The Clockwork House

by Wendy Saunders

  As she soothed her, Julia’s murmurs and rocking gradually slowed and her eyes drifted closed. Ava looked up and saw her mother standing in the doorway watching her wordlessly.

  Ava gazed at the clumps of hair strewn over the floor and sink, and the half bald woman in her arms, at a loss as to what to say. In the end she didn’t need to say anything.

  ‘Help me get her to the bed,’ Mrs Mays told her quietly. ‘She’ll sleep for a while.’

  She stepped into the bathroom. Taking the buzz cutters from her drowsy daughter’s hand she calmly switched them off, as if she dealt with this kind of thing every day. Between them they walked the woman back into her bedroom and lay her down on the bed. Ava stepped back and watched as the older woman tucked her under a pale pink blanket and stroked her sleeping face tenderly.

  ‘Thank you,’ she looked up at Ava.

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For treating her like a real person,’ she sighed. ‘I know what they say about her. They pity her, gossip about her, make fun of her… the kids are afraid of her… she used to love kids…’ she muttered as she watched her daughter sleep. ‘She’s my only child, I’ll never have grandchildren and when my time comes, I worry who’ll care for her.’

  She turned to Ava.

  ‘I hope she was able to help you.’

  ‘Thank you for allowing me to speak with her,’ Ava nodded before turning and walking out of the room and straight into Kelley’s chest.

  ‘Are you done?’

  She nodded, ‘let’s get out of here.’

  ‘Where are we going?’ he asked.

  ‘To see your dad,’ was her cryptic reply.

  He followed her out into the rain and drove her straight to the sheriff’s office. By the time they’d been bustled into the small office and Ava had been fussed over by all the deputies, most of which she’d met while they’d taken turns watching her property, he was afire with curiosity.

  ‘AVA!’ Gus’s voice boomed through the small office as he crossed the distance briskly and enfolded her in a huge bear hug.

  ‘Hi Gus,’ she whooshed out a breath as he wrapped his arms around her and squeezed, adding a little sway just like Kelley did when he held her.

  It was such a dad hug, she could feel the warmth and affection as he held on and patted her back, and she found herself blinking back the tears.

  ‘You worried us,’ he pulled back and looked her over as if checking that she was indeed alright and fit to be released from hospital.

  ‘I’m okay,’ she reassured him.

  ‘What happened?’ Killian seemed to think you’d fallen down the stairs, but the doc said you didn’t have any injuries consistent with a fall.’

  ‘It’s still a little unclear,’ she murmured, not wanting to admit that the ghost of Luella Lynch was not only real, but had knocked her out cold by trying to fry her brain. ‘But I’m here about something else, I need to ask you something.’

  ‘What’s that?’ his eyes flicked to his son who shrugged.

  ‘It’s about…’ she looked around and dropped her voice, ‘the two boys who died at the house, Declan and Todd.’

  ‘What about them?’ he asked carefully.

  ‘This is going to sound a bit weird but when you recovered their bodies, did they have any strange marks on their heads, five each side. They would’ve looked like small oval shapes but when you look closer, they’d have been more like electrical burns.’

  Gus stared at her for several long seconds.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said finally.

  Ava and Kelley followed along obediently as Gus led them back into his office. They both took a seat and waited as he rifled through an old battered file cabinet. Taking a handful of files, he moved behind his desk and sat, dropping the files in front of him and folding his hands over the top of them.

  ‘First,’ Gus said seriously, ‘tell me how you know about the marks.’

  ‘Then I’m right?’ Ava replied quietly, ‘they did have them?’

  Gus picked up one of the files and flipped it open to an autopsy photo which he tossed in front of Ava.

  ‘Jesus,’ Kelley swore next to her as he glanced at the picture of an eighteen-year-old kid laid out on an autopsy table.

  ‘I won’t show you the other one. He went over the cliff and he wasn’t too pretty by the time we scraped him off the rocks.’

  Ava picked up the photo with trembling fingers and stared at the side of his exposed skull. The burns didn’t just mark his scalp, they went all the way down to the bone. She swallowed hard and looked up at Gus.

  ‘Julia Mays has them too,’ she whispered.

  ‘What?’ Gus frowned, ‘how do you know?’

  ‘We’ve just come from her house,’ Kelley told him. ‘Ava wanted to speak with her.’

  ‘What? Why?’ Gus looked at Ava.

  ‘I wanted to know what she knows,’ Ava shook her head. ‘I’ve seen things, in that house, things I can’t explain, and I just wanted to talk to her, but she got really upset and before I could stop her, she grabbed the buzz cutters and shaved part of her hair. She was trying to show me the marks on her scalp.’

  ‘It didn’t occur to us that she might have them too,’ Gus shook his head. ‘Both of the boys had them, but it was more than that. During their autopsies it was discovered that the prefrontal cortex of the brain in both cases, was swollen to twice the size it should have been. At the time of death both boys would have been in agony with the swelling in their brains being constricted by their skulls. It was suggested that possibly they were exposed to some kind of mold or fungus in the house that may have caused an allergic reaction and that their deaths were a tragic accident, but it was never proven.’

  ‘So much death,’ Ava looked down at the file in front of her.

  ‘Are you okay Ava?’ Gus asked quietly.

  She shook her head.

  ‘I’m actually more tired than I thought I was. I think I need to go lie down.’

  ‘Kelley,’ Gus glanced at his son, ‘why don’t you get Ava home. We’ll talk more when she’s feeling better.’

  Kelley rose from his seat and held his hand out to Ava. With a final goodbye to Gus and a promise to check in with him, they walked out of the building, hand in hand, and into a torrential downpour.

  ‘What is it with all this rain?’ Kelley remarked as they climbed into the car. As soon as the doors were closed, he turned to Ava. ‘Okay, what’s going on?’ he asked directly. ‘What was it you didn’t want to say in front of my dad? How did you really know about those marks?’

  Ava stared at him for a moment, sighing quietly as she leaned over and lifted her hair so he could see the marks on her scalp.

  ‘Because I have them too.’

  ‘Jesus Christ Ava, what the hell?’ he gasped in shock.

  ‘Luella touched me, she put her hands either side of my head and it felt like I was being electrocuted.’

  ‘Are you telling me that’s what happened to Julia and those guys?’

  ‘It must be,’ she frowned thoughtfully. ‘It’s the only explanation because it sure as hell wasn’t mold or fungus that did this.’

  ‘Ava, we need to get you back to the hospital now,’ Kelley started the car. ‘You heard my dad; those kids’ brains were swollen.’

  ‘Kelley wait,’ she grasped his wrist before he could put the car into gear and reverse out of the parking lot. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. You heard the doctor, they performed a CT and an MRI, they would’ve immediately picked up any swelling or discrepancies with my brain.’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ he sighed and switched the engine off again. He turned back to look at her as the rain hammered against the windscreen.

  ‘I don’t either,’ Ava shook her head in confusion, ‘as far as I know four of us bear the same marks. Two died almost instantly, their brains swelled, one took a dive off a second-story balcony and the other swan-dived off the cliff. Julia survived but anyone can see she’s not able to function normally
, but me… it knocked me out cold for four days straight but other than that I don’t seem to be affected.’

  ‘That we know of,’ Kelley frowned, but looking over and seeing the distress in her eyes, he pushed back his own frustration. ‘Come here,’ he pulled her into his arms, pressing his face against her damp hair and breathing in the smell of shampoo and rain.

  ‘I’m scared Kelley,’ she whispered.

  ‘I know,’ he murmured over her head, his own eyes filled with worry, ‘but I won’t let anything happen to you Ava, I promise.’

  23

  ‘And the weather front is moving east across Maine from Canada, causing a string of unseasonable summer storms. They appear to be gaining in strength as they approach the coastlines. The advice to the residents of the costal islands is to stay inside. Don’t travel unless it’s necessary and wait until it’s blown past and out to sea.’

  Ava picked up the remote and switched off the TV. She reached down and stroked Bailey’s fur as the huge dog lay sprawled across her lap, taking up most of the couch. The rain continued to hammer relentlessly against the window like tiny little fists demanding entry.

  Her head dropped tiredly back against the couch as she stared out the window, the clatter of the rain and the howl of the wind lulling. Bailey let out a contented whine and snuggled closer, and with the heavy reassuring weight of her dog pressing her into the couch, Ava’s eyes drifted closed.

  It was an assault of painful images which left her raw and bleeding. She could hear the children screaming, the worst kind of screaming, children screaming for their lives. She could feel their terror and it slammed into her chest, her heart pounding so fast she couldn’t breathe. Somewhere close by a woman cried out in despair, her sobs soul wrenching.

  Ava shot upright on the couch, breathing heavily, her t-shirt sticking to her back, heavy with sweat. Pushing Bailey off her she dropped her legs down to the floor and cradled her head in her hands as the last of the images faded from her mind. She felt sick, her stomach churned, but as the dizziness receded the feeling in her belly was replaced with a sense of urgency. She needed to get out of the apartment, she was suffocating.

  Leaving Bailey behind her, barking in protest, Ava grasped her keys from the table by the door and ran out of the apartment, slamming the door behind her. She couldn’t focus, her mind was churning, driven by pure instinct.

  The second she stepped out into the storm she was soaked through, her long black hair dragged down her back, heavy and cumbersome, as she headed toward her truck. The sky lit up with streaks of jagged light and the thunder rolled, growling ominously. The air felt hot and heavy, the reek of ozone lay over everything, so strong it almost made her dizzy as she climbed into the truck and gunned the engine. She wasn’t even sure where she was going, she just drove.

  Miranda slammed the cash register shut and turned to her cousin.

  ‘Hey, you actually working tonight?’ she propped one hand on her hip, her red hair blazing in the neon light of the bar.

  ‘Sorry,’ Kelley frowned as he lifted his phone and shifted his position. ‘No reception. I guess the storm knocked out the signal.’

  ‘Kel,’ she smiled as she placed a couple of glasses in the dishwasher and wiped down the bar, ‘if you’re that worried about her, why don’t you just head home for the night?’

  ‘I can’t leave you on your own again,’ he frowned. ‘You’ve covered for me plenty over the last few weeks.’

  ‘Seriously?’ she shook her head. ‘It’s dead in here.’

  Kelley looked around; she was right. They’d already closed up the kitchen early so their cook could get home safely and there were only a few diehards left nursing their drinks.

  ‘I’ll give them another hour then kick them out,’ she told him, ‘and I’ll stay in the apartment upstairs tonight. There’s no point in trying to drive across the island in this crappy weather.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Go,’ she laughed, ‘before I change my mind.’

  ‘Thanks Mira,’ he dropped a kiss on her cheek. ‘I owe you one.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ she shoved him playfully, ‘I’m keeping score.’

  He threw her a disarming grin and grabbed his jacket.

  The moment he pulled up outside his apartment he knew something was wrong; Ava’s truck was gone. He glanced up to the floor above and saw Bailey barking behind the window. He launched himself out of the car, sliding on the wet sidewalk as he ran through the driving rain and into the building. He repeatedly pumped the button for the elevators, but nothing happened. The power must have been knocked out by the storm.

  He took the stairs two at a time, sweaty, panting and rain soaked by the time he reached his apartment. She wasn’t there. Bailey was barking madly, but he shut her back inside the apartment for her own safety and headed back to his car, pulling out his phone and checking it for bars.

  He tried calling her, but her phone went straight to voice mail. He tried his dad and it managed to connect on the third ring.

  ‘DAD!’ Kelley shouted into the phone above the howl of the rain. ‘DAD! AVA’S MISSING… DAD!’

  He heard a faint answer but after that it just kept cutting out. He couldn’t even be sure his dad had heard what he’d said.

  Shoving the phone roughly into his pocket he got into his car and tore out. He wasn’t sure where she was heading but his gut told him there was only one place that could be. He sped through the almost deserted streets of the town and turned onto the coast road which led straight to the cliff top and to the Lynch House.

  Ava climbed out of the truck and stood, staring at the house. The rain was beating against her, her t-shirt and her jeans were plastered to her body and the rain was stinging her skin. She stared up at the house. A single lone candle burned and flickered in one of the topmost windows.

  The double front door should have been closed and locked but instead stood wide open, blazing with light. She took an involuntary step forward, she could hear it, pounding in her blood. The house was talking to her, drowning out every other thought. The logical part of her brain was screaming at her to stop, to not go in, but she brushed it aside, as harmless and irritating as a fly.

  She took another step and another, climbing the steps slowly as the storm raged around her until she stepped through the door and into the brightly lit foyer. All of the floodlights Killian had installed were switched on, powered by the portable generator. She glanced up to the second-floor balcony above her, which stretched between the two curving staircases. A small face and an unruly mop of blonde hair appeared, peering through the spindles of the banister, his pale eyes wide with fear. He looked across and was joined by a little girl slightly older but not by much, her sweet round face framed by ringlets bound at her temple by a lopsided bow and wearing a white apron over her dress.

  Ava turned to the entrance to the parlor which had served as the school room. Two more angelic faces peered around the doorway watching her. Directly ahead of her, beneath the balcony, the foyer led into another huge room from which she could see another three children peering around the corner.

  ‘She won’t let them leave,’ Ava muttered.

  Her gaze slowly tracked down to the floor beneath her feet. Killian had laid down some protective plastic but some of it was scuffed and torn away, revealing the tiles beneath. Ava tilted her head as her brain slowly began to process what she was seeing.

  She leaned down and grabbed some of the loose covering and pulled it back, watching as the plastic split and tore away revealing the original foyer floor. She sucked in a sharp breath; the geometric pattern of the tiled floor was the exact pattern Julia Mays had been recreating with her childish 2d shapes.

  Ava stepped back and stared at the floor, to the huge stain which looked like rust, and which spread across the foyer, stretching between the two staircases.

  She heard a door slam violently somewhere upstairs but as she looked up all the children had once again disappeared.

&n
bsp; Kelley sped up the road as the trees weaved and swayed alarmingly in the storm. Lightning struck the tree in front of him in a shower of sparks and a thick branch collapsed into the road. He swerved violently to avoid it, the car fishtailing on the slick road. Suddenly a figure appeared in the bright glare of his headlights. He slammed on the brakes and swerved, the car skidded, hit a downed branch and flipped, rolling over and over in a screech of crunching metal and smashing glass. The car skidded to a halt on its roof, bumping up against a thick tree trunk, the wheels spinning, the wipers still moving and the headlights cutting through the dark woods.

  For a few seconds Kelley didn’t move, just hung suspended upside down in his seat. Then he sucked in a deep shuddering breath. Dazed, he reached for his seat belt and unclipped it, falling forward heavily with a pained grunt.

  He crawled over the broken glass and painfully hauled his battered body through the shattered side window. He rolled over onto his back and lay for a moment, breathing heavily as the rain slanted towards his face.

  His head throbbed painfully. Reaching up he felt a gash at his temple and when he pulled his fingers away, they were covered in blood. He rolled over once again and pushed himself painfully to his feet. His body was badly bruised and aching but thankfully he didn’t seem to have more serious injuries.

  An urgent feeling slammed into his gut. It felt like something was trying to stop him from reaching the house, from reaching Ava. He pushed himself away from the wreck of the car and staggered through the woods. The heady scent of wet loam and wood filled the air. The rain beat down on his head and neck obscuring his vision. Praying he was heading in the right direction he continued to climb steadily uphill.

  The lightning strikes would randomly light his path until finally he saw a light through the trees. Hurrying toward it, the trees parted, and the house loomed out of the darkness. A single light burned in the topmost window and bright light spilled from the open doorway.