“He isn’t fooling anyone with that charisma of his. He’s a masochist! And so what if he likes cryptic, old poets? That just shows that he thinks medievally like them! Did you know that Chaucer used to beat his wife? It’s all there, written in ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’,” her mother had said to her, but she had been too infatuated to pay them due heed. She did the exact opposite of what they told her and moved into his apartment with him. But after the birth of their child, everything changed.
The beating and the verbal abuse continued for three more years. Emma took to wearing full-sleeves and sunglasses at times when he’d hit her in the face. Whatever ailed Ben Fowler to cause him to drown his sorrows in alcohol, she did not know. But she did not want her daughter to grow up without a father, and despite their love life ending, the couple continued to live together for the sake of Kylie.
She had had enough when, last month, he’d come home at three in the morning. Normally Emma was asleep at that time, but Kylie’s chest had been acting up and the poor kid had been coughing and wheezing. Emma was nebulizing Kylie when Ben barged in, in a drunken stupor, and demanded, “Where’s my dinner?” his voice was slurred and the whiskey on his breath and the stench of him was evident from across the room,
“What dinner? You ate at nine!” she said as she packed away the nebulizer and held her daughter to her chest to comfort her. Her back was turned to Ben so she did not see him raging at her with his extended fist, which he landed on the small of her back, causing her to tip over and fall. Thankfully, the bed was right in front of her, so Kylie was unharmed, but she started crying from the forceful jolting.
Before Emma could cry out in pain, he hit her again. This time in the face with his fist! She fell to the ground, where he kicked her in the chest. She began to cry, curled up in a foetal position, waiting for the beating to subside. But it didn’t. He kept screaming about his dinner not being ready, which was odd since he always had his dinner at nine. Not one minute before, not one minute after. Amidst the rain of blows Emma realized that he had reached a new level of inebriation, where he’d forgotten having had dinner, and was now hitting her hard enough to kill her.
Badly bruised, sobbing and hurting all over, Emma grabbed Kylie, who was still crying more profusely than before, and ran for the door. If Ben hadn’t slipped on the carpet and fallen, he would have chased her all the way. But thank God for little blessings.
She drove to her parent’s house in the suburbs of Chiswick, in the rain and dark, and woke them with her knocking, at four in the morning.
“I’m sorry,” she said, badly beaten up and barely able to stand, with a child in her arms. They took her inside immediately, consoled her, gave her coffee and put the child to bed.
The very next day her father, a lawyer, secured a restraining order restricting Ben Fowler to a distance of more than five hundred foot from Emma and the child. He returned home with the order, gave it to his daughter and said, “that’s the last of him you’ve seen. I don’t want to say ‘I told you so’ but your mother and I kind of did, didn’t we?”
“I’m done making bad decisions,” she said.
Half a month later, she secured a job as a secretary at Sullivan & White, a law firm where her best friend from school, Jennifer, worked as a paralegal. The offices of Sullivan & White were near the University of Westminster and her parents’ house in Chiswick. She’d been staying at their house for about two weeks and, even though they loved her, it was less than ideal for a twenty-four-year-old woman with a child to be living with her parents.
“I think I’d like to buy my own place now,” she said one day after returning from work. She had accumulated ample savings and, together with her decent earnings as a secretary at the law firm she was well equipped to get an apartment or a small house with a reasonable mortgage.
“You know, you should call the estate agent tomorrow to discuss your budget and feasibilities” her father said from behind the newspaper.
So that’s what she did. She learnt then of the house in the exurbia of Chiswick, not far from her parents’ house, that was selling at such a low price it almost seemed too good to be true.
“I think I can buy it in one payment. Wouldn’t even have to worry about the lease,” she said to Jennifer on the phone, as she drove down to Shadow Creek House.
It was love at first sight. Besides the agent’s ugly Subaru standing in front of the house, everything supported Emma’s compulsion to buy it. Aloof? Check. Green? Check. Cheap? Check. Close to her office and to her university? Double Check. Serene surrounding? Check. She bought it on the spot, not asking about the low price, or the previous tenants’ reasons for hastily abandoning the house ten years before.
“Oh, the last owners, they left the house fully furnished, as well as all their possessions. You’re going to have to get that out on your own. Hope you’re fine with that,” the agent, a chubby and friendly woman named Sasha, smiled at her. She was about to tell Emma, but there had been a long-standing bet about the Shadow Creek House back at the real estate office. After ten years on their books, Sasha was the one who finally sold it. Guess who was going to get the thousand pounds and a hefty commission?
*****
Emma made herself at home that day while Kylie slept peacefully on the sofa. This didn’t bother Emma. Kylie was an energetic kid, brimming with imagination and inherently friendly, with an attitude that attracted adoration. She had tired herself playing on the porch with the porcelain dolls she’d found lying around in the house. Emma smiled at her, knowing she’d sleep for another two hours or so.
Birds chirped outside the living room window, from the oak tree and, even though the day was sunny, the canopy of trees kept most of the light at bay save for a sliver or two that crept in through the windows.
Perhaps I’ll call Jennifer and have her help me unpack, Emma thought as she sat beside her sleeping daughter on the sofa and grabbed a Shirley Jackson novella from a newly opened box of books. She could live without a lot of things; love, friends, a college degree and even, at times, food. But she could not bear to spend a moment without her books. They’d seen her through harsh times, and what better way to begin a fresh start than by reading a new book? She curled up on the sofa with a cup of coffee and started reading ‘The Haunting of Hill House’. She thought she heard a faint whisper but, looking around, was relieved to see it was just Kylie shifting in her sleep. She ignored all subsequent whispered voices and absorbed herself in the book, though Kylie never made a sound.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
The House Creaked
“Crikey! What a huge house!” Jennifer Lyndon, Emma’s best and only friend said, with utmost fascination as she observed the house from the front, while Emma stood beside her. Unable to decide on what to do with the previous owner’s possessions, some being quite usable and useful, she invited her friend to a housewarming/house cleaning party. Being a Saturday afternoon, neither of them had anything better to do.
“Neat, isn’t it?” Emma asked.
“Ooh! I bet its haunted like in those supernatural spooky books you’re always reading!” Jennifer said and nudged her friend playfully in the ribs, unaware as she was of her as yet unhealed bruises. Emma winced but quickly regained her composure, and scoffed good-naturedly, “Shirley Jackson isn’t all about the supernatural, you know!”
“Right,” Jen said and rolled her eyes. She wasn’t into reading books, but if questioned she’d admit to Stephen King being her favourite author, hands down. That man knew how to raise the hair on her neck and, more often than not, his works weren’t about horror at all.
The two women went inside the house where Kylie was playing with the porcelain dolls she had been playing with yesterday. She looked at Jennifer and said, “Aunt Jenny! Come and play with me!”
“Aww sweetie, how can I say no to you?” Jennifer said and joined the three-year-old on the floor by the fireplace while Emma went to the kitchen for wine.
“Someone seemed to have
left in a hurry,” Jennifer called from the living room. She was talking about the previous tenant’s belongings scattered everywhere. “I wonder why.”
Emma came back with two glasses, a plate of cheese and the bottle of Pinot Noir her mother had given her by way of ‘congratulations on your new house’, but Jennifer knew it was more of a ‘thank God you’re finally getting out of ours!’ gesture. No matter how much you love your kid, having them lives with you in their twenties for more than a couple of weeks, becomes uncomfortable for everyone. They were happy that their daughter was back on her feet within a relatively short period. She had a job and a house and was planning a return to university to complete her bachelor’s degree.
“It’s a blessing for me, anyway,” Emma sat down alongside Jennifer. Kylie was now looking out the window and waving at someone. Emma dismissed this since the child had taken to waving at the creek because, in her words, ‘look mommy, the water’s waving!’ She sipped the wine and arched back into the helm of the sofa and said, “I got this house so cheap I still have money left in my savings account!”
“Perhaps you should get a roommate. You know, it’s sort of a big house and you’re gonna get lonely sooner or later,” Jennifer said. Emma knew what she was hinting at.
“I don’t plan on doing anything of the sort. I do intend starting work on my novel,” she said. It’s common knowledge that every English major is busy either writing a novel or searching for inspiration to start writing. This house, with its romantic view and pristine surroundings would serve as a fine catalyst to her creative juices. “That room over there,” she pointed to the bedroom to the farthest right of the house, “I plan on converting it into a writing room. The window looks out over the creek and the river Thames in the distance, and the other window looks out over the church tower. There’s nothing more poetic and writerly than that.”
“Well, I did promise to help you this entire week with moving your things and getting settled. So, sure, I’ll help you set up your writing room. But back to the roommate thingy. I’ll be blunt. When are you going to start dating again? It’s been over a month since your breakup,” Jennifer said. Her wine glass was drained and the tipsiness had loosened her tongue on a topic she’d have been too sensitive to broach while sober.
“Honestly Jen, I’ve no plans to date again. Ever. Period. You don’t know half of the shit I had to go through with you-know-who and, to be frank, I’ve exhausted my emotional barometer,” Emma said. This was getting bitter. She’d sworn never to reminiscence over her ex, and this conversation wasn’t helping.
“Maybe the next guy won’t be as bad as Voldemort, you never know,” Jennifer was persistent, encouraged by the second helping of wine.
“Enough Jen. I don’t want to talk about it,” Emma snapped impulsively.
The two women sat in silence for some time, watching Kylie press her nose against the window and say, “Come in and play! Come in and play!” This unnerved Emma a little. Could there be a person standing outside? She stood up, feeling a little dizzy, due to the wine, and joined her daughter, who was standing on a pile of old magazines, and looked out the window. There was no one there. She sighed and settled back to talked to Jennifer about everything, other than boyfriends or Emma’s past, which eliminated most of the gossipy chinwag.
After an hour, Jennifer said goodbye to Emma and promised to return early the next morning to help her in the house.
Emma returned the half full wine bottle and the untouched plate of cheese to the kitchen. She put the bottle on the shelf, and noticed that it wasn’t half full, but completely empty. She went back to the living room, thinking that it had perhaps spilled on the wooden floor, but there wasn’t a drop to be seen.
She went to bed with Kylie still wondering where the remaining wine had gone to. The gentle sound of the creek water flowing over rocks lulled Emma to sleep almost immediately, into the first dreamless slumber in many nights.
*****
Days went smoothly by as Emma gradually got the hang of her new life. She dropped Kylie at the day-care every morning at eight, to be at the law-firm at eight thirty. During the half hour in between, she got breakfast from the coffee shop. Nothing fancy, just a cappuccino and a couple of cinnamon rolls. After her rushed breakfast, she’d set up her boss’s office, arrange the papers according to importance, in ascending order, before taking her seat to take calls till four in the afternoon. During the day, she’d see to his coffee and lunch. In the short time of working there, she had grown quite fond of her boss. Not romantically, but familial, as one would grow attached to a cat or a fatherly figure. He’d taken to calling her Ems and, while not strictly appropriate, she called him ‘Boss man’ or at times, ‘Sir’.
After four, she collected her daughter from the day-care, thanked Betsie, the kindly old matron who oversaw the kids, before driving home, picking up food on the way. She waved to the neighbours before entering the exurbia, and parked her car only to find Jennifer already waiting for her.
From five thirty to eight that night, the women cleaned the house, discarding anything unnecessary left by the previous owner.
This routine repeated for two days until the house was spick and span and actually looked inhabitable. They’d left the attic untouched since they’d both assumed it would take more time and effort than it was worth.
“I cannot thank you enough. I don’t know how to repay you,” Emma said to Jennifer one night at the end of the second week. Jennifer hugged her back and said, “Let me set you up on a date and we’ll call it even. I’ll have someone to go on a double date with on date night.”
“I’m in your debt, Jen but no thanks on that front, I’m still adamant on living alone.”
The women bid each other goodbye and Emma went back into her house, eager to finally make use of the writing room she had so painstakingly created. Kylie was watching SpongeBob on the television in the living room with the porcelain dolls still in her hands. It was eight at night and darkness had already crept in, canvassing the sky in total darkness. It was a moonless night.
Emma opened the door to the writing room and went inside. She didn’t close the door behind her because she wanted to keep an ear out for Kylie. The room was elegantly done, with a shelf prominently positioned to hold her novels, which were arranged in alphabetical order. In front of the window was her desk, with the Chesterfield typewriter her father had gifted her back when she first enrolled in university. The reason behind placing the table next to the window was to enjoy a picturesque view while writing. However, right now, in the dark of night, it only served to unnerve her. It was pitch black outside and the darkness creeped her out. When she sat down to write a few random thoughts at her desk, she let out an irritated cry.
The paper she’d fed into the typewriter was filled with gibberish. Kylie couldn’t have gotten this far up, even with the chair to help her, the feat would’ve been too great.
Since there was no other explanation, Emma removed the paper, crumpled it in a ball and threw it in the dustbin. She decided she would write early in the morning before dropping Kylie at the day-care.
The house creaked. Emma knew that the house was over a hundred years old and reserved every right to creak and moan. As she regained emotional sobriety over the course of the weeks, she began to sense a certain eeriness about this place. Something volatile in the air. Although she read horror novels which wholeheartedly advocated the existence of the supernatural, Emma knew for a fact that ghosts did not exist.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Paranoia
Today was Monday, and being human, Emma was obliged to hate Mondays. It was not the fact that her boss, once he’d gotten used to her, had started dumping his work on her. He’d do that, and go golfing with the chief of police or the Defence Attorney, leaving her to take his phone calls, redirect his documents around the office, and make sure that his 4 o’ clock court session was still on. Not that it mattered to any one at the law firm. When it came down to it, Kendrick
Williams was as excellent a lawyer as the name partners of the firm. Heads turned whenever he did decide to come into office. Emma once heard that they were going to make him senior partner in the company, making the company name ‘Sullivan, White & Williams.’ No one else at the office, not even Walter Sullivan or Sylvia White, the two main partners behind the company, gave two craps about Kendrick’s wayward behaviour. At the end of the day, he won most of their cases for them and brought good repute to the firm. The rest of the time he did practically nothing, and that’s when Emma learnt that, to be able to enjoy doing nothing, you do really need to be at the top.
Emma got up early, at six in that morning, to sift through Friday’s documents which she had to arrange for her boss. Like most people, she too spent the weekend doing nothing but procrastinating, or watching the latest season of whatever was on the TV. These days it was pretty much Game of Thrones. It was now Monday morning, and she had yet to arrange these docs. With her cup of hot, black, sugarless coffee, she made her way down the steps towards her writing room, but then she thought better and decided not to violate the liberating environment of her writing room with office work. This was mundane work, all of it, but the salary was unbelievably large for a legal secretary. Given the amount she was earning, she would be able to enrol in Westminster university within a few months, and she’d have saved enough money by then to support herself and her daughter till she graduated.
She sat on the living room sofa and put the stack neatly on the table in front of her. It was then that the two porcelain dolls which Kylie always played with, caught her eyes. There was something unnerving about the dolls. Porcelain dolls are scary enough per se, without anything unnerving going on for them. These two looked like twins, with auburn hair and blue eyes. They were both dressed in antiquated looking nightgowns. Emma hadn’t bought these for Kylie, Kylie had found them in the house somewhere. Judging by the enormity of stuff left by the previous owner that Emma had dumped, they didn’t appear to be the type to be connoisseurs of porcelain dolls. The only item close to artistic which she had found amongst their belongings, was a ‘Victorian Edition’ of Pottery Barn magazine.
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