Within These Walls

by Ania Ahlborn

  Kids like you . . .

  Her gaze drifted upward until it settled on a weatherworn logo printed on a black T-shirt. It was a triangle with a rainbow shooting through it, something she couldn’t place but knew she had seen before. That shirt was half-hidden beneath a beat-up leather jacket. Taking a half step back toward the window, she blinked at the man before her, her anxiety obliterated by sheer distraction. If this guy was an ax murderer, Vivi would never suspect it past his pretty face and disarming smile.

  “Vivi.” Her new nickname rolled off his tongue like spun sugar, those two syllables palpitating her heart. He smelled like patchouli and red currants. Nearly pinned against the window, she could hardly move when he reached out to touch her hair. The man who had looked at least twenty-five or thirty years old ten seconds before was now toeing the edge of seventeen.

  “Vivi. Almost like viva. Do you know what that means?” He canted his head to the side, as if inspecting her, a sly smile clinging to his lips.

  She shook her head, too stunned to speak. It’s him. It’s him! Except Jeffrey Halcomb was even more beautiful than any visage captured on grainy old film.

  “Viva mi familia,” he said. “Long live my family. Viva mi amor. Long live my love. And that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”

  She opened her mouth to speak, but there was no sound.

  “Love,” he said. “Your parents.” Those two words hit her like a double-fisted punch. “I know all about them, I know how cruel they can be. It’s not easy being forgotten. I know that.”

  “You do?” She managed to form the question in a faint whisper. The boy nodded, his eyelids dipping low, his face solemn.

  “I’ve been watching you, rooting for you, but sometimes even our best intentions go unnoticed. Adults are so wrapped up in their own lives . . .” He paused, as if holding himself back. His brown eyes sparked with a quiet rage that Vivi understood all too well. The neglect. Being shrugged off because she was just a kid. The muffled yelling behind closed doors, only for her parents to act like everything was fine the next day. Like she didn’t know that they were fighting. Like she was too stupid to figure out that, because of their hardheadedness, her life was about to fall apart. “I had a father once,” he said. “He pretended to love me until it became an inconvenience. I was his son until he no longer wanted me. I know that pain, Vivi. I know how much it hurts, how much it makes you hate. But we can’t let the hate consume us. We have to take all the goodness we have left in our hearts,” he said, “and direct it somewhere else. Just how you’ve directed your love, your faith, toward me and my friends.” He reached out and gently brushed the pad of his thumb against the swell of her lower lip. “You’re so brave,” he murmured. “And I love you for that, Vivi. For that, I swear you’ll never be lonely again.”

  She stared at him, unable to believe what she was hearing. She knew it was insane, but she kept repeating it to herself: he loved her. This beautiful boy, this creature loved her. Her chest felt full, as though her ribs could crack and her heart could burst. Her bottom lip began to quiver.

  “Hey. Don’t cry.” He leaned into her, his lips brushing featherlight against her cheek. “None of that matters now, anyway. Forget the past. It’s toxic. Poison.”

  She fought to swallow her sorrow, struggled to push down the sadness. The tips of his dark hair tickled her collarbone. His fingers swept across the length of her right arm.

  “They don’t deserve you, Vivi. We’ll run away together, just you and me and my friends. You’ll have a new family, and we’ll be happy. Forget the fighting, the anger. Forget they ever existed.”

  His fingers slid around her arms. Her pulse quickened by a half-dozen beats.

  He was real.

  Tactile.

  He pulled her close, and she inhaled the scent of worn leather. His hands tangled in the waves of her hair. She closed her eyes, wondering what it would be like to start a new life, to forget the frustration and hurt. To just run away, and never come back. She had considered it when the arguments had gotten bad, shoving a few T-shirts and a change of underwear into her school backpack in the middle of the night. She had counted out her money, making sure she had enough for train fare.

  Just head to the F train, she had thought. If you can get out of Queens, you can go anywhere in the whole world. But you gotta get out of here first.

  Having snuck down the stairs while her mother slept, she found her dad working on his laptop, his back to the living room. Vee hovered around the doormat that read “HOME SWEET HOME” just inside the front door. She was ready to go, ready to run, ready to never see either one of them again. That would give them something worth fighting over . . . or getting back together over. It didn’t matter what happened to them—all she cared about was that she wouldn’t be there to listen to their screaming through the walls.

  But as she stared at her father’s back, she took in the way he hunched over his work. The way he grabbed for his coffee mug every minute or two, as though what he was drinking was some sort of creative life source. It all gave rise to a cancerous lump in the center of her heart, a dormant tumor waiting to become malignant with guilt and regret. Standing on the doormat her mother had picked out with the best intentions for the happiness of their family, Vee had known that abandoning her parents wouldn’t just kill them—it would also be the end of her. It would twist her up, slowly strangle her. And if by chance she survived, there’d be nothing but a shell of what her parents hoped she’d one day become.

  Having been dragged to Pier Pointe, she had tried to convince herself that perhaps now, with her mother out of the picture, things would be better. But they weren’t. If anything, they had become worse.

  But her dad. She still loved him. She couldn’t leave him, not after what her mother had done to them both.

  Vivi drew away from Jeff. I can’t just leave. She struggled for words, a way to explain. If I do, it’ll make me just like my mom. Jeffrey’s offer was tempting, but she simply couldn’t abandon her father, not until she was sure he’d be okay on his own. But before the words could leave her throat, Jeff’s image shifted like steam beneath the sheen of her tears. He warped the way the street did beneath the burn of a summer sun. Suddenly Vivi wasn’t quite sure why she was so unafraid. How could she possibly have forgotten that the room she was standing in wasn’t hers? That the boy standing before her wasn’t . . . alive?

  She jerked back.

  He’s supposed to be dead.

  But Jeff hadn’t just gone wavy beneath the weight of her emotion. For half a second, seeing the world through the lenses of her own tears, the seventeen-year-old had grown older than her dad, maybe even older than her grandfather. In that moment, she saw the truth. The teenage boy with the beautiful face looked about seventy years old. The youthful serenity was nothing but a mask. Beneath it was an old man’s hard stare. Angry, impatient, a look that told her she was thinking too much, hesitating for far too long. A moment later, he looked young again, his true form wiped from view. Handsome, alluring.

  Except that now she was truly afraid.

  This isn’t right. Fear coiled around her insides, choking the bravery it had taken her weeks to summon.

  “I . . .” She tried to think of something to say, but the thudding of her pulse derailed her train of thought. If Jeffrey Halcomb was dead, how could he be here and touch her? If he wasn’t really there, how could she smell the musky scent of oiled leather and exotic smoke that seemed to waft off his skin? He was more than a ghost. More than an apparition.

  “You . . .” Jeff murmured at her, refusing to give her any extra space.

  “I have to go,” she whispered. “I’m sorry, I just . . .”

  “You’re just scared.” He finished the sentence for her. “There are different types of people in this world, Vivi. You’re a helper.”

  No, she thought. He’s putting words in my mouth. He’s t
elling me what to think.

  Her attention veered left.

  “And you’re the one who’s going to help us all.”

  She choked out a quiet yelp when she saw a girl standing in the corner. Vivi recognized her as Chloe Sears.

  “I have faith in you, Vivi. I still believe you have the strength it takes to do the right thing.”

  Over his shoulder, here now was Georgia Jansen, flanked by three younger girls. Shelly. Her mind paired a name with a face. Laura. Roxanna. And the boys were there, too. They stood motionless, filling the already cramped space of the small room. Their eyes were fixed on her, unblinking, waiting for her to make the right decision. They were waiting for her to do whatever “helping” entailed.

  “You wanted this,” Jeff reminded her.

  No, I’m not sure anymore . . .

  “You’re tired of being overlooked. But being overlooked is all you know.”

  I am, but my dad loves me. I’m sure he still loves me . . .

  “You’re afraid, I understand that. But you have to have faith.”

  “Have faith,” the others whispered in unison.

  “Everything we do, we do for each other,” Jeff said. “Do you understand?”

  “I’m just scared.” She echoed his words to herself, trying to convince herself of that very point. “I’m just so scared.”

  “You want this,” Jeff said. “You need this. It’s not you, Vivi, it’s them.”

  Her gaze drifted back to Jeffrey, the comfort of his beauty suddenly overwhelming. He reached out to her again, brushed a strand of blond behind her ear. But the moment his fingers drifted across her cheek, she saw the entire group downstairs: eight bodies lying on the rug. And in the center was the beautiful boy with a blond-haired girl, with her hair, her face, exhaling a final breath as blood geysered out of her abdomen.

  Understanding crashed over her. That was what they wanted. For her to become like them. Trapped in some in-between world. She was just a stand-in. That was all.

  “Don’t be afraid, Vivi,” Jeffrey said.

  She pulled away from him.

  “Don’t you see? You’re the answer to our prayers.”

  “We’ve been waiting a long time,” said one of the girls.

  “Waiting for you,” said another.

  No.

  Being part of something bigger than herself was one thing, but dying to be loved . . . ?

  No, this isn’t me. I’m not that girl. I’m Vee, not Vivi. I’m Vee. Virginia Graham!

  Vee shoved herself away from the window and ran for the bedroom door. She had to get out, she had to find her dad and run. She managed to fling the door open, and it swung wide and banged against the wall, trembling in its frame. And there was her father, as if sensing her desperation.

  Dad!

  She wanted to run to him, but something pulled Vee back. An invisible hand lifted her off the ground and threw her across the room. She briefly saw her father being flung in the opposite direction. Like two magnets with the same polarization, they were cast apart, having gotten too close.

  Her back hit the far wall of the room. She crashed onto the bed. Scrambling away, Vee ran into her closet, snatched up the silver cross she’d left there, desperate to have some form of defense. That need for self-defense was back. She had no idea what would happen if she tried to stab Jeffrey, only that she had to protect herself somehow.

  “Stay away,” she whispered, holding up the cross like a naive girl in an old vampire movie.

  Except, instead of hissing in pain and shielding his eyes, Jeffrey smiled, then shook his head with a tsk. “Vivi,” he said.

  That’s not my name! she wanted to scream.

  “Don’t you understand? God is on my side. He’s the one that put me here, to lead you to salvation.”

  The group chuckled among themselves, enjoying the joke.

  Vee blinked at him, her back pressed hard against the wall. She tried to put as much distance between herself and the grinning ghosts as she possibly could.

  “No. My father told me you tricked everyone,” she said, still holding the cross at arm’s length. “You said you were going to make everyone live forever, but they died.” She shot a look at Chloe Sears, at Georgia Jansen and Shelly Riordan. “Don’t you get it?” she said to them. “He’s a phony! If he was real, you’d all still be alive!”

  It was a long shot. Perhaps she could bring them to her side, turn Jeff’s little following against him and save herself at the same time. For a second, she swore she could see their hideous grins waver like a desert mirage.

  But Jeffrey moved toward her, leaned in, and placed his hands square against the wall just above her shoulder. His lingering smile vacillated between tolerant and annoyed.

  “Vivi,” he said, his words slower than before. “You’re confused. You believe the words of a man who doesn’t even know you’re alive. Your father is a liar.”

  “No,” she whispered. “You aren’t even real. I want to see my dad. Right now.”

  “Fine.” He shrugged as though Vee’s request was of no consequence to him, then gave his group a look. “Let’s go see Dad,” he told them. “After all, a proper introduction is long overdue.” With that, the eight figures that stood around the room murmured as if in some sort of approval. Before Vee could comprehend what was happening, they had vanished, as though never having been there at all.

  55

  * * *

  Monday, March 14, 1983

  Three Hours Before the Sacrament

  AUDRA HADN’T SEEN the world beyond the house for nearly three months—not a trip to the grocery store, not even a walk on the beach with Shadow by her side. She no longer knew what day it was. Her only hint at the month was suggested by a calendar that hung on the kitchen wall just shy of the fridge. But the days didn’t matter anymore. Her confinement seemed, at times, imposed by the weather rather than by the people she had once considered her friends. The bleakness of a Washington winter left the sky the color of steel. The ground was wet with cold rain, sent sideways against the windows by an unforgiving wind. If it wasn’t the rain, it was her exhaustion. Nearly nine months pregnant, she had swollen feet, and her fatigue was out of control. But it couldn’t dull the memory of Claire’s garbled scream. Every time Audra closed her eyes and began to drift, she found herself back in the Stephenson home—the floor smeared with Richard’s blood, a butcher knife held fast in her hand.

  Despite her guilt, Audra had to focus on the baby.

  She had no due date. No doctor to tell her the baby was healthy or whether it was a boy or a girl. None of those things seemed to matter to anyone, and she was left to pretend that it didn’t matter to her just the same. Every time the baby shifted or rolled or kicked, it was a reminder that she would soon be a mother. The closer she inched to the birth of Jeffrey Halcomb’s offspring, the more she wondered if the child would know it had come from her womb. Would they allow her to raise the baby as her own, or would it be passed around among the girls?

  Part of her wanted to believe that, had she been born again, she would have loved to have so many women doting over her. The adoration would have been a welcome change to the harsh, pointed peering of her own mother. Locked away in the house, Audra had a lot of time to think about things she wouldn’t have otherwise considered, like how, perhaps, turning her own mother into a grandma would improve their relationship. Perhaps a baby would jump-start something in her mother’s heart—that maternal instinct Audra couldn’t seem to pull away from herself. Because no matter what Jeff and the family believed, she wanted to be Mama. This was her baby, her little bundle. Samson if it was a boy, Sylvie if it was a girl. Sam or Vivi. It didn’t make a bit of difference to Audra which, just as long as she was the one raising it as her own.

  But there was something wrong—not with the baby but with the group. Audra had sensed a shift in
the past few weeks, but only now did she understand what was going on.

  “We have to go to the clinic,” Gypsy said, motioning for Audra to get herself together and come downstairs. Clover had been posing as Audra for the past couple of months, smiling and presenting Audra’s driver’s license at the front desk. Nobody had asked questions. But now something had changed. “The prescription ran out,” Gypsy announced. “So you’re gonna have to fix it.”

  And so they went to the clinic to fix it. Except it didn’t go the way the family had planned.

  Now, with Audra sitting in the back of her own hatchback while Gypsy sped away from the pharmacy, the tension was worse than ever. Three months without seeing the outside world, and her reintroduction had taken place at a clinic counter. Her prescription couldn’t be refilled, nor could it be extended for a week, or even a few days. I don’t even take them, she wanted to say, but she had held her tongue and given the girl a pleading look.

  “I’m sorry,” the counter girl said with an apologetic shake of the head. Audra could see her gaze bouncing from Jeff to Clover to Gypsy, the three of them seated in the small waiting area behind her. The girl leaned in with a murmur. “You shouldn’t be taking those types of pills while you’re with child, Ms. Snow. Have you spoken to your doctor? Is he aware you’re expecting?”

  The answer was clear. No, her physician wasn’t aware of the baby. If he had been, the prescriptions would have been different, and they certainly wouldn’t have been expired.

  “Please,” Audra said, “just refill it this once. Just a couple of days’ worth so I can make a doctor’s appointment. I haven’t had time to see him. If my father finds out I’m not . . .” She quieted herself, having said too much. Would it be so bad if her dad found out? Maybe this was exactly what she needed—a change of routine to alert him that something was wrong. He’d drive down or at least call. And while she was sure that her phone call would be monitored by someone looming over her shoulder, maybe she could let him know she needed his help in some secret, undetectable way.