The Unwanted (Black Water Tales Book 2)

by Jean Nicole Rivers

  Before leaving Slokivka the next day, Blaire noticed a postbox while standing at the bus stop on the main road. She dug into her bag and pulled out two white envelopes, studying them nervously before shoving them back into her bag. Blaire thought of Mrs. Andrich’s last picture of Ivan in his stiff black suit the day of Frita’s funeral, the slight distortion that had begun on his face. After retrieving her cell phone from her bag, Blaire clicked open the camera application, held the phone out in front of her and snapped. With trembling hand she reeled the phone back in for review and a rickety breath escaped her. It was clear as day, showing the navy of her coat against the bright red brick of the building behind her. Every image was crisp except her face, which was completely dissolved in a hodgepodge of unidentifiable, swirling lines. Blaire’s hand, which previously had a gentle tremble caused by the cold, now shook violently as she buried the phone back in her bag.

  Just then Blaire heard the old bus rattling, resembling the cough of an aging smoker. Blaire shuffled toward the door of the bus and just as she reached its steps, she stopped and said, “One second, please.” Blaire turned and ran back to the postbox where she pulled out the envelopes. After fumbling, she managed to throw them into the dark mouth of the metal box.

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  “So, what did you find out?” Travis was anxious to know. The game room buzzed with the chatter of excited children, making decorations for the upcoming party. Blaire was only gone for a day, but it felt as if a lifetime had passed.

  “I met Ivan’s mother.”

  “Really? What was she like? Crazy?”

  “No, not at all, that’s the scary part. She never wanted to bring Ivan here, but they had to when he started having visions.”

  “Visions? What kind of visions?” Travis said. Blaire narrated her encounter with Mrs. Andrich from the beginning right up until the point where she shut Blaire out of her house, leaving her with the name, Dmytro.

  “You think that this Dmytro was a child that lived here?”

  “Could be, but get this. Ivan began having these visions after they took him to the funeral of someone that they knew at a cemetery in another town called Slokivka.”

  “Someone who died here?” Travis asked in confusion.

  “No, a lady named Frita.”

  “Slokivka, why does that sound familiar?” Travis asked, a little frustrated by his lack of understanding of the meaning of all of these seemingly trivial facts.

  “It’s where Magda Lutsky and her daughter were from and many of the early workers here at St. Sebastian,” Blaire explained.

  “So, they took him to the funeral of some lady in Slokivka, and then he started having visions? I don’t get it.”

  “I didn’t either. So, I went to the cemetery and guess who I saw?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Dmytro Prada,” Blaire said, whispering into Travis’ ear.

  “Dmytro?”

  “At least, his tombstone, he’s buried just a couple of sites down from Frita. The Andrich family must have passed right by that grave during the funeral, and that evening is when it all began.”

  “Do you believe that Ivan actually lived here as a boy in another life?” Travis asked. “You think that’s possible?”

  “Do you have a better explanation? Either he was here or someone that he is talking to was.” Blaire told him.

  Travis hesitated as he gathered his thoughts. “You think Ivan is possessed? Please don’t tell me that because you are really going to kill me with this. I’m stressed enough as it is. I haven’t been feeling too hot.” Travis sighed, wiping away small beads of perspiration from his purple skin. “And now you hit me with this.”

  “I…I don’t know what I’m saying. I’m almost more confused than I was before I left. What do you think?”

  “Honestly?” he asked.

  “Of course!”

  “I just can’t believe all of this, Blaire. It is just too much to absorb, ghosts and possessions…”

  “What about this picture?” Blaire pulled out her phone and showed him the picture that she had taken that morning in Slokivka. “Mrs. Andrich had a photo of Ivan that she took right after Frita’s funeral, and his image had begun to change just like this one. Just like all of the photos that Danya has taken. It’s like this place…it…it devours pieces of your soul, little by little.” Blaire received a sympathetic look from Travis.

  “Don’t tell me you think this is all just one big coincidence,” she said.

  “Flaws on pictures happen all of the time,” he reasoned. “It’s just difficult to believe. It’s much easier to believe that being in this new and difficult environment is taking a psychological toll on us.”

  “So now I’m crazy?”

  “Blaire, that’s not what—”

  “You can’t just keep ignoring this like everything else in your life!” Blaire felt as if she were losing control.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Travis shot back.

  “Lorna, where’s Lorna?” Blaire suddenly remembered that Mrs. Andrich had mentioned her name.

  “Who?”

  Blaire cocked her head. “Lorna…Lorna, your patient, my student, little girl, red overalls.”

  Travis narrowed his eyes now as if he were giving a medical examination.

  “Don’t look at me like that!” Blaire snapped.

  “Blaire, I think you need to rest. I’m concerned about you.”

  “I’m fine. I just want to know where Lorna is.” She was pleading now.

  “Blaire, I don’t know who that is.”

  Dismissing him hastily, she went to Anya who was sitting at a table with Ivan and Bo. “Anya, have you seen Lorna?”

  Ivan’s eyes shifted down to the table, and Bo lowered his head.

  “Who?” Anya responded.

  Blaire raised her hands in frustration. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  Blaire fled the room, and as she approached the steps, Natalka was coming down.

  “Have you seen Lorna?” Blaire asked. Natalka shrugged her shoulders. Blaire pushed passed her and ran up the stairs taking them two at a time. On the second floor, she burst into room 2B.

  “Lorna,” Blaire called out, but the room was empty. She went to room 2C where she threw open the door.

  “Lorna,” she called again.

  Turning from hanging clothes in the closet, Hannah spoke, “Who?”

  That night Blaire hardly slept. Over and over, she replayed her images of Lorna and encounters with her, and all of them were now blurry and dream-like. How could she have imagined this child? Blaire sunk deeper under her comforter.

  The first heavy snow of the season for Borslav began, gently climbing down from the overburdened black sky and a merciless freeze settled on the grounds. There wasn’t a sound to be heard in St. Sebastian that night, but the whites of many anxious eyes lurked just inside the darkness since sleep came less and less to the inhabitants of the old brick building. Something was about to happen.

  The sound of the alarm from Blaire’s phone began to filter through her dream as a soft buzzing, growing louder until it rang with startling clarity into her ears. She blinked her eyes open to the darkness and silenced the rude noise. It was time for bed check.

  On the second floor, Blaire crept from room to room, peeking through all of the windows of the doors. Before heading back to her room, Blaire stopped in the third floor bathroom. Just enough silvery strands of moonlight pierced the window to forgo the ceiling lights. Emerging from the stall, Blaire bent over the sink and splashed her face with warm water. She froze the moment she felt it, something was behind her. It was close and uninvited, flushing out from the vents and rumbling through the cold floor under her feet. A thin, dark figure rose from the tub behind Blaire, its back toward her and Blaire could feel the gentle, odorous winds at her back, reeking of what could only be death. Higher and higher the woman rose until she was almost touching the ceiling.

  Blaire opened her eyes and
a chilling scream erupted from her as she dashed toward the door. She heard her keys clatter to the floor as she stumbled over her own feet. Blaire hit the ground hard just as the door whipped itself shut locking her in the bathroom. There’s something in the basement. Blaire crawled to the door and fought hard with the knob, but it refused to move. Help us. Blaire banged on the door, screaming for help. Don’t go down there. Suddenly, there was a ferocious grip on Blaire’s leg that yanked her back, deeper inside. Too terrified to turn and face it, Blaire screamed louder as it, whatever it was, slithered up her legs like a snake entwining a tree branch. Blaire’s breath was strained with terror. Her hand flopped around her throat as it became more difficult to breathe as the thing was around her neck now, choking her.

  The uncontrollable beat of Blaire’s heart almost deafened her, and she was sure that she would lose consciousness at any moment when she felt a draft of air hit her face from the hall as the door swung open. Natalka looked down on Blaire who lay squirming on the floor. Blaire scrambled to her feet and finally turned around to see that the bathroom was empty. She looked around the vacant room and then back to Natalka. Blaire grabbed her keys from the floor, took Natalka’s hand, and led her to the girls’ room quickly.

  “Natalka, I need you to go to bed,” she said through shallow breath as she placed the girl in the room, closing and locking the door with shaking hands.

  She fled to the stairs and took them two at a time to get to the third floor where she sprinted to the end of the hall and into the arms of a groggy Travis.

  “What happened? Why were you screaming?” he asked, but Blaire had no time to talk. She pushed him into the room and locked the door behind her. She ran to one side of the heavy dresser and began grunting as she tried to force the piece of furniture to move.

  Travis coughed several times before he could get his breath. “What are you doing?”

  “Help me!” she screamed as she pushed harder. Obediently, Travis found his place beside her and pushed until the dresser was pressed tightly up against the door with one loud scraping noise that touched a nerve inside of Blaire.

  “That’s it!” she whispered.

  “What’s it? Why did we just do that?” Travis asked.

  “That’s the scrapping noise in 3C. It’s something being pushed against the door and I thought it was happening to keep something locked in, but…but now, I think it was meant to keep something out.”

  “What? Why were you screaming?”

  “Oh, my God…” Blaire’s voice trailed off as she changed her mind and began to remove the dresser from the front of the door. Travis helped her to move the dresser back. Blaire unlocked the door, swung it open and dashed down the hall toward room 3C.

  “Blaire!” Travis called after her. He saw her stop at the end of the hall and face the wall where she rubbed her fingers against the paint lightly.

  “The fire axe…” Blaire whispered to herself.

  “The what?” Travis asked.

  “The fire axe! This light space on the wall, this is where there used to be a box with a fire axe. I thought it was a picture, but no. Ida…she had the fire axe, and she took the children into the basement. She hurt them and now she’s trying to do it again.”

  “Who?”

  “The woman that I saw with Ivan.”

  “Who? Wait, what woman?”

  “The woman from the photographs, the photographs all over the halls, I think her name is Ida. The woman I saw that night with Ivan, when I was outside,” Blaire screamed.

  “You never told me you saw anyone.”

  “I tried, but you weren’t listening to me, and then I thought maybe I was dreaming or something, but I wasn’t. It was her and something just attacked me in the bathroom, but Natalka came in and it disappeared.”

  “How did Natalka get out of her room?”

  “I…I don’t know.”

  Travis sighed deeply, while rubbing his eyes. “Blaire, I’m getting really worried about you. Are you sleeping at all?”

  “It’s not me, Travis…it’s this place.”

  “What about this place?”

  “It keeps taking little pieces of us and pretty soon…” There’s something in the basement. “…we’re gonna be all gone. There’s something in the basement and I need to know what it is.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

  “Am I the only person around here that you have not completely alienated?” Anya asked in frustration, as she pulled a load of bed linens from the dryer and tossed them into an oversized wicker basket.

  “No, but you’re the only one whose husband is the town’s locksmith and installed all of the locks on the doors around here,” Travis said as he hopped off the washer.

  Blaire smiled lightly in Travis’ direction, she knew he didn’t really believe her wild stories, but he had agreed to help her follow this through to the end, and that was one of the things she loved about him. He was a true friend, even if this probably was some sort of psychological ploy for Blaire to get all of the information on her own, and come to the conclusion that she was mistaken and overreacting. A very psych minor kind of thing to do, but a good-hearted one, too.

  “I told you that in passing, not so I can become part of another one of your schemes,” Anya said. She huffed as she picked up the basket and walked over to the makeshift folding table.

  “Well, there is no better way to become part of one of our schemes,” Travis joked, but Anya didn’t laugh, neither did Blaire.

  “We almost got caught the last time I participated in one of your tricks, and if anyone knew that I was helping you...”

  “Anya, I am not just asking for your help because of who your husband is. I am asking because I know that you care about these children. Something bad is going on here. I know it. I can feel it, and whether or not either of you choose to admit it, you know it, too,” Blaire said.

  “I don’t know anything,” Anya whipped back.

  “You do!” Blaire snapped. “Back when you first asked me if I was going to help the children, I wasn’t quite sure what you meant, but now I know exactly what you mean. I told you that I would, and I intend to follow through on that promise with or without your help. I walked away once when I should have helped someone, but I won’t do it again.”

  A pregnant silence invaded the room before Anya spoke, “I will get you a key to the basement and after that I am done. I’m OUT!”

  The sky was overcast, and a clean snow blanketed the town of Borslav in soft white. Blaire and Travis attempted to bundle up while making sure that their workout clothes were an obvious part of their awkward ensemble. It had been a couple of weeks since the cold had become completely wicked, causing Travis to give up running. Blaire had never been out for a run with Travis, but still hoped to avoid suspicion with their athletic ruse. Out of the door, the two started a slow jog around the side of the building, as if they were headed toward the water.

  Travis coughed and cursed the flu he had not been able to shake. Blaire could see his bluish veins, pulsing just beneath the pulled skin of his once plump and healthy face. At the back of the building, the two scanned their surroundings to make sure that no one was watching before they made a quick descent down the cement steps.

  Blaire reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out the two keys.

  “Jesus!” Travis called out as he tucked his gloved hands tightly under his arms, like a child on a New England bus stop. “Hurry!” he said in a puff of smoke.

  “I’m going as fast as I can,” Blaire responded when she heard the final lock click open.

  Tugging on the door hard, it popped like the cork on a bottle of champagne. She and Travis disappeared inside.

  Blaire brought her flashlight to life, and a single beam cut through the dusty shadows of the room. Travis retrieved his flashlight and their beams of light danced merrily along the walls, and in and out of the shadows of ancient objects. Blaire waved her hand in front of her face as she coughed, trying to clear her immediate
breathing space of unsavory dust particles. The room was packed with everything from an old washing machine to broken bookshelves. Blaire’s light found a broken antique crib of light wood. It was colder in the basement than it was outside. A broken rung jutted out from the otherwise perfect crib, and its sharp, splintered edge made the device more of a death trap than a baby cradle. Blaire took off her gloves, kneeling down to study faint remnants of a red substance splattered across the rungs. The basement was a musty old place, a time capsule imprisoned behind a locked door.

  “Ouch,” Blaire blurted when she tripped over an old beaten-up rocking horse.

  “You okay?” Travis asked.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” she answered.

  “Look at what we have here,” Travis called out, as he pulled a dirty sheet off two file cabinets that sat against the far wall.

  “Children,” he read out loud the words from a piece of paper that was taped to the side of the cabinet. “The other one is for employees.” Travis stated before he began coughing wildly.

  “More files?” Blaire said, as she carefully made her way across the room.

  “That’s what it looks like, but it’s locked.”

  Blaire sighed.

  “Here we go,” Travis said with a big grin on his face, as he pulled a hammer from underneath the utility sink. “What would you do without me?” Travis laughed at his comment and began to work the back of the hammer into the top of the drawer like a crowbar. Several times he repeated the process until the drawer popped open with a shrieking belch that released a mass of dust.

  “Hold up your flashlight,” Blaire said, instructing Travis as she sat hers on top of the cabinet and began sifting through the manila folders. Travis focused his light on her hands.

  “These are old,” Blaire informed Travis. “Really old.” By the time Blaire passed the P’s, she was disappointed, but by the time they had gone through the entire file cabinet, she was devastated.