The Switch House: A Short Novel

by Tim Meyer

  The look in his eyes suggested he might actually do that, or something equally vile. She removed herself from her position on the toilet and crawled on all fours toward the small pinprick of light. Once in the path of the beam, she felt a warmth infiltrate her bones, and not in the comforting way the morning sun sometimes felt on the back of her neck, how it sometimes soaked into her skin. This was a dark warmth, a conquering warmth. It made her feel like maggots were hosting a party beneath her flesh, an all-encompassing death orgy.

  When close, Terry reached out and grabbed her by her hair, guiding her toward the hole. With force, her eye met the opening and she peered through, her body teeming with the sick shine the aperture emitted.

  [It's the house, but it isn't their house. It sits in the middle of the Everywhere, the surrounding world a blanket of dirt, a boneyard of old souls, lost and wandering, eternally trapped here. She pushes her way past the spirits, their amoebic shapes swirling in the atmosphere, disappearing when touched. Before blinking out of existence, their physical manifestations disperse like dandelion seeds, wafting into the air, floating over her head, swallowed up by the sheet of darkness reigning above.

  She moves toward the house, paying the souls no mind. They speak to her in different tongues, some of them coherent, most of them not. She ignores the warbling of their combined voices and pushes forward, up the steps and onto the porch. The front door stands ajar and little effort is required to swing it open, as if someone opens it simultaneously with her touch. She steps into the living room, her eyes immediately glancing down at the vase stuffed with old, wilted flowers, blackened petals matching the cold, dead sky above. She makes her way across the carpet, toward the kitchen.

  A shadow waits for her.

  A hip-high shadow with no face, and a name she has so desperately tried to forget, forced out of her memory. But the name sticks. And she knows it well.

  Ma-me, the faceless shadow says in that familiar tone. Ma-me, home.

  Tears leave her eyes, roll down her face. Music plays from somewhere in the distance, something harmonic and keyed, something ambient. It's like a movie score, she thinks, the soundtrack of her life and death.

  Ma-me, the shadow speaks, stepping into the light. Ma-me. Where-go?

  She musters enough courage to tell the shadow she hasn't gone anywhere; that she's right here, and God, she's not leaving. Not ever. Not again.

  Ma-me. Where-put-me?

  Invisible hands wring her heart. She can almost hear her essential organ breaking in her chest.

  Ma-me, love-me?

  The boy steps into the living-room light.

  It's not the same boy she remembers. His skin is dirty, mottled with patches of missing flesh. Maggots squirm in the craters of his carved muscle, teeming out of the wounds, falling onto the floor by the handfuls. He's missing one eye, and the other is covered in a film of milky white. Deep lacerations have been cut into his face, trenches of glistening red. His hair is caked with dirt, disheveled, mussed with mud and other earthly sediments. The clothes he'd been wearing on the day he left are torn and ragged, soiled beyond distinction, but still, she knows they are the same clothes.

  She knows.]

  “Oh my God,” she whispered.

  “Is it him?” Terry asked. “Is it my boy?”

  “William...”

  [I thought you loved me, Ma-me.

  I do, son, I do. She says this over and over again, her reassuring mantra.

  Follow me, the boy-who-is-not-William says.

  He walks backward until the darkness of the kitchen wraps its shadows around him, concealing his grotesque figure. Something pushes her ahead; one foot follows the other, and, before she knows it, she's in the kitchen, looking out the back door. Outside, the-boy-who-is-not-William hops off the bottom stair, his feet landing in the wet dirt. She follows him out the door, down the stairs, planting her feet on the surface, allowing her toes to sink into the overturned earth. A chill rises up her legs, corkscrewing her bones. Her flesh hardens, breaking out in raised bumps as the fear settles in the base of her spine, propelling her along at the daydream's command. The boy points to the shed in the corner of the yard; beyond it lays a wasteland of dug-up earth and scattered human bones.

  The left shed door sits slightly ajar. She catches a glimpse of something moving in the space between the doors, slithering like a snake in midnight shadows. She realizes it's a hand. Dark green flesh mottled with black spots, reptilian-like smoothness. The night's natural lighting—which is minimal—gleams off its cold skin. Curled fingers topped with hooked nails, perfect for slicing and dicing the fleshy surface of its enemies. A single finger rises from the rest, waves, beckons her, and invites her inside.

  Distance has killed the background music, and now, there is utter silence. She drifts across the dirt and steps over half-buried bones, beginning the short, soundless trek toward the dream goblin's domain.]

  Outside now. She'd led him out the back door, across the dirt lot that made up the backyard.

  A breeze broke across her face. Moonlight flooded her vision. She concentrated on the shed, her eyes straining against the visible dark.

  “The shed,” a voice whispered in her ear. “The shed.”

  “That's where I last saw him.”

  “That's what you told them,” Terry said, his words whistling through clenched teeth. “That's what you told the cops, the detectives, and the district attorney.”

  “He went back there to play, and...”

  “...and?”

  “He never came back.”

  Terry grabbed her, spun her, and shook her violently.

  “I don't believe you!” he hissed.

  [“Ma-me?” asks the boy who is very much William.

  Sunlight now fills the yard. It's warm and comforting and the feeling sinks all the way down into her toes. Looking up at the bright afternoon sky, Angela smiles.

  “Ma-me?” William asks as he squeezes her hand.

  “Yes, baby?”

  “Ma-me.” That's all he says. That's all he'll ever say, so the doctors tell her. “Ma-me?” Terry doesn't think so. He says the doctors don't know squat—after all, they're not fortune-tellers. The boy who is William can snap out of it at any moment or, hell—grow out of it. Doctors don't know everything.

  She doesn't share the same notions.

  She closes her eyes, allowing the sunlight to bathe her before she slips into the darkness the shed provides. “Do you want to play a game?”

  “Ma-me.”

  She opens the shed door. With a hand on William's back, she guides him inside.

  “Come on, honey. Let's play a game.”

  “Ma-me.”

  They walk inside. The shed stands completely empty. Since the house has two garages, there is no need for the extra space.

  She closes the door behind them, shutting out the light. The only brightness in the room comes from the lone window opposite the wall from where they had entered. Everywhere else is dark and painted with shadows. “Close your eyes, pumpkin.”

  William does as he's told. Such a good little boy, obedient. Always does as he's told.

  She takes the kitchen knife she's been lugging around all day, the same weapon that would later be wielded by her husband, the same one that nearly ends her life.

  “Keep your eyes closed, baby.” She's crying now. In her mind, music plays. A sad song. Like the end of a sad movie when the credits are rolling. “Keep your eyes closed for mommy.”

  Like the good boy he is, William does as he's told.

  “Ma-me,” he says.

  And she brings down the knife.]

  “The cops found this knife,” Terry whispered into her ear. “They found the weapon.”

  “No DNA,” she said, her voice projecting into the darkness coating the shed's interior. An endless voice responded with still silence. “No DNA, and no body.”

  “Where did you put him?” Terry asked, putting the knife back to her throat. She felt the chalky
dust of the sheetrock on her skin. “Please tell me, Angela,” Terry cried. “For the love of God and all that is holy, please tell me what you did with our son, William. Did you give it to them? Did you give it those monsters?”

  “He's safe,” she whispered. “He's in a safe, safe place.”

  [The knife comes down, the metal blade sinking inches into the wooden floorboards. She backs the knife out of the uncovered subfloor and screams with frustration. The noise is loud and bestial, unsettling to human ears. She barely recognizes the sound as her own and she briefly wonders if it was, or if there was something else in the shed with her besides her damaged son.

  William only stares blankly at his mother and asks, “Ma-me?”]

  “He's in the Everywhere,” Angela said, turning to her husband, no longer concerned with the knife at her throat. “This whole time we worried that our William is dead. But he's not. He's safe. He's alive, Terry, and he's safe!”

  She recalled the pharmacist and her infinite words of wisdom: “He's still alive,” she had said, and wondered if the dream goblin had touched the woman from beyond, briefly hijacked her subconscious. In any case, the girl was right.

  William was alive.

  Somewhere.

  [A crowded mall during peak shopping hours. A galley of benches. Angela sits down next to a couple who seems around the same age as she. She stations William between them.

  “Thank you for showing up,” the woman says, speaking in a low tone and refusing to glance in her direction. Both strangers sport dark sunglasses. The man has a baseball cap pulled down, the brim shielding the upper half of his face.

  The mall is alive with shoppers and their passing conversations are enough to drown out their own.

  “No problem,” Angela says, her voice unsteady. She tries to keep her cool. She tries not to lose her shit. Terry has already grown suspicious, she's certain of it. He's noticed her odd behavior over the last week. He's been busy with work, so they haven't had time to “talk”, but she knows he'll ask. The what's-wrong-with-you-nothing-honey conversation is inevitable. “Can we make this quick?”

  “Ma-me,” William says.

  “He looks precious,” the woman says.

  “He's perfect,” the man concurs.

  Angela feels her stomach flip, her insides liquefying. Everything feels like jelly.]

  “He's alive,” Angela said, almost as if she were pleading. “Terry, he's alive and safe.”

  “No, Angela,” her husband said, dropping the knife to his side. “No, he's gone. And you killed him. You killed him when you lost him. When you gave up on him.”

  Angela's face contorted. “I did not kill my son. I did not. Do you hear me? I DID NOT KILL HIM.”

  [Angela kisses her good boy on the top of his head.

  With no discernible expression, he looks up at her and says, “Ma-me.”

  “May we ask what happened?” the man asks, pointing to his head. “Mentally, I mean.”

  Angela keeps her lips pressed against his scalp. She looks at the man, shooting him a sharp glance. “Just born that way. That's what they told me.”

  The woman doesn't act concerned. “He's perfect. Our client will be happy.”

  “Client. William won't be... in any danger, will he?”

  The strangers shake their heads. The man speaks up first.“No, nothing like that. Our client is a very wealthy woman who enjoys helping those less fortunate. Those with certain mental abilities... they interest her.”

  “Abilities?” Angela asks, almost laughing. “You mean deficiencies?”

  Neither stranger answers.

  Angela lets the comment go, hoping the conversation will swing in another direction, toward the end. She doesn't enjoy the intense panic building in her chest, the numbness in her entire body. She'll consider herself lucky if she walks away from this thing without having a heart attack.

  “I have to ask,” Angela says, changing the subject. “How will you do it? Legally, I mean.”

  The woman answers promptly: “We have birth certificates, social security cards—we even have pictures of your son with our client, from birth on. Photoshopped. Very professional. Very credible. No one will question it. Trust me.”

  “This isn't our first rodeo,” the man says, and there is something about his confidence that causes Angela's bones to shake.

  “Are you ready to do this?” the woman asks.

  “I think so,” Angela answers, and she can't believe those words fly from her mouth so quickly.

  “Did you destroy your hard drive?”

  Angela nods. “Local computer nerd assured me our conversations will never see the light of day. I had to tell him I was cheating on my husband. I paid him in cash.”

  “Good.” The man rubs the top of William's head. “Such a good boy.”

  “Don't seek us out,” the woman adds. “If you try to find us or locate William, they will kill you.”

  Kill me?

  “Excuse me?” Angela asks.

  The man cracks a nervous smile. “That won't be necessary, Sharon,” he says, then turns to Angela. “Right?”

  “Right,” she squeaks in response.

  Who are these people?

  “I have to ask... you know... for my own knowledge... but why? Why William? There are plenty of kids in the system? Why did you seek out my boy?”

  The strangers look at each other, then shrug as if to say, no-harm-in-telling-you.

  “Our client has her reasons,” the woman says. “She's kept an eye on William for quite some time now.”

  “He's a very special boy.”

  But how? she wanted to ask but couldn't locate the courage to further the odd, unsettling conversation.

  “I'm afraid we can't elaborate beyond that,” the woman adds.

  “I was just curious.”

  “Well, don't be,” she says, her attitude changing, her voice cold and harsh. “You know about curiosity—it kills cats.”]

  “I DID NOT KILL HIM.”

  There was a terrible look in her eyes. Terry glared at her with an equally murderous gaze.

  She breathed hard. Her chest heaved in rapid succession.

  Terry gritted his teeth, the muscles in his neck becoming visible cords. The knife fell from his hand and landed on the ground. “What did you do with him? Who took him from you? No one disappears, Angela. Fuck this dream goblin bullshit! You did something with him! I know it!”

  [She begins to sob]

  “I put him in a safe place,” she said, her face glistening in the moonlight.

  [“You'll keep him safe?”]

  “Why?” Terry asked, the knife falling to the turned soil. He put his hands on the side of his head. “Why did you do anything with him? He was our son!” She's never seen her husband cry so much before. As he wept, his entire body shuddered with the rhythm of his outbursts.

  [“He's safe with her. Where he's going, he'll have lots of friends to keep him company. The other boys and girls, special like him.”]

  “I couldn't do it, Terry. I couldn't look at him anymore. I just couldn't. I know that makes me a horrible a person, but I couldn't do it.”

  “You bitch,” he spat. “You bitch! YOU KILLED OUR SON!”

  The blade near her feet reflected moonlight, catching her eye.

  “I told you, I didn't kill him.”

  Quicker than Terry could react, she went for the knife.

  [They each take one of William's hands and begin walking, toward the hustling throng of shoppers.

  William glances back over his shoulder. Their eyes connect for one final moment.

  “Ma-me,” he says.

  She closes her eyes as a wave of dysphoria bowls her over.

  “Ma-me?”

  When she opens them, the trio is farther, about to be swallowed up amongst the bustling pedestrians. She focuses on William's face, and she briefly thinks his face is filled with worry, which isn't possible because William doesn't worry, never has. He doesn't laugh or smile, frown o
r get angry. He doesn't do much at all. He's just...

  ...he's just William.

  That's all he'll ever be.

  She begins working on her lies, training herself to believe them.]

  Terry bolted forward, grabbed for the knife, but he was too late. She snatched it first, and he immediately altered his intentions. Instead of scrambling on the floor for the only weapon, he barreled into his wife and knocked her back, sending her inside the shed.

  The interior was utterly dark, the only light filtering in through the open door and the small awning window opposite the entryway. She wore the darkness like a cocoon, immediately crouching on her toes and creeping over to the darkest corner.

  A shadow filled the entryway.

  “Angela... why? Why did you do this to us? Why? Why? WHY?”

  No more questions, she decided.

  As he stepped foot inside the shed, she rushed forward, jamming the knife into where she thought her husband's neck was. A wet sucking sound interrupted the silence, leaving her ears as quickly as it had arrived. A sticky warmth flowed over her fingers, down her hands, tickling the nerves of her soft skin. With force, she withdrew the blade, and this time the wetness dotted her face.

  Terry stumbled into the puddle of moonlight in the center of the shed with both hands wrapped around his neck, gushes of crimson squirting through the cracks of his fingers.

  “I told you...” she said through her teeth, “I didn't kill our son. He's still alive. He is safe. He is with her in the Everywhere, you dumb fucking bastard!” She stabbed him again, this time in the back, between the shoulder blades. “YOU NEVER LISTENED TO ME!” She slipped the knife inside him again, this time in the ribcage, retracting it, stabbing, retracting it, stabbing, repeating the process over and over; flowers of scarlet blooming across his midsection. “YOU NEVER PAID ATTENTION! YOU WERE NEVER THERE FOR ME!” The next swipe slashed up his arm, ripping open fabric and flesh, creating a dark red furrow which spat copious amounts of blood. She drove the blade up under his arm, penetrating the soft muscle of his armpit. The blade stopped when it struck bone. “You never understood how I felt,” she said, more calmly now. “About William. About our situation.” She ripped the knife free and pointed it behind her, back toward the house. Scarlet dripped steadily off the tip. “About this house. I hate this fucking house. I never wanted to move here and you NEVER FUCKING LISTENED TO ME!”