by Etta Faire
“Yes.” He nodded. “I must’ve been hallucinating I’ve been under a tremendous amount of stress lately. The restaurant’s not doing as well as I need it to. I must get rid of this problem once and for all.”
“We’re trying. Just tell us what happened,” Rosalie said.
Mr. Peters went on. “I remember walking toward the hole, and I guess I got too close.”
Rosalie’s face went pale. “Are you crazy?”
“It wasn’t my brightest moment. But I had to follow the voices.”
“Voices?’ I said, practically shouting. Now, I wasn’t sure. Maybe he really was hallucinating.
He sat up, his thin blue hospital gown falling forward with him. He pulled it safely closed along his shoulders then continued. “Yes, voices coming from the hole in the wall. The closer I got the clearer the words. It was a woman’s voice saying something like tick tock, but it was more like Dick Dock. Dick Dock. It was weird. Then someone else said something about being sick of this dick. And are we playing cards or what?”
I gasped.
“What?”
“Nothing,” I said. “That’s just very interesting. I’ll have to look into that.”
“Into my hallucination?”
Mr. Peters’s voice was weak and raspy, and every once in a while he paused to take a deeper breath. “But when I got about three feet away, just as I was noticing a little metal horse, it suddenly felt like the wall took a huge inhale. And I was sucked into the hole. I think it spit me back out again. I don’t know. I blacked out from then on.”
“Ohmygosh, Louis. I’m so sorry,” Rosalie said again, touching his arm, tracing a finger along his bandage. “I’m so thankful you’re okay.”
“Yes, I’m okay. I’m sorry too. I should never have asked you to do things for me for free. And now, look at me. An old fool with a huge hospital bill.” He was staring into my boss’s eyes, and she was only looking back at him. And they both got their goofy smiles back.
I snuck out during the love-fest staring contest, trying to think of a way to get in touch with my weak ex-husband.
One thing was certain, though. Those wall voices had come straight from my channeling, and I had no idea what that meant. But worse, the thing had sucked Mr. Peters in and spit him out probably because he wasn’t the one meant to go in there.
Chapter 22
Hole in the Wall
Rosalie lectured me the whole way over to the restaurant Sunday morning. Except that it was more like crazy yelling.
Her tirade started the moment I told her the conversation Mr. Peters overheard by the vortex was the same one I also heard in my channeling with Feldman.
So now, she was convinced my channelings were the cause of everyone’s problems, down to her bad hip, I think.
I ignored her as I drove. The weather was nicer today. The news said it might even hit 65. I rolled the window down, trying to feel the breeze along my face, taking a deep breath as I bounced over every pot hole on the drive. Life seemed different since my last channeling. Or at least I felt different. More powerful. More in control.
I stopped at the light by Potter Grove Methodist, the typical brown rectangular church most the locals attended. Music streamed from the sanctuary, and I giggled at the irony. “Good people are heading to church right now. While we are literally headed someplace else.”
Rosalie was still yelling about how I was the one who’d created the vortex, when she stopped and giggled too. “Those good people ought to be thankful we’re heading to the gates of hell, honestly. I’ve been reading up on the vortex. Things are only going to get worse if we can’t stop this. One farmer claimed he lost four goats, almost an entire crop of beans, and a mother-in-law before he was able to close the gate again. Of course, this story happened in the 1600s.”
“And he happened to hate his mother-in-law,” I added, driving away from the church. “How’d he close the gate?”
“Didn’t say. But there’s a recipe in the book. Of course, the ingredients are very expensive…” She let her voice hang there at the end, like she expected me to jump right in and offer to pay for it.
Looking down at my steering wheel, I felt the guilt pour over me. This whole thing was my fault, kind of. “I can ask Ronald if the estate will cover the costs again, but last time I could tell he really didn’t want to do it.”
We passed the Spoony River Cafe and I craned my neck to see if Shelby’s Cadillac was there. I didn’t see it, but it was still pretty early.
“Whole town’s looking for Bobby now that there’s a reward. You joining the task force?” Rosalie asked.
“I don’t need half off the gym,” I said. “I canceled my membership after I realized I hated exercising. But, I’ll probably still join a search party soon. I hope all of this attention brings up Shelby’s spirit. Gives her a little hope.”
Chez Louie was dark and quiet again, but this time I didn’t think it was the strong ghost causing it. Like the Purple Pony and most other businesses in Landover County, fancy dining places didn’t open until they were good and ready, which was usually around eleven.
I looked at the clock on my dashboard. 9:10. We sat in the car for a minute before either of us went for the door. “I’m a little nervous about this,” I finally admitted, pulling my door handle.
“I’d be worried if you weren’t worried.” Rosalie was right behind me.
The strong smell of sulphur seemed to take over the parking lot. The last time I was here, that smell was restricted to the basement. Now, it was everywhere.
I also felt something. A heavy presence coming from the restaurant.
Rosalie waved a hand by her nose and sniffed back a tear. “Not what you’d expect to smell from fine dining,” she said.
My eyes stung and I coughed into my elbow. The stench was so strong I could taste it sitting along my tongue. I popped my hatch and grabbed my bike helmet from the back. The shiny silver coating gleamed in the sunlight.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Rosalie said when she saw me stuffing my curls into the sides and clipping the strap.
“I bought this a few months ago, when I first learned that the penetrating-skull birds might be back.”
The helmet was a little loose so I pulled on the strap like I knew how to adjust it. Looking up, I noticed Rosalie staring at me, mouth open.
She took a wobbly step back. “You really think an oversized bike helmet is going to save you from whatever the hell the gates to the hosts of evil is?”
I shook my head “no” and the bike helmet slid along my hairline with the movement. “It’s all I have, though.”
“You got another one?” she asked, as I closed the hatch.
We made our way over to the basement, and the sulphur smell grew even stronger. Rosalie took her sweater off, exposing her large bare arms. She draped her cardigan over her nose and mouth and tied the sleeves in the back.
I resisted the urge to take a selfie. Me in my helmet, and Rosalie in her sweater mask.
The staircase seemed darker than what it should have been considering how light it was outside. And the temperature dropped as soon as I hit the first step. My teeth chattered and I almost snatched Rosalie’s cardigan from her face.
There was definitely a presence here, trying to make a connection with me, making my skin crawl with the sensation of fingers tickling my neck. I refused to focus on it, and instead kept my eyes on the stairwell and the old wooden door in front of me, reminding myself that I was in control.
Mr. Peters had given us a key, and I was just about to jab it into the lock when it occurred to me we didn’t really have a plan. I turned to the woman coughing into her sweater mask next to me.
“We’re just going to see the vortex for ourselves,” I said. “From a safe distance. We’re not actually stepping inside the speakeasy.”
I got my phone out, covered my nose and face with the edge of my t-shirt, took a deep breath, and unlocked the door.
Rosalie grabbed my arm
before I opened the door. “Did you hear that?” she asked. I hadn’t heard anything strange, but I took my hand off the door knob and concentrated on the sounds around me.
It was unmistakable. The sound of breathing was all around me. Very loud and slow, making me wonder why I hadn’t heard it sooner. But then my own breathing had been louder than normal… I took another large inhale. And so did the thing inside, at the same time, which seemed strange.
Just to rule out the possibility, I held my breath. The breathing inside the basement stopped too. I quickly exhaled, same as the vortex.
“What are we waiting for?” Rosalie asked, motioning toward the door.
“Nothing,” I answered, because when your breathing happens to be exactly in time with whatever is breathing in the gates of hell, you keep it to yourself. And act natural.
But whatever it was, it obviously wanted me to know it knew I was here. And that we had made our connection.
I gulped and opened the door.
The door swung open with a sticky kind of sound I wasn’t expecting. I blinked around the dark room, shining my phone’s flashlight this way and that, willing my eyes to adjust already so I could see the hole and get the heck out.
Problem was, my eyes watered from the stench surrounding me and I was having a hard time seeing anything. Rosalie pointed toward the back wall where tiny white specks drifted around randomly. Heavy breathing in time with my own echoed off the wall, making me feel like I was standing in the doorway of a giant MRI machine. Every exhale blew huge, cold gusts of sulphur-smells in our direction.
But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get my eyes to adjust to the room enough to see the hole accurately. I focused on the specks, realizing they were probably papers, and they didn’t seem to be blowing around the back of the wall after all. They were blowing around inside the hole.
I realized the hole was the entire length of the wall now.
“This is bigger than the waiter described,” Rosalie said. “We need to go.”
My heart quickened and so did my breath, which caused the thing to breathe faster too. The force sucked me into the room, and Rosalie screamed through her cardigan.
I fumbled through the gust that was pulling me, trying to grab something, anything — the door frame, one of the support beams, the bar — but I couldn’t. It was the horrible sensation of being out of control.
Somehow, I got it together enough to hold my breath. The thing did too, and I fell hard along the floorboards. My head smacked against my helmet, sending a pain down my neck and over to my shoulders. I looked at the wall. The tiny floating bits of paper had fallen as well.
I scrambled to my feet, my lungs already aching because they wanted to inhale. I was never a strong swimmer, so holding my breath was not something I was used to. My head already throbbed with the feeling I was going to pass out if I didn’t inhale.
I made it over to the support beam in the middle of the room and held on. Looking around for the horse that Mr. Peters said he saw in here the night he got hurt, I spotted it by the end of the bar closest to the hole opening. I took a strong, long inhale, and let my legs suck toward the vortex. My hands stung against the force of the air being sucked around me but I refused to let go. Then when my lungs were full, I held my breath again, dropped to the floor, hobbled over to the bar, and grabbed for the horse. It fell to the floor, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get it. My lungs hurt. My face hurt. I hop-ran over to the exit as quickly as I could.
Rosalie reached for my hand and pulled me out of the basement, quickly closing the door and locking it.
I practically collapsed onto the first step as I assessed my injuries and took my helmet off.
Rosalie mumble-screamed through the sweater still draped over her face. It sounded like, “What in the hell was that all about?”
“I’m not sure,” I replied. “But you were right. I’m going to need more than this bike helmet.”
Chapter 23
The Stories We tell ourselves
My head and shoulders still ached the next day when I stumbled into the library like a woman finally coming home from a week-long bachelorette party. I scratched at my still-numb head, trying to wake up and feel something.
I had a ton of research to do before the channeling later that evening, but I was mostly there because it was the one place Jackson seemed to be able to reach, or at least that’s what I was hoping.
I needed to tell him about the vortex while also looking up stuff on the Kentucky Derby, the author Feldman knew from New York, the side effects of sapientia formula…
Children’s laughter interrupted my thoughts.
“There she is,” Mrs. Nebitt said from across the library. “We thought you forgot about story time.”
I looked around, stunned with fear. The children’s section was full. Shelby, Parker, and Lila sat in chairs with their children in front of them.
Shoot. I’d forgotten about story time.
I waved. “Sorry, I’m late,” I said, still unsure why I’d agreed to do these things for Mrs. Nebitt once a month anyway.
Mrs. Nebitt waddled over to me, handed me the book she was about to read, and gave me the once-over. Then she curled her lip.
I knew why. I was dressed like I wasn’t taking my library duties very seriously, in my torn jeans and stained sweatshirt. I smoothed down my curls that were probably all over the place from me rubbing my aching head.
I always planned to step it up and look professionally cute, but it’s kind of hard when your days are filled with things like almost being sucked down the throat of the vortex to hell.
I decided not to share my excuse. It didn’t matter anyway. She’d already made her way back to the front desk and I was left with a section full of children, staring at me. Fortunately, it was not a large section. But it still wasn’t where my mind was at.
I glanced at the book in my hand as I walked over to my audience. “Hi everyone. Looks like Mrs. Nebitt picked out The Very Hungry Vortex of Evil…” I coughed over my words. “Of course, I mean caterpillar.”
At least the faint laughter to my right was comforting. Jackson was here after all.
Shelby looked healthier today. Her cheeks had natural color through her makeup and she was smiling when she approached me after story time with Bobby Jr. on her hip.
“I cannot believe how many people signed up for the task force to find Bobby,” she said, making me feel guilty because I hadn’t done it yet. “It’s like the whole town cares.”
Parker and Lila were right behind her as their children ran wild through the stacks. Mrs. Nebitt glared at me, like I was one of the children’s parents.
“Told you it would get the community together,” Parker said, putting a hand on Lila’s shoulder. “And all thanks to the Donovan family.”
I smiled politely even though I wanted to hurl, and it wasn’t because Parker was putting his hand on another woman. It was because that woman was a Donovan.
“Yes, thank you, Lila. You too, Parker,” Shelby said, hugging them good-bye before leaving the library. She almost forgot to hug me. The friend she’d known for more than ten years.
This was all about that stupid this task-force thing.
Parker ran a hand through his thick, light brown hair. “I am the luckiest man alive,” he said to Lila, with the kind of voice that led me to believe he and Lila might be more than just task-force buddies. “First a job. Then our kids are best friends. And now, we’re helping the community together.”
They kissed, and I almost fell into the carousal rack of paperbacks behind me. I looked away.
“Ew,” Clarisse and Lil Mil said when they saw them kissing. They quickly turned around and ran in the opposite direction. And Mrs. Nebitt shot me another look.
“So you two are a couple,” I asked. “Congratulations.”
Lila smiled. Her short, sleek, yellow dress and bright blue jacket looked straight out of the pages of Vogue. And whenever she laughed at something Parke
r said (which was nauseatingly often), she’d flip her perfectly highlighted hair to the side, with manicured fingernails. I checked. She looked professionally cute, the way I always intended to look if life would stop tossing me into vortices already.
The Donovans were by far the richest family on the lake. And Parker Blueberg was part of a family that still lived in their original, now-tilting house from the 1940s. Although it was completely possible these two were a legitimate couple, it was also very suspicious.
I felt like Feldman watching Flo Donovan slumming it with his brother, right before he got his throat sliced.
“I’m so lucky,” Parker said, again.
“No, I’m the lucky one.” Lila laughed. Her voice sounded eerily similar to one of the voices in the backroom of George’s barbershop. She turned to me. “There’s another task-force meeting tomorrow. You should join us. Take a stand.”
You should join us. Take a stand. That was the exact phrase someone had said to George that night, and in that exact voice.
She looked at me sideways, almost as if she was daring me to call her out on it. I didn’t take the bait.
“I would. That sounds incredibly helpful to the community, but I’m busy tomorrow,” I replied. I didn’t mention that I was busy trying to close the gates of hell, but I think it was understood.
“Well, I hope to see you tomorrow at 10:00. Landover Park and Rec,” Parker said.
As soon as they all left, I searched the library for my ex-husband, peeking around the cabinets in the periodicals section. “Jackson,” I whisper-yelled into the air.
He barely appeared, only a very faint smoky gray outline over the table by the research computer. He had almost zero color to him, and I couldn’t make out any of his facial features, or even where his face was. It seemed to morph together with his neck. I gasped. “Are you okay?” I whispered.
“Never better,” he dead-panned, voice barely audible.