The House That Wasn't There

by Elana K. Arnold

  Another voice, sounding as desperate as she felt, yelling, “Fern!”

  She didn’t have time to wonder what that was about. Her kitten was out here somewhere, alone, soaking wet, scared. And it was her fault.

  “Walnut!” she called again, pushing into the wind—it was almost as if the wind’s hands were on her shoulders, trying to push her back, but she leaned even farther forward, she insisted her way toward the tree stump, where she had seen the flash of orange.

  Nearer now, the other voice called, “Fern!”

  And then it was nearly upon her—“Fern!” There was Alder, under the large canopy of a black umbrella, pushing forward, as she was, to the same spot in the yard. The wind cruelly pressed on the umbrella’s fabric, folding it inward. Alder was using it like a shield, holding it in front of himself as he pushed forward, and Oak could tell that he didn’t see her there in front of him.

  “Hey!” she called before he could jab her with the umbrella’s sharp spike. He stopped abruptly, and his sudden shift allowed the wind to catch underneath the umbrella’s canopy, flipping it inside out to reveal its silver skeleton beneath.

  It would have been funny except that just then, three things happened: first, both Oak and Alder saw the same dash of orange movement—“My kitten!” they both called. Second, Oak remembered with an icy shock of fear that one should never carry anything metal during a storm, and she moved to knock the umbrella from Alder’s hand. And third, a ragged flash of lighting tore across the sky.

  And then, there was nothing.

  Chapter 11

  When Alder opened his eyes, it was to find that he and Oak were no longer outside in the rain. They were inside, somewhere, and staring at a front door.

  It wasn’t Alder’s front door; it wasn’t Oak’s, either. But it could have been, almost. This door had the same three skinny rectangular panes of glass set along the top of the door, just as did Oak’s, just as did Alder’s. The knob was a silver orb, just like Oak’s, just like Alder’s. But unlike Oak’s front door, which was painted orange, and unlike Alder’s door, which was painted green, this door was not painted at all. Natural wood grains swirled across its surface in burls and whirls and knots. And they seemed almost to shimmer.

  Alder looked away from the door and over at Oak, who turned to him with eyes round as records.

  “Are we in your house?” Alder whispered.

  Oak shook her head. “Are we in yours?”

  Alder didn’t bother pointing out that if they had been in his house, he wouldn’t have asked Oak if they were in hers. He just shook his head.

  Then he heard a sound—a movement—coming from behind them.

  Alder turned to see that the house in which they found themselves was laid out identically to his—a short entry hall that branched, to the left, into a smallish family room and led, to the right, to another hallway which, he assumed, would lead to three small bedrooms. The sound had come from the left—the family room.

  Lightning lit up the hallway for a quick second, like the flash of a camera, and then came an ominous rumble of thunder.

  Alder and Oak looked at one another. Without a word, they turned back to the door, reaching in unison for the knob, anxious to get out of . . . wherever they were. But before they reached it, they heard another sound that froze them in their tracks.

  Meow.

  “Fern,” said Alder.

  “Walnut,” said Oak.

  And they turned together back down the hallway, leaving the door behind them.

  In the living room, the only light came from the fireplace, cheerfully crackling. Orange flames licked the logs, and just as Oak and Alder crossed the threshold, a log popped and sent a spark zigzagging upward into the chimney.

  There was a shelf crowded full of odd little knickknacks, a table set for tea, a fringed antique rug with a fading, complicated pattern of vines and flowers. A low-backed couch and an overstuffed chair, angled toward the fireplace.

  Someone was sitting in the chair; Oak and Alder could only see the top of the person’s head, the messy tuft of brownish-grayish hair.

  Whoever sat in the chair was no taller than a child. Oak and Alder could see legs, too short to reach the floor, and swinging feet, wearing shining brown leather boots.

  Then, they heard it again—Meow.

  Emboldened, Alder stepped forward.

  Beside him, Oak cleared her throat and said, “Excuse me. I wonder—is that my kitten?”

  “Your kitten?” Alder nearly forgot for the moment that they were in a stranger’s house, that they had no idea how they had gotten there. “If it’s anyone’s kitten, it’s my kitten.”

  “There, there, children.” came a voice from the chair. It was a male voice, but rather high-pitched, and it was not a voice either Alder or Oak had ever heard before. “No need to argue,” the voice continued, and then the feet stretched toward the floor, and the owner of the feet and the voice plopped out of the chair. “We’ll sort everything out,” he said. “After all, there is more than one way to skin a cat.”

  A noise came out of Alder—kind of a squeak—and beside him, Oak cleared her throat uncomfortably.

  And then the odd little figure stepped away from the chair and toward Alder and Oak, who still stood in the room’s open doorway. As he scuttled toward them, Alder reached out and clutched Oak’s arm. She put her hand on top of his.

  The boots caught and reflected the flames as if they’d recently been shined. Above the boots were woolen socks—tall ones—and then short pants—not shorts, exactly, for they fell below the knee and had buttons there, cinching them close. Above the short pants was a waistcoat and a watch chain that disappeared into a small pocket, presumably where a watch was resting.

  And there was an orange kitten cradled in two hands—strange, tiny, pink hands—and then there was the face. Hair all over, white in the center, fading out to grayish brown, and a long, pointed snout, with a burst of bristly white whiskers on either side. Jewel-black eyes—shiny—and when the creature smiled, two uneven rows of pointed ivory teeth grinned out.

  Alder felt his mouth flopping open and shut like a fish’s.

  “Hello,” said the creature. “I’m Mort. I’ve been waiting for you.”

  It couldn’t be Mort, thought Alder.

  Except, of course, it was—Mort, the taxidermied opossum from his bookshelf at home, but now here, the size of a six-year-old child, fully dressed, and clutching, Alder was certain, his kitten, Fern.

  That was the most important part of this situation, he decided with a clarity that surprised him. He had to get Fern safely away, and then, later, he could try to work out what exactly all of this meant.

  But then Oak stepped forward. “Walnut!” she said. “You have my kitten—what are you doing to my kitten?”

  “Your kitten?” said Alder. “That’s Fern!”

  “I don’t know who Fern is,” said Oak, and she stomped her foot, sounding angry. “All I know is that . . . thing has my Walnut. Give him back. At once!”

  Mort began to hop a little, foot to foot, nervously. “Well, well,” he said, and his boots made clippity-cloppity sounds on the wood floor, like a pony might. “Well, well.” He seemed, Alder thought, as if he were a little bit afraid of them.

  And then the creature backed up to set the kitten down on the chair—gently, Alder noticed—before suddenly, freakishly, curling his black-tinged lips back into an awful grin and freezing in place, his eyes shining like marbles.

  Meow, said the kitten, and it hopped down from the chair and began sniffing the boots of the completely unmoving opossum.

  “What is happening?” Oak asked. She was trembling all over; her hands were shaking, her teeth chattering. It was fear.

  “I think . . . ,” said Alder, and he stepped slowly forward, toward the frozen figure, “I think . . . he’s playing possum.”

  It was impossible that this figure was actually Mort, the harmless taxidermied opossum that had stood, all of Alder’s life
, on the bookshelf in the front room of his home. But, impossible or not, it seemed that, indeed, this Mort was somehow a version of his very own Mort.

  And perhaps it was because of his lifetime affection for the smaller Mort, or perhaps it was because his father had given Mort to his mother as a gift many years ago . . . whatever the reason, Alder found that he did not feel afraid anymore, but rather almost overwhelmed by a desire to help this creature who, he was certain, needed him.

  “It’s okay,” Alder said, taking slow and careful steps away from the doorway and toward the dummy-still Mort. “We aren’t going to hurt you,” he soothed, and his voice was gentle like his mother’s sometimes was, the voice he used with his kitten back at home.

  The kitten—Alder’s eyes flitted away from Mort and down to the orange cat still sniffing the polished boots. It did look quite a bit like his Fern, but, Alder realized, this kitten was bigger than Fern, rounder of belly and wider of face.

  “Walnut,” said Oak behind him, and the kitten turned and pranced, purred and wound himself between Oak’s legs until she scooped him up.

  Fern was still missing, and whether she was here or back in his yard or someplace else entirely, Alder did not know. He would find her, Alder promised, but first, he had to help Mort.

  “It’s okay,” said Alder again, and he reached out a hand, hesitating a moment before resting it gently on the opossum’s wrist, which stuck out past the sleeve of his jacket, the fur there looking so vulnerably exposed. The fur was soft, just like Mort’s fur back home, but there was warmth underneath—the pulse of life. Alder could feel the rapid fluttering of Mort’s pulse just beneath his pelt.

  Then there was another noise—Mew—and this time it was Alder’s kitten who emerged, as if nothing was unusual at all, from Mort’s kitchen.

  Alder bent to pick up Fern, and he held her soft, warm body close to his chest and kissed her sweet little head. She began to purr, a loud and friendly rumble that seemed much too large for her body.

  “Ah,” said Mort, whose arms dropped to his sides. He shook his head as if to clear it. “Sorry about that. Old habits die hard.”

  Chapter 12

  Mort offered to heat up some cider, but both Alder and Oak refused politely.

  “Cider gives me a stomachache,” said Oak. In truth, she was simply a bit nervous about accepting a hot drink from a four-foot opossum she’d only just met, but Mort looked so saddened by her pronouncement that Oak felt immediately sorry for having lied. Which was such a weird way to feel—sorry? In a situation like this? Where the whole world seemed to be make-believe—like a dream or a hallucination?

  Maybe she was hallucinating, Oak thought. Maybe she was in a coma or something, because of the lightning.

  But until she figured out what was going on, or until she woke up, she might as well see how this played out.

  So, when the weird opossum creature gestured for her to take a seat, Oak slid into a spot on the low-backed couch, her kitten sleeping like a warm little nut on her lap. She was glad when Alder sat next to her, so close that their legs nearly touched. In his lap was a kitten who looked so much like Walnut that there was only one explanation. This, at least, was a thing that she could make sense of.

  “We adopted siblings,” she said. “You named yours Fern?”

  Alder nodded. “I named her after our plant. Yours is Walnut?”

  “I named her after the tree,” said Oak, and Alder nodded again. Oak didn’t have to explain which tree she meant.

  “That’s pretty weird,” said Alder, but, Oak thought, compared to the company in which they currently found themselves, the kitten coincidence was not nearly as strange as it otherwise might have seemed.

  Mort had moved his chair so that its back was to the fire, and he’d added another log so that the fire crackled merrily, and then he hopped up into his seat, scooting his rump comfortably back, settling himself into place as if he’d done it a thousand times. “Now,” he said with a smile, and Oak really wished that his teeth weren’t quite so sharp, “Alder, why don’t you do the introductions?”

  Alder knew this thing? Oak hadn’t thought she could be any more surprised, but here she was.

  “Wait,” she began, “you . . . know each other?”

  Alder cleared his throat. “Well,” he said, “in a way. Um, Mort, you’ve already met Fern and Walnut, I guess, and this is Oak. She’s my new neighbor. They just moved in next door. Oak, this is . . . Mort.”

  “I’m pleased to make your acquaintance,” said Mort, and his voice was stiffly formal, as if he were happy to have a chance to break out his fancy vocabulary.

  “Likewise,” said Oak, though she wasn’t exactly pleased to make his acquaintance. Still, she had manners, and her mom would probably be proud that she remembered them, even in this bizarre situation. Politely, Oak asked, “So, where exactly are we?”

  “On a couch, in my front room,” said Mort. Oak wished that his smile wasn’t so terrifying.

  “But . . . where is your couch? Where is your front room?” asked Alder.

  Now Oak was even more confused. Alder knew this creature, but he didn’t know where they were? She was starting to get a headache from all her questions.

  “Ah,” said Mort, and Oak leaned forward. Mort seemed like he was getting ready to explain everything, which would be such a relief. But before he said another word, his attention was taken by something he seemed to see outside, for he hopped down from his chair and scurried over to the front window to peer outside. “The storm is almost over,” he mused. He turned back to face them. His whiskers bristled forward, vibrating. “Children,” he said, “you’ve recovered your kittens, and it’s time for you to go.”

  And he gestured with his tiny pink hands for them to get up, which they did, and he ushered them to the front door.

  Oak protested, “But—”

  “It’s been lovely,” Mort interrupted, reaching for the silver doorknob and turning it.

  “Thank you for the hospitality,” said Alder.

  He sounded relieved to be leaving, but Oak wasn’t in quite such a hurry to be rushed off. She had questions. Lots of them.

  “Wait a minute,” she said, but Mort the opossum scooted them both out of his house, onto the front porch. And then he made a formal little bow, so stiff and old-fashioned that it would have been funny if the whole thing hadn’t been so impossible.

  “Goodbye,” said Mort. He shut the door firmly, and Oak heard it click into place, and then he was gone.

  Chapter 13

  One moment, they were being ushered out an open door; the next, Alder heard the click of the door closing.

  But when he turned to look over his shoulder, there was no door.

  There was no house.

  Alder was standing on the stump where the tree had once been; Fern was curled in his arms, and beside him, Oak cradled Walnut and looked around, her expression as bewildered as Alder felt.

  The storm had passed. Silver-gray clouds populated the sky, but they did not menace or threaten; they drifted apart, like guests at the end of a party. The air felt damp and electric. There across the lawn, pushed up against the flower bed beneath his front room window, was the broken, twisted shape of his umbrella.

  Alder shivered.

  “I’ve got to go,” said Oak, and she stumbled away from him toward her house.

  “Wait!” Alder called after her, but Oak shook her head and didn’t turn back. He watched as she pushed open her front door and disappeared inside.

  In his arms, Fern stretched her legs and squirmed as though she wanted down.

  “Oh no, you don’t,” Alder said, and he headed back toward home with one last look behind him, at where the house had been.

  Inside, things were so normal that it seemed impossible that he could have just experienced what he had indeed experienced.

  Alder closed his front door and kicked off his shoes. Fern tucked under his arm, he went into his bedroom, where he found a puddle under the windo
w and the screen knocked loose from its attachment. Setting Fern on the bed, Alder rehooked the screen and then shut the window firmly. Fern settled onto his pillow and began nonchalantly cleaning her tail, as if nothing peculiar had happened at all.

  He was soaking wet, Alder realized suddenly, and very cold. He needed to get out of his wet clothes, but first there was something he had to check. He padded in his socks to the front room and over to the bookcase. There, just as he should be, was Mort—on all fours, opossum size, attached to his wooden base.

  When he heard the doorknob twist behind him, Alder whirled around, preparing to see the other Mort burst into his house. But it was just Mom, arms full of grocery bags. She shut the door and shook her head like a wet dog, spraying water droplets.

  “Looks like the storm got you, too,” she said to Alder, smiling. “That was a big one, wasn’t it?”

  Alder opened his mouth, but nothing came out. How could he possibly explain what he had just experienced? As the minutes ticked by, he was rapidly beginning to doubt that any of it—the strange house, the crackling fireplace, the oversize Mort—had actually happened at all.

  “You look soaked to the skin,” Mom said. She kicked off her shoes and made her way to the kitchen, putting the grocery bags on the counter. “Why don’t you go take a nice hot bath, and I’ll get dinner started.”

  Alder didn’t answer. He just nodded and headed toward the bathroom. A bath. That sounded nice.

  Alder filled the bathtub with water as hot as he could stand. He had to climb in slowly, inch by inch, acclimating himself to the warmth. At last, he sighed and immersed himself, dipping even his head into the water, and his ears, just his face above the surface.

  It was quiet like that, and peaceful—him floating, loose-limbed, ears plugged by water. It felt safe.

  And Alder found that he didn’t quite want to think about what had happened, or hadn’t happened, where he might have been, or where he might not have been. It was much more likely, he was coming to believe, that none of it had happened at all. That he had simply experienced a hallucination, or maybe just a dream.