I shake my head.
"You didn't have to be pretty to land yourself a husband and raise a family. You just had to be a good person."
"Like the best looking girls didn't get the best men," I say.
"If you think the girls you see as pretty are any happier than you are, you don't know much about anything."
"Yeah, well—"
Ellie doesn't give me a chance to speak; she just barrels along over the top of what I was about to say.
"What you don't understand," she tells me, "is that all these problems you've got— none of them are your own fault."
"Oh, right. The old cop-out: Society's to blame."
"It is, girl."
"Brenda. My name's Brenda."
I hate the way she keeps calling me "girl."
"Society makes you get all these expectations for yourself and then, when you can't meet up to them, it screws up your life. You spend money you don't have because you're trying to comfort yourself. You smoke because you imagine it relieves your stress. You lose weight, not because you need to, but because you think if you can look like some woman in a magazine your life's suddenly going to be perfect. But it's not going to work that way.
"First you have to accept yourself— just as you are. Until that happens, nothing's going to get better for you."
At least she's not going on about my father, the way the therapists always do, but it still all sounds so pat. And how much did she make of her life? Working her ass off trying to keep her business afloat, having to declare bankruptcy, probably dying broke in some alleyway, one more burned-out baglady.
"What would you know about why I'm doing anything?" I say.
"Because I've been there—" she hesitates for a moment "— Brenda. I spent too much of my own life trying to be somebody that everybody else thought I should be, instead of who I am. If there's anything I regret, if there's anything that really gets me riled up still, it's all those years I wasted."
Is this my future I see sitting in front of me? I wonder. Because I know all about that feeling of having wasted my life. But then I shake my head. There's a difference. I'm doing something about my problems.
Still, I think maybe I know what's keeping Ellie here now. Not vengeance, not any need. Just regret.
"You really are dead, aren't you?" I say.
"Land sakes, girl. Whatever gave you that idea?"
I'm not going to let her put me off this time.
"I know you're a ghost," I tell her. "No different from the voices in the well."
"You've heard voices in the well?" she asks.
"First the voices," I say, "and then the ghosts. I dream about them. I started wondering what they looked like— the people those voices once belonged to, and now I can't get them out of my head. They've been getting stronger and stronger until now— well, here you are."
It makes sense, I think as I'm talking. The closer I am to the well, the stronger an influence the ghosts would have on me— so strong now that I'm seeing them when I'm awake. I look over at Ellie, but she's staring off into nowhere, as though she never even heard what I was saying.
"I never considered ghosts," she says suddenly. "I used to dream about spacemen coming to take me away."
This is so weird, it surprises a "You're kidding" out of me.
Ellie shakes her head. "No. I'd be vacuuming a room, or cleaning the bathroom, and suddenly I'd just get this urge to lay down. I'd stare up at the ceiling and then 'I'd dream about these silver saucers floating down from the hills, flying really low, almost touching the tops of the trees. They'd land out on the lawn by the wishing well here and these shapes would step out. I never quite knew what exactly they looked like; I just knew I'd be safe with them. I'd never have to worry about making ends meet again."
I wait a few moments, but she doesn't go on.
"Are there ghosts in the well?" I ask.
She looks at me and smiles. "Are there spacemen in the hills?"
I refuse to let her throw me off track again.
"Are you a ghost?" I ask.
Now she laughs. "Are we back to that again?"
"If you're not a ghost, then what are you doing here?"
"I live here," she says. "Just because the bank took it away from me, it didn't mean I had to go. I've got a place fixed up above the office— nothing fancy, but then I'm not a fancy person. I sleep during the day and do my walking around at night when it's quiet— except for when the kids come by for one of their hoolies. I get my water from the stream and I walk along the railway tracks out back in the woods, following them down to the general store when I run short of supplies."
I hadn't gone further into the office than the foyer, with its sagging floorboards and the front desk all falling in on itself. That part of the motel looks so decrepit I thought the building might fall in on me if I went inside. So I suppose it's possible...
"What do you do in the winter?" I ask.
"Same as I always did— I go south."
She's so matter-of-fact about it all that I start to feel crazy, even though I know she's the one who's not all there. If she's not a ghost, then she's got to be crazy to be living here the way she does.
"And you ye been doing this for twenty years?" I ask.
"Has it been that long?"
"What do you live on?"
"That's not a very polite question," she says.
I suppose it isn't. She must feel as though I'm interrogating her.
I'm sorry, I say. "I'm just... curious."
She nods. "Well, I make do."
I guess it's true. She seems pretty robust for someone her age. I decide to forget about her being a ghost for the moment and get back to the other thing that's been bothering me.
"I know there's something strange about this well," I say. "You told me last night that it's cursed..."
"It is."
"How?"
"It grants you your wish— can you think of anything more harmful?"
I shake my head. "I don't get it. That sounds perfect."
"Does it? How sure can you be that what you want is really the right thing for you? How do you know you haven't got your ideas all ass-backwards and the one thing you think you can't live without turns out to be the one thing that you can't live with?"
"But if it's a good wish..."
"Nothing's worth a damn thing unless you earn it."
"What if you wished for world peace?" I ask. "For an end to poverty? For no one ever to go hungry again? For the environment to be safe once more?"
"It only grants personal wishes," she says.
"Anybody's?"
"No. Only those of people who want— who need— a wish badly enough."
"I still don't see how that's a bad thing."
Ellie stands up. "You will if you make a wish."
She walks by me then and pushes her way through the roses. I hear the rasp of cloth against twig as she moves through the bushes, the thorns pulling at her jeans and her shirt.
"Ellie!" I call after her, but she doesn't stop.
I grab my candle, but the wind blows it out. By the time I get my flashlight out and make it out onto the lawn, there's no one there. Just me and the crickets.
Maybe she isn't a ghost, I find myself thinking. Maybe she was just sitting here all along and I never noticed her until she spoke to me. That makes a lot more sense, except it doesn't feel quite right. Do ghosts even know that they're ghosts? I wonder.
I think about the way she comes and goes. Did she have enough time to get out of sight before I got through the bushes? Who else but a ghost would hang around an abandoned motel, year after year for twenty years?
I get dizzy worrying at it. I don't know what to think anymore. All it does is make my head hurt.
I decide to follow the railway tracks through the woods to the general store where Ellie says she buys her groceries. I'll use the pay phone in the parking lot to call Jim. And maybe, if they're still open, I'll ask them what they know about Ellie Carter and
her motel.
20
Jim picked up the phone when it rang, hoping it was Brenda calling. He hadn't heard from her for a few days now, and Jilly's odd call this afternoon had left him puzzled and just a little worried. But it was Scotty on the other end of the line.
"I thought you had a date tonight," Jim said.
He carried the phone over to the sofa. Sitting down, he put his feet up on the coffee table and rested the phone on his chest.
"I did," Scotty told him, "but she stood me up."
"That's low."
He could almost see Scotty's shrug.
"I can't say's I really blame her," Scotty said, "if you really want to know the truth. I'm coming on so strong these days, I think I'd stand myself up if I was given the chance."
"What are you talking about?"
"Ah, you know. All I do is think with my cock. I should be like you— take it slow, take it easy. Be friends with a woman first instead of trying to jump her bones the minute we're alone. But I can't seem to help myself. First chance I get and I'm all over her."
"Yeah, well don't hold me up as some paradigm of virtue," Jim said. "And besides, I get the feeling I'm getting a version of the old runaround myself."
He told Jim about the call he'd gotten from Jilly this afternoon and how it had sounded as though she hadn't known Brenda was away on business.
"When you put that together with how Brenda won't even leave me the number of where she's staying, it's... I don't know. I just get a weird feeling about it."
"Sounds like a scam to me," Scotty said.
Jim switched the receiver from one ear to another. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Think about it. It's obvious that she's put her friends up to call you— just to get a rise out of you. To make you more interested."
"How much more interested can I seem? Whenever she calls, we're on the phone for at least an hour. I'd take her out in a minute, but I can't seem to get the chance. She was too sick before she left and now she's out of town."
"Supposedly."
Jim sighed. "Supposedly," he repeated, somewhat reluctantly.
"Maybe she's just getting back at you for not calling her after she sent you those flowers."
"You really think so?"
"Hey, what do I know? Dear Abby I'm not. I'm just a guy who can't get a date and when I do, the girl dumps me before we even go out." He paused, then added, "Next time she calls, just ask her what's going on."
"What if there's nothing? I'd hate to screw things up. I figure not calling her back right away was already one strike against me. I don't want to add to it now because—"
A sudden beep on the line interrupted him.
"Just a sec," Jim said. "That's my call waiting. It might be Brenda calling."
"I've got to go anyway," Scotty said. "Call me tomorrow and let me know how things worked out."
"Will do," Jim told him.
Cutting the connection with Scotty, he took the other call.
21
I was really looking forward to talking to Jim tonight. I just wanted to hear his voice and connect with a world that didn't involve ghosts or diets or strange voices that come out of a haunted wishing well.
Following the railway tracks really cuts the distance to the general store. The highway takes a curve, but the tracks go straight through the woods. They're overgrown, but not so much that they're not easy to follow. I didn't even need to use my flashlight. I just stepped from wooden rail to wooden rail, one foot, then the other, but slowly, every step an effort. I was so tired.
This flu bug I've caught made it seem as though I was walking all the way back to Newford. I kept having to stop and rest. I would've given up and just gone back, but by the time I started thinking along those lines, I'd already come so far that going back no longer made much sense. And besides, I had this real need to step outside myself and my problems— if only for a few minutes.
But now I wish I'd never called Jim, because it seems as though all my lies are coming home tonight: the ones Ellie pointed out that I'd used on myself, and the ones I'd told Jim. He didn't come right out and say he didn't believe I was out of town, but he kept asking all these questions about what my day had been like, had I got to see the sights, that kind of thing. Innocent enough questions, but I couldn't help but feel there was an agenda behind them, as though he was trying to catch me up in my lies.
And then there was this business with Jilly calling him and Wendy wanting to pick up a dress from my apartment.
I don't have any of Wendy's dresses— God knows they'd never fit me anyway. At least they wouldn't have before the diet. I could get into one of them now, I suppose; it'd just be a little short in the skirt and sleeves. But even if I did have something of Wendy's, she's got a key to my place anyway.
As soon as Jim started talking about their having called him I knew what was really going on. They were worried about me. They'd probably found out about my phone being cut off. Or that I'd lost my job. Or both. Wendy was probably upset anyway because of the way I've been avoiding her these past few weeks...
What a mess I've made of things.
I get off the phone as quickly as I can. Once I hang up, though, I don't have the energy to go back to the motel. The general store is closed, gas pumps and all, so I just sit down on the steps running up to its porch and lean my head against the railing. I want to rest for a couple of minutes.
Once I'm sitting down I feel as though I'll never be able to move again, but I know I can't stay here. It's not that I'm scared of running into the people who own the place or anything— there's no law against using a public phone and then having a rest before heading back home.
No. It's that I can't shake the feeling that I'm being watched. At first I think it's Ellie, but the watching has a hungry feeling about it, as though I'm being stalked, and I can't see Ellie wanting to hurt me. If she ever did, she's already had plenty of opportunities before now.
Logically, I know I'm safe. I'm just a little sick, weak from this flu bug I've caught. Maybe it's the flu that's making me feel paranoid. But logic doesn't help me feel any better because, logically, there shouldn't be ghost voices in the well and ghosts running through my dreams. Logically, I shouldn't keep having conversations with the deceased proprietor of an abandoned motel.
Finally, I drag myself to my feet and start back. I have to rest every fifty feet or so because I just don't have any strength left in me at all. The feeling of being watched gets stronger, but I'm feeling so sick it's as though I don't even care about it anymore. I have cramps that come and go in painful waves. I want to throw up, but I've got nothing in my stomach to bring up. I can't even remember if I had any dinner or not. When all you eat is the same thing, popcorn and lettuce, lettuce and popcorn, day in and day out, it's hard to differentiate between meals.
I don't know how I make it back to my room, but finally I do. Dawn's pinking the eastern horizon, casting long shadows as I stumble to my bed. The birds are making an incredible racket, but I almost can't hear them.
My bed seems to sway, back and forth, back and forth, as I lie on it. I keep hearing ominous sounds under the morning bird calls. A floorboard creaking. A shutter banging. I'm too sick even to turn my head to see if there someone there. There's a wet, musty smell in the air— part stagnant water, part the smell you get when you turn over a rotting log.
I really want to turn to look now, but the cramps have come back and I double up from the pain. When they finally ease off, I fall asleep and the ghosts are waiting for me.
They're not familiar any longer— or rather, I recognize them, but they look different. It's so awful. All I can see is drowned people, bloated corpses shambling toward me. Their faces are a dead white and grotesquely swollen. Their clothes are rotting and hang in tatters, they have wet weeds hanging from them, dripping on the floor. Their hair is plastered tight against their distended faces. They have only sunken sockets, surrounded by puffs of dead white flesh where they should have ey
es.
You're only dreaming, I try to tell myself. You're sick and you have a fever and this is only a dream.
I manage to come out of it. The lights bright in my eyes— must be mid-morning already. It's impossible to focus on anything. I have some dry heaves which only makes me weaker. I try to fight it, but eventually I fall back into the dreams again.
That's when I finally see her, rising up from behind the ranks of the drowned dead. She looks just like the picture of the rusalka in that book. A water-wraith. The deadly spirit of the well.
22
Wendy stayed over at Jilly's studio Saturday night. She slept on the Murphy bed while Jilly camped out on the sofa— over Wendy's protests. "I'll be up early working," Jilly insisted, and refused to discuss it any further. And sure enough, when Wendy woke the next morning, Jilly was already behind her easel, frowning at her current work in progress.
"I can't decide," she said when she saw that Wendy was awake. "Have I made it too dark on this side, or too light on the other?"
"Please," Wendy said. She put on the kimono that Jilly used as a bathrobe and shuffled across the studio toward the kitchen area, looking for the coffee. "At least give me a chance to wake up."
The door buzzer sounded as she was halfway to the coffee carafe sitting on the kitchen counter.
"Would you mind getting that?" Jilly asked. "It's probably Geordie coming by to mooch some breakfast."
"Wonderful," Wendy said.
She was barely awake and now she had to put up with Geordie's ebullient morning cheer on top of Jilly's. She considered writing a sign saying, "Quiet, please, some people are still half asleep," and holding it up when she opened the door, but she didn't have the energy to do more than unlock the door. When she swung it open it was to find a stranger standing there in the hallway.
"Um, is Jilly here?"
Wendy gathered the kimono more closely about her neck and looked over her shoulder. "It's for you," she told Jilly. Turning back to the stranger, she added, "Come on in."
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