by Geoff North
January 3 1986
The entire family was together for Christmas at our place, even Gordo! We still don’t get along but his new wife Megan is nice. She hit it off with Cathy right away. Unfortunately they think we should get together more often. Not going to happen. Donald’s fatter than he should be and his wife is fatter still. At least he’s cut back on the racist comments. Their two kids are loud and spoiled. I suggested they sleep in the crawlspace. Cathy gave them our room.
Wish I could help Heather out more. She’s struggling in the city to make ends meet. Maybe someday.
February 19 1986
Saw the little girl in my study this morning. Took her almost three years to show her face again. Not nearly as scary as that night in the bedroom. She’s really cute, and shy. She waved at me and vanished into thin air. I think maybe I scared her more that night than she scared me. Hopefully she’ll stick around next time long enough for a little chat.
July 13 1986
My second book, Coming Home, hit the shelves today. Some early reviews say it’s not as good as my first, but do I care? The advance on this one was triple, and the royalties for number one keep rolling in.
October 29 1987
Cathy has been bugging me about starting a family a lot more lately. Not yet time. We’re going to the Dominican for Christmas and New Year’s. That should keep all the baby talk to a minimum for a while longer.
March 11 1988
Dad finally had to quit working. Even though he quit smoking two years ago, his breathing hasn’t improved. Doctor says its mild emphysema. It will get worse.
June 21 1989
Fifteen years to the day since coming back to live my life. Not quite halfway there yet. I’m no longer in a hurry to meet up with old Hugh. This life is good. I love my wife and she loves me. I like who I’ve become and I love what I do. No rush.
Chapter 24
1992
Benjamin Nance was born on January 12 1991, not on February 7. This didn’t trouble Hugh’s precise sense of timed events. If anything, it proved time was not static, things did change, and not always for the worse like he once believed. Today for example, was the dreaded day in September from his first life when little Ben toppled down the stairs. A lot was different now. This wasn’t even the same house, and the basement door was locked safely at the top. He’d checked it more than once since getting up that morning.
Hugh was a successful author, not a file maintenance clerk at Little City Food Store. There would be no call at work in the afternoon, because Hugh worked at home. He would spend the entire day with his boy, and everything would be fine.
“This isn’t like you,” Cathy said as she watched her husband plead with their son to eat his lunch.
“What’s that?” He didn’t look at her. He was too busy picking food up off the floor.
“You getting up at six in the morning and changing his diaper. You fed him breakfast and here you are now sitting with him at lunch.”
“So I love my boy, what’s wrong with that?”
“Not a thing. I love seeing the two of you together. It’s just that you’re usually locked away in your writing room at this time of day. It’s nice.”
It was nice, he thought. He looked at his messy young son and smiled.
You’ll be three years old when your first sister is born, and almost eight when your brother comes along. What kind of brother will you be? Who will you look like?
They were questions he’d asked in vain for many, many years. Now he would finally get to see. The little boy’s face went beet red for a few moments and his blockish blonde head shook with inner effort.
“Oh you little rotter,” Hugh said backing away and plugging his nose.
“Do you want me to do it?” Cathy asked. The smell didn’t affect her, it never did.
“I’ve got it,” he said, removing Ben from his highchair. Cathy stayed behind to clean the kitchen while Hugh changed the diaper in their bedroom. The two walked slowly back down the steps a few minutes later, father bent over holding his little boy’s hand, allowing him to get some more practice on his short, chubby legs. He tightened his grip a bit more as they passed by the cellar door at the bottom of the stairs. Hugh glanced near the top one more time. It was locked tight.
They sat together in the living room and flipped through the television channels. Hugh was headed for a news station, but Ben was too quick for him. He saw a big flash of purple and wailed at his father until they were back on PBS and Barney the Dinosaur. All of their kids had loved Barney, and here he was going through it all again.
My God, it’s only the first season.
Fortunately Barney hadn’t made it to VHS yet and once the program was over, Benjamin had to settle for the next program they could both agree on. Hugh wasn’t a big fan of Indie racing, but the little tot was entranced by the dozens of colorful cars speeding by on the screen, the high-pitched buzz of their engines appealed to developing senses.
Cathy joined them an hour later, cuddling up to her husband on the couch. Ben looked at her briefly from the floor, shaking a fist toward the television. “Cawr voom! Cawr voom! Faas, faas, faas!”
“Yes, sweetie, the cars are fast!”
Hugh wrapped an arm around her. “You know, he can’t go on like this forever, why don’t you go downtown and rent us a movie for later?”
“You never want to watch movies, what brought that on?”
That wasn’t quite true. Hugh loved movies, he just didn’t enjoy watching movies over again. He’d seen almost all them before. It was hard for him not to comment whenever they saw trailers on TV advertising the next big blockbuster. He knew if it was good or bad before it even hit the theatres. They didn’t go to the movies often, but Hugh was feeling especially good today, and he wanted to share the feeling with her. “I’m taking a weekday off from writing, how often does that happen?”
“Not often enough,” she kissed his ear and ran her tongue across his cheek.
Hugh pulled away and rubbed the side of his face. “Gross! Are we renting a movie or not?”
“How about a romance?”
“Sure, why not?”
My least favorite type of movie. Good chance I won’t have seen it.
“We need a few groceries anyway. I’ll make a list and you can go down to Little City as soon as Ben lays down for a nap.”
Hugh didn’t like the sound of that. He’d never set a foot in Little City Food Store in the dozen or so years it had been open, and he didn’t intend to do so today. That’s where he was the day Ben died.
“No, no, no. The deal is you go downtown for the movie and I stay home with Ben.”
“You never do the grocery shopping, what are you? Some kind of chauvinist?”
She was kidding of course, but he was beginning to worry, almost sorry for bringing the whole movie idea up in the first place. “Please, Cathy, I just wanted to stay in the house all day.”
Her eyes lit up as if she’d suddenly remembered something. “Alright then, but I know what movie were watching.”
He braced himself. “What is it?”
“Sister Act, with Whoopi Goldberg.”
A musical comedy, far worse than romance, and he’d seen it.
It was after five in the afternoon before Cathy’s fourth and final client left. She prepared a quick grocery list and changed Ben into a clean pair of pajamas. Hugh was still watching television and could her singing one of Barney’s tunes on their way downstairs. He sat up on the couch and started to look for the remote on the coffee table. They were at the foot of the stairs when he glanced their way. Ben had gotten ahead of her at the bottom, his arms whirling circles in the air.
The cellar door was wide open.
Hugh screamed and jumped off the couch. His knee jammed into the corner of the table and he dropped with a crash. Cathy ran ahead of Ben to check on her husband. “Are you alright?” She went to help him up, but he pushed her away, his eyes still locked on Ben’s little body. The b
oy’s attention had been diverted away from his parents. He was heading for the dark opening in the hallway.
“No! Ben, get away from there!” The pain in his knee was excruciating, it slowed him to a limping hobble. Ben vanished out of sight. “NO!”
In the eternity it took to get to the cellar doorway, Hugh tried to imagine the best outcome in a horrible situation. The stairs weren’t as steep as they had been on the farm, perhaps Ben would only fall a few steps. There was no pail of rusty nails at the bottom for him to strike his head against. There was a banister running down these steps where there hadn’t been one in the farmhouse, maybe Ben had grabbed onto it at the last moment.
Hugh staggered into the hall and found his son standing at the edge of the cellar stairway. There was a good foot of doorframe and inner wall that had blocked him out of Hugh’s sight. Ben’s fingers were gripped through the white lattice plastic of a baby gate locked tightly into place at the top of the stairs. He shook at it like a prisoner rattling on cage doors, desperate to see what was beyond.
“Relax, Hugh. He’s fine.” Cathy rubbed his back. “Let me take a look at your leg.”
“Forget about my goddamned leg. What about Ben? Why was the cellar door open? For fucks sake, Cathy!”
Ben started to cry and she gathered him up in her arms. She gave Hugh a dirty look but kept her own voice down. “It stinks down there. I opened it up while you were sleeping in the living room to air it out a bit. Jesus, Hugh, did you have to scream like that in front of him.” She kissed Ben’s forehead and smoothed the back of his hair down.
“I-I’m sorry, I just had this bad feeling.”
She looked down at the knee he was rubbing. “Hope you broke it.”
Sister Act wasn’t as bad the second time round. Ben was put to bed early in the evening and the couple had some wonderful make up sex, the best kind. He was still feeling relief from the tragedy that never happened, and there was a good chance the two of them would have another go in the bedroom later on in the night.
Sooner than later.
“More popcorn?” He offered her the bowl which consisted of little more than a few buttered un-popped kernels on the bottom.
“I’m stuffed.” She got off the couch and ejected the rewound tape from the VCR. Hugh watched her ass as she bent over, her tight jeans making him instantly hard. He set the bowl aside and got up to stand behind her. He placed his hands on her hips and pressed himself up against her. She straightened back up and he pulled the t-shirt collar away from her neck, kissing the soft skin up from her shoulder.
“Let’s go to bed,” he panted.
She reached down and rubbed his aching penis. “Let’s clean up first.” She gave it one last squeeze and started for the kitchen.
“You’re a tease.”
“It’s called foreplay.”
They rinsed out the dishes and picked the toys off up off the floor. “Can we go now?”
She winked at him. “In a minute, let’s check on Ben one last time.”
He followed her upstairs, limping on his sore knee and straining hard-on. Ben’s was the small room next to theirs. The orange glow from his Winnie the Pooh night light showed him sleeping peacefully in his crib. A little foot kicked out from beneath a blanket, jerked a few more times before settling back down.
“Oh, isn’t that sweet?” She whispered. “He’s dreaming.”
“So am I,” Hugh answered, working a hand beneath her loose shirt and cupping a large, firm breast. He worked at her nipple with his fingers until it was rock hard.
“All right, let’s go.”
Hugh had her shirt off before they reached the bed. He kissed her back and ran the tip of his tongue down the length of her spine. She crawled on the mattress on all fours and he worked her pants off with one hand, the other tugging away at his own. She slid her panties away and lay on her side, watched him get completely naked. He could see her smiling in the low light trickling in from the bedroom window. He wouldn’t last long. She reached out, took his hand and pulled him down onto his back. She went on top and rode him. He sucked on her nipples and she moaned, rode him harder.
Neither one of them lasted long, but after a ten minute rest they went at it again.
“What time is it?” Cathy asked after they finally finished. She sounded as tired as he felt.
Hugh looked over at the red digital readout on the alarm clock. “Just after midnight.”
She snuggled up to him for warmth. “Can you go check on Ben before we go to sleep? It’s cold tonight and I want to be sure he’s covered up.”
Hugh groaned and sat up. He found his underwear on the floor and started for the door.
“Don’t be long, lover boy,” she purred.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
Ben’s one foot was still sticking out from under the blanket. Hugh gave his one toe a gentle squeeze before covering it up. Cathy had been right. It was cold. He leaned down and kissed the side of his head. The skin felt dry and cool. Too cool.
He quickly went back to the door and flicked on the bedroom light. Ben’s skin was not only dry and cool…it was blue. Hugh’s heart began to hammer.
“Hugh?” Cathy called from the other room. “Is everything okay?”
***
Benjamin Isaac Nance had choked to death on a piece of hard plastic. It was part of a toy carpentry set he’d gotten on his first birthday from Uncle Gordo and Auntie Megan. An oversized red nail, two inches long and almost half as thick. The big, rounded head of it was what got lodged in his throat. Cathy and Hugh had thanked the couple for the gift at the time, but they both knew it had to be put away until their son was old enough to play with some of the smaller parts. Little kids were choking on little toys all the time.
It had been stored in the closet floor of bedroom. Neither parent could remember which one had stored it on the floor instead of the upper shelf above the clothes hanger rack. Hugh didn’t accuse Cathy, and Cathy didn’t accuse Hugh. It didn’t matter anymore. Ben was gone and he wasn’t coming back.
They blamed themselves. While they were fucking their brains out, their little boy was choking his life away. They never told anyone what they were doing that night. It was something they’d have to live with for a very long time. A secret guilt they would carry the rest of their lives.
Hugh was alone in the house two days after the accident. Cathy was still out at his parent’s place, too scared to come home, too drugged up to move. He could barely move himself, unable to eat or sleep, but he could drink.
He staggered into his study, spilling rum from his glass onto the carpet and not giving a damn. He sank into his chair and finished the drink off.
I haven’t even cried yet, but I’ve found time to get good and drunk.
He shoved his half-finished manuscript off the desk, letting it fall to the floor with the spilled booze and folded his arms across the cool, mahogany surface. He lay his spinning head down and closed his eyes. Maybe he’d consumed enough to die from alcohol poisoning…he hoped he had.
“I’m sorry you feel so sad.”
He lifted his weary head and saw the ghostly girl in front of the desk. Frilly grey dress with a white face and pale blue eyes.
Eyes are blue this time, not black…not so scary.
“You picked a fine time to visit,” he slurred. “I’m too drunk to be scared, too fuckin’ sad to care.”
“You shouldn’t cuss like that in front of a little kid.”
He blinked twice, forced her and the rest of the room to stop spinning. The hairs on his arms started to rise and he felt for the first time how unnaturally cold it was in the study. He leaned back and the swivel chair bumped into the window frame behind him. He shook his head, rubbed at his eyes furiously and took another look. She was still there, now sitting in the chair across from the desk, the same chair he could’ve sworn she had sat in from time to time over the last nine years without being seen.
“You’re right--I shouldn’t. How did y
ou know I was sad and not just stinking drunk?”
“My daddy used to drink a lot, and he was sad a lot, too. I can just tell.”
“Your daddy was Michael McFarlane?”
“Dr. McFarlane,” she corrected him like a proud child only could.
“And what’s your name?” Hugh was scared. It wasn’t a ‘terrified piss your pants’ kind of scared, more of an ‘I feel like dying, so who really gives a damn’ type of scared. He would be polite and treat the spectral visitor with respect. Even through the haze of inebriation and self-loathing grief, he was still afraid and curious.
“Mary.”
“What happened to your mother and brother?”
Stupid question. She’s a ghost that’s been stuck in this house for forty years. How would she know?
She shrugged her narrow shoulders, obviously un-offended. “Been a long time since I seen them…or daddy.”
“Your daddy isn’t here with you?” He indicated the house by turning his head and moving his eyes around. Her little body shuddered and Hugh’s heart ached for her. She was about to cry. “I’m sorry that your sad too, Mary.”
Her face brightened and she stood up from the chair excitedly. “I won’t be sad much longer, I’m going off to see daddy again real soon.”
“But didn’t your dad--well, didn’t he hurt you?”
“Grown-ups do all sorts of bad things; it doesn’t mean they don’t love as much deep down.”
From the mouths of babes, Hugh thought. Kids could be so forgiving, even dead ones. “Aren’t you going to visit me anymore, Mary? Where do you plan on going? Where is your daddy?”
“He’s waiting in another place. He told me that when the time came I could go there and be with him. He’s not angry anymore. He won’t hurt me again. Nobody hurts nobody else there.”
Nothing brought sobriety on faster than talking with a ghost, Hugh realized. His mouth was dry, and he could feel a headache coming on, but he no longer felt sick in his gut, his senses were sharp once again. “Where is that? Why are you going now after so long?”
“Because I’m not going by myself. Someone’s coming with me.” Ben crawled out from behind the chair. He was wearing the same pajamas Cathy had dressed him in on the last night of his life. In one hand he clutched a fuzzy blue blanket with elephants and chimpanzees all over it. He stood up on shaky legs and grinned at his father.