by Eva Pohler
“Don’t say that,” Sue said. “Of course it’s not your fault. It’s no one’s fault. Things happen.”
That night, Ellen lay in her bed in the dark, unable to fall asleep. She’d tried to read the mystery novel on her bedside table, but couldn’t concentrate. She also couldn’t get interested in anything on her son’s old television. So she lay in bed thinking about the past two weeks. Every day had been the same: She’d have coffee and toast in the morning, teach a few hours of painting at the university, and come home and load the previous night’s dinner dishes into the dishwasher after taking out the clean dishes from the night before that. Then she’d cook one of the twenty or so meals that had become a staple of her dinner menus. Then she’d eat, usually alone but occasionally with Paul. Soak the dishes in the sink. Take a shower. Watch a little home and garden television. Read a little mystery. Go to sleep, only to begin again the next day. What was the point of it all?
She thought maybe if her kids ever gave her grandchildren, purpose might be restored to her life, but this interim period between raising her own and waiting for grandkids was making her restless and insecure about her existence. Wasn’t she meant for something more than this?
Her tears became sobs as she felt more alone in the universe than she’d ever felt in her whole life. Her children were gone, her father was dead, her mother had never really been there in the first place, her brother was in fucking Kentucky, and her husband was estranged from her under the same roof.
She had her friends, she reminded herself. And they shouldn’t give up on this adventure. Maybe they could look at other properties…
The moment she allowed herself to consider that possibility, her stomach filled with bile, and she rushed from the room to the bathroom, where she was sick. She chastised herself for becoming so emotionally attached to this house—but there it was. She loved this house, and she loved the women who’d been victimized in it, and she wanted to be a part of its restoration—of their resurrection. She didn’t want the women who had lived there to be invisible to human history.
Then an idea hit her: could she become involved with the Conservation Society? Could she help them to restore the house?
She cleaned her face and hands and went to the front room to her laptop to research the San Antonio Conservation Society. After clicking through several pages, she clicked on the most recent newsletter and was surprised to see an article written the day before by the society’s president, entitled: “Our New Fourth Vice President Spearheads the Acquisition of the Historic Gold House.” The article read:
The second time’s a charm. The San Antonio Conservation Society attempted to purchase the historic Gold House on Alta Vista over a decade ago but was unsuccessful due to a claim of ownership that hadn’t yet been settled by the courts. That claim was denied two years later, but by then the society had moved on to other projects.
Led by our new fourth vice-president, Mitchell Clark, the historic home has been successfully acquired by the society. While the society has no immediate use for the property, someone else has a vision for it: the San Antonio Zoo is interested in turning the grounds behind the house, which butte up to a greenbelt and dry creek bed, into a petting zoo with the goal of educating elementary-aged students about animals native to Texas. Although improvements to the structure may not happen anytime soon, the society will retain rights to the easement to protect the historical character of the façade. Negotiations with the San Antonio Zoological Society are underway.
Ellen gawked at the glowing screen of her laptop. How could this be? As much as she loved animals and educating children about them, the Gold House was not the place for that. What about its unique history? What about the lives of the women who had suffered through that history? A petting zoo would annihilate everything that old house had to say about human rights and female equality. Ellen had to do something to stop this plan from moving forward.
Although it was almost midnight, she called Sue.
“Did I wake you?” Ellen asked.
“I hadn’t yet drifted off. What’s up?”
Ellen told her what she’d learned.
“Oh my God,” Sue said. “We can’t let them do that.”
“I agree. What should we do?”
“I guess we can start by emailing the president of the Conservation Society. Do you want to do it, or should I?”
“I’ll do it. I can’t sleep anyway.”
“Neither can I.”
“I want this house, Sue.”
“Maybe we can convince the society to let us buy it from them,” Sue offered.
“We won’t be able to get it for the same good deal, though.”
“Well, let’s not assume the worst just yet. Okay?”
“Okay.”
Then, as they were about to hang up, Sue said, “Wait a minute. Mitchell Clark. The new fourth vice-president. Why does that name ring a bell?”
Ellen searched her memory. It sounded familiar to her, too. “I don’t know.”
“The gold digger,” Sue said. “Millie Forrester mentioned him to us. He’s the neighbor who believes in the old legend.”
Ellen gasped. “Oh my God, you’re right.”
“I bet he got wind from the Forresters that we were going to buy the property,” Sue said.
“Are you suggesting he had the Conservation Society step in to prevent us from making the purchase?”
“I don’t know, but this can’t be a coincidence. That man must be up to something. Don’t you think?”
Ellen’s mind spun. Could Mitchell Clark have anything to do with the girl who might or might not be a ghost?
“We can’t let this go,” Sue said. “Okay?”
“I’m with you, there,” Ellen said. “There’s no way I’m giving up on this house now.”
The next day—a Saturday—Sue drove Ellen across town to the King William district to pay a visit to the Forresters, hoping they would be willing to chat about the recent acquisition of the Gold House by the San Antonio Conservation Society. They had invited Tanya, but she had no desire to be in the presence of Bud Forrester. As Sue pulled up to the curb, Ellen glanced at the Greek revival next door, biting her tongue in an effort to keep the stupid tears from coming again.
Bud answered the door. He didn’t look surprised to see them.
“I bet I know why you’re here,” he said. “Come on in and have a seat. I’ll go get Millie.”
“Thank you.” Ellen was surprised by how welcoming Bud was. For someone who’d initially given her the creeps, he was downright charming.
While they waited, Sue whispered, “I wish we could have called. I feel bad surprising them like this.”
“Me, too, but this is urgent.”
“To us, it is. Maybe not to them.”
“To them, too. Do you think they want a petting zoo right next door to them?”
“I guess not.”
“If we can get their support, we might be able to convince the Conservation Society to sell to us instead of the zoo.”
“I hope so,” Sue said. “I really do.”
The two of them sat there, whispering and fretting, for over twenty minutes before Millie finally appeared around the corner in her chair, being pushed by Bud. Ellen was startled by the strong odor that accompanied her, which a mask of perfume only made worse. Millie’s face, too, looked washed out, and her hair was oily beneath a colorful scarf.
Ellen tried not to judge. She imagined it must be hard on Bud to bathe Millie regularly, not to mention Millie’s mother. Maybe Millie wasn’t comfortable hiring strangers, leaving him with all the hard work. And she imagined it must be no easy feat to lift her from her chair into a shower or tub and back into the chair. Maybe it was impossible, she thought as she tried to picture it. Maybe he gave her sponge baths and washed her hair at the sink.
“We’re so sorry to barge in on you like this,” Sue began. “But we feel this is important. Have you heard the news about the Gold House?”
> “We have,” Millie said.
“You don’t seem upset about it,” Ellen said.
“Why should we be?” Millie asked.
Sue raised her brows. “So you won’t mind having a petting zoo next door?”
“It’ll never happen.” Bud took a chair next to Millie. “Not on this street. They could get away with something like that in other parts of King William, but not on this street.”
“The Conservation Society published an article in their newsletter,” Sue said. “It sounds like it’s going to happen. Why do you think it won’t?”
“The neighbors on Alta Vista have a few political strings,” Bud said.
“This is all Mitchell Clark’s doing,” Millie added. “He wants to keep looking for his gold. When he heard about you, he lured the San Antonio Zoo in with promises he can never keep. And he used the zoo’s interest, and this and that, to get the Conservation Society behind him. He knows the residents on this street will do everything in their power to prevent the sale.”
Ellen felt the blood rush to her face. “So you think he set this up so that the house would stay vacant?”
“I’m sure of it,” Bud said. “We were just on the phone with him three days ago. He called everyone on the block and told us straight from the horse’s mouth.”
“And the other neighbors are okay with this?” Sue asked. “They would rather the house stay in ruins than see it restored to its original beauty?”
“Well, they don’t want a petting zoo,” Millie said. “But I’m not sure they wouldn’t prefer a restoration.”
“They know it’s not safe,” Bud said. “They know Mitchell likes to take his chances scouring the property for gold, but I don’t think anyone likes the idea of stirring up the ghost in that house. We all know she’s likely to come to one, or all, of our houses during the renovations, you see.”
“That’s true,” Millie said. “People are afraid of her, and this and that.”
“So far, she’s only harmed our pets,” Bud said. “But who knows what she’ll do if she’s displaced?”
“We don’t want to displace her,” Sue said.
“What do you mean?” Millie asked. “You want that horrid thing to stick around?”
“We don’t think she’s horrid,” Ellen said. “We think she needs closure. It has something to do with her mother. We want to help her. And if she wants to stay, she can stay.”
Bud’s face turned white. “Well, I guess it doesn’t matter anymore what you want. What’s done is done.”
That night, Ellen dropped off Sue and Tanya in front of the Gold House and then parked a block and a street over before walking the distance to where they were waiting for her at the back of the house. She still had the key Ronnie had loaned out to Paul, but they weren’t so sure the house hadn’t already been rekeyed. Ellen tried the back door with no luck.
“I’ll go around front, just in case it still works,” she whispered.
She jogged around the side opposite of the Forresters hoping to avoid detection. She lifted up a prayer in case anyone could hear it, and then she slipped in the key.
The door opened.
Her heart pounded as she paused on the threshold, listening for evidence of a presence. When she heard none, she went inside and closed the door behind her. She used the flashlight on her phone to light her path to the back door, where she let in her friends.
She’d been terrified to be inside the house alone and was grateful to have them join her. But even with them beside her, she found herself trembling.
“Ready?” she whispered.
They both nodded and followed her to the stairs.
The stairs groaned beneath them all the way up. When they finally reached the second floor, they heard something drop in the attic above them—like a book or a box.
“She’s up there,” Ellen whispered, still not sure whether she referred to a person or a ghost.
“Maybe we should try to talk to her again,” Sue whispered.
“But we don’t have any candles or food,” Tanya said.
“We may not need them,” Sue said. “You forget I have the gift.”
Tanya gave Ellen a look of skepticism but didn’t say anything more as they followed Sue to the base of the attic steps.
“Do you have your gun?” Ellen whispered. “Just in case?”
Sue nodded. “But it won’t do much good on something ethereal.”
“We still don’t know for certain,” Ellen said.
Tanya touched Ellen’s elbow. “You’re the only one who feels that way.”
With their phones illuminating the stairwell, they took the creaky steps up to the attic door, which was closed again. When Sue turned the knob, it was locked.
“I’ll try to speak to her through the door,” Sue whispered. Then, out loud, she said, “Friendly spirit of the past who dwells here, if you can hear me, please rap once for yes.”
They were all three trembling and sweating in the heat in the little halos of their phones, waiting nervously. Ellen felt faint.
They heard the floor boards in the attic move beneath the weight of something, and this was followed by footsteps toward the attic door.
Shit! Ellen wanted to run away, but she stood perched on the tiny step behind Sue with Tanya behind her. Tanya grabbed her arm and made her jump.
“Oh, friendly spirit of the past,” Sue said with a shaky voice. “If you can hear me, please rap once.”
On the door between them and the attic came an unmistakable knock.
Ellen’s heart raced a million miles a minute. She found it difficult to breathe.
“Thank you, friendly spirit,” Sue said quickly. “We’ve come here because we want to help you find closure. If you’re willing to talk to us, please rap once for yes and twice for no.”
Ellen nearly jumped from her shoes when the knock came at the door again.
When a second knock did not follow, Sue sighed with relief and said, “Friendly spirit, are you here because you’re looking for your mother? Please rap once for yes and twice for no.”
One very loud knock.
“And, friendly spirit, is it true that your mother’s name is Cynthia?” Sue asked. “Please rap once for yes and twice for no.”
Nothing.
Sue waited for at least thirty more seconds, which is quite a long time when you are standing in the dark in a hot attic stairwell with a possible ghost on the other side of the door. Then she said, “Oh, spirit? We want to help you find your mother. Is her name Cynthia? Please knock once for…”
The attic door began to open.
Tanya rushed to the bottom of the stairs, emitting a shrill cry.
Ellen’s feet were glued in place, grounded by fear.
Sue’s curiosity seemed greater than her fear. She didn’t budge from the top step, even though her whole body was shaking and her breathing was as fast as Ellen’s.
The white ghost cat rushed down the steps. Tanya screamed again as it flew past her.
Ellen, who had followed the cat with her eyes, turned back to the attic door to find the ghost girl standing before them. Half in darkness and half in the light of their phones, the girl’s white hair and white eyes shone like the moon.
“Help me,” the girl said in a voice as shaky as Sue’s. “Please help me find my mother.”
Tanya tip-toed back up the steps toward them. None of them knew quite what to do next. It seemed the cat had got Sue’s tongue. They were all three in awe of the ghost before them.
Ellen cleared her dry, tight throat. “We promise…We’ll do everything in our power. First we need to take some pictures of the antique medical equipment up there, so we can stop this place from being turned into a zoo.”
Ellen wasn’t sure what to expect once she’d finished her speech, but the girl did the last thing Ellen would have guessed: the girl screamed a blood-curdling cry and slipped past them in the narrow stairwell, down the attic stairs. It was too dark to tell, but it was as if she wen
t through Sue. They heard her go to the first floor and out the back door, screaming the entire way.
Tanya shook Ellen from her shock by saying, “Hurry! Let’s get this over with before she comes back!”
They entered the attic and, using the flash on their phones, snapped as many photos as they could in the darkness.
Ellen stumbled when her foot hit something near the one empty bed—possibly the thing that had been dropped on the floor when Ellen and her friends had been on the story below. She shined the light of her phone on the floor and discovered a dusty shoebox without a lid.
“I hope it isn’t more dead rats,” Sue said as she moved beside Ellen.
With trembling hands, Ellen reached down and scooped up the box. She held her phone light up to it and gasped.
“Oh my God,” she said. “Photographs. At least fifty, maybe more.”
They were mostly black and white portraits of women—none of them smiling.
Tanya looked over Ellen’s shoulder. “Do you think those are of the patients?”
“I think so,” Ellen said.
“Let’s take them,” Sue said. “I can scan them and include them in our letter.”
Their conversation was interrupted by the sound of the back door slamming shut followed by heavy footsteps—too heavy for the ghost girl.
“What the hell’s going on up there?” a man’s voice carried up from the first floor.
“That’s not Bud, is it?” Tanya whispered.
Ellen shook her head.
“I swear, I’m gonna burn this place down,” the man called out again.
“What do we do?” Sue asked.
“Hide,” Ellen said. “He wouldn’t dare smoke us out.”
“Don’t move,” Sue whispered. “There’s no way we won’t be heard creaking around on the floorboards. We should stay right where we are.”
Once again, the angry man’s voice came up to them from the first floor. “I’m getting too fucking old for this, sweetheart! I’ve got my grandbabies over, and now you have them wanting to sleep in my bed. You need to cool your jets, or I swear I’ll burn this place down!”