by Nic Sheff
“Come on, man, be cool,” I say.
His look isn’t really the nicest look I’ve ever seen.
In fact, it’s a look that makes me chilled all over.
“Anyway, I gotta go,” I say again.
I turn and start to run off down the trail.
But then he catches me by the wrist and pulls me back toward him. A sick feeling forms at the base of my stomach. My heart races. I contemplate kicking him in the balls but hesitate for some reason.
“You don’t go until I tell you to go,” he says.
His eyes are wide and crazy-looking in the darkness. I pivot and swing my boot up with all the force I can gather under it, connecting with the side of his leg so he doubles over and yells, “You bitch!” but then is up fast and running after me as I sprint down the driveway.
We round the bend, him close up behind me, when I give a little shriek and stop because a new boy has just stepped out onto the road. Me and Alex must see him at the same time, because we both stop running and I can feel his hot breath on me and my heart really does feel like it’s about to crawl up out of my throat and go running off screaming into the woods.
The new boy steps past me, wordlessly, and punches Alex straight in the face—sending blood shooting out of both nostrils and making him sit down hard on the cracked concrete.
“Leave, now,” I hear the new boy say and I turn to see Alex push himself up and go running off down the driveway.
The new boy comes over to me, a little out of breath.
“Hey,” he says. “You all right?”
I shake my head.
“No,” I say. “No, I’m not.”
I blink my eyes and try to focus on him. He’s heavily built with big, broad features and dark skin.
“But thank you.”
He nods slowly and then I notice the red kind-of rugby shirt with a white stripe he’s wearing.
“Hey, were you in the woods back here earlier?” I ask.
He laughs.
“Yeah, there’s a path that goes through there from the beach into town. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sneak up on you.”
“It’s all right,” I say. “I just moved in today . . . so, uh . . . I don’t know the area.”
“Yeah, I know,” he says.
He smiles more and I can see a dimple in his cheek that’s pretty goddamn cute.
“Everyone’s been talking about you coming into town. There’s not much else going on ’round here.”
“So I gathered.”
“I’m Colin, by the way,” he says.
I tell him my name and we shake hands and I feel the heat from his body.
“I’m sorry about Alex,” he says. “His dad owns like ninety percent of the real estate in Beach Haven . . . and Staffordshire Township. He’s used to getting what he wants. The whole Winter family is like that.”
“Winter?”
“Yeah, Alex Winter. He’s got three brothers and they’re all as bad as he is. Worse, maybe.”
“Isn’t that the name of the actor in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure? I mean, the one who’s not Keanu Reeves?”
Colin laughs again.
“I never saw it.”
“Well, thank you, again,” I say. “Are you gonna have trouble with him later?”
He shrugs.
“Twenty bucks says he won’t even remember this. We were on the football team together a couple of years ago. I can handle him fine.”
“There was something not right about him,” I say. “I felt that right off.”
“Everyone’s goin’ a little crazy with the winter coming in. Town like this, there’s nothin’ to do ’til spring. You’ll see. It’ll probably get worse before it gets better.”
“Great,” I say.
We both stay silent for a minute.
“How long have you lived here?” I ask him, starting back toward the house, letting him walk along with me.
“Couple years,” he says. “I was in Vermont before this. My uncle’s a contractor. Did some work on the Harmony House remodel, actually.”
“Oh,” I say. “So you know it, then?”
“Yeah, a little. My uncle only lasted a couple days on the job. You know there are no right angles in the entire building? Every corner is off center. And a room that seems like it should be directly on top of another room is to the left or right. It’s like a carnival fun house. The original owner built it that way intentionally, so the hotel developers wanted to preserve that same . . . uh . . . lack of symmetry.” He pauses. “Which, when you’re in construction, is a real pain in the ass.”
I laugh. “Is that why your uncle quit?”
“No, not just that. You meet him? The developer guy?”
“No.”
“People here wanted to run him out of town. They were pretty unhappy with the house being turned into a tourist attraction. There’re a lotta stories about what went on up there. They think the place should have been . . . left alone.”
I glance down the drive toward the house. “Thanks for your help,” I say. “But I better go on alone from here. I was trying to explain this to our mutual pal Alex, there, but my dad is a bit of a Puritan. Meaning if he sees me walking with a boy, he’s gonna come kill me and then kill said boy, and then we’re both gonna be dead.”
He laughs. “You sure you’re all right?”
I nod.
“Well, it’s a small town,” he says. “So I know I’ll see you again.”
“I hope so. I really can’t thank you enough.”
I stand on my tiptoes and kiss his rough-feeling cheek—quickly.
I run off then without saying anything else.
I run down the dark, winding driveway, the trees like a canopy overhead. There is a crashing through the underbrush. Rats and night birds, screeching owls, the high-pitched cries of bats in the night.
A car engine sounds behind me and there are headlights rounding the bend. It must be my dad returning from the store. I cut off the road into the tangle of branches and ivy. I crouch in the bramble, waiting, holding my injured wrist tightly.
My dad’s car drives slowly by.
I bide my time.
My eyes struggle to adjust to the darkness again after the lights pass.
I creep back toward the house.
I climb up the trellis again and in through my open window.
The room is just as pink and terrible as when I left it.
I take off my contraband clothes and hide them under the bed.
Then I put on a pair of flannel pajamas and get out my cosmetics bag with my toothbrush and makeup.
I open the heavy door to my room and step out into the strange, curving hallway lined with grotesque, mismatching wallpaper. The closest bathroom is down the hall and so I walk clumsily.
From behind me I hear the faintest of whispering.
It’s like a breath, a sigh from somewhere just out of sight.
My heart beats painfully fast, though I can’t say why.
“Hello?” I say, my voice cracking.
The whispering comes again—words I can’t quite make out.
“Who’s there?” I ask.
The sound again—too faint and mumbled.
My hands shake.
And, finally, I recognize the voice.
My vision blurs with tears.
The voice . . .
It is my mother’s.
I feel the plush blue carpet from our house in Johnstown under my feet as I walk down the staircase. The front door is open, letting in the damp summer heat. Two uniformed police officers stand, arms crossed, heads bowed, talking to my father. The lights from the cruiser outside blink red then blue then red again. The officer speaks softly, but not so softly that I can’t hear.
“I’m sorry. She didn’t make it.”
And now, in Harmony House, I hear my mother again.
“Anselm,” she whispers.
But it can’t be true.
It can’t.
I follow the sound down the hallway. It seems to be coming from the room just in front of me.
I try the doorknob, but for some reason it’s locked.
I try it again.
And then something grabs me from behind.
CHAPTER 3
“What are you doing?”
It’s my father, his eyes narrowed at me.
“Dad, what the h . . . heck? You scared me.”
“Where are you going?” he asks, his jaw set.
“Nowhere,” I say. “I just—I thought I heard something in here.”
“Heard what?”
My mind goes blank, searching for an answer. The whispering has stopped now. And it obviously wasn’t my mother. It can’t have been. I don’t know what the hell is wrong with me.
“Why’s this door locked?” I ask, trying to change the subject.
He tries the knob himself, as if he doesn’t believe me.
“Huh? Well, maybe they put some of the valuables in here. Let’s see . . .”
He rummages around in his pocket and pulls out an antique-looking skeleton key.
“This should do it,” he says.
He fits the key in the lock and turns the bolt.
The door is heavy, but I force it open. The smell from inside comes wafting out and my dad and I both recoil.
“Did something die in here?” I say stupidly.
“Yeah, maybe.”
I step through the door. A shiver runs through me. The temperature has dropped like twenty degrees just in this room—even though the windows are closed.
The dust and cobwebs are thick on the white sheets draped over the furniture. Otherwise, the room is like some kind of antiques store. Old, valuable-looking lamps and paintings stand on every surface. There are stacks of books and fine china and silver. A large Oriental rug is rolled up in the corner.
A small leather-bound book sits by itself on an antique dressing table. I stare, somehow unable to take my eyes from it.
“See? The valuables,” my dad says. “At least we don’t have to clean in here.”
He laughs, the noise sounding strangely hollow—forced.
My dad goes to the windows and checks the locks. I go to the book and pick it up quickly. It drops neatly into the pocket of my robe.
I’m not sure why I do it, exactly, except I’m curious. There seems to be something about it—I don’t know what.
“Well, come on,” he says. “I made some dinner—it’s our first night, so it’s just grilled cheese sandwiches. Tomorrow I’ll make something better.”
“Sure,” I say. “Thanks, that’d be great.”
“And we’ll lock this back up.”
“Okay.”
“Okay.”
I look at my dad in this cold, shivering room. He is trying. I can see that. He may be a backward, judgmental religious asshole—but he is my dad.
I laugh then.
“What’s funny?” he asks, smiling.
“Nothing,” I say. “Thanks for making dinner.”
He shuts the door behind us and we step back out into the hallway—away from that rotting smell and the icy cold.
Downstairs we sit in the brightly painted kitchen eating grilled cheese sandwiches and half-burnt zucchini. The simple food is good on my stomach after the pie and ice cream earlier. I drink a ginger ale and my dad drinks a bottle of Budweiser.
“I got donuts for the morning, too,” he says.
I thank him, though the thought of anything sweet right now makes my stomach turn.
“I really want this to be a fresh start for you,” he says. “I want it to be a fresh start for both of us.”
“Yeah,” I say lamely.
“I’m sorry things have been so hard.”
I sip the ginger ale—then, awkwardly, put my hand on his.
“They’ve been hard for you, too, Dad. I know that. We both miss her.”
“But it’s not just that,” he says, clasping both his hands around mine. “I need you to understand.”
He looks into my eyes and I look away.
“Your mother and I,” he says. “We weren’t on the righteous path. She was a sinner. She squandered the many gifts God gave her. She brought us down. She would have pulled us both into the pit of hell. Now we have this chance and . . . I need to take advantage of it. I need you to take advantage of it, too. We’re so fortunate to have it—”
I pull my hand free of his.
My jaw sets tight and I speak through gritted teeth.
“Fortunate. We’re fortunate.”
“Yes, don’t you see? God’s given us this opportunity to repent.”
I stare hard at him.
We are fortunate, he says, that my mother is dead.
We are fortunate, he says, and he means it.
I want to scream. I want to scream at him and hit him. I want to wake him the fuck up.
The sickness is back in my stomach. The heat rises inside of me.
The yellow kitchen walls and framed black-and-white photographs of lighthouses spin around me.
“We have a responsibility,” he says. “To practice His principles day in and day out. Your mother wouldn’t listen to me. She wouldn’t listen to anybody. But I won’t let that happen to you. Your soul’s salvation is my responsibility.”
I stand, clenching my fists, and breathe in. The heat flushes my cheeks and for just a moment my whole body seems as though it’s on fire.
A loud crash sounds just behind me.
My father gasps and shields his face.
The heat drains as quickly as it came. I turn, startled.
“What was that?”
“Careful,” my dad says. “You’re not wearing any shoes.”
A glass bowl has broken into tiny pieces all across the linoleum. It is so thoroughly shattered, it looks like spilled granules of sugar.
“Careful,” my dad says again.
The wave of anger is gone, replaced by a deep weariness. I am so tired I just want to curl up in a corner somewhere and disappear.
“I’m not feeling well,” I tell him. “I’m going to bed.”
He looks distractedly at me and then back at the puzzle of broken glass.
“What? Yeah, okay.”
I walk out into the hallway. The smell of mold is dank and cloying beneath the shadowed stairwell. A cold shiver runs through me and I wrap my arms tightly around myself.
Then a sharp pain cuts into the center of my forehead.
I squeeze my eyes shut against it.
When I open my eyes again, a flash of movement makes me turn.
In the very corner of my vision there is a figure in white. A girl in a flowing dress.
She glides across the floor as though floating back and forth, back and forth, to a gentle rhythm.
Her long black hair hangs down, contrasted starkly with the white of her dress and her pale skin.
I move my lips to call for help.
But the words won’t come.
And then I see a rope, caked with dirt and blood, around her throat. It extends up, to a railing above us.
Her eyes are bloodshot and bulging—her tongue protruding blue. Her neck elongated.
I blink and stumble backward. When I turn to look again, the girl’s body is gone. There is nothing in front of me but empty space.
I shiver all over, wondering—was I asleep?
Was I dreaming?
I start up the many flights of stairs, back to the upstairs bathroom—trying to forget whatever the hell that just was.
Inside the bathroom there is a separate walk-in shower and a deep claw-foot tub. I scrub my face at the sink and pick at a couple zits on my forehead and brush my teeth.
Behind me, I can see in the mirror’s reflection, a framed woodblock print of a sperm whale—like from the cover of Moby Dick. There’s also a horizontal, rectangular triptych of different sailboats and another frame with mounted pieces of rope tied in various sailing knots—each knot with its own handwritten label bene
ath it. I study them absently—the bolan, the double half hitch, the hangman’s knot.
Tomorrow, I tell myself, I will go down to the beach.
I spit the foaming toothpaste in the sink and drink some water straight from the faucet—cool and clean-tasting.
I put on some lip gloss.
And then I remember the little hardbound book in my pocket. I take it out and squint to read the faded markings engraved in the cover. Devotions of Saint Francis of Assisi.
Inside, the first pages contain the prayer my father has drilled into my head a million times:
Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace
Where there is hatred, let me sow love
Where there is injury, pardon
Where there is discord, harmony
Where there is error, truth
Where there is doubt, faith
Where there is despair, hope
Where there is darkness, light
And where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console
To be understood as to understand
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Many other, less familiar prayers follow, along with illustrations of Saint Francis himself surrounded by woodland creatures—the animals gathered around him, birds perched on his fingers and shoulders like he’s some kind of goddamn Disney princess.
I flip quickly through and land on the inside back cover.
A name has been penciled in on the thick, rough-textured endpaper. I read the inscription—
Margaret.
I snap the book shut and throw it on the floor.
Margaret. My mother’s name.
My mother’s name is written in the cover of the book. It is written in the same kind of perfect, feminine handwriting she always had.
I sink down onto the bathroom rug.
The house sounds fade out.
Everything blurs around me.
Images are projected on the backs of my eyelids.
Gray morning light seeping in around the edges of plush, red velvet curtains. A small boy, dark-haired, with shining blue eyes and pale white skin, sits on the frayed Oriental rug looking up at a young woman in a black tunic with her long blond hair hanging down her back. She holds a nun’s habit in her hands and stares down, lovingly, at the boy.