by M. C. Atwood
At the turn in the ramp is a door with an exit sign above it. When we get there, no one speaks but we stop and are still.
I’m pretty sure they’re all waiting for me to try the door. Only, I don’t want to try it. I’m totally, 100 percent freaked out by this whole House. But I look at the three in front of me, limping and bloody. Violet next to me being all Violety . . . If this isn’t a time for capes, I don’t know what is.
I step forward.
The door in front of me has one of those horizontal push latches across it. Above the door and the sign is a cardboard dragon. I mean, it’s a cardboard dragon. Who has a cardboard dragon?
I take a step toward the door and hear skittering up above me and see, just in time, the dragon blow fire down at the door. I jump back into Dylan who jumps back, too, dragging Ashley who says, “Feet, feet, fucking hell!”
The dragon, curiously, is still cardboard, but now its snout is smoking. It doesn’t move. Just to be sure, I take another step toward the door and the dragon comes to life again and breathes fire on the door. The heat blast scorches my face, like opening the oven to check on a pizza. I squint and see that the door is fused to the frame anyway.
Violet sighs so loud I feel it in my bones. And this makes me sadder than anything I thought possible.
If Violet is losing hope, then we are all done for.
Gretchen looks again at Ashley’s feet, her face serious with what I could swear is concern. “Should we carry you?”
Ashley, pale and shaking, grits her teeth and shakes her head. She tries to take another step but whimpers. Gretchen looks at Dylan and with that relationship telepathy I’ve seen happen before—my mom and dad had it—they seem to decide something. Dylan takes the lead and bends down, picking up Ashley with his butt. She hesitates but then wraps her arms around his neck, her face relaxing.
“We got you, dudette,” Dylan says softly.
Right then, more than anything, I wish I was more like Dylan. He sacrifices without thinking, just like my dad used to. Not like me. I think all the time. I’m afraid all the time. A pit opens up in my chest.
Gretchen, her hand on Ashley’s back, says, “Let’s just make it to the café.”
Everyone starts walking.
When I pass the dragon, I flip it off. Then I feel idiotic. That’s as tough as I get. Brave in the face of danger, once the danger has already passed.
Part IV
People began disappearing.
Maxwell Cartwright Jr. was the first to vanish. Locals knew the day he left—the sun shone brighter, the crows disappeared, the laughter of children could be heard again. The pall over the land lifted. Many felt they could breathe better than they had in years, like a film of something had been lifted and they could finally draw air.
But the shadows of the House grew deeper. The sculptures dimmed darker. The lodge sat in silence and the locals knew: stay away from Boulder House.
But as the world became more fixed, more certain, more rational, the rumors and legends about the House faded. People noticed the disappearance of a person here or there, of course. But the concern never lasted long. The disappeared were termed “troubled” and “impulsive.” Mental illness was blamed or a bad home life, or any number of maladaptations that might make a person vanish. Authorities would ask if the disappeared had wanderlust, a desire to be free. Perhaps the scenery in the wild Wisconsin woods wooed them back to nature, talked them into a more peaceful life, away from the pressures of modern culture. In hindsight, their friends and families would say, there were clues they would run away. They should have known. But maybe the disappeared were happy now. Maybe, finally, they’d found some peace.
Deep in the House, though, deep in the collections, those who lost Maxwell Cartwright Jr.’s games had not found peace. The disappeared found only pain. Pain and shame and horror. With each passing year, they forgot a little more who they were and why they were there. And in time, their only purpose was to wait for the times they could release some of the indescribable rage they felt, with no recollection of why they felt it. In time, they lost any idea of who they were. In time, they lost all humanity. And when that happened, they forever and always became belongings of Maxwell Cartwright Jr.
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Excerpt from p. 134, The Collections of Maxwell Cartwright Jr.
GRETCHEN
She did save Dylan’s life. And I was a bitch to her. But more, her feet look like a scene from a Saw movie. Jesus. So I try to move us all fast enough to get past the shit on the ramp (glass cases again—come on!) and get us to the café. I keep getting glimpses of down below.
We are coming up on this thing that’s called “The Rube Goldberg Contraption.” It’s this huge train, only it’s got a chicken and some figure playing the fiddle on it and a moose . . . What the . . . ?
Paul says, looking at my eyebrows, “Ever see those cartoons or Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, where they put together a contraption to make toast or something? That’s what this is. It’s like a machine that makes things complicated.”
Like my feelings for Dylan. I say out loud, “Like this whole fucking House.” Everyone huffs out. Dylan says, “Truth, yo.”
We pass by this machine on our right, and as the fiddler starts fiddling, a monkey above him begins to move and dance and make monkey noises. Luckily, everything is behind a huge piece of plastic and doesn’t seem to be making moves toward us. Not that I’d trust them as far as I could throw them.
I don’t trust anything in this House. I don’t trust FULL STOP on a good day. And this is not a good day.
Next is a Hells Angel-looking tuba player whose cheeks puff in and out while the tuba makes a dusty tooting sound. Then some punching gloves tap a chicken that clucks and lays an egg and then the egg seems to hit a moose that kicks something else and it all ends in this cat getting up and stretching and yawning. Despite myself, I am walking slowly past this weird thing, wondering what the hell is going on when the old-fashioned cars on the floor across the way start honking and flashing their lights.
The sound beats my eardrums and I clamp my hands over my ears. And then as abruptly as it starts, it stops. But my jangling nerves don’t.
We turn the corner of the ramp and see a house that says ice cream on it. Farther down is the large glass wall and the café behind it. And Benjamin Franklin before the entrance.
I hear the little footsteps. Motherfucking dolls in this motherfucking House, as Dylan would say. I make sure to keep my eyes up so I know if any dolls are coming down on me.
We get to the Benjamin Franklin statue and it snaps its head up. “Hello, travelers. Do remember: Lost time can never be found again. Honesty is the best policy. Tricks and treachery are the practice of fools that don’t have brains enough to be honest. Three can keep a secret if two are dead. He who—”
Ashley yells at him, “Shut the fuck up, Benjamin Franklin!”
And Paul says, “Seriously.”
Violet says, “Yes, please.”
Dylan says, “For real, yo. And Ashley, dudette, that was right in my ear.”
And I say, “Hallefuckinglujah.”
“Well,” Ben Franklin says. But then he shuts up. Ashley grins at me from her perch on Dylan—who is huffing a little since she probably weighs more than he does—and I grin back, but then I remember I hate her so I furrow my eyebrows again and walk into the café.
I hate her, right?
At one end is a fortuneteller like Madame Josefina. This one has brown hair. She says in a soft, beautiful voice, “Come here, darlings. Let me tell you your future.”
Violet says, “Eff off!”
I stop and look at her. I say, “Violet!” half-joking. We all laugh a little.
The fortuneteller mumbles, “Needn’t be rude, you know. I’d rather not be here either.”
But we
’re all smiling at each other now.
Dylan puts Ashley down in a booth toward the end of the room. Then he runs to the counter that is at the other end of the café and jumps over it, like it’s a turnstile. Kid is talented that way. How does he have the energy?
He dips down below and then pops up, his hands full of sandwiches. “’Wiches Bitches!” He yells and I swear to god we all run at him like we’re being chased. Except for Ashley who yells, “I want all of them!”
He starts throwing them at us and everyone catches theirs except Violet who drops it and says, “Oh, shoot,” but she’s laughing and I’m laughing, and for the first time since I stepped into the Wheel House room, I don’t feel insane.
Dylan grabs some sodas from a mini fridge behind him and we each take one then go to Ashley in the booth. Dylan and I cram on the other side of Ashley, and Paul and Violet sit across from each other at a table, every once in a while looking up at each other in this gross sickening way that makes me roll my eyes. I share a look with Ashley and she snorts.
Jesus. They should just do it already.
I clear my throat.
No one talks for a full five minutes. The sandwich I’m eating is the best sandwich I’ve ever eaten in my entire life. My. Entire. Life.
When we’re done, I look at Ashley and her pale face. I notice blood dripping down the booth seat. I notice blood on the table from Dylan’s arm. Paul’s head isn’t bleeding anymore, though, and Violet’s ear looks mangled and red and only half there, but not oozy.
Ashley is by far the worst. I say, “How are they?” She shrugs. Then looks up and smiles at me, her eyes huge and her face white as shit. “My pedicurist will have her work cut out for her.”
It’s kind of an asshole thing to say. She can actually say that and mean it.
But she has sweat beading on her upper lip and I can tell she is in mega pain. And I have to give the girl props for not complaining. Not once. I say, “We need to do something with those.”
She hesitates and inhales, then nods. I get up, searching for something to start bandaging people up with. For some reason, I’m the least hurt of all of us. Scrapes here and there, but nothing serious.
I duck behind the café counter and walk into the kitchen. It smells like every industrial kitchen ever. I open steel cupboards and drawers and come up with nothing.
And then, in the corner, I spot a huge box with a red cross on it.
Bingo.
I grab it and some clean towels I see in one of the drawers and come back out.
I throw two towels to Violet and Paul and put the first aid box on their table. I grab a huge tube of antiseptic and three towels and turn to Dylan.
Dylan points at Ashley. “Do the dudette first. I stopped bleeding and I can do the salve myself.” He grabs the tube, squirts a big glob on his hand and then rubs it into his puncture wound, making blood trickle out again. I wince and my stomach turns.
I just wanted to be a clothing designer. I’m not ready for war.
He grabs a towel and wraps it around his forearm. I swallow down my ick and go to him, tying the cloth tight. Then I go to the other side of the booth to Ashley. I pull up a chair and pull one of her feet toward me, soft. I don’t know where to put my hands. Everywhere I touch there is blood.
I open a water bottle and pour it on her feet, trying to wipe around obvious glass pieces so I can get a sense for what I’m dealing with here. Oh, goddess, it’s gross.
Ashley is shaking but she goes for a smile. “No glass slippers for me, huh?”
There are at least five glass pieces per foot that I need to take out. And who knows how many that I can’t see. This is bad. I need to pick these out fast and I can’t have her kicking me or we’ll never get done.
I look her hard in the eye, “I have to get this glass out.” She swallows and nods. “This is going to suck ass, Ashley. You have to try not to kick me, okay?” She nods again and sets her mouth.
I exhale slowly and point at the first large chunk of many.
“On the count of three, Ash. One—” and then I yank it out. She howls and I smile grimly. “That always works,” I say.
She shoots me a shaky smile back. “Asshole.” But the way she says it makes me feel warm all over.
ASHLEY
Gretchen is touching my feet.
Actually, Gretchen is massacring my feet.
“FUUUUCCKKK!” I yell as she yanks the second to last asshole piece of glass from my left foot.
“Hold still,” she hisses and puts the cool antibiotic cream on the latest wound when it stops bleeding.
In movies, this is supposed to be romantic. But it actually hurts like a motherfucker.
“Last one,” she says and before I can say anything, she yanks it out. I grunt. Actually, I make this “grrrrr” sound I didn’t know I was capable of producing. Like an animal.
Pain. Everyone is an animal when it comes to pain.
Gretchen wraps my foot in mountains of gauze and tape, then wraps a towel in a complicated bootie shape. Then she tapes it up like the other foot so now I have towel-boot shoes.
Hot.
I try my new shoes out, stepping out of the booth slowly. It hurts—there’s probably a ton of glass still in there—but it’s a fuckton better. I can actually walk. I grab some leftover tape and put it in my bra since my skirt doesn’t have pockets. Because why would I do myself any favors and wear something that wasn’t just a teen guy’s wet dream? Note to self: when I get out of this, comfortable shoes and things with pockets. Hell, I might even go full-on camo and carry a knife on my belt. Maybe I should butch it up. Seems way more practical.
“Where’d you learn to do something like this?” I ask Gretchen, who is finally getting color back in her face.
Gretchen shrugs as she puts stuff away. She mumbles, “I don’t know.” And then she clears her throat and says louder. “I make clothes.”
I want to know. I want to know about her clothes that I secretly envy though I would never in a million years tell her. I want to thank her in a real way for fixing my feet and not going crazy here. I want to do all those things.
Instead, the air starts vibrating.
All of us stand up and move toward each other.
And then with a POP, the sonuvabitch demon-thingy is in front of us, doing that weird streaky thing and twirling his goddamn cane. The burning egg stench makes my nose twitch.
“Kidsssssss,” he says, hissing so much it actually hurts my eardrums. “What do you think of the House so far? I trust it’s treating you like proper guests?”
He smiles and his teeth are fang-y, his eyes are TWIRLING red. What the hell?
I swallow and lean into the whole group. I would kill for a gun right now. Or that knife on a belt.
Gretchen, her voice shaking, says, “What do you want from us? Why won’t you let us out of here?”
Violet starts to cry. I’m two seconds away from that.
I’d take a whale and a squid any day over this asshole.
He suddenly stops walking and it feels like time stops. He claps his hands like a gleeful kid. “What spirit you’ve shown! What . . . togetherness.” He winks. “However, I just wonder . . .” He puts the cane up against his mouth like he’s thinking. “I just wonder how well my darling Five know each other.” He wiggles his eyebrows.
He twirls his cane again and begins walking around us. He clears his throat, then stands still like he’s at an imaginary podium giving a lecture. “I have chosen you for this game for very particular reasons. Because you all have some delicious tidbits about yourselves, don’t you? Interests, doings, the like, that you’ve perhaps never shared before?”
Ice shards poke down my spine. Oh shitball fuck.
He looks at Gretchen. “For instance!” He points his cane at her. “I know Gretchen here is terribly embarrassed of he
r living situation. Why is that, Gretchen, dear?”
I feel Gretchen’s body stiffen. He goes on. “Why is it you make your own clothes? Why are you so darn different?” He cocks his head like he’s trying hard to think of why.
I see an actual sweat bead on her forehead. He cackles. “Shall I tell? Shall I tell them all that your daddy had an affair with a younger woman? That he has a new family now—new, better children? Shall I tell them that he has forgotten you so much that he has forgotten to send money, and you are therefore on . . .” He stops and looks at us, widening his eyes. “Food stamps? You can’t even afford food. You are a taker, as they say. A mooch. A drain on the American people. I believe you are what they call trailer trash? Tsk tsk. And you seem so independent. Ah well. ”
Gretchen shudders and I feel her swallow.
Oh God. She’s on food stamps. And how many times have I . . .
Dylan says, “Listen, you demon sonuvabitch—”
But the thing points his cane at him. “Yes, let’s talk about YOU, Dylan!” Dylan shuts right up and takes a step back.
“Or should I say, John?” Gretchen’s bitch brows furrow at that. Douchemunch demon guy goes on. “Yes, Ms. Gretchen, did you know your darling boy, Mr. Skater-man, takes-you-on-dates-with-couch-change anarchist non-conforming punk guy is actually John Luke Desmond, member of the Holy Evangelical Christ Church?”
Gretchen takes a step back. Dylan or . . . John? . . . or whatever says, “Gretch—”
But the demon keeps going: “Our John here goes to church like a good boy three times a week. His wonderful parents—yes, his parents are still together—Mr. and Mrs. Desmond have taken John and his sister, Ruth, to many different vacation spots. They’re quite well-to-do, you see. They’ve even been in here, though they decided it was a bit dark for their beliefs. I haven’t the faintest idea why.” He looks around like he’s all innocent. “Next time, they’ll be going to the Creation Museum in Kentucky.” He winks at Dylan. Or John. Or whatever his name is. And, suddenly, sweat starts down my spine. If he’s telling their secrets . . .