The House We Haunted and Other Stories

by Amy Cross

  "You're drunk," I point out.

  "I'm not drunk," he replies, as if it's the dumbest thing he's ever heard. "A couple of glasses of whiskey are not enough to get me drunk. What do you think I am, a lightweight? I can handle my drink."

  "Can't you just stay the night?" I ask.

  He lets out an amused grunt.

  "I'm serious," I continue. "Kate's gone. Don't you think we should try to stick together? Would it really hurt to stay one more night? We could talk and maybe think about the good times."

  Stopping by the door, he turns to me. "In this place? You've got to be kidding, right? There's no way I'm spending another night in here. Not ever. You'd just start trying to tell me stupid ghost stories, and the whole thing would just become morbid. Maybe that's your idea of fun, but I'm done with it."

  "Can't you just do it for me?" I ask.

  "We're not kids anymore," he continues. "We don't have to sit around, holding each other's hands. Dad's here, and Luke's staying for a few more days. You won't be alone. Even if I stayed, I'd go tomorrow, and then what would you do?" He pauses. "At some point, Ellen, you have to start doing things on your own again. When we were kids, we used to hang out together, but we're adults and we've got lives. Some of us, anyway. It's not healthy to sit around here and think about the past. That's what Kate did, and look how things turned out for her."

  As he heads out to the landing and then makes his way downstairs, I linger alone in the room for a moment. I know I should go after him, and I should definitely get hold of his car keys and make sure he doesn't drive away. Then again, there's a part of me that no longer really cares so much about the people around me. If John wants to risk being pulled over, or worse, then that's his problem. I was always much closer to Kate than to my brother, and I don't see why or how that's ever going to change. For better or for worse, he's found a way to cope.

  In some ways, it's probably better if John isn't here over the next few days. He's not really a part of this.

  Chapter Four

  Ellen

  "Well that was fast," Luke says as the front door swings shut.

  I open my mouth to reply, but I don't really know what to say. When all the guests left an hour ago, I figured I was in for an excruciatingly painful evening in the house with just Dad and Luke, but Dad suddenly announced that he'd booked himself a holiday in Turkey. He even had his bag already packed, and with his usual brusque lack of care for the needs of other people, he called a taxi and got ready to go to the airport. I should have guessed that he'd take the first opportunity to run away from everything, but I figured he'd at least have the decency to stick around for a day or two. Instead, he's leaving for a week, and although he'll be back next Monday, it's clear that he has no patience for everything that's happening here.

  He can't face the truth.

  "I'm here for a couple more nights," Luke says as we stand in the hallway. "I mean, if that's okay with you. It's just a bit hard to go and stay in a hotel with Wilbur, so I talked to your Dad and he said he's fine with us sticking around until things are a bit more settled."

  "Sure," I reply, even though I'm still trying to make sense of everything.

  "I've found a place I can rent a few miles away," he continues. "It's not the best place in the world, but -"

  "Don't worry about it," I reply, cutting him off. "Stay as long as you want. I guess I'm going to be here, going through Kate's stuff and..." My voice trails off as I realize that the task of sorting through her belongings is going to be infinitely harder than I'd anticipated. At the same time, I'm looking forward to being surrounded by her things and her smells again.

  "I already went through some of it," he says after a moment.

  "You did?" I feel a little flare of anger in my gut, but it quickly passes. I guess it's natural for Luke to want to help, even though really it's all my job. He was her boyfriend, but I'm her sister and now that she's gone, I'm the one who should take charge of dealing with all the things she left behind. Before I take my revenge on the house, I need to gather Kate's possessions and get them out of here.

  "Don't worry," he adds, "I didn't throw anything away. I wouldn't even know where to start."

  "We don't have to keep everything," I point out. "It's just a matter of looking after the important things." I pause for a moment as I realize that there's no way Luke can possibly know which of Kate's possessions are important; he'll probably want to keep things that remind him of their time together, whereas I'm more interested in personal items such as hairbrushes and clothes and anything else that might still contain a part of her.

  "Your Mum left pretty quickly," he says after a moment.

  "I'm surprised she even came," I reply. "She and Dad don't exactly get on very well these days."

  "At least there wasn't an argument."

  I smile politely. Mum was like a dark cloud all through the funeral, and it's clear that she blames everyone but herself for what happened to Kate. Me, Dad, John, Luke... She probably has it all worked out in her head, when the truth is that she was more responsible than anyone for the nightmares we endured as children. I guess she thinks her conscience is clear, but in reality she has as much blood on her hands as anyone. Sometimes, I want to just grab her fat head and scream into her ears until she understands the misery she forced us to go through. It's not her fault that the house was this way, but it is her fault that we were all too crippled to deal with it.

  Then again, sometimes I wonder if she was aware of the ghosts. Maybe that would explain her behavior...

  "To be honest," Luke continues, "I think it'd be useful to start looking at her things. I don't really have anything else to do, and it's one of those jobs that's just going to hang over us until we get started. I figured I'd spend the next few days just sorting through everything, working out what to keep and what to throw away. Someone also needs to go to her apartment. There's not much stuff there, but -"

  "I'll go," I say firmly.

  "Okay," he replies. "I can stay here and go through her wardrobe -"

  "I'll do that too," I tell him.

  "Well, I should help -"

  "Please," I continue, "just let me do it. I think I know what needs to be done with everything."

  He pauses, and it's clear that although he wants to argue with me, he's too polite to kick up much of a fuss.

  "Sure," he mutters after a moment. "I think I'll make some tea. Do you want some?"

  I shake my head, and as he heads through to the kitchen, I find myself contemplating my next move. I thought that Dad would be here for the next few days, and that he and Luke would keep each other distracted while I worked on my plan. Instead, I'm stuck here with just Luke for company, and that means that I'm facing a much more direct challenge. I get on fine with him, but I've never really got to know him too well, and I can't deny that there's a hint of awkwardness about the whole situation. As I listen to him setting the kettle on to boil, I realize that somehow I have to turn this unexpected development into a positive.

  First, though, I need time to think.

  "I'm going to go and look at her apartment," I call out, before hurrying to the door.

  "Are you sure you don't need help?" he asks.

  "I'll be fine," I reply, hurriedly slipping into my coat before heading outside. I don't know why, but I'm suddenly gripped by a sense of panic, and I feel as if I need to get out of the house for a few hours. By the time I reach the bus stop, I've managed to calm down a little, but I still can't stop worrying about what I'll do tonight. Just when I thought I'd got the house in my sights, something has come along to unsettle me, and I know I'm going to have to take time to determine my next move.

  As I wait for the bus, I glance down at my hands and after a moment I notice a spot of blood on the sleeve of my coat. I wipe it away, but I have no idea where it came from.

  Chapter Five

  Ellen

  "Do you ever get this weird feeling in the pit of your stomach?" I ask, leaning across Tom and gr
abbing my phone from the table by the bed. "Like, something's wrong somewhere far away, and you don't know what yet, but..." I pause as I double-check that I've got no messages or missed calls. "Just a feeling," I add. "Like waves reaching out."

  "Waves?" he replies with a smile. "I'm not sure I've ever felt waves reaching out to me."

  "You know what I mean," I mutter, putting the phone down before rolling back to my side of the bed and pulling the sheet up to cover my bare chest.

  "Have you got that feeling now?" he asks.

  I nod.

  "When did it come on?"

  "A few minutes ago," I tell him. "Like suddenly something just punched me in the gut, like the universe was trying to get my attention but I don't know what I'm supposed to be looking at." I pause for a moment. "I felt it the night Kate died, and I feel it now."

  "Maybe it's my fault," he replies. "Maybe I'm so bad in bed, I actually make people feel like that."

  I smile politely, but the truth is, I don't appreciate the joke. When Tom came to town a few weeks ago, I was pleased to see him and he was a useful distraction from the build-up to Kate's funeral. We'd stayed in touch after Hong Kong, but I never really felt that we were destined to be great friends. Unfortunately, we met up for a drink and things kind of snowballed from there, and this is now the third time in the past week that we've hooked up. I keep telling myself that each session is going to be the last, but deep down I know that I don't really have the nerve to turn him down. He'll probably want to have sex again tomorrow, and I'll probably agree. It's just how things go.

  "You're worried about something," he continues. "I remember that look. You had it a lot in Hong Kong. At the end, anyway. I always felt that something must have happened, but you never really talked about it. I tried bringing it up a few times, but you were always good at changing the subject. Sometimes, I felt as if you'd become a different person." He pauses, waiting for me to reply. "I worried about you," he adds. "I know that probably sounds crazy and a bit weird, but it's true. I could see this pain in your eyes, but I didn't know what to do."

  "It's just my family," I tell him. "They cause problems."

  "The funeral must have been hard," he replies.

  I nod.

  "I could have come, you know."

  "No," I reply. "That wouldn't have helped. There were already too many people there."

  "I can't imagine what it's like to have to bury your sister," he adds. "Especially when everyone knows that she..." He pauses. "Sorry, I shouldn't talk about it. It's just, sometimes I feel as if you're going through all of this stuff alone, and that seems totally unfair. It must have been difficult dealing with all the questions today, and all the people who were milling around, not wanting to say the wrong thing."

  "It wasn't that," I continue. "It's..." I pause for a moment as I think back to the way the day unfolded. For a few seconds, I feel as if the whole thing was something that happened to someone else, and I was just watching through a glass screen. "The funeral was okay," I add eventually. "It's everything else. My Mum left pretty early, and then my Dad announced he was going on holiday... and John couldn't even stand to stick around for a few more hours. I feel like everything's disintegrating..."

  I pause for a moment.

  "I tried to kill myself a few years ago," I say eventually, before turning to see a stunned look on his face. "It was a little while after I came back from Hong Kong. I'm sorry if this is totally the wrong time to tell you this, but it's important. I thought it was the right thing to do at the time... I thought it would solve everyone's problems, so I climbed a fence and started walking along the train tracks near the house where I used to live. I really thought I was going to die, but the train stopped in time and this angry conductor pulled me up. I only really had the guts to try it one time. Since then, I've kind of just been trying to find some other way forward."

  An awkward silence descends for a moment.

  "Why did you try to do that?" he asks eventually.

  "I thought..." Pausing again, I realize that he'll probably think I'm insane if I tell him the truth. Then again, I've had enough of lying. "I thought that somehow it might balance things out," I say eventually. "I thought that somehow it was necessary, and that if I did it, everyone else would be left alone."

  "Left alone by what?"

  "The house."

  He frowns.

  "It's complicated," I add, realizing that there's no way I can ever really explain how things have been. "At the time, in my head, it made total sense. It doesn't now, but I've always been worried that one day I'll suddenly go back to that kind of thinking, and it'll make sense again and then I'll..." My voice trails off as I realize that I probably sound as if I'm completely unstable.

  "I'm glad you didn't," he says after a moment.

  I force a smile.

  "Aren't you glad?" he asks. "I mean, I know things are bad right now, but aren't you happy you made the right choice?"

  "Of course," I reply, although I can tell that he's not entirely convinced. "It's just that I often wonder what would have happened if things had worked out differently that day. If the train hadn't stopped in time and I'd been..." I pause for a moment as I try to imagine how it would have felt as the train hit me. "Maybe everything would have been better," I continue. "For everyone else, I mean. Maybe if I'd been brave enough, it would have been like I was sacrificing myself in order to save the family."

  "That doesn't make any sense," he points out.

  "It does to me," I reply quietly.

  "The way you talk," he continues, "it's like you think there's someone watching you. I mean, how would your death balance things out?"

  "Maybe it's..." I take a deep breath as I try to decide whether I should tell him everything. "It was just a thought," I add eventually, forcing another smile. "I guess I was just running through some things out loud."

  "So you're glad you didn't die that day?"

  I nod. He's not the first person who's ever asked me that question, and I always give the same answer, even though it's not true.

  "I really don't think death by train is a great way to go," he adds, clearly unable to talk for too long without injecting some flippancy into the conversation. "I bet everyone you left behind would've been really upset, Ellen. I know I'd have been gutted if I'd found out that you were dead."

  "Well," I reply, "I'm glad I didn't gut you."

  "Come here," he continues, reaching under the sheets and putting a hand on my bare waist. "I want to tell you something. I hope you don't mind, but it's important. I've been waiting for the right moment, but I don't think there's ever going to be a right moment, so I guess I should just get it over with."

  "I think I have to go," I reply, pulling away and getting out of bed. My clothes are in a neat little pile on the floor, and I keep my back to him as I start getting dressed. I suddenly feel intensely embarrassed by the whole situation, and I just want to get out of here. There's an antsy, unsettled feeling in the pit of my stomach, and lolling around in bed with Tom isn't going to solve anything. Hopefully I've scared him off, so at least I won't end up being persuaded to sleep with him again tomorrow.

  "Are you okay?" he asks as I grab my coat and head to the door.

  "Yeah," I reply, glancing over and seeing the confused look on his face. "I was only supposed to be going out to look for things at Kate's apartment. I don't really know why I called you, I just... I guess I wanted to be with someone, even if it was only for a few hours."

  "Do you want to hang out tomorrow?" he asks.

  I pause at the door. "Sure," I say eventually, even though I really hate the idea. "Give me a text or something."

  Once I've left the house and I'm out on the street, I realize that there's a growing presence all around me. I hurry along the busy pavement, but I have to constantly glance over my shoulder to make sure that I'm not being followed. No matter what I do, however, I feel as if someone's watching me. I've felt the same kind of thing before, but never quite so
strongly. This time, it's as if there's a new kind of urgency to the presence, and I can't help feeling that it's going to reach out and strike me at any moment.

  When I get to the bus stop, I can't help but notice that a man nearby is staring at me. I turn away from him, feeling a little creeped out by his attention, but after a moment I glance down at my shirt and notice a substantial patch of blood. I have no idea where it came from, but this is the second time today that blood has appeared from nowhere. Forcing myself to stay calm, I decide that the best thing to do is just to stick to my plan and go to Kate's apartment. It'd feel good to be surrounded by her things, by her smell...

  Once I'm there, I can work out what to do next.

  Chapter Six

  Ellen

  It takes a while, but finally I'm able to find what I'm looking for.

  Sitting fully-clothed in the dry bath, I run my finger along the tiles until I reach a faint red stain that has soaked into the grouting. It's not much, but I'm convinced it must be blood.

  Kate's blood.

  Taking a deep breath, I try to imagine what it must have been like for her to sit in this bath and end her life. I'm tempted to turn on the taps and then soak myself in warm water, just so I can experience the world in the same way that she experienced it during her final moments. Then again, I guess that would be a morbid thing to do, and it wouldn't really help me to get inside her mind. By the end of her life, Kate's thought processes were clearly all over the place, and I don't know if I'll ever really understand what she was thinking.

  Pressing my fingertip against the stained grouting, I try to get a little of the blood onto my skin, but it's too dry. I guess someone must have come along after the body was removed and cleaned the whole place up. It must be a pretty foul job, washing away the signs of someone's death, but it's not as if all the blood could have just been left here for the next tenant. Soon, someone else will take over the lease of the apartment, and they'll probably never know that someone died in here.