The House That Wasn't There

by Elana K. Arnold

  And Oak missed her dad more and more. Originally, the plan had been for him to move down by the end of September, but various work-related issues had delayed this, and now his move date was “up in the air.”

  Mom seemed oblivious to how much Oak missed her dad. Everything was working out just fine for her, Oak thought. She’d gotten the new job she wanted and the new house she wanted and the new upstairs bedroom she wanted. And when Oak complained one afternoon about how long it had been since she’d seen her dad, Mom just said, “Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” which was the dumbest thing Oak had ever heard.

  Rather than say something back that she might regret later, Oak just turned on her heel and went to her room, shutting the door rather loudly, with enough of a bang to wake Walnut from his slumber on her pillow. He fluffed up, his claws poked out, and he hissed.

  “Sorry, Walnut,” she sighed, and she shuffled in her socks across the room to pet him. But when her hand touched his fur, she felt a sudden jolt of static electricity, and both she and Walnut yelped with the shock of it.

  Walnut leaped down from the bed and darted under it, retreating to a far corner.

  “Oh!” said Oak, and she clambered down to the floor, lifting up the bed skirt to peer beneath. Walnut’s eyes glowed, two amber orbs. “Sorry, Nutters.” She touched the metal edge of the bed frame to make sure the static was gone and then reached way beneath the bed to scratch the kitten’s head. After a moment, he accepted her touch, began to purr, and came out from his hiding place.

  When Oak woke the next morning, her eyes were so dry that she practically had to peel them open. Walnut was asleep on her head; she scooted him gently to the side and slipped from bed, stumbling to the bathroom to splash cold water on her face. Her mouth tasted dry and sticky, so she headed to the kitchen for a glass of juice.

  Her mother was standing at the kitchen window, staring outside. Leaves whirled in the grass, and several large palm fronds were strewn around the yard too, from the tree across the street. Oak got some juice and joined her mother at the window.

  “Sleep okay?” Mom asked.

  Oak shook her head. “I had weird dreams.”

  “The Santa Anas can do that,” Mom said.

  “The Santa Anas?”

  Oak’s mom gestured at the yard. “This weather,” she said. “It gets like this here in the fall. Hot, dry, strong winds. Fire season, some people call it.” She looked away from the window, to Oak. “You can wear shorts today if you want. It’ll be hot as summer outside.”

  She was right; it was hot outside. When they left the house together—Mom to drive to the office, Oak to walk to the bus stop—Oak’s hair whipped into her eyes. Her mom laughed and said, “It’s days like this that make my haircut seem like an especially good idea!” She kissed Oak goodbye and got into her car. Oak watched her drive up the street before she turned to walk to the bus stop.

  She stood on the corner and bent down to scratch her leg. The air was so dry. Her fingernails left long white marks where she’d scratched.

  Here was Alder, coming up the block. His hair was a wild puff, blowing this way and that in the wind. He was walking slowly, his eyes scanning the street. It looked like he was saying something, but Oak couldn’t hear him over the sound of the wind in the trees.

  When he got closer, she saw that his eyes were red and puffy.

  “Alder? Are you all right?”

  “Fern is missing.” Alder’s voice cracked. “Mom had to leave early for an appointment, and she must not have closed the door all the way. Or the wind blew it open. But Fern is gone!”

  “Oh no,” said Oak. She looked up and down the streets: palm fronds and dry leaves, and parked cars, and nothing more.

  The bus would be there any second. They had to act fast. Oak grabbed Alder’s arm. “Come on,” she said.

  “Where are we going? What are doing?” said Alder.

  “We’re going to find her,” Oak said.

  Alder looked over his shoulder, up toward the corner. Oak could hear the bus’s familiar squeak as it pulled to a stop.

  “Hurry,” said Oak, and she crouched behind a parked car. Alder crouched beside her.

  They stayed perfectly still and waited. At last, the bus pulled away. Then the only sounds were the wind and their own breathing.

  “Okay,” Oak said. “Let’s go.”

  They dumped their backpacks in the front hall of Alder’s house.

  “Let’s just check again, to make sure she’s not sleeping in a closet or something.”

  “I checked everywhere,” Alder said.

  “Just in case,” said Oak, and he nodded.

  They looked in all the closets and cabinets and drawers; they even dumped out the yarn from the knitting basket. They looked behind the books on the shelves; they looked behind the curtain in the bathtub. They looked under Alder’s bed, and his mother’s. No Fern.

  Then they went outside and scoured the yards, front and back. They peered under bushes and beneath the porch steps. “Fern!” they called. “Here, kitty! Fern!”

  But even as they searched, Oak knew that Fern wasn’t there. She could feel it. The air was dry, electric, practically crackling. Walnut sat in the front window of Oak’s house and scratched at the glass like he knew what they were doing, like he wanted to help.

  At last, Oak had to admit it. “Okay,” she said. “She’s not here.”

  “I told you,” said Alder, and his voice was high-pitched with worry.

  As much as Oak had wanted to try to teleport again, this wasn’t the way she wanted it to happen. With a missing kitten and Alder on the verge of tears. From his seat in the window, Walnut yowled.

  “Maybe Fern just popped away for a little bit,” Oak suggested. “Maybe she’ll be back soon.”

  “Maybe,” Alder said. “But what if she’s stuck, wherever she teleported to? What if there’s not enough energy, like in her . . . you know . . .”

  “Henry’s pocket,” Oak said.

  “Yes!” said Alder. “Her Henry’s pocket! What if there’s not enough energy stored up for a return trip home?” His eyes were wide and wet. “I have a bad feeling, Oak.”

  Oak nodded, taking charge. “We’ll get her back,” she said. “There’s a chapter in the book about this. . . .”

  She headed for her house, and Alder followed. When she opened her front door, Walnut tried to bolt. “Oh no, you don’t,” Oak said, blocking his path with her foot and then bending to scoop him up. “One missing kitty is plenty.” After they were inside, she closed the front door firmly behind them.

  Alder went to the couch and slumped down glumly. Walnut rubbed against his leg as if to cheer him up.

  It was strange to be home like this—in the middle of the morning, when she was supposed to be at school. She’d get in trouble, probably. But she’d think about that later. First, they had to find Fern.

  Feline Teleportation was right where Oak had left it—tucked into her pillowcase. She grabbed it and went to join Alder on the couch. “Okay,” she said. And she turned to chapter 11—“CATASTROPHE! Your Teleporting Feline Is Lost. What to Do?”

  “Sometimes,” the chapter began, “in spite of their best intentions and most independent attitudes, an intrepid traveler requires assistance. If you are very fortunate, and if the weather is particularly dry, and if you possess an item an auxiliary cat particularly loves, you may be able to convince that cat to lead you to the wayward traveler.”

  What followed was a description of how to help a cat decide to teleport (“Remember,” read the book, “you can’t make a cat do anything”). Oak skimmed through the instructions as Alder sat beside her, reading over her shoulder but obviously too worried to really take anything in.

  “Do you still have that ball of yarn that Walnut likes?”

  “The green one? Yes,” said Alder.

  “Good,” said Oak. “That’s his favorite. And it is especially dry outside. Because of the Santa Ana winds.”

  Oak reme
mbered petting Walnut the night before—the way his fur had stood on end, the shock of static electricity. Today was even drier. Oak’s thoughts felt as electric and wild as that spark.

  She wondered. If the day was dry enough—if there was enough electricity in the air—maybe they really could help Walnut to catch it. To harness it. And, as on the day with the lightning storm, maybe they could create a strong enough current to hitch a ride with Walnut. Only this time, on purpose.

  “It’s perfect weather for teleporting,” she said. “We’ll just have to hope Walnut knows where to take us.”

  Alder nodded, tight-lipped and worried. “I’ll go get the green yarn,” he said.

  “Don’t forget a wool sweater!” Oak called. “And your sneakers!”

  The door clicked tight behind Alder, and Oak stood to rummage for the things she would need. Walnut seemed to understand what Oak was doing; he followed her, purring, through the house.

  Oak found one of her dad’s wool sweaters hanging in the entry hall; she pulled it on and caught a whiff of his scent, the pine deodorant he wore, and it reminded her again of how much she missed him. “I’ll think about that later,” she said, half to herself, half to Walnut, and went looking for her thickest-soled shoes.

  Then, dressed in rubber-soled shoes and an unseasonably warm wool sweater, kitten tucked under her arm, Oak headed for the stump of the walnut tree, where Alder waited for her, green yarn ball in hand.

  “You’re sure this won’t hurt him?” asked Alder.

  “Walnut won’t be the one getting the shock,” said Oak, doing her best to make her voice sound totally confident. “We will.”

  “I still don’t get it,” Alder said, sounding slightly panicked. Doing her best to remain calm, Oak explained again.

  “On days when the air is really dry, like today,” she began, “there’s more electricity in the air. And so we’re going to help Walnut harness it. Hopefully, when he teleports, he’ll be able to take us with him.”

  Alder pulled at the neck of the sweater he was wearing. It was, Oak noticed, the one he’d been finishing for Beck. It was almost done, and Alder had even added a small pocket over the heart.

  “I know it’s too hot for a sweater,” Oak said, “but wool is an excellent conductive material. Like fur.”

  Alder nodded. He held the green yarn ball out to Walnut. “Hey, Nutters,” he said, and he sounded as if he was on the verge of tears, “if you can, help us find your sister, okay? Take us to her, wherever she is, so we can help her get home.”

  Walnut sniffed the yarn, and then he rubbed his face against it and began to purr.

  Oak made sure her rubber-soled shoes were comfortably steady on the dry wood stump and motioned for Alder to do the same. Then she began to pet Walnut, who rested one paw on the ball of yarn. He tilted his ears forward, as if he understood what Oak was trying to do. Did the pockets of Walnut’s ears spread open, just a bit, or did Oak imagine it?

  Either way, Oak sensed that the time was right, and she stopped petting her kitten, extending her finger toward Alder, who reached his hand out in reply.

  Just before their fingers touched, a blue spark leaped from their fingertips, arcing in a bow, connecting them, closing a circuit, and opening a door.

  Chapter 25

  “Children!” said Mort. He sounded genuinely thrilled to see them again. “You’ve returned!”

  Alder blinked, feeling a bit off-kilter, and looked around. He was standing, just as before, in the entry hall of a house that had not existed just a moment before. He had the strange sensation of having not moved a step but, at the same time, having been transported an immeasurable distance. It took him a moment to get his bearings, but as soon as he did, he said, “Hello, Mort. Have you seen my kitten?”

  “Hmm,” answered the opossum, touching together the sharp-nailed fingertips of his strange little hands. “I’m afraid I haven’t noticed any visitors. . . .”

  Alder’s heart tightened as if there were a band around it.

  In Oak’s arms, Walnut struggled to be released. Oak set him down, and as soon as his paws touched the floor, he ran off like an orange bolt, disappearing around the corner in the hallway.

  “Walnut!” Oak called after him.

  “Oh dear,” said Mort, “oh my.” He looked on the verge of freezing up once again, but then—

  Meow.

  Mew.

  Here they came, sauntering back to the hallway, one orange kitten—Walnut—followed by the other—Fern!

  “Oh, those sneaky kitties,” Mort said, relaxing.

  “Fern!” Alder half cried her name. He knelt down, and Fern pushed her forehead against his knee as if nothing strange had happened at all.

  “The gang’s all here,” said Mort. He began to prance in place, his strange little boots clip-clopping on the wood floor. “Such a delight!” He giggled, a rather unsettling sound, especially as it emerged from those rows of yellow sharp teeth, but Alder was so relieved to be reunited with his kitten that he grinned in return.

  “Hello, Mort,” said Oak. “It’s nice to see you again.”

  “I was hoping you’d come back,” said Mort. “As soon as the wind picked up, I thought, well, this is traveling weather, and I set right to work making refreshments, just in case. I remember last visit, you said that cider upsets your tummy, is that correct?”

  “Ye-es,” Oak said slowly.

  Mort clapped his tiny hands. “Well,” he said, “this time I’ve prepared a spot of tea. How does that sound, hmm?” He turned toward the living room.

  Behind Mort’s back, Alder whispered to Oak, “Can we drink his tea, do you think?”

  “I don’t remember anything in Feline Teleportation about eating or drinking in a portal world,” Oak whispered back. “But I remember reading a story once where a girl ate six pomegranate seeds in the underworld, and then she had to spend half of each year there. Only that was Greek mythology, so it’s probably not the same.”

  Still, Alder thought, better safe than sorry, so he said to Mort, “We just finished our tea, right before we came.”

  “Oh,” said Mort, looking a bit disappointed. “Well, I hope you won’t think me rude if I have a cup, just the same. It’s ready to pour, you see.” He gestured to a small table in front of the fire; upon it squatted a teapot gently steaming.

  “Please,” said Alder, “we insist.”

  Like a fussy old man, Mort bustled over to the side table and poured a long amber stream from the pot into one of the three teacups. “I do like to drink my tea before it’s had a chance to oversteep,” he explained, and his nose twitched rather adorably as he sniffed the fragrant liquid. Behind him, the fire sparked and cracked. “I’ll set out cream for the kittens,” he said, pouring some into a saucer and putting it on the floor in front of the fire. “They so enjoyed it last time, and travel does deplete a kitten, don’t you agree?”

  If they’d already had a drink of cream last time they were here, Alder couldn’t see what harm could come of allowing them to have another, and so when Fern and Walnut headed toward the saucer, he didn’t stop them.

  Oak must have come to the same conclusion, because she didn’t stop the kittens either, instead sitting in the same spot on the couch she’d sat in last time they’d visited.

  Alder followed Oak’s lead. Now that he knew Fern was safe, he could feel himself relaxing.

  “It’s such a treat, don’t you think,” said Mort, “to sit with a nice hot drink?”

  Alder and Oak both nodded.

  Mort took a rather noisy sip and then set down the teacup. His hands, though grotesque at first glance, were actually quite beautiful up close. From the cuff of Mort’s sleeve came a second cuff, this one of fur, which ended neatly above his five pink fingers. Each finger was tipped with a long, curved claw that looked, Alder decided, very much like the human fingernails in the pictures from the World Nail Competition that he and Marcus had researched. Those nails, he remembered, were considered beautiful if thei
r shape mimicked the golden ratio.

  Suddenly, Alder pictured a hand strumming a banjo, fingers flying. Two fingertips—those of the index and the middle fingers—were each capped with an upside-down golden claw.

  That was what his father had called the finger picks he’d worn when he played—his golden claws. Suddenly, and completely, and for the very first time, Alder remembered his father’s hands.

  “Is my dad here?”

  Alder hadn’t known he was going to ask that question until he had blurted it out, and he found that with the question came a hot flood of tears.

  “Oh,” said Mort, and he looked so agitated that Alder worried he might perhaps freeze up again, like he had last time. He lifted a cookie from the plate next to the teapot and held it out to Mort, hoping it would distract him from his agitation. And perhaps it worked. Mort took the cookie, one of his odd pink fingers brushing Alder’s wrist, and then he nibbled it, his teeth shaving it away bite by bite to nothing.

  “Thank you,” Mort said when the cookie had disappeared. He shook out a cloth napkin and pressed it to his mouth. His whiskers vibrated with intensity.

  “Alder,” he began, “I’m afraid your father isn’t here. I live alone, you see.”

  “I didn’t think he lived with you,” Alder said. He took a napkin when Mort offered it and dabbed his eyes. “I just thought that maybe . . . he might visit, or something.”

  “I’m sure he would, if he could,” Mort said. “I’m certain of it.”

  Oak reached over and took Alder’s hand. Her hand was warm, and soft. She squeezed Alder’s, and he squeezed back. The kittens, bellies full of cream, abandoned the saucer and jumped one and then the other atop Alder’s lap, as if they knew he needed them. They purred loudly, butting their heads first against one another and then against Alder’s belly, and he petted them with his one free hand, and then both hands, when Oak released him so she could pet them, too.

  “There is more than one way to travel,” Mort said. “Energy, you know, cannot be created or destroyed. It can be harnessed and it can be let free. But it’s still there, dear children. Energy never dies.”