldn't come, his options were severely limited. Several times he started to dial the phone number of one of his wife's other relatives, but that wasn't going to do any good. Jillian wouldn't want any of them to see her like this. And Michael needed quicker results, regardless.
He rested his forehead against the refrigerator, feeling the electric hum vibrating inside his skull. After a moment he pulled away, nodding to himself. The phone was still clutched in his hand and he dialed quickly, his pulse accelerating as he listened to it ring on the other end. He looked out the window above the sink; it was pitch black out there. Perhaps the moon had gone behind some clouds, or was blocked by the trees behind their house. Whatever the cause, it seemed like more than simple night blackness. It was as though the dark had swallowed up the house entirely.
“Hello?” asked a voice on the other end of the phone.
“Teddy.”
“Mikey! Hey, bud, you really came through for me. I left you a bunch of messages. Where've you been? You feeling better? Working the cobwebs out of your brain?”
Just the sound of his friend's voice soothed him. Suddenly Teddy was his touchstone of sanity. Michael was being swept along a river of grief and impossibility and terrifying loss, but if he could only get Teddy to throw him a line—
“Listen, Ted. I need your help. It's . . . it's Jilly. I've got trouble.”
When Teddy Polito spoke again all of the playfulness was gone from his voice. “Talk to me, Michael. Tell me what you need.”
O
N THE DRIVE OUT TO
Amesbury, Michael kept the radio off. It seemed a time for silence. His heartbeat provided a persistent rhythm, an ominous staccato that propelled him on too fast. The headlights of oncoming vehicles lit up the inside of the car with a golden shimmer that made it all the more surreal. He had no idea what he was going to say when he reached the Barnes house. Was he supposed to just barge in? The Michael he had always been cringed at the thought, yet that part of him was being slowly eroded. What remained was the core of him, where all that mattered was Jillian.
He would do whatever he had to do to protect her, no matter the cost. If that meant breaking down doors in the middle of the night, then that was the way it would have to be. He sensed that answers existed just at the edges of his mind, the same way the lost girl had lingered just out of view in his peripheral vision.
But he would have those answers. And soon.
Old Route 12 led right into the heart of Amesbury. Michael used the atlas to navigate along several long, winding streets and then through a small grid of roads that seemed to be one sprawling neighborhood development, two decades old. He slowed to study the house numbers. The Barnes place was set back slightly on a rise, a long ranch whose driveway had been cut into the hill so that a garage could be put underneath. A stone wall ran along the property beyond the house, and past that there was only woods. Michael felt a passing tremor looking at the trees. They reminded him of his search for Wildwood Road.
He pulled into the driveway, got out, and went up the front walk. The engine noise and the slam of the car door had drawn attention from inside, for the lights above the door went on, throwing a dome of illumination over the stoop. No sooner had he rung the bell than he heard the click of a deadbolt being thrown back, and the door swung open to reveal a thirty-something guy in a Red Sox T-shirt. His feet were bare and the cuffs of his jeans were ragged, but he was clean-cut, his dirty-blond hair neatly trimmed.
“You're him,” the man said with a dreadful weariness. “The guy who called.”
Michael had imagined having to introduce himself, even having to plead for the man to open the door. Now he was taken off guard.
“Yeah. Look, I can't apologize enough for just coming over here, intruding on your life like this. I swear to you I'm not a reporter or some kind of stalker. I just . . . I need to talk to your mother, Mr. Barnes.”
With a sigh of resignation, Barnes leaned against the frame of the open door. “What's your name?”
“Sorry, yeah. I should've . . .” He thrust out his hand. “Michael Dansky.”
Barnes did not bother to uncross his arms to shake. He only studied Michael.
“Well, you're here. I probably should call the cops but you've already made me think about things I don't want to think about. The harm's done. So take thirty seconds, tell me what you want to tell me, then go away.”
His expectation of an argument defied, Michael faltered. “I'm not sure how to . . . all right, okay.” He paused, then began again. “There's this house. I mentioned it on the phone. It's off of Old Route Twelve, on or near Wildwood Road.”
Barnes flinched at that. Michael saw it, but didn't push. He knew there was something here, that the guy had gotten so upset on the phone because there was a connection that he did not want to share. Maybe that was why he was listening, now. Perhaps his mother's fate was its own mystery, and he thought Michael might be able to solve it.
“You were upset before. I don't want to upset you,” he continued. “It's just that I have . . . an interest in that house. And I think your mother may know some things about it that no one's told me yet.”
Barnes gave a little cynical sniff of a laugh. “Jesus, Dansky, that's pretty weak. You're harassing me at, what, quarter past eight at night and you can't be any less vague than that?” He gave Michael a dark look. “I'm closing the door now. I want you to leave my mother alone.”
The man started to close the door. Michael's breath caught in his throat and he put out a hand to keep it open. Barnes was quick, and stronger than he looked. He grabbed Michael's wrist and forced him backward, moving out onto the stoop with him.
“You've got balls, buddy. Touch my door and I really will call the cops.”
Michael ran his hands through his hair in frustration. He was at a loss. But Jillian couldn't afford for him to fuck this up, and neither could Susan Barnes. The problem was, how was he supposed to explain that to her son?
“It's about my wife.”
Barnes scowled. “I don't know your wife. I don't know you. And clearly you don't know my mother, or you wouldn't be here asking about her. So for the last time—”
Michael's eyes burned with exhaustion and his patience ran out. “Listen to me. Just . . . just listen, all right? Something's wrong with my wife. I think it has something to do with that house. I'm getting the idea maybe something's wrong with your mother, too, from the way you're talking. If that's true, it may also have to do with this house.”
They stood there in the light cast by the lanterns on either side of the door, only darkness beyond it. Barnes hesitated a moment, then peered even more closely at Michael.
“How did you know they called her Scooter?”
“I don't think you'd believe me if I answered that question.”
Seconds ticked by as their words hung in the air. Michael thought Barnes had a sense that whatever had happened to his mother was out of the ordinary, but did not know how to deal with that.
“No,” the man said at last. “No, I guess I probably wouldn't.”
“Mr. Barnes—”
“Tom.”
“Tom. I think some of this rings a bell with you. If it didn't, you wouldn't be talking to me. My wife . . . she needs help. Please.”
The man could not meet Michael's gaze after that. He retreated over the threshold but paused inside the house to look back.
“You know she was a Realtor. The house on Wildwood Road was the last one she ever showed. It had been abandoned for years until the state took it over by eminent domain. She specialized in older homes, and she went up to take a look at the place. Showed it to a client that same day. After that—”
During the momentary pause in the man's words Michael felt panic rising inside him. If Susan Barnes was dead . . . if the specter that had visited him over and over was truly her ghost . . . then all of his theories were wrong.