The Dark Corners Box Set

by Robert Scott-Norton

  She broke off, caught Lisa’s eyes, then looked away, not wanting to make this hurt any more than it already did.

  “He’s been coming up here to see a woman. Are you saying he’s having an affair?”

  “I don’t know what it means, but I suppose it’s possible.” She realised she was raising her voice, but she didn’t care. If she didn’t do what she could to release that frustration burning her up inside, she thought she would explode. How could Dad do this? How long had he been coming up here for his little affairs? How long had this one been going on?

  “We don’t know if it’s true. It’s just what she told me in the office.”

  Lisa paused. She bit her lip and glanced back at Judy’s car. It was tempting to just go back home and forget all this. But that wouldn’t solve anything, not really.

  “Let’s find him. He’s got some serious questions to answer.”

  Judy nodded. She came and took Lisa’s hand in hers and looked her straight in the eye. “We’ll do this together. There’s nothing to be worried about.”

  But she’s wrong, isn’t she? She knows nothing.

  It took them five minutes walking through the caravan site to reach the pitch which used to house Lisa’s caravan as a girl. The caravan had long been replaced, probably half a dozen times, and it seemed alien to her. If she looked through half-closed eyes, and allowed her gaze to follow the tree line, she glimpsed how things were when she was a girl, and turning back to face the way they’d come, the edges of the woods hadn’t changed much, everything was taller, but still as unwelcoming. A clear warning to not veer off the beaten track.

  They’d passed a few residents on their way, exchanged a couple of hellos, but nothing more. None of these people were familiar to her from her time here.

  “It’s like someone’s been inside my head and redrawn my memories. None of this feels right, yet it’s the place we used to come most weekends.”

  “Must be strange, coming back to your childhood haunts. It’s been such a long time since I’ve been back home. Whenever I do attempt to see my parents, I sneak a look around the old estate we used to live on. But two minutes is all I need to remind myself of why I left.”

  “Do you not miss them, being so far away?”

  Judy shrugged. “Nothing much to miss. They weren’t exactly the parenting kind. Not sure why they ever had me. I think I must have been a mistake.”

  “I wonder if that’s what I was to my parents.”

  Judy’s face reddened. “Oh, I didn’t mean it to sound so dismissive. Just I’ve never got on with them.”

  “I know that. But it doesn’t make it any less true for me. It must have been a mistake for my parents. Something mustn’t have been right when they had me and Phil. Timing, or circumstances or whatever. If we were planned, they would never have given us up for adoption, would they? That’s not what you do?”

  “People don’t always know what they’re getting into with a pregnancy. Their circumstances may have changed during the pregnancy. Money troubles, family putting too much pressure on them. Life was different forty years ago, they were living a life we can’t imagine, and to be fair, it’s not our place to imagine it. They were adults. We know that from the adoption papers. Don’t read into it what we don’t know. If you do, you will drive yourself mad with it all.”

  A dog barked as they passed in front of a caravan sited close to the road. They both jumped.

  “So, what now?” Judy asked. “Should we check out those holiday houses?”

  Lisa shivered, then drew her arms in close. The dog had unsettled her, and she placed a hand to the side of her temple, rubbing gently. The headache that had been threatening her ever since they’d arrived at the site was steadily getting worse, and the nausea she’d felt since that morning was stronger than ever. She’d hoped to never have to step foot in this caravan park again, and yet here she was, heading deeper into the unknown.

  39

  Thirty years ago

  On the face of it, there was nothing unusual about the building. A rather squat compact house, with a ground floor and one level above. The windows were dark and unwelcoming, wooden frames, once painted brown to match the dark panelling under the windows, were peeling, flakes falling off like dead skin. There were a handful of tiles missing from the roof and Lisa knew that that would cause a problem. Two windows had missing glass and had been boarded up with hardboard panels.

  The house was terminally sick and desperately unloved.

  “It’s watching us,” she murmured, more to herself than to her brother. Phil’s demeanour had changed upon the approach and he came to stand beside her now, placing an arm around her shoulders.

  “Don’t be silly, it’s a house.”

  But she felt the tremble in his body. He felt the same way. She knew him and he knew her. The gift of being a twin.

  It was quiet in the house’s clearing. The whispering breeze that had eased them along the track had muted, and although the branches of the surrounding trees were still moving, Lisa couldn’t hear them. She pressed her fingers to the back of her neck, certain that she’d felt something there. The hint of a breath. A murmur by her side.

  “I don’t like this place. Why did Dad never refurbish it? Why leave it to die like this?”

  “I don’t know. Money, I guess. It costs a lot to keep houses maintained.”

  “But these places don’t rent for cheap. The caravans are usually pretty full all year round. And the other four houses are rarely empty.”

  “How would you know that,” Phil asked, surprised.

  “I read a lot. When I’m in the site office, I see what’s in the booking ledger. And I hear him talking to Mr Melbourne.”

  Mr Melbourne was the site manager. He ran the place so Dad didn’t have to. A short fat man with spectacles, he had a slow ponderous manner about him that reminded Lisa of an ageing hippo. When he was standing in the site office behind reception, sweat would be dripping in rivulets down the sides of his forehead and he constantly seemed to have a handkerchief in his hand wiping them away.

  “Melbourne knows nothing. He’s an idiot,” Phil announced.

  “What was he doing here last night? What did you see?”

  Phil looked down at his feet, then began walking back up to the house like he’d had to psych himself up to approach. “I hung back. I didn’t want him to see me, but it was cold last night. For a while, must have been at least five minutes, he just stood in front of the house, looking up at the windows. He put out the cigarette he’d been smoking, then immediately lit up another. He really isn’t on the verge of quitting despite what he tells Mum.

  “After his second cigarette, I heard him mumbling to himself. I was too far back in the bushes to catch what he was saying, but I figured he was bothered by something. It was almost like he was laying out what he was going to do, like he was readying himself for something. Then he went in through the front door.”

  Phil stopped. He was looking up at the top window in the house, the one that had a sharp crack in the glass. It needed replacing, but this one hadn’t even had a board placed in front of it yet. Lisa hurried to stand beside him, curious as to what had caught his attention. Curious and scared as to what she might see. Coming down to this house was like stepping off the pier into the dark waters of the unknown. Once again, she felt the pressure building around her, not sure what part of her would crack first. Every fibre of her being was screaming at her to leave this place, to take Phil and run back to the caravan, taking her brother back to safety. He was too full of bravado to think straight about most things and his mind was clouded in this instance.

  But Phil was walking once again to the front door, and like an obedient puppy, she couldn’t help but follow him.

  He’d taken his eyes away from the upstairs window and was now focusing straight ahead. And he’d speeded up, eager perhaps to get this over and done with.

  “Phil, wait. Tell me what else you saw? You didn’t go into the house last ni
ght, did you?”

  “Nah, I moved closer though, found a better place to stay hidden where I could see more of the house.” He pointed to a place about twenty metres away from the front door where the shrubbery was every bit as dense as the side of the track. He’d have got a good view from back there, with coverage over all the windows on the front of the house.

  He continued to the front door; Lisa came beside him.

  And they waited.

  “What are you doing? You’re not going to go in there are you?” She was whispering. Why on earth was she whispering? There was no one inside, the place was empty.

  But if it was empty, why was Dad here in the middle of the night?

  “You said you thought he was meeting someone. Did you see anyone else?”

  Phil shrugged.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means,” he hissed, “I don’t know. But if we don’t go inside, how are we going to know for sure?”

  “We can’t go in there. That’s trespassing.”

  “Dad owns this house, just like all these other houses. It’s not trespassing if you own it, stupid.”

  And there was that little sliver of malice in his eyes that almost made her wince. Belittling her was his defence whenever he got threatened. She’d wound him up sufficiently on occasion that he’d raised a fist, ready to hit her, but then thought better of it and calmed himself. It made her brother look ugly, and it made her feel stupid and ashamed.

  “I’m not stupid,” she whispered. “I just don’t see how we’ll explain this to Dad if we get caught.”

  “We won’t get caught. No one knows we’re here. There’s no one around.”

  “The other houses,” she pointed out.

  “Are too far away to see us. Look, can you see the other houses?”

  She did as he bade and had to concede that no, there was no chance of anyone from the other houses seeing what they were doing. The trees were too dense, the branches too full of leaves.

  So, anything could happen to you inside and no one would ever know. How long will it take them to realise we’ve come here?

  Nice, cheery thoughts. Way to go, Lisa. She swallowed, then nodded, indicating to her brother that they should proceed.

  Phil pushed his hand on the door, and they stood silently as the door opened into a black rectangle of corridor.

  40

  “I remember it now, or part of it at least.” Lisa had stopped moving and Judy worried that she was going to turn around and run back out of the park.

  “What do you remember? Tell me.”

  “It was one of the holiday houses. Phil and I broke in and I got trapped.”

  Judy tried to take Lisa’s hand, but she snatched it back, the eyes seeing something that wasn’t there anymore, hadn’t been in front of her thirty years. When she realised she’d overreacted, her shoulders relaxed, and she looked at her and nodded. “Sorry,” Lisa said. “It was coming back to me.”

  “Are you good to go on?”

  “Yes, I think so. It’s been there for so long, this memory, but until now, I’ve never been able to get past the first part, the part where we got beyond the front door.”

  “Maybe it’s because we’re so close, the memories are freeing up.”

  Lisa continued walking up the track and Judy stepped in alongside her, her senses attuned to the surrounding woods. If Adrian was close by, she wanted to know, she wanted to see where he was before he saw them. Her skin was itching with the bad feelings she was getting about this place. She paused at a road sign, partially hidden by overgrown bushes.

  Hampton Street

  The place Phil had mentioned in his journal. The street that his dad had shouted at him about.

  “Did Matt Hodgson ever have anything to do with this place?”

  Lisa shook her head. “Not that I can remember.”

  “But you know who I’m talking about?” Judy had slipped Matt’s name into the conversation, hoping with Lisa’s memories being a little looser, she might recall some people that had worked here when she was little. If Matt had had anything to do with the caravan site when she was younger, it might explain why hearing from him might have affected Adrian.

  “I don’t know. I think I know him.”

  As they rounded the bend in the track, the house came into view and Lisa stalled once again. There were no signs of life in the house, but it was not what Judy was expecting. The building looked like a cheap seventies build, a combination of brick and wooden structures. None of the windows were unscathed, most had been boarded up and even those boards looked like they should be refreshed. The trees were trying to reclaim this plot of land and Judy figured if no one took care of the land then it would succeed in another fifty years. What grass there was was knee high and clumps of nettles were taking over around the edges of the plot, narrowing in on the house.

  But it wasn’t just the house that had caused the women to pause. There were two vehicles parked in front of the house. The first was Adrian’s Mercedes, the second was a white van that Judy had seen once before this week.

  “That’s Matt Hodgson’s van. The man who was calling your dad. I saw him drive off in it from your dad’s office.”

  “Why is he here?”

  Judy had no answer for her. Whatever the phone call had been about, it had stirred Adrian into meeting the maintenance guy, but why would he be meeting him all the way up here? Why not somewhere local?

  “This is the house you went inside?” Judy asked, but she didn’t need to. Lisa’s reaction said more than words could. “I’ve seen this before,” Judy continued, then it came to her. “This is the house we saw on the television at your house.” Her instinct was to turn and run back along the track until they reached their car, but she ignored the tingling along her arms and the dryness in her throat. What had the ghost wanted them to see this house for? Why was it so important?

  “What aren’t you telling me?” Judy asked.

  “I… I know this place.”

  “You’ve been here before and so has our ghost friend.”

  Lisa was staring at the building, unable to tear her gaze from it. Judy saw the trembling build in her body and grabbed hold of Lisa’s arms before she fell.

  But as she looked back up to the house, she saw something that made her blood go cold. “There’s someone up there.”

  41

  Thirty years ago

  Phil’s nose wrinkled in disgust at the smell that slunk from the dark hallway. Lisa put her hand over her mouth and tried not to gag. He stepped over the threshold, reaching a hand behind for his sister to take. Lisa accepted it and stepped inside beside her brother.

  The smell seemed to dissipate, or she’d got used to it very quickly, because once standing on the worn red carpet in the hallway, she no longer felt the need to vomit or even hold her nose.

  “I don’t like this,” she said.

  “U-huh.”

  “No, I really don’t like this. I think we should go now. There’s nothing here.”

  “We haven’t even been in any rooms yet. Give us a chance. Dad was here for a reason. What if he’s got something hidden here that he doesn’t want anyone to know about?”

  “Like what?”

  “Money?”

  “Don’t be daft. Dad’s rich enough that he doesn’t have to hide money.”

  “But what about taxes? Maybe he’s hiding it so the tax man can’t get it.”

  “What have you been listening to?”

  Phil shrugged. “Stuff. I’ve heard him on the phone. I can eavesdrop as well as you.”

  “You listen to some weird conversations.”

  A staircase to the right led upstairs, a turn in the stair made it impossible to see what was on the first floor, but Lisa didn’t care, she had no interest in going upstairs. As far as she was concerned, she’d done more than enough by crossing the threshold.

  The hallway door creaked open ahead of them. They looked at each other, Phil’s eyes had
widened, and that self-assuredness was gone.

  “It’s the breeze, that’s all. Some windows are damaged, and it’s affecting the air flow in the house,” he said, then swallowed.

  She didn’t believe that he believed that for a second. There was something wrong in this building and it was nothing to do with airflow. She took a step forward, then another, her hand reaching for the internal door.

  Phil’s hand touched the small of her back but she didn’t look, just moved forward, her feet heavy like they were working their way through mud, each lift another weary effort.

  When the front door slammed shut, she jumped and shrieked. Spinning around, she realised she’d been mistaken. Phil wasn’t behind her. A banging on the other side of the front door confirmed he was back outside.

  So, who touched you?

  “Lisa! Stop messing around. Come out.” Phil’s voice was panicked. He banged again on the door.

  Lisa ran and tried the latch, but the mechanism didn’t shift. “The lock’s broken. Why did you do that?”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “Help me, this isn’t funny.”

  She felt the weight of his body slam into the door. He tried again to knock it open, but the door was far stronger than it looked.

  “It’s jammed.”

  “I know,” she cried. Oh God, what was happening? Why had she let herself get stuck in here? “This is not funny. Let me out. You’ve had your fun.”

  “It’s not me. I swear.”

  But he would swear it wasn’t anything to do with him. This was a typical Phil prank, and she’d fallen for it hook line and sinker. The story of following Dad, the destination a forbidden building. How could she have refused?