Window in the Earth Trilogy

by Fish, Matthew

  Chapter 2: The First Night

  Grandpa Bones gave his short, “time-constrained” tour of the place he proudly considered home. The main room, or living room, looked rather cluttered. It was as though Bones wasn’t that much of a fan of dusting and had something of either a habit or hobby for keeping old copies of TV Guide, as well as newspapers, around well past their expiration date. The main room also contained the only television set in the entire house, and it was an old black and white set, much to Christopher’s disappointment. The kitchen, also located on the main floor, was like stepping into a whole other world when compared to that of the living room; it was white and clean and almost painfully bright to Christopher’s adjusting eyes when he crossed between the two rooms. Also on the main floor was Grandpa Bones’ bedroom, which was “Far too untidy to tour this night, maybe next week,” he said, ushering the brothers past the door and up the stairs.

  The upper floor of the house contained two bedrooms set aside for the Janes brothers. Each was tidy in the sense that Bones had decided a few hours before the brothers’ arrival that it needed some emergency attention. It was a quick and somewhat short fix, yet it was workable. Each room had clean sheets and plenty of room for each brother to express their specific decorating style whenever they were comfortable enough to give it a chance. There was also a small room across the hallway from the bedrooms, which was mostly used for storage. It was full of wartime memorabilia and other non-daily use items that probably hadn’t seen the light of day in a quite a spell, and probably wouldn’t any time soon. This room also led up into the attic; another area that Bones claimed was far too unpleasant for an evening exploration.

  Back on the main floor of the house, and just past the kitchen, was the entrance to the basement cellar. It was a pretty typical place as far as basements and cellars go, having a slight earthy smell and dampness to it. The three rushed through that area pretty quickly, as they were a bit creeped out by the feel of a basement at night. They figured many people were, regardless of age.

  Christopher felt very hopeful about his new surroundings. It was a definite change from what he was used to. Just like the surrounding country, it was a completely different world. However, Christopher was slowly learning that sometimes different doesn’t always have to be a bad or good thing. It’s just a different thing, a different way to be.

  After the tour, James decided to go ahead and go to sleep, although it was only eleven o‘ clock, and he had definitely been sleeping a lot more since the accident, as Christopher had noticed before. He had hoped that tonight he would finally get a chance to speak to James about how things were unfolding, and these new unfamiliar surroundings. Yet, it seemed that once more that they would not get the chance—at least not this night.

  “You staying up for a bit, then?” Bones asked Christopher. He kicked his feet up and lay back on the dusty gray couch, scratching the salt-and-pepper-colored growth of hair beneath his chin.

  “If it’s okay…,” Christopher timidly replied. He wasn’t sure as to what any real ground rules were, since so far none had exactly been laid out. “I don’t think I can sleep, at least not right now.”

  “If it’s okay?” Bones repeated as he clicked the TV over to a M*A*S*H rerun. “Of course it’s okay. Hell, I just figured I’d let you guys have the run of the place for a few days, you know, get used to everything around here, then maybe we’ll see what goes and we’ll do the figuring of what is okay and what’s not.”

  “Thanks,” Christopher said, feeling even more relieved. Bones’ demeanor was quite a comfort to him. He had been desperately worried that Bones might end up being someone unpleasant like Aunt Lynn, but he honestly didn’t believe he’d be that bad. After all, out of everyone in the family, Bones had been the one who agreed to take the two Janes brothers in. “I mean, I really appreciate it. Everything.”

  “How old are you, Christopher?” Bones asked, taken aback for a moment by Christopher’s politeness. “Thirteen, right?”

  “Yes, sir,” Christopher answered. “Fourteen this September.”

  “That’s far too young to worry as much as you do. Hell, after all you’ve been through I think you should be able to do just whatever you feel like for a while.”

  “If you don’t mind…,” Christopher began as he sat down on the couch across from the TV set, beside Bones, “…could I ask why you decided to take us in?”

  “Shit…,” Bones said suddenly, as though the matter bothered him immensely, but then quickly recomposed himself. “Oops. Crap, I mean, or whatever. Truth be told, I never really stayed in contact with your father and mother as much as I think I probably should have. It’s not that we ever had any kind of disagreement; no, it’s just that I choose to live out here, and you know everyone else lives very busy lives. I bet you don’t even remember the last time you guys were here before.”

  “We were here before?” Christopher asked, desperately trying to remember something he hoped he had not forgotten.

  “I think you were probably two back then.”

  “I don’t remember,” Christopher replied, feeling a bit sad.

  “Well anyway, no matter; no one remembers stuff like that when they’re two,” Bones said with a deep chuckle before he went on: “Like I said, I never stayed in contact, and I should have. I always meant to, and then this happened. The rest of the family, they were all talking about splitting you two up, and who would take whom. Seems as though your parents weren’t that close with any of them either. I can’t say I blame them. I think the whole rest of the family is a bunch of snobby bastards. That’s just what I think though, okay?”

  “Okay,” Christopher said quickly, and smiled.

  “Okay, well hell.” Bones reached into a dark, filthy crevice between the cushions of the couch, pulling out a small silver flask and a healthy plume of dust. After taking a deep drink and grimacing momentarily, he placed the container back in between the cushions. “Like I said, they were talking about splitting you up, and I didn’t think that was right. They were all talking like you were some damned liability. You’re kids for Christ’s sake.”

  “I see,” Christopher said as he let out a deep breath of discouragement. “Did you have to pay Aunt Lynn for her to get us here?”

  “Yeah,” Bones answered bluntly as he repositioned himself more comfortably on the couch. “But don’t let it bother you, not one bit. Don’t even waste one moment of your life worrying about what she thinks, and, as far as the money goes, it was worth it. She doesn’t know you, and she isn’t even trying to get to know you, that makes her worth about as much as a turd in a ten dollar blender to me.”

  “Thanks, I mean, really thanks,” Christopher said, laughing a bit at the ‘turd in the ten-dollar blender’ part, even though he didn’t really get it. If there was even anything to get, he wasn’t exactly sure. The part about his family bothered him deeply, but he was glad that Bones was here and he was happy for all that he had done for both him and James. The conversation made him feel just that much more comfortable with the entire situation. “It has been really confusing lately—I mean, with everything. I do worry a lot, too; I worry a lot about James as well.”

  “He’s been pretty quiet since he got here,” Bones said, nodding in agreement. “I did notice that.”

  “He wasn’t like that before; he was so much more outgoing. He loves to talk and make jokes and stuff. That’s why I was worried. He’s changed I think,” Christopher said, looking down toward the floor. “Can people just change like that?”

  “Well, I reckon he has quite a few demons in his head he needs to chase away. Painful events affect everyone differently. I’ve noticed with my experience in the war, that when you go through something that changes your life, it’s very, very difficult to really get back to the place you once considered normal,” Bones said, a faraway look in his eyes, a look of being somewhere else, somewhere in the past. “I lost a brother in the war, and it was really hard. I mean it took quite a bit of working
out in my own head just to get back to who I was. I know it probably doesn’t make much sense, but yeah, in the end he’ll work it out and be back to normal. It’ll just take time.”

  “I understand,” Christopher said with a yawn. He wished that James would just be back to normal now and that there wasn’t anything to work out, yet he had a good idea of what James was probably going through. It was just so strange for their parents not to be around. Strange that he and James were somewhere new and their parents weren’t even here with them. It was such an unsettling, depressing thought, to think that he’d never see them again, or talk to them again. A feeling like being locked in a black room with no way out and no one to ever come and let you out. That was a place that Christopher was afraid of: someplace where you were alone and miserable and no one would ever come for you.

  “You look pretty tired there, son,” Bones observed as Christopher’s eyes got heavier and heavier, slowly losing their battle against the almighty gravity of sleep. “Besides, tomorrow I’ll introduce you to the rest of the family.”

  “I almost forgot the dogs!” Christopher exclaimed. How could he forget? It was, after all, one of the only things he was really excited about when he had been told. Their house back in Bloomington was far too small to allow him to have dogs, let alone two dogs!

  “Yep, Poppy and Kate. I’ll properly introduce the both of them to you in the morning, and, if he’s around, you’ll make the acquaintance of Stinky as well,” Bones said, a big grin on his face.

  “Stinky?”

  “Yeah, he’s a gray-and-white tomcat that hangs around, and he’s pretty stinky. I don’t know what exactly the hell that cat gets into, but yeah.”

  “I can’t wait!” Christopher rose from the chair, now excited for the next day to come. Actually, more excited than he had been in a long, long time. “What time do you want me up?”

  “Whenever you feel like it,” Bones said, still smiling.

  It was difficult at first for Christopher to get to sleep that night. It was that sense of just being in a new place, a place that wasn’t at all familiar, that did not even feel remotely the same. It didn’t smell like home did either, and this bed didn’t feel the same way that his old bed did. He was happy at least to have his same pillow, and that his faithful friend Fred, a small, white stuffed dog, was along with him. Still, everything just felt too strange. It was like when they went on family vacations and stayed in hotels. They were comfortable, yet just not comfortable in the same way that being in your own bed is just so perfectly comfortable. Comfortable and familiar, that was it. This place seemed to be neither of those two things.

  Eventually all the unpleasant thoughts drifted away, carried off by the faint chirps of crickets and songs of frogs croaking faintly in some distant pond. That was another thing that Christopher was not used to, yet he was glad for their company as well. As his eyes grew heavier and heavier, he eventually let himself go, and the darkness came into his mind and calmed him as slipped away into sleep. He was having some kind of strange dream, something he couldn’t really wrap his mind around. Then, for no particular reason at all, he was awake again.

  “What am I doing awake?” Christopher thought to himself, his mind racing. He wasn’t quite sure what had awoken him. It was just a sudden shock. Like when it’s dark and your going down a set of stairs and you forget about that last step, where you think you should be stepping down onto solid ground, only to find air and uncertainty. That strange way your stomach seems to plummet during a large dip in a roller coaster. “Was it a bad dream I was having, one that I can’t remember?”

  Christopher shot quick glances in every possible direction, hoping to find something familiar to fix his gaze upon, momentarily forgetting where he was in this unfamiliar place, and being overcome with a sickening sense of panic. A hot, burning feeling slowly swelled up from his stomach, and he felt like he was going to vomit.

  There was a loud pop somewhere out in the dark, followed by what sounded like a door slamming. Terrified, Christopher shot up in bed, his eyes searching desperately around once more for something familiar, something to calm him down.

  Then he thought What if it’s something as simple James just taking a leak? He’s been louder than this before…on many occasions. It was perfectly logical, or so he hoped. What was it exactly that had him feeling so illogical? It’s not like he was the only one in the house, after all. “Just need to calm down, I’m just not used to this place yet,” he muttered to himself in the dark, eyes firmly shut. “I just need to calm down. It was probably just Bones.”

  He didn’t think talking to himself was too weird if he didn’t do it all the time, and besides, he could feel the fear subsiding inside him, little by little, just because he heard someone say the words. He wasn’t sure as to what had caused this heightened state of panic, but he was glad that with every passing moment it was actually leaving him. “I just need to calm down,” he repeated, clutching onto Fred the dog, remembering once again that this was something, this was familiar. Fred was comforting.

  This method of thinking did seem to help, as slowly Christopher felt himself start to relax more and more. He let himself lie back down in bed. Moments passed and nothing seemed to really be happening, although he was sure there was something happening, couldn’t see it. No scary monster had come to claim him, and no ghost seemed to wish to torment him further. “I’m okay,” he said to himself.

  “You’ll be fine,” a voice spoke from right below Christopher’s chest.

  Christopher was in that moment of time right before the disconnect, right before sleep, when he found himself scared and startled anew. In his half-awake state he swore that Fred, his stuffed dog, had just told him he’d be fine.

  “Did you just talk to me, Fred?” he thought, far too tired to actually say the words. It was as though he had been suddenly drugged, like that heavy feeling he got when his parents gave him NyQuil. “I think Fred just talked to me.”

  Chapter 3: Pine Hallow

  Little feet, little voices—distant sounds echoing through the chambers of summer’s heart.

  Christopher awoke the next morning unable to picture with much clarity what had happened the night before. Perhaps it was the thrill of a new morning, or the fact that this new bright day was filled with all kinds of new noises to which he was unaccustomed. Back at home in Bloomington, Christopher would often awaken to the sound of nearby construction and passing vehicles flooding the busy street a few feet outside his window, which was next to the head of his bed. Here in this new bed, the noise outside was gentler, yet the urgency was the same. He didn’t think that the sounds of birds could be so loud, so interesting.

  Christopher slowly rose from the sheets and stretched his arms, and then, yawning, slid out of bed and shuffled over to the window. Outside it was a beautiful summer day, one of those cloudless days where the sky seems so bright and blue that it’s almost painful to look at, yet too nice to actually keep yourself from trying. Christopher remembered something that his father had told him a few years earlier: “A new, cloudless day is like a clean, blank sheet of paper, able to accommodate to any dream you can come up with, in whatever way you choose to bring it alive.” He was never exactly sure what his father had meant, something about the world being open to those who dream to make it different. Something like that. All he knew is that it seemed so relative to times like this one, and the thought, of course, brought him to his father, a subject he was definitely not comfortable with yet.

  As he beheld it, he found the view the window afforded him of the house’s backyard was quite an intimidating one. With no road, no building, nor any sign of other people in sight, Christopher was left with a rather isolated feeling—that strange, empty contentedness you feel if you’ve ever been out in the woods alone at night, or stopped by the side of the highway on a lone desert road. All around him were views of green, rolling hills covered with trees, some of them as tall as buildings were back home. Christopher imagined for a mome
nt that each hill was the tomb of some dead colossus, now overgrown with vegetation and long forgotten. Off in the distance he could vaguely make out what he thought was a lake and made a mental note of it, intending to ask Grandpa Bones. It had been years since he had been fishing and he would greatly appreciate the opportunity to do so again.

  After retrieving one of his suitcases from underneath the bed, Christopher rummaged through both of them and picked out some of the clothes he would wear for the day. It was a strange thing, to have everything he owned packed away. He wondered for a moment what had happened to the rest of his stuff back at home. He had heard something about it all being stored, but where? He was only allowed three suitcases; a lot of things had to be left behind. He remembered that James had a much easier time with it than he had—it was almost as if James no longer cared for a lot of the things that he had used to. In a way, Christopher could see why.

  Dressed and ready for the day, Christopher made his way downstairs, smelling some sort of breakfast being cooked, and judging by the scent it was most likely sausage or bacon. He wondered if James was up yet. Hopefully today he would have a chance to talk with him.