by Cat Knight
It didn’t move.
She frowned. She had not relocked the catch on the door, she was sure of it. Yet now it appeared locked.
It wouldn’t budge. She found the proper key and tried to unlock the door for a second time. The key didn’t work. That was impossible. She had used it just minutes earlier. It wasn’t as if she was going to forget which key it was. Upset, she tried every key on the ring. None worked.
None.
What did that mean? A tingle passed over her. How could the door be unmovable like this? She thought a moment. It was probably stuck, and she wasn’t strong enough to push it open. Yes, that was all.
Lucy walked to the back gate and fumbled with the key and lock. In the alley, she locked the gate behind her and looked up and down. Since the houses had been built side by side, there were no gaps between, no place to dart through. With set lips, she walked up the alley around the corner to the first cross street. She wheeled to her left and made her way back to her front door.
And the front door was closed.
Lucy shook as she studied the door. The knot in her stomach returned and with it a creeping sensation. That door had been wedged. She’d done it intentionally with the tissue packet to keep it open to allow air in and provide light.
She remembered that. Yet, it was now closed. She looked up and down the empty street. She didn’t remember noticing someone hanging about, someone who might have invaded her home.
But what other explanation was there? Wind? Maybe. But it would have to be a strong one, and she hadn’t felt it.
How could the door be shut? Could the tissues just have popped out from under the gap and the door swing closed with the motion. Not likely. For a moment, she considered calling the police, but she doubted they would send someone right away, especially since the house was derelict and devoid of anything valuable. No, she was going to have to brave this by herself.
She turned the knob. The door didn’t budge. It was locked. Locked? That was crazy. Even if the tissue wedge had somehow not held the door, it might shut, but that wouldn’t lock it. She pulled out her key ring and found the proper key. With nervous energy, she slid the key in, turned the lock and entered. She tapped on her torch app again and surveyed the room before she stepped inside. The stench hadn’t gone away.
She debated whether or not to lock the door behind her. If there was someone in the house, a squatter, a locked door might slow her to the point where she couldn’t escape. Yet, an open door might invite such a person back in, one who was a little bit crazy or desperate, one who might be watching her from the outside.
It was an uncomfortable thought that someone might be scoping her out, deciding if she was alone. If that were true she would be easy prey if that someone had a mind. Lucy compromised. She closed the door but didn’t lock it.
Lucy retraced her steps to the kitchen, carefully checking each room as she went. They were all empty. She tried the back door which was unlocked and opened easily which was barmy. Hadn’t it just been locked or stuck? The queasy feeling hadn’t left her stomach, and to reassure herself she opened the door wide and checked the yard where there was no place to hide.
No one.
She closed the door and locked it because it seemed obvious that if anyone had been in the house they had gone out the back door while she ran around the block. In any case, that trespasser wasn’t getting back in through the kitchen. Satisfied and feeling slightly less vulnerable, she started up the stairwell that led to the second floor and the bedrooms.
That the stairs led from the kitchen bothered Lucy only a little. She supposed it would make breakfast convenient, but beyond that, she didn’t find any efficiency.
The second floor consisted of two decent sized bedrooms, a full bath, and a smaller bedroom that would serve as a very nice home office.
She added a note to her list to make sure there would be sufficient power and connectivity for her electronics. The rooms were in the same condition as the first floor, which meant they badly needed refurbishment.
More gang symbols covered the walls, more symbols she didn’t understand. In one bedroom were the remains where someone had tried to start a fire. Luckily, that hadn’t happened. All in all, the second floor was not irredeemable.
In the hall, she spotted a pull-down ladder that obviously led to the attic. She would have explored the attic had she been tall enough to reach the short rope pull but it would have to wait. Her phone filled with notes, Lucy reversed course and went down to the kitchen. For peace of mind, she checked the back door one more time—locked. She smiled.
Moving down the hall to the front room she flashed around the torch yet one more time. When the torch stopped still, she began to shake.
Chapter Two
MY HOUSE MY RULES.
The words were bright red on the dirty wall, and Lucy could swear that they weren’t there when she surveyed the room the first time. At least, she was pretty sure they weren’t there. Slowly, she walked over and touched the words. The paint was… wet. Her fingers came away stained.
“Oh, god,” Lucy said out loud. She spun slowly, using the torch app to illuminate every corner of the room.
Nothing.
Nobody.
The front door was still closed, so whoever had left the message might still be in the house. In the dark, someone might easily hide. Suddenly, Lucy felt afraid, very afraid.
Holding the light so that it shined behind her, she backed to the front door. If someone was in the house, then, he could stay in the house.
She was leaving, and that was good enough. When the contactors arrived to make the much-needed repairs, they would deal with a stranger or squatter or whoever it was that had just painted a message on her wall. She’d let them know. Big burly men were better at that kind of thing than her.
Outside, Lucy closed and locked the door. For a moment, she chided herself for being spooked by a message. That wasn’t like her, but she wasn’t prepared to fight. There was something odd about the whole thing. But if it was a squatter trying to spook her, let them have the house for one more night. She would reclaim it in the morning, after the interloper was tossed out.
Breathing deeply a small sense of calm returned. Lucy sent a text to the contractor’s mobile that said ‘Not 100% certain but possible squatter at Rochford House.’ She hoped that he would read between the lines.
On the way back to her flat, Lucy considered stopping by a pub. The red message had left her with a bit of the shakes. But it wouldn’t do to get all worked up again and wind up with another hangover. Once at her flat, she locked the door behind her, and double checked it.
Then she filled the bath with hot soapy water. Not only did she feel dirty from her inspection, but the red paint needed to come off. As long as it was on her body, she felt a cold dread.
Clean and more relaxed, Lucy sat at her table and pulled up her phone. She wanted to transfer her list of needs to her laptop. There, she would aggregate it by trade and print out the notes for the contractors. Notes for the plumber, notes for the carpenter. She sipped tea and hit the proper places on the screen.
Nothing happened.
Lucy frowned. She tapped again. The “note” app appeared, and while she expected it to automatically pull up her latest list, it did nothing of the kind. The list on the screen was her shopping list from two days before.
That’s really odd. Lucy pushed the thought away. It was important she stay on top of things.
With practiced ease, she tapped more tiny icons, and all her lists appeared — as they should have. They were in chronological order, so the notes she took in the house should have headed the list. They didn’t. In fact, they weren’t included at all. She scrolled through the screens, wondering if perhaps the notes were in alphabetical order.
No… they weren’t. And worse, her list of house notes seemed to be gone, erased, sent cascading into the ether. She stared.
Lucy believed in technology. Notes and lists, once created, didn
’t disappear. In her head, she replayed her visit to the house. She had certainly typed notes on her phone. She distinctly remembered that. And she didn’t for the life of her remember deleting the notes. How could they have been evaporated away into thin air? She stared. She repeated the search, and then did it once more. She fought the will to try a third time. No, she had to accept that the list had been erased and was unredeemable.
Wait, perhaps all was not lost. Maybe she had already emailed the list to herself. Perhaps, while she was thinking about something else, she had let her fingers work their magic.
Perhaps, just maybe, the list of house notes was patiently waiting to be opened and printed.
Forcing a smile, because for some reason a smile always made her feel better, she checked her email.
No email, no list, nothing even slightly resembling a list of things the house needed.
“Bloody hell,” Lucy said, all trace of a smile gone.
She fumed for only a few moments before she figured it out. It wasn’t all that mysterious. Somehow, some way, the phone in her pocket had been hit in precisely the right combination of places and sequence. Those seemingly random taps had opened her app and disappeared her list. It was like bum dialling someone on her speed dial. While embarrassing, it wasn’t magic. People had called her in precisely the same way. It happened. No gremlins, just sitting the wrong way. Nothing to do for it.
She pulled up her laptop and opened a new app. She would have to recreate the list to the best of her memory. Lucy hated to do things twice. Yet, there was no way around it. Taking a sip of tea, she typed.
It took Lucy an hour to rewrite the list, and she was certain she had missed some items, which irked her. She would have to revisit the house and compare her list to what she saw. A waste of time. She printed out her lists and laid them on the table. Since the contractor was starting the next day, she would swing by the house before arriving at the library.
She knew the contractor would spot most of the items on her list, but she wasn’t one to leave things to chance. For a minute, her mind returned to her survey of the house.
Those odd things about the doors and the keys and locks, and of course, the painted message at the end. She hadn’t seen anyone, but she couldn’t come up with any explanation other than some squatter or derelict who was using the house. Lucy didn’t see how anyone could use a house without water or electricity, but she supposed it could be done.
People camped out all over, didn’t they? The more she thought, the more she became convinced. There definitely had been someone in the house, someone who had avoided her. Even if the contractors didn’t find anyone in the morning, those locks needed changing.
By bedtime, Lucy had prepared for the next day. She had determined her route and the approximate hour she would pass by the house. In a way, she was thankful for the detour. It would give her an idea of how long it would take her to get to work once she moved in. Alone in her bed, she glanced one last time at her phone. She frowned at the email flag.
What did Mia want?
Chapter Three
Lucy opened the email despite her misgivings. She was ready to sleep, and she didn’t want something that might infect her dreams. Mia was a bit prone to the macabre with all her mumbo jumbo, and while it was entertaining of sorts, her emails sometimes acted like a late-night meal. They weighed heavier on the mind than they should, especially when one was tired. And Lucy was of the opinion that whatever passed through her brain immediately before sleep managed to infiltrate that realm of the subconscious that controlled dreams. Should she read it or could it wait?
But to not read the email would place a question in her dreams and probably give her that terrible recurring nightmare. The one where she could never find the room she was searching for, which meant she would fail her library science test.
Not being able to complete a test was one of Lucy’s favourite bad dreams.
Letting out a frustrated sigh, she opened the email.
Lucy: I know you don’t really believe in other worldly places, or spirits that recycle or remain, but I would not be a friend to you if I didn’t acquaint you with a revelation that was shared with me today by my guides.
While I’m not trying to tell you that you should forget about your new house, I feel, very strongly feel, that you are going to be in for it– some-how. The house has an energy within it. I don’t know what kind of danger there is there, but you should be prepared to take measures to protect yourself. I can perform a cleansing if you wish.
Love Mia.
Lucy frowned. What was Mia trying to say? It was one thing to play at supernatural hokey pokey, but another to actually rely on it. At least it was, for Lucy. Indulging Mia’s pseudo-reality was dandy when it was just a game. And while Mia performed all manner of rites stipulated to rid a place of any and all nasty spirits, Lucy never really took her seriously.
She might have pretended to, but that was the job of a mate wasn’t it? And she had to admit, sometimes it was fun to believe it just for a lark.
The real problem was that Mia truly believed she was an exterminator for the ghosts. And now she seemed to think that Lucy had one. The fact that her message arrived at precisely this moment was just an unfortunate co-incidence. Laying her head back down and snuggling into the pillow Lucy rationalised. Mia’s concern was genuine. Even if Lucy, not even for a minute really believed that she needed an aura cleansing or something equally as silly, Mia was just being Mia.
In fact, Mia had often been the butt of friendly teasing in their group of friends for precisely this reason. This dramatic inclination she had to things.
The house was just a beaten down old place in need of repair, not an abode for wayward spirits. It was likely a home to squatters too, by the way things seemed to be turning out.
A troubled sigh whooshed quietly past her lips and Lucy sat back up, phone still in hand and typed.
‘I’m glad you let me know. I promise I’ll be careful, love Lucy.’
That was good. That would do. Clicking the light out and snuggling back down she told herself that she had fulfilled the rules of friendship. Mia’s email was answered, promptly and without sarcasm or ridicule. And it was friendly. That was enough.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
The contractor and his crew were already at the house when Lucy arrived the next morning, just as she had planned. Ronnie was a ruddy-faced man who nodded too often and smiled too much. Lucy had the impression that the man didn’t really care too much about what she was saying, or possibly even the text she had sent to him. His job was to keep the workers on task and to keep her reasonably happy.
“Did you get the text Ronnie?”
“Aye – found naught. Probably hightailed it in the night.”
“I still want new locks.”
“A-right then. Can’t be too careful.”
He accepted her lists and assured her all items would be addressed.
“Do you intend to stop by every day then?”
“Well…. probably… I want to see how it’s getting on. You know how it is… I’m excited.”
“Whatever you say. But don’t expect every day to be exciting. There’ll be times when it’s all behind the scenes you see. You won’t know anything has changed. But it will have.”
Lucy nodded her head and forced a smile to stop the thin line her lips were forming.
“But surely there’ll be….”
“Nope. Not everything will be visible to the naked eye.”
Lucy wasn’t at all sure that Ronnie made sense, but she was willing to go along—for the moment. If there were too many days of ‘work behind the scenes’, the smiling foreman was going to get an earful. Just because Lucy was a woman didn’t mean she was incompetent.
“Alright – well, I’ll just take a look inside anyway.” A sunny smile lit her face. “I really can’t wait to move in.”
She stepped inside and while the glow from the workers lights lit up the back end of the hallway, it didn�
��t extend into the front room so she started the torch app on her phone. With determined memory, she flashed the light on the far wall.
The message was gone.
Lucy’s eyes opened so wide they almost hurt. The message had to be there. It was there the day before.
She had dipped her fingers into the red paint, it stained them, she’d washed it off, hadn’t she? The message couldn’t just disappear overnight. That was insane. Then, she tapped her head. The explanation was simple. She had misremembered which wall.
Running her torch over the next wall, she scanned it top to bottom. Quickly at first, and then more slowly.
The message wasn’t there—anywhere. Lucy’s hand shook, as the torch light bobbled over the room.
“Is everything all right?” Ronnie asked.
“No one has started work in here, have they?” she asked.
“Not yet, but soon. After a spot of tea.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, why? We always have tea first.”
“No – I didn’t mean— nothing, forget it.” She turned for the door. “I’ll see you later.”
She felt the man staring after her as she zipped out of the house.
Lucy arrived at the library carpark and pulled up. How she had made it there, she couldn’t remember, but some-how she had arrived intact.
All she could think of was what she had seen the day before. And she believed Ronnie. None of his men had cleaned any paint off the wall— they were having tea. Yet, someone, in the space of twelve hours, had erased the message she had seen the day before. Which seemed impossible.
Also, why would anyone go to the trouble of cleaning off the paint? If the warning was sincere, then wouldn’t the painter leave it? An anxious sigh broke from her throat and she tried to reason out the meaning of the disappearing message. There was no doubt at all. It had been there. She had seen it, felt it even. And she was certain she hadn’t become confused about which room had featured the warning. Yet, it was no longer there.
That seemed impossible. The known universe didn’t act in such a way. By the time she reached the main desk, she had decided to figure out everything later. The exigencies of work flushed the conundrum from Lucy’s brain. A disappearing scrawl couldn’t compete with the need to take care of patrons and books. If she expected to pay back the house loan, she needed to stay in her job.