The Agony House

by Cherie Priest

  “Great,” Denise declared, with great sarcasm. “Now I definitely can’t tell them I need a tetanus shot.”

  “Maybe they won’t charge him, if it’s only a couple of stitches. Since they already got paid to do it once.”

  She ignored his optimism, knowing it was useless. “I don’t think it works that way. I swear … by the time we’re done with this house, that doctor will be able to buy himself a yacht. Maybe I should change my major and go to med school. I could use a yacht.”

  “You don’t have a major yet. You’re still in high school.” Then he paused and frowned. “Right?”

  “I’ll be a senior this year: Rudy Lombard, or bust. And I will have a major, pretty soon.”

  He dropped his bag on the table, beside hers. “What will it be?”

  “Law,” she said. “I’m going to be a lawyer.”

  “Everybody hates lawyers.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m going to be one.” She explained, “Me and Mom, when it was just the two of us … we got screwed over a bunch. Our landlords were always cheap bastards, or crooked bastards. They’d take our money and let the place go to hell, or refuse to give us our deposits back, so we couldn’t move to a better place. First and last month’s rent is hard to pull together when you can’t get your deposit back.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “They always had some BS reason for it, and they always would send us letters from their attorneys, kicking us out or saying we owed more money than we ever agreed to. It was a racket,” she declared, echoing something her mom had said years before. “There was one lawyer who tried to bleed us dry, when my mom got served for driving without insurance—and another lawyer who charged us a bunch of money when Mom got hit at a stoplight. Some dumb girl was texting, and plowed right into her. It tore up Mom’s shoulder and neck real bad, but all the money we got from the girl’s insurance went to the lawyer’s fees. Mom needed physical therapy for months. We could only afford it for a couple of weeks.”

  Terry scrunched up his face, like he wasn’t entirely sure where she was going with this. “So … if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em?”

  “Exactly! If we’d had a lawyer … if we could’ve afforded a real one … things would’ve been different for us. Once I’m a lawyer, I’ll make sure that kind of BS doesn’t happen again. Not to my mom, or me, or anybody else who needs help but can’t pay through the nose to get it.”

  “You’ll be a lawyer for free?”

  “Not for everybody—only for the broke folks. Or that’s the plan. Now come on, I’ll drag out the comic since it’s just you and me.”

  “You promise you won’t get creeped out again, and slam it shut?”

  “Yeah, I promise. Let’s see what this ghost has in store for us next. Forewarned is forearmed, right?”

  “I have no idea. I don’t even know what that means.”

  Terry leaned back against Denise’s bed, and let out a little laugh.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked him.

  He pointed at the open manuscript. “See? The comic isn’t predicting what’s going to happen. Unless you seriously think you’ve got goblins, in addition to rats and spiders. And ghosts.”

  “So far, we have absolutely zero goblins. No rats, either. I think? I haven’t seen any. Plenty of spiders, though.”

  He nodded gravely. “Oh, you definitely have rats. Everybody has rats, around here. But it’d be worse if we were any closer to the river.”

  “Please do not tell me these things.”

  “I’m only trying to help.”

  “Stop. Stop trying to help,” she urged. “Forget what I said about being forewarned. What I don’t know won’t hurt me.”

  “Oh my God, you are so wrong.”

  Denise smacked her hands triumphantly on her knees. “That is totally our kitchen, in that scene right there. Look, it’s the same layout, with the sink under the window, and the door’s in the same place, and the walls look similar.”

  Terry’s eyes went wide. “You have a fireplace in your kitchen? Holy crap. I’ve got to see this …”

  She stopped him before he could leap up from the floor and dart down the stairs. “No, dummy. We don’t have a fireplace, or a cauldron full of boiling bones, either. But the window is in the same place, and I bet there used to be a fireplace where the cauldron is. For cooking or whatever.”

  “I only barely saw your kitchen for a minute the other day. I’ll take your word for it.”

  She touched the panel with the table and chairs. “The dining room is pretty much the same too, though it’s tough to tell.”

  As if on cue, tires ground into the grass and gravel beside the house.

  “It sounds like they’re home.” She went to her bedroom window. She stood in the full blast of the AC, enjoying the chill for another few seconds before turning the dial down to “low.” If Sally thought she’d been blasting it ever since she got home from Crispy’s, Denise would never hear the end of it. She watched her mom get out of the driver’s side quickly, then run around to the passenger’s side and open the door for Mike. He climbed out carefully, one arm clutching his chest, and let Sally lead him up to the house.

  “I’d better go see how he’s doing.” She turned to find Terry on his feet, the comic in his hand.

  He set it on her bed. “I’m sure he’s good.”

  “Me too, but I want to hear it from him.”

  Together they headed downstairs, greeting Mike and Sally at the door.

  “Hey there, Terry,” Mike said with a lopsided grin. “Nice to see you again.”

  “Thank you, sir. Nice to be back.”

  Denise looked him up and down. “You blew out some stitches, huh?”

  Sally rolled her eyes. “I told him to lay off the handyman stuff, but he didn’t listen. My beautiful dumbass thought he’d take a crowbar to the wainscoting in the dining room, and it was more than the sutures could take.”

  “I just wanted to pull it off before the electricians reach it tomorrow. It’s in good shape,” he insisted. “We can put it back up later. They’ll just tear it loose or cut right through it. We should try to save it.”

  “I should try to save it,” his wife corrected him. “Or we can ask Norman to take care of it tomorrow. You should go lie down.”

  “I can’t. I’m too hungry.”

  Sally shook her head. “Aw, dammit. We were going to run past Wendy’s, and I forgot.”

  “We could order pizza …” Denise suggested. The mention of Norman had made her think of it.

  “Pizza,” her mom agreed wearily. “I don’t have the energy for anything else. Terry, are you sticking around?”

  Politely, he demurred. “I don’t have to, ma’am. Y’all already fed me once. I should probably go home and make something for myself.”

  “And your dad?” Denise asked.

  “He’s doing a double shift. He won’t be home until after I’m in bed.”

  Mike waved away the boy’s protests. “Then that settles it. You’re not eating home alone, not while we’ve got pizza on the way. Sally, hand me your phone.” He shot Denise a wink. “Maybe Norman is working the delivery routes again, eh?”

  She rolled her eyes and said, “Come on, Terry. Let’s go upstairs.”

  Once in Denise’s room, they settled in with Lucida Might again—but as they opened the manuscript, Denise changed her mind and picked up her phone to check her messages.

  “Do you have to do that right now?” Terry complained.

  “Settle down, you addict. I was just going to show you this email I got, from an agent. Her dad used to represent Joe Vaughn. She wrote me back.”

  “Who wrote you back?” Denise and Terry jumped. They looked up and saw Sally standing in the doorway. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I just came up to say the pizzas will be here in another twenty minutes.”

  Denise’s stomach growled in response. “Good,” she said, and opened the email before her screen went dark.
r />   “Is it something important?” Sally asked. “Is it about a scholarship?”

  “Mom … no, stop it. It’s something else.” To Terry, she said, “She wants me to get in touch with her.”

  “Who wants you to get in touch?” Her mom came inside, and tried to get a look at the phone.

  Denise held it out of her reach. “This lady, okay?”

  “Some stranger on the Internet?”

  “Yes. No, I mean. It’s not like that.”

  “And since when are you into comic books?” she asked, suddenly noticing the open manuscript lying on the floor between Denise’s and Terry’s folded knees.

  “Since I found this one in the attic. It’s not a real comic book, exactly. It’s a manuscript for one, but I don’t know if anybody ever published it.” She looked back down at the email. “Don’t make fun of it. It might be valuable.”

  Sally was unconvinced. “Yeah, I bet.”

  “This lady in New York wants to look at it. Her dad was the writer’s agent, a long time ago. She thinks this might be a lost manuscript. Someone might buy it, or pay us money to publish it.”

  “That’s fine, but I don’t want you making phone calls to any internet randos. And if the comic book is valuable, don’t let that lady see it without paying you first.”

  “I don’t think that’s how it works, Mom …”

  “What’s this?” Mike appeared in the doorway. “We have something valuable in this house? You can’t be serious.”

  “It’s just some old comic book.” Sally gently smacked him on the arm. “Don’t get too excited about it. Dee says she found it in the attic, so it’s probably just a waterlogged mess, anyway.”

  “No, it’s not,” she insisted. “It was wrapped up real good, in plastic.”

  “If you say so, dear.” Sally squeezed out the door past Mike. “I’ll be downstairs, scaring up enough dollar bills to tip the pizza guy.”

  “Check my wallet. I think I have a couple of ones.” Mike told her. Then he asked Denise, “Can I see it? I like comic books.”

  She shrugged, and pushed it forward. “It’s called Lucida Might and the House of Horrors.”

  “Lucida Might … that rings a bell.” Gingerly, he sat down cross-legged across from Denise and Terry, and turned the manuscript around so he could look at it upright. He flipped back to the beginning, leaving one set of fingers sandwiched in the pages where they’d left off reading. “Joe Vaughn,” he read from the cover page. “Yeah, I’ve heard of him.”

  “You have?” Denise asked.

  “He had a TV show, years and years ago. If this is one of his manuscripts … I wonder when he wrote it? Hell, I wonder what it was doing in our attic …” he added, shuffling quickly through the early pages, taking in the artwork.

  She cleared her throat. “Um … I don’t want to freak you out or anything, but I think he died here. In this house.” She told him all about her Internet research, and her suspicions. “And on top of that, I think he’s still haunting the place.”

  “Really? You think we have a ghost?”

  “I think we have two ghosts,” she confessed. She looked at Terry, who gave her an encouraging nod. “I think they’re probably Joe, and the old woman who used to own the house. She disappeared before he died, and nobody knows what he was doing here. But this agent I talked to online—she said that maybe Joe was using the house for an art reference. I mean, the house in this comic sure looks like our house.”

  Terry had her back. “No way it’s a coincidence!”

  Mike made some more murmurs that said he was thinking, as he checked the thing page by page. “Ghosts, eh? I didn’t know you believed in ghosts.”

  “I didn’t, either. Wait, do you?”

  He shrugged, still gazing down at the pages. “I’ve never seen much evidence for them, or against them.”

  “Terry has,” she said, before he could volunteer the information. “He takes recordings. It’s crazy, but he’s picked up some really strange voices.”

  Mike looked up and eyed Terry. “Is that so?”

  “I’d be happy to play them for you, sir! I didn’t bring my recorder today, but next time …”

  “Next time, then. And stop calling me ‘sir,’ would you? It’s just Mike,” he smiled. “If I’ve got two ghosts on the premises, I’d like to know more about them.”

  Denise watched her stepfather warily. “You’re being awfully cool about this whole ‘haunted house’ thing, Mike.”

  The look he gave her in return was guarded. “Let’s just say I’ve seen and heard some weird things myself, since we got here. And leave it at that.”

  “What about Mom?” she asked. “Has she seen or heard anything unusual?”

  He shook his head. “If so, she hasn’t mentioned it. If this house is infested with ghosts, I say we keep it to ourselves for now. Your mom has enough on her plate. Don’t give her one more thing to worry about, please? I can worry for the both of us.”

  Denise wanted to tell him not to worry, that it wasn’t a big deal—the ghosts were friendly! Probably! But she didn’t think it was strictly true anymore. If he could worry for Sally, then Denise could worry for Mike. They could share the worry load, and maybe everybody wouldn’t be scared to death all the time.

  Was that how it worked?

  Denise said, “Ghosts aside, I want to let this agent see the manuscript. I don’t expect free money or anything, not that it wouldn’t be awesome to have some. Do you think …” she began, almost shyly. “Mike, do you think it would be okay, if I talked to her?”

  Downstairs, there was a knock on the front door.

  Mike gave her a grin. “If it were me, I’d call her in a heartbeat. But this is your book. You found it, so you decide what to do with it. If you want to, go ahead and call the lady up. See what she has to say.” They all heard Sally greeting the pizza guy, who turned out to be a pizza girl. No surprise visit from Norman, oh well. “But do it tomorrow. For now, let’s eat.”

  After pizza, Denise went back upstairs to the meat locker (as she’d begun to almost lovingly think of her nice, cool bedroom) and she banged out a quick response to Eugenie Robbins’s email. She didn’t want to call because she hated talking on the phone, but she wanted to reach out—and an email was a good compromise.

  Thanks so much for getting back to me. I really appreciate your time, and your interest in representing the comic book for publication. If you’re sure that no one else owns the rights, I guess there’s no good reason not to try and sell it. I am off to college next year, and then to law school. I could definitely use the money—any money at all. I hear the textbooks are expensive.

  I can take more pictures and show you the pages, or maybe if you’re in New Orleans anytime soon, you can come see the book for yourself.

  She almost included her address, but restrained herself. One thing at a time, just in case this lady wasn’t who she said she was. She closed out the email and hit SEND, and then sat back, wondering if anything would come of it.

  She knew the hard way that maybe-money was no better than no-money-at-all.

  It was even worse, if you got your hopes up.

  Mike paused, and poked his finger at the image of Doug. “Wait, who’s this guy?”

  Denise said, “He’s Lucida’s useless boyfriend. You should just read this from the beginning.”

  “I will, one of these days. This is crazy, how you just found it … I’ve never seen anything like it.”

  They were sitting together on the floor, their backs braced against the foot of her bed. Terry had gone home after pizza, and Sally was entirely disinterested in anything comic book related, so it was just Denise and Mike. The book was open with one flap on her leg, and the other on his.

  “I’ve never seen anything like it, either. Nobody has, apparently.”

  “Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you,” he said, nodding his head at her hand. “What happened? What’s with the Band-Aids?”

  Denise tried to play it off. �
��I got into a knife fight with a pirate.”

  “And that’s all the damage you took? Well played. But come on, kiddo. What gives?”

  “It’s no big deal.” She tried to say it cool, like this was obviously nothing to get excited about. “I poked myself with a screw, while I was putting my bed frame together.”

  “Will you let me take a look?”

  “These are my last Band-Aids. I’ll show you after I take a shower, but for what it’s worth, I showed a nurse, and she said it was fine.”

  He gave her a long, hard look. “Okay,” he said. And he let it go.

  Mike lifted his head and looked around. “Wait … do you hear that?”

  Beneath their feet, they could feel a rumble. They could hear a rumble. Denise smelled grave dirt and sulfur with a dash of mold. “Where’s Mom?” she asked frantically. Before he could answer, she yelled out, “Mom?” and scrambled out of the bedroom ahead of Mike, who was still moving a little slowly.

  She was halfway down the stairs when she heard two things at the same time: her mother shouting, “Jesus!” and what remained of the ceiling collapsing into the parlor.

  “Mom?”

  “Sally?” Mike cried from the top of the stairs.

  Denise was already at the bottom. Dust filled the room and dirtied up her eyes—some of it was powder like drywall, and some of it was brown and fluffy. She could hardly see. Everything smelled awful, and she wasn’t sure where her mother was. “Mom?”

  “Over here.” Sally coughed and waved, like she could banish the filthy air with the back of her hand. “I’m fine. It missed me. Mostly. I think.” She sounded creaky and uncertain, but she was definitely alive. The ceiling was on the floor, and a big jagged beam leaned down from above, its bottom end jammed through a rug at Sally’s feet.

  Sally made for one of the windows, wading through several inches of poop-colored fluff, and forced open the only two windows that worked. The air cleared a little. The stuff on the floor waved and swirled, like the grossest, driest snow anybody ever saw.