by Ed
She checked the tool room at the end of the hall; the window there was untouched, too.
She walked up the ramp at the opposite end of the hall and checked the door. Locked.
In the next room, she tried not to look at the plank covering the blood tank—tried to avoid even thinking about it—and devoted all her attention to the two windows there.
Nothing had been broken or pried open.
She turned to the doorway that led to the morgue. Although she hadn't admitted it to Al or anyone else, she didn't like to go in there. She didn't think it was evil, or anything like that; it just made her...uncomfortable. But there were three windows in there and, although she was pretty sure the boys had been pulling her chain, she supposed she should check those, too.
With a sigh, she walked into the dingy room and turned on the light. It was much more tolerable since Al had painted it, but still...
She checked the window across from the door, then the two on the back wall.
There were footsteps behind her.
"Michael?" she said. "There's no way anyone could have—" She turned and her voice caught in her throat and she froze in place, mouth open, as the air around her became icy cold, as if she were standing in front of an open freezer, and just as she turned, she felt someone brush by her, rubbing against her only slightly, and felt the shift in the cold air as someone passed. There was no one there.
Stephen went downstairs to find Michael sitting on the edge of his bed, frowning as he stared intensely through the open French doors. The light was on in the next room.
"Where's Mom?" Stephen asked.
Michael nodded toward the doors. "She went back there. I think she's—"
Suddenly, they heard a rush of movement in another part of the basement: footsteps, a rapid series of clicks as the lights were turned off, doors slamming, and Carmen walked quickly through the next door, flicked off the light as she came out and closed the French doors hard.
For a moment, Stephen thought she might scream. There was an odd look on her face, one he'd never seen before, one he thought, at first, was abject terror. Then she stood before them, set her jaw, and put her fists on her hips.
"There was no one in here tonight, you understand?" she said, her voice low but unsteady. "No windows or locks were broken. Everything's closed up. No one was in here. Now, if you thought that was funny, you're wrong, and if you do anything like that again, you're both gonna be in big trouble."
She spun away from them and stomped up the stairs.
Stephen and Michael exchanged a silent glance, then Stephen called, "Mom? There really was—"
"I don't wanna hear it, Stephen!" she snapped, turning back and pointing a finger at him. "I told you a long time ago to keep your stories to yourself, but you had to go and tell Michael and you got him all worked up and now you're both upset, which is exactly what I said would happen, remember? Well, remember?”
Slowly, Stephen nodded.
Carmen started up the stairs again.
Stephen turned to Michael, released a long sigh, then started slowly up the stairs behind his mom.
"Where do you think you're going?" she asked over her shoulder.
"I...um, I was just gonna come up and watch a little—"
"You're going to bed, is "Can I at least come get a glass of water?" Stephen asked quietly.
"Yeah, yeah, go ahead."
He waited on the step until she was gone, then turned to Michael again.
"Boy," Michael whispered, "she's pissed."
"Or something," Stephen said before going upstairs.
Carmen went into the living room and flopped into the recliner. The picture on the television screen disappeared in a blur of colors as tears stung her eyes. She sucked in a deep breath, wiped her eyes quickly and grabbed her pack of Marlboros from the end table. Her hands trembled as she lit her cigarette and she shook the match harder than usual, as if to shake the tremors out of her bones.
She leaned her head back, closed her eyes, and savored her anger. She was angry because, with their vivid story and their wide, frightened eyes, the boys had managed to convince her that strangers had been in the house. Three of them! She'd allowed her imagination to get caught up with her sons'.
"Yeah," she breathed, thinking, That's all it was. Just my imagination and that stupid story of theirs. Right?
But the tiny little voice of her conscience that usually spoke from deep within her mind remained silent.
8
School’s In
“C’mon you guys, outta bed!" Carmen shouted down the staircase, clapping her hands sharply three times.
Stephen held his pillow over his head, but he heard a muffled groan from the direction of Michael's bed, then a groggy, "Errr, summer's over."
There were sounds of yawning and sighing as they stirred, sat up, and looked around with puffy eyes.
"You wanna shower first?" Michael mumbled.
"Uh-uh. G'head."
"C'mon, you're gonna be late!" Carmen called.
"H'come?" Michael replied as he trudged up the stairs.
"'Cause my alarm clock didn't go off, that's how come. Breakfast is ready!"
Stephen flopped onto his back, rubbed his eyes, then stared at the ceiling.
He would not be going to school right away like Michael and Stephanie. Instead, he would have to go to the hospital for his treatment. Last week, Mom had met with the principal of the high school Stephen would be attending, as well as one of the counselors. She'd explained the learning problems he had faced while going to school in Hurleyville and told them of his illness and that he would be late for school every day the first week so he could get his treatments. She'd said they were very understanding and had assured her that they would do everything possible to see that he was comfortable and that his problems were dealt with properly.
Stephen had no way of knowing, of course, if they were sincere or not, but he hoped for the best. School was hard enough by itself, but going to a new school with total strangers made it even harder; he certainly didn't need any more trouble.
When it came right down to it, he didn't need anything other than those treatments. They were enough trouble all by themselves, thank you very much. He despised them even more than the doctors and nurses he had to deal with every day. There was nothing particularly wrong with them—except that they administered the treatments.
Each day he was put under a sinister-looking contraption that resembled an X-ray machine, only it was bigger and uglier and more threatening. The worst part was being abandoned by everyone while he was exposed to radiation. If they were all afraid of it, why were they leaving him in there?
He'd had a nightmare—several times, in fact—in which everyone left him in that sterile white room beneath that ominous machine...and they never came back.
Oh well, just a few more days, and then...well, as Dr. Simon said, "And then we'll see."
Stephen couldn't wait for the treatments to be over, and hoped he'd never have to have them again. He could think of nothing worse.
"Stephen?"
Nothing except that voice.
He sat up on the bed and listened.
"Stephen? Are you ready?"
He turned toward the French doors, but saw nothing through the glass panes.
"Are you ready, Stephen?"
It was the same male, voice, but now it was coming from another part of the basement.
"I'm waiting, Stephen."
Each time it spoke, it sounded closer.
Staring through the panes, Stephen thought he saw something...just a faint sign of movement...a shadow, perhaps...a shadow falling through the open door across the next room.
He shot from the bed and scrambled around the room, grabbing pants, a shirt, shoes, then—
"Time is wasting, Stephen."
He raced up the stairs, the sound of his breath loud in his ears, rounded the banister and hurried down the hall, his clothes clutched to his chest.
Carm
en stepped out of the kitchen in front of him and they collided.
"Stephen!" She snapped, more frustrated than angry. "What're you doing?"
He started to speak, then snapped his mouth shut and just stared at her, trying not to tremble.
She held up a rigid index finger and said, "I don't wanna hear it, Stephen. Not now, not ever, but especially not now. This morning's been bad enough already. Go eat your breakfast, it's on the table."
She hurried past him and went into her bedroom.
Stephen stood in the hallway and listened, but all he heard was the shower. Relieved, but still tense, he headed for the dining room.
Carmen could not understand what had gone wrong with the morning. She knew she'd set her alarm for seven o'clock, but when she'd finally dragged herself out of a sound sleep, she found that the alarm button on top of the clock was still in the ALARM ON position, but the clock had been set for twelve and she was forty minutes late.
After waking everyone urgently, she'd tossed a quick breakfast together, thrown on some clothes—she always felt more awake when she was dressed—set her purse and keys on the kitchen counter so she'd be ready to take Stephen to the hospital, and somehow managed to get Stephanie and Michael fed and dressed in time to meet their bus, but not before asking them, "Did any of you fool around with my alarm clock?"
They'd all looked at her with puzzled expressions and said no.
"Okay. Just wondered."
Once Stephanie and Michael had gone, she was left with Stephen, who was even more quiet than usual, and Peter, who couldn't stop talking about the day when he would be able to ride to school in a big yellow bus, too.
Carmen sat across the dining-room table from Stephen and said, "Well, how about we go to the hospital and get this over with so you can get to school?"
His hair, wet from his shower, was combed straight back and clung to his head, making his thin face look almost skull-like. "Do I have to go straight to school afterwards?"
"'Course not. You can come back here, if you want. Relax. Recover. Then I'll take you to school. In fact, if you don't feel like going at all, that's fine, too. It's only for this week, and they know all about it at school. It's up to you."
He nodded slowly, stared at the tabletop for a long moment, then looked at her, lips parted slightly, as if he were about to say something. Then he seemed to think better of it, closed his mouth and muttered. "Okay, let's go."
When everyone was ready, Carmen went into the kitchen to get her purse and keys.
They were gone.
She stared at the empty space on the counter where she had set them as Peter tugged on her hand and said, "Mommy, I'm pretending you taking me to school!"
"All right, where's my purse," she said. Then, louder, "Stephen, have you seen my purse?"
"No," he called from the living room.
"Well, it was right here on the counter with my keys and now they're gone, so look for them, okay?"
"Where'd you put 'em?"
"Right here,” she snapped.
"Okay, okay, I'll look."
They looked. They searched the entire upper floor of the house, but the purse and keys were nowhere to be found. Carmen was near tears when she met Stephen in the dining room.
"Think they might be downstairs?" Stephen asked.
"I haven't been downstairs this morning."
"Okay. Just asked."
But that question made Carmen pause. She frowned as she thought about it. Then, against her better judgment, knowing her things couldn't possibly be down there because she hadn't been down there, she went downstairs and, a few steps from the bottom, she froze.
Her purse and car keys were on Stephen's bed.
She stared at her fists for a long time before clenching them at her sides and calling, "Stephen! Stephen, get down here right now!"
Carmen did not turn when she heard him coming down the stairs, she just continued to stare at her purse and keys on the bed. When his footsteps stopped, she pointed at the bed and said, "Did you put them there?"
"Nuh-n-no!"
"Then how did they get there?"
"I-I-I d-don't know!"
Finally, she turned to him, glowering. "Stephen, this has got to stop," she said, her voice almost a whisper, quivering with anger. "I mean it. I don't know what you're trying to do, but whatever it is, I'm sick of it!"
He stared at her, slack-jawed and horrified. "B-but I didn't—"
"Shut up!" she growled through clenched teeth. "I don't want to talk about it. Just see to it that this crap stops now, Stephen! I'm serious. If you're still pulling this stuff when your dad moves home, you're gonna be sorry, because he won't put up with it. And neither will I!"
She crossed the room, swept the purse and keys off the bed, then started up the stairs, calling back, "C'mon, let's go."
They didn't speak for a while; Peter was the only one who did any talking, babbling on about how he was pretending Mommy was taking him to school. Once they'd been on the road for a while, Carmen felt herself begin to relax. Other thoughts began to crowd her mind, making it easy for her to forget about her purse and keys being moved downstairs. Along with those thoughts came guilt.
"I'm sorry for shouting at you like that, Stephen," she said quietly. "But you made me very angry."
He turned to her suddenly and said, "But I didn't—" then stopped just as suddenly and faced front. He said nothing more.
Carmen was relieved by his silence. She was glad he'd thought better of denying it once again. She really did not want to hear it.
Because the quiet voice in the back of her mind kept whispering insistently that Stephen's denial might very well be the truth.
9
Sleepless Thoughts
Carmen could not sleep, so she sat at the dining-room table— her favorite spot in the house—and smoked as she thumbed absently through a back issue of Vanity Fair and half-listened to the radio call-in talk show that played softly.
Once Stephen's treatments had come to an end—for the time being, at least—Carmen expected him to change. For the better, of course. He'd been so quiet and brooding since they'd moved into the apartment, so unlike himself. She told herself it was due to his illness and, perhaps even more so, because of the grueling daily treatments for it. But the only change she noticed in him during the weeks following his final treatment was that his mood seemed to grow quietly and gradually darker.
At least Stephen had Jason to cheer him up. Jason's parents both worked and he was alone a lot, so he'd started spending most of his time at their house. Carmen didn't mind. She didn't like the thought of the boy's being alone so much, so she tried to make him feel at home.
Although she was glad that Stephen had a friend, Carmen was disturbed to see that the only time Stephen seemed truly happy was when Jason was around; otherwise, he was silent, depressive, and, if she asked him what was wrong, he made no more than a vague, monosyllabic reply.
She worried about him, but told herself that he'd been through a lot and might not be through all of it yet; as long as he had a friend who made him happy and was doing well in school, she was satisfied.
The only problem was Jason. There was nothing wrong with him that she could put her finger on—he was a nice enough boy, friendly and polite when spoken to but otherwise pretty quiet—he just seemed...different, like the kind of boy who might find it difficult to make friends. And yet he and Stephen had hit it off famously. Oh well. So they were friends. As long as they weren't knocking over liquor stores or burning down buildings for kicks, what was the harm?
You're just being a mother, she told herself. Too much of a mother.
She wasn't so hard on herself when it came to Stephen's idea that there was something evil about the house. Since Michael had picked up on it, Carmen often found the boys and Stephanie whispering among themselves, only to fall silent when they found they weren't alone. That had been going on for some time between Stephen and Stephanie, of course, but since Michael had come
home, it seemed to happen more often. It got on her nerves, but she kept her feelings to herself.
On the weekends, Al didn't seem to notice the children whispering secretively. His mind was on other things. One hundred and six miles of driving every weekend was taking a toll on him, as was the stress of knowing he would be taking a step down and making less money once his transfer went through, making their financial bind even tighter than it was already.
When he was home, they didn't talk about anything important or too serious. He'd go fishing (although Stephen didn't seem interested in going with him anymore) or spend time watching television. When they made love, he acted distant, preoccupied. And he didn't seem to be sleeping well at night, either. The last time he'd been home, Carmen had awakened very early on Saturday morning to find herself alone in bed; a couple minutes later, he'd come into the bedroom and gotten back into bed looking worried, his face twisted in a frown of creases made to look even deeper by the faint glow of moonlight outside the window.
"Whasmatter?" Carmen had asked.
Her voice startled him and he looked at her for a moment, that frown clinging to his face, then said, "Uh, nothing, nothing, go back to sleep."
So Carmen had more than her share of things to worry about: Stephen, his illness, and—no matter how hard she tried not to— his friendship with Jason as well; and money and Al. But, for the first time she could remember, she was actually relieved to have those worries. Those worries gave her a welcome excuse for some of the odd things she'd been doing...things she thought she'd been doing, anyway.
There was, of course, the voice she'd heard that day while she was alone in the house. She'd chalked that up to missing Al.
Then the plates and silverware had appeared to take themselves back into the kitchen the day Michael came home, and her purse had disappeared and her car keys had gone from the kitchen counter to Stephen's bed downstairs.
Last week, she'd found the bathroom faucet running and steam billowing up from the scalding water.