Echoes

by Ellen Datlow

  The clearing was just as it had been, the same white clouds scudding overhead. It could almost have been that same day, as if it was always summer here, always July.

  The hole in the ground was there, too. It hadn’t been filled in or fenced over or sealed. It looked cold, the grey stones more than ever like teeth. Hungry, I thought, and pushed the thought away. It was only a short passage—the creep—and then I’d be in the chamber. I could take the things from my backpack: a candle from the cupboard under the sink, and a box of matches. I was going to light the candle for Sophia, to let her know that, after all, we were family.

  Some call them holts, I remembered, or fuggy holes, or vows. Well, this would be my vow to Sophia: to remember her as she would have wanted me to.

  I knelt and looked into the entrance. There was a steady movement of air, so slight it was like cold breath on my cheek, and then I couldn’t feel it anymore. I shuddered. I could only see a short way in, an arched passageway lined by more of those stones, then blackness. My breathing sounded as unsteady as it felt, but I couldn’t wait or my courage would fail. I’d become that same person again, the one she’d turned her back on. I had to show her—and maybe myself—that I could be different.

  I grabbed my mobile phone from my jeans pocket and switched on its torch, the thin beam vanishing in the daylight. Then I ducked into the tunnel and started to crawl.

  I realised at once the torch wasn’t going to be much use. The roof was lower than I’d even expected, and when I raised my head I felt stone brushing against my hair. I bowed lower, seeing only dry-packed earth, hard as rock against my hands. The air in here was a constant cold, scraping the back of my throat, chilling my skin. There was a smell, too, one I didn’t like to think about: a smell like old bones, grave dirt, and time. I wondered when Lucy last came here. It felt abandoned, as if no one had been here in centuries. She’d probably lied about the chamber. There was no magical glow; there was nothing fairylike about it.

  I forced myself to take another deep breath. Still, I couldn’t help thinking of the weight of earth over my head, nothing but the arrangement of old stones pressing against one another to stop it all coming down.

  I shuffled forward, hitting my head on a lower stone that jutted from the roof. The pain was sharp, and I rubbed it then held my hand before my face, trying to see if there was blood. But it would be worth it, wouldn’t it? Soon I’d be through. I’d spill from the mouth of the tunnel and I might even laugh, never mind if I was alone.

  I twisted to see the passageway ahead, shining the light from my mobile into it. The centre of the tunnel was dark, nothing to catch its beam; I only saw fragments of stone, one hanging lower where the roof bulged downward. What had Lucy said?

  There’s no mortar holding the stones together. There’s one bit—the roof comes down. You have to wriggle.

  It was nothing unexpected. Sophia had done this and so would I. I’d be back at the cottage within the hour, and this time I’d put the picture away somewhere and she wouldn’t bring it back. It would stay where I placed it, because I’d laid her to rest; because, if she could see what I was doing, she’d be happy.

  Cold air gasped into my lungs and I pushed aside the panic clouding the edges of my vision. I imagined the darkness creeping into me with each breath . . . No.

  I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold the torch any longer, not until I was through the squeeze, and anyway, it wasn’t doing any good. I slipped it into my pocket. Then I lowered myself fully to the earth, feeling it dry and gritty against my arms, hard against my chest. I wriggled as they must have, pushing with my toes, pulling with my forearms, my hands finding the way. I imagined the low stone hanging above me, ducked under where I thought it was, and felt colder air like fingers brushing my scalp. Was that the chamber? The passage hadn’t been so very long after all, just like she’d said. Then I felt pressure against my spine as my backpack pressed downward.

  I froze. Why hadn’t I taken it off? But I’d rushed at this, not stopping to think. I’d almost forgotten about the pack anyway, since it weighed almost nothing. And yet, now, it felt heavier—heavy and unwieldy.

  Breathe. It wouldn’t help me to panic. An image rose before me of the extra handle jutting from the top of my backpack, designed for carrying it in one hand. It might have snagged on something. Another wriggle would free it. I could even remove the pack here—I tried twisting an arm behind me and the pressure on my back increased, my elbow connecting painfully with the wall of the passage. I decided I’d take it off once I was in the chamber. It wasn’t far, after all, and the way out would be easier, the centre of the tunnel shining white instead of dark.

  I pressed myself into the ground, shuffled an inch or two backwards, and the straps around my arms tightened.

  I let out a little sound, one I was glad no one else could hear, my breaths coming too loud and too fast. Forget Sophia, forget everything; she wouldn’t have done this for me—would she?

  But she would have. She’d have done it because she wasn’t scared, wasn’t stupid, wasn’t like a—like a mouse, scurrying through a tunnel.

  Slowly, I realised that the sound of breathing wasn’t just my own. It was coming from the darkness itself, as if this whole place was alive. . . . But of course, it wasn’t. It was only my breath echoing all around me, along the passage, distorted by the old stones.

  I scratched at the earth and tried to pull myself along and couldn’t move. There was no give in the straps holding me in place. There was no light, none at all. I closed my eyes and opened them as wide as I could—nothing.

  And there was no air. I gasped, my lungs straining as if there wasn’t enough to fill them; it felt as if there never would be again. There was only the cold dark, and I was a fool—what had I been thinking? I had to get out.

  I shuffled backwards once more and the straps around my arms tightened again, compressing my chest. I wriggled as hard as I could. Grainy light burst around me and I realised my eyes were closed; when I opened them, the dark remained. I couldn’t reach my mobile phone to get any light. An image: the strap of my backpack caught on a loose stone. The arch was held in place by the way those stones were arranged, each one doing their part, bearing its share of the load. What would happen if one of them fell?

  I took deep breaths. When I moved forwards again, it would be all right. Anything else just wasn’t possible. A few hours ago I’d paddled in the pure, clear sea. I’d squinted against the sun shining on white sand, and wished it wasn’t so bright.

  I wished it was bright now. I wished I was there—but soon, I would be. Tomorrow I would run in mad circles in the water, splashing it high, and Mum would laugh at me, not knowing the reason why.

  And the thought came to me that no one knew where I was.

  I pictured all the distance between us, the clearing, the trees, the lane. They wouldn’t hear me, no matter how loud I shouted. My screams would only fill the chamber, echoing back at me, driving me mad. . . .

  I forced my thoughts in a different direction. None of it mattered. I wasn’t really stuck. In a few seconds I’d be in the chamber and I’d shrug off the backpack, as easy as it had always been. I wouldn’t even stay to light the candle before I was out of here.

  I made myself as flat as I could and tried to drag myself forwards, feeling my nails breaking against the ground, and this time something gave. I moved maybe an inch and then I was caught again and there came, as clear as daylight, the sound of glass breaking.

  I shifted my weight a little to the side, hearing another glassy chink from my back. I knew what it was. I pictured the photograph, two girls smiling into the dark, their faces obscured by the cracks in the glass holding them in. The photograph that I hadn’t kept, hadn’t packed, hadn’t wanted to see—the one she had brought to me, in case I could forget her, in case I could breathe again. I imagined its frame, square and heavy, jutting from my backpack, because she’d put it there—because she wouldn’t be laid to rest, not by me or anybody. Why
had I ever thought she would?

  Now I wasn’t sure it was a strap that had caught against the roof at all. Had that picture frame somehow wedged into a gap between the stones? If I moved, would it pry them loose?

  I twisted my head, resting one cheek in the dirt, and without volition, a memory came. It was Sports Day. Sophia had been surrounded by her friends, only coming over to me when called to pose for the camera. I remembered the way she’d been looking over at her boyfriend; and I remembered the way I had.

  No. That must be a false memory; it was the kind of thing she would do, not me, never wanting me to have anything—

  Could she actually have been jealous of me? Had she hated the way I looked at him—the way I looked at her, at her perfect skin, her golden hair, her life? Had I wanted it all so very badly?

  My mind skipped, loosened, found another memory. Later that same day, Sophia had been waiting for me behind the gym. She hadn’t smiled then. She didn’t even speak. We weren’t the July girls, not then; we never had been. I remembered the feeling of her hands clawing in my hair. I felt it as I hit the ground, the way my elbow struck off the wall, the pain flaring. The weight on my chest as she knelt on my back, the way she’d pushed my head into the earth: Stay down, bitch. Just stay down, or I swear . . .

  I’ll bury you.

  Oh, God. It was the only kind of vow she’d ever made to me. And I saw it all so clearly, here, where I could see nothing.

  Without thought, without purpose, I struggled. I couldn’t lift my head, couldn’t get my breath. But I wasn’t going to die. I would get out, because I had to; soon, I would get out.

  I felt the touch of fingers in my hair, there and then gone. I let out a sharp sob, too loud. It couldn’t be her. There was only the chamber ahead of me, and that was empty. And an answering sound came, slow and insidious: a whisper? The chamber didn’t feel empty, not any longer.

  But of course it wasn’t empty. Sophia had come to me and put the picture into my bag, hadn’t she? Something to remind me of her, if anything were needed. How could I forget? I’d spent so long thinking of nothing else but her. And now she hadn’t forgotten me. She hadn’t forgiven. My mother had been wrong: Sophia was here and she hated me. She hated me because I was jealous. She hated me because I wanted everything she had. She hated me because she was dead and I was alive but I didn’t know how to live, not really—not without her to show me how.

  But I was alive. I gasped in a breath, tasting earth and stone and time. And I tried to heave forwards and there was a dull scrape as something gave and I could move. I shot forwards but the sound was growing, a far-off rumbling getting closer and louder, and then the world came down.

  I think I screamed but I couldn’t hear it because that sound was all around me. I waited for the earth to fill my mouth but it didn’t, it was my legs and my back it took, and I waited for the pain to begin. It didn’t, not then. It was coming though, I knew, getting closer every second. For now, there was only an awful and intense pressure. I tried to move my legs, to wriggle my toes. I couldn’t feel anything at all. I tried to twist my head and couldn’t. It felt as if someone was kneeling on my neck.

  Stay down, bitch. I’ll bury you.

  I heard a sob. I think it was mine.

  I let everything go limp, tasting despair at the back of my throat. The tunnel must be blocked. No one could look into it, see me there and pull me free. And the air would be sealed out. Soon it would go stale—

  I started to shout, inarticulate sounds without words; I think I screamed. And then I felt those fingers again, running through my hair, easing it away from my face, stroking my skin, as if in comfort. It quieted me. I let out another, softer cry.

  And I realised I could see something after all. There was no light to see by and yet something was glowing, dancing before my eyes, an illusion or a trick. Still it grew brighter, and the breath caught in my throat. I could see a glow, unmistakable now, but it wasn’t moss. It was hair: gleaming, golden, lovely hair.

  Sophia did not speak. She had no need of words. She had already said everything she wanted to say. I knew why she was here. It wasn’t her who’d wanted to own everything, to take it all; it was me. And there was only one thing left to her now that I didn’t have: death. She wanted to share that with me too. There, in the dark and the cold, she had decided to be my sister, after all.

  About the O’Dells

  Pat Cadigan

  I was just a little girl when Lily O’Dell was murdered.

  This was before everyone was connected to the internet and people posted things online straight from cell phones. Infamy was harder to achieve back then, but Lily O’Dell’s murder qualified. It was the worst crime ever committed in the suburb of Saddle Hills, or at least the goriest. One night in June, Lily’s abusive husband Gideon finally did what he’d been threatening to do for the two years they’d been married, using a steak knife from the set her sister had given them as a wedding present.

  The police had already been regular visitors to the O’Dell house. Lily had pressed charges the first couple of times. Then a woman officer mentioned a restraining order and a jail term instead of probation and community service. After that, Lily always gave the cops some prefab story, like she’d fallen down the cellar stairs and hit the cement floor face-first, and when Gideon had tried to help her up, she’d been so dizzy she’d fallen again. Was she a klutz or what? Maybe she needed remedial walking-downstairs lessons, ha, ha, but not cops coming between her and her lawfully wedded husband, no way, José!

  Anywhere else, Lily O’Dell’s murder might have been predictable, but people didn’t get murdered in Saddle Hills. They didn’t leave their doors unlocked—that era was long gone—but the streets were safe, the schools were top-notch, and all the parks had the newest playground equipment and zero perverts lurking near the swings. This was the true-blue suburban American dream and the O’Dells didn’t fit in.

  For one thing, they didn’t have kids and for another, they weren’t even homeowners—they lived in one of the neighborhoods’ few rental properties. No one expected they’d last long. Sooner or later, one of them would leave the other, who would skip out on the lease. Or they’d decide to start over somewhere else and skip out together. The company that owned the place would keep their damage deposit, shampoo the carpets, and rent to people who didn’t need the police to break up their fights.

  Instead, Gideon O’Dell chased his wife around the block and through several backyards before catching her in front of our house. He stabbed her so many times, the knife broke and he was too blind with rage to notice—he just kept pounding with the handle until it slipped out of his grip. Everybody said when the cops arrived, he was crawling around looking for the blade.

  And I slept through the whole thing. At four, I slept like the dead.

  • • •

  Mr. Grafton in the house across from ours had some kind of special power attachment for his garden hose. From my bedroom window, I watched him using it on the spot where the O’Dells had played out the final scene of their marriage. It didn’t look to me like there was anything left. When the FOR SALE sign appeared on his front lawn, I figured he was tired of power spraying the road, which he’d started doing at least twice a week.

  It was more than that, as I learned from my favorite hiding place behind the living room sofa. My father told my mother and my older sister, Jean (who at thirteen enjoyed the privilege of adult conversation) that Mr. Grafton’s wife forced him to go to the doctor. Now he had medicine that was supposed to make him stop power spraying the road. He told my father he didn’t like how it made him feel. Besides, he wasn’t a nutjob. He hadn’t hallucinated the O’Dell killing, it had really happened. So it wasn’t his fault that when he looked out his window at night, he could see it again, as clearly as if it were happening right that very moment.

  My mother said Mr. Grafton was such a gentle man, he could barely bring himself to pull a weed. Jean said that explained why Mrs. G did all the gar
dening, but not why Mr. G had lost his marbles.

  I expected my parents to jump on her for that. But to my surprise my father said, “No, honey, Gideon O’Dell lost his marbles, and one of the worst things about people like him is the effect they have on everyone around them.”

  “Yeah, I bet Lily O’Dell would be the first to agree with you,” Jean said.

  That got her a scolding. My father told her what had happened to Lily O’Dell was a tragedy, not a joke; my mother said it was bad luck to disrespect the dead. Then Jean peered over the back of the sofa and found me. “Hey, what do you call a little pitcher with big ears?” she said.

  “Gale,” my parents said in unison. My father reached over, picked me up by the back of my overalls, and sat me on his lap. He started lecturing me about sneaking around and listening to private conversations. But I knew he wasn’t really mad because he did it as the Two-Hundred-Year-Old Professor with his glasses pushed far down his nose, which always made me giggle till I hurt.

  The Graftons sold their house a month later. Jean asked if we were going to move too. My father said just thinking about having to pack everything up made him want to run screaming into the street. It was supposed to be funny but none of us laughed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment. “I wasn’t thinking. Maybe without Joe Grafton power washing the street every two days, we can finally put it behind us.”

  “Stains like that don’t wash out so easily,” my mother said.

  • • •

  My parents split up the summer I turned fourteen. I was surprised although I shouldn’t have been. Watching them grow apart hadn’t been much fun, and I’d had to do it alone. Jean went through high school in such a whirlwind of activities, she was never home even before she left for college.

  I knew something was wrong but I thought they’d fix it; they fixed everything else. My parents were good people. We’d never had the police at our house, nor would my father ever chase my mother through the street with a steak knife. If there was a problem, they’d solve it.