“It looks empty,” Laurel observed.
John guffawed. “It better be empty. But no worries. It has electric. We can watch TV. We’re not that far off the grid.”
Sam thumped across the wooden porch and lit a match. That made everything worse. It was the setting of a horror movie. Here was the vacant cottage where we’d spend the night to get out of a storm, awakening to screams in the middle of the night. In the morning, one of our number would be reduced.
Whose idea was this again?
John unlocked the door. “Give us a minute to find the circuit breaker and get the lights going, ladies.”
Laurel sat down on a wooden bench against the wall and hugged herself. “They better hurry, it’s freezing out here.”
I sat down beside her, pulling the sleeves of my hoodie over my hands. “I had no idea it would be this cold. I feel like we’ve been transported to Siberia.”
“Whose idea was this again?” she laughed, echoing my thoughts.
The front room suddenly flooded with light. Laurel and I scrambled to our feet. The darkness surrounding the porch thickened into an impenetrable wall. I felt like we were on display.
“This is, like, the setting for Friday the Thirteenth,” Laurel complained as the guys shambled back onto the porch to retrieve our luggage.
“It’s not. It’s nice during the day,” Sam said, offended. “It’s just freezing right now. We didn’t think of that.”
John shrugged. “I forgot how cold it can get in the mountains this time of year. I only come up during the summer.”
“Well, it’s after midnight, so we should all head up to bed now and try to get some sleep,” Sam said. “I turned on the furnace, but it’ll take a while for the house to heat up.”
We followed him inside. The cabin was rustic almost to the point of irony, but it contained an assortment of twenty-first century appliances. A corner of the big front room was sectioned into a kitchenette by a wooden island containing several burners and an oven on one side, a row of stools on other. “See, all the modern conveniences,” Sam assured us. “We have plumbing too.”
“As long as the pipes don’t freeze,” John added.
Sam shushed him. “John and I renovated this place ourselves after our folks died. When we were growing up, this kitchen was a separate room and practically something out of the nineteenth century. We used a propane stove for cooking, and a generator to power a few lights and the plumbing. We had a TV, but we could only watch movies on the VCR. We had no channel reception. Now…” he proudly indicated the living room with a flourish, “big screen satellite TV, a desktop computer with WIFI, all the modern conveniences.”
“Except for when the television and internet go out during a storm,” John added.
“Which won’t be this weekend,” Sam said. “See, Mel? We’re gonna have fun.”
The men quickly showed us around the rest of the house. The master bedroom in the rear was dominated by an enormous king-sized bed and a massive stone fireplace. “Dibs!” Laurel cried. “Sorry, Mel, but I gotta have a fireplace. I’m freezing.”
“This is my room anyway,” John said.
Sam poked me. “Our room is just as good, if not better. Come see.” He led the way up a narrow staircase, cleverly concealed behind the fireplace in the front room so the entrance appeared to be a shadow or trick of the light. At the top of the stairs was an huge loft stretching the entire length of the living room beneath us.
“This was our room when we were kids,” Sam explained. “Now I have it all to myself. We put a bathroom up here when we redid the place.” He flipped a light in a smaller adjacent room, revealing an enormous jetted tub.
“Wow,” I breathed.
Sam grinned. “Knew you’d like that. Girls always do. We put that in with an eye towards selling the place. I’m glad it got a smile out of you.”
“I can’t wait to try it,” I said, ignoring the girls always do remark. I shivered. “Can we start a fire or something?”
“Oh, sure. Sorry,” Sam said. He opened a closet and tossed a blanket at me. “Wrap yourself in that in the meantime. Brrr! John and I should have checked out the weather. I had no idea it would be this cold.”
Sam ran downstairs to get some wood. In his absence, I took a closer look around the loft. There were no signs two boys grew up in this room, but that didn’t come as a surprise. It had been renovated since then. Part of me was sorry. The result was as sterile as a hotel room. Besides the mammoth bed, there was a comfy armchair perfect for curling up with a book, a battered chest of drawers, and the closet from which Sam had taken the blanket. I opened the door. A couple of shirts and a hoodie dangled from the hangers.
I sat down in the armchair, wrapping the blanket around me. I wished I thought to bring reading material with me. I didn’t even have my phone to keep me occupied. The weekend stretched ahead of me, endless and strange, with nothing to do. I was going to be bored. Television was not enough to stimulate me.
“I’m back,” Sam said. “John and Laurel are cozied up in his room. I decided against checking on them.” He made a face.
I made a worse one in return. “Eww. Gross.” The last thing I wanted to imagine was the two of them having sex. John was so disgusting, with that horsey face and awful breath, I didn’t know how Laurel could stand it.
Sam kneeled to stack wood inside the fireplace. “Isn’t this the life?” he sighed, inhaling deeply. “Cold clean mountain air. And hear that?”
I cocked my head, listening, wondering if he could hear strains of John and Laurel’s lovemaking. “I can’t hear a thing.”
Sam laughed at my expression. “Exactly! It’s quiet. Peaceful. No traffic, or sounds of people yelling, or their televisions or music, or the thousand different noises you hear all day long without realizing it. It’s so restful.”
I closed my eyes and listened. Nothing. An alarming vast nothingness, reminding me there was no one out there for miles. No one to hear me if I screamed. Why was I having such morbid thoughts? It was the wrong reaction. “Right,” I said.
Sam inhaled again. “Mmm. Fresh air.”
I took a deep breath and forced a smile. “Totally.”
I smelled nothing different about the air. It smelled no different than home, where people could hear me if I screamed, and the police would be at my house in minutes. Up here, it would take them hours to find us. How could people live like this?
I couldn’t tell Sam his childhood home was creepy. It was rustic and charming. I’d just seen too many horror movies.
You would do well to remember someone died in those woods Agnes’s voice said in my head, right on cue.
No one told me that once she died, I’d hear her voice all the time.
Yes, I will remember someone died in these woods, Mother. Someone just like me, a woman who loved Sam Martin. How could I forget?
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Melody, listen to me.
I rolled over, fighting the tide of sleep. Agnes, leave me alone. Please leave me alone.
Shut up and listen to your mother. Listen for once in your life.
You’re dead. Please shut up and stay dead.
Melody. This is important. Listen to me. Listen. Sam took your cell phone.
Sam took my phone? Sam? Why would he do that, Mother? That’s ridiculous.
I sat up, blinking. I was soaked in sweat. It was still dark, but the light from the fireplace was effective at keeping the shadows at bay. But it was a bit too warm. I kicked off the blankets.
What time was it? I squinted at the window, but there was no telling from outside. It could be three am or seven, judging by the quality of light filtering through the dusty panes. There was no clock in the room. And I didn’t have my cell phone.
That reminded me of my dream. Well, sort of dream. I dreamed Agnes was calling me relentlessly, complaining about Sam. Claiming he took my cell phone. Ridiculous, but that was Agnes. Last Thanksgiving, she accused John of stealing money from her p
urse. This Thanksgiving, Sam stole my cell phone.
I could visualize my cell phone. It was in one of two places, either my kitchen counter or car charger. Sam couldn’t have taken my cell phone. Sam never even had the opportunity to take my cell phone. I wish I could just dismiss the words as the rantings of a paranoid old lady, but I knew it was my subconscious speaking. Those words came from my brain.
Sam didn’t take my cell phone. That was ridiculous. Why would he?
I rubbed sleep from my eyes and slid out of bed, wincing when my bare feet hit the freezing floorboards. I crept down the stairs. As I rounded the corner, I could see them all in the kitchenette. Sam was lounging with his back against the sink, smoking. Laurel and John were leaning towards each other from opposite sides of the island in the center.
“Once we get the dumpster, we can just empty the house right into it,” Laurel was saying. There were dark circles beneath her eyes. “Shouldn’t take much longer than a day.”
“Aren’t we putting the cart before the horse here?” Sam asked.
“What are you guys talking about?” I croaked.
Three startled faces whipped towards me.
Sam was the first to recover. “How long have you been standing there?” he asked, forcing a smile that didn’t touch his eyes.
“I wasn’t standing, I was coming down the stairs,” I grumbled. “What time is it?”
“Just after six,” he answered, stubbing his cigarette out on the side of the stainless steel sink. “Why don’t you go back to bed? Sleep in for a change.”
“How come you’re up already?” I suspected Sam never went to bed. I waited up for him until I fell asleep.
“I was having trouble sleeping,” Laurel said, as if that answered my question. “There’s nothing to eat or drink. The guys were just about to run out for supplies. I’m going with them.”
“I’ll get dressed,” I said.
“No, no,” Sam protested. “Go on back to bed. You look exhausted.”
“I don’t want to stay here by myself,” I said.
“Don’t be silly. We’ll be gone an hour at the most. I’ll make sure the doors are locked. You’re safer here than you are at home, trust me.”
I was going to argue until I saw the expression on Sam’s face. It had a shuttered look that meant the subject was closed. Something was wrong. He seemed angry. Maybe he didn’t want me to see the way the locals treated him. But how bad could it be so many years later?
I retreated upstairs, where I wrapped myself in a comforter and huddled in the armchair beside the window. Again, I wished I had something to read. Outside, the darkness was fading, and now I could see. I watched as Sam, John, and my sister climbed into the Jeep. They all looked somber, as if they were on their way to a funeral instead of the grocery store.
As the Jeep took off, canting crazily on the steep driveway, I knew I was done sleeping. Alone in this house? No way.
Since it was lighter, I could see the room better. Not that there was much to see. But for the first time, I spied a miniature door in the corner. It must lead to a crawl space. Now that I thought of it, I recalled Sam mentioning his parents had a lot of junk he and John couldn’t part with after their deaths. I hadn’t seen any evidence of it anywhere. The rooms were as sparse and spotless as Sam’s condo. It must all be in there.
Maybe there was something for me to read.
Dropping the comforter, I went to the door and twisted the knob. I expected it to be locked, but it turned. I only had to stoop a little to enter. Being short had its privileges.
The cramped space was dusty. I sneezed three times in succession. Two grimy windows lined the far wall, letting in faint gray light. Enough that I could see that the attic was crammed full of junk.
I gasped as I spied a pair of eyes staring into mine, only to realize a second later they belonged to a creepy life-sized Christmas doll wielding a candle like a knife. Taking a deep breath with a hand pressed against my chest, I got down to the business of finding something to read. Sam’s parents must have been readers, living all the way out here with no television. Somewhere in these piles of junk had to be stacks of romances and Tom Clancy novels. I’d take anything. I wasn’t picky.
I spotted a book sized object and uttered a premature sound of triumph. It turned out to be a photo album covered in a thin layer of dust, which I blew off to reveal gold lettering embossed on the blue leather cover: Family Memories.
I hesitated before opening it. A family album belonged on display in the living room, not hidden away. Would Sam want me looking at it? I had a feeling the answer was no, but wasn’t that ridiculous? These days complete strangers could access your family memories online.
Most of the photographs within were Polaroids, judging by the telltale white border. My family had similar photographs taken in the late seventies and eighties. I smiled as I paged through the album which began when John and Sam were small. There were pictures of them wearing bathing suits and splashing in a green frog wading pool. Sam was adorable, his hair white blonde feathers, wearing swimming trunks printed with miniature Snoopys. John looked practically adult beside him, with his long legs and slicked back hair. The only thing missing was his stupid mustache.
Flip the page and it was the first day of school, both faces tense and miserable. Sam was wearing jeans and a blue and white striped shirt. He was holding a metal lunchbox featuring the Waltons. Laurel had the same one. By the time it passed into my memory, it was rusty and smelled of sour milk. We used it to play school.
The next pictures were of a birthday party. There were shots of Sam holding up his gifts, squinting in the sun. Transformers. Matchbox cars. A G.I. Joe figurine. One of those enormous plastic water guns my parents would never buy, what were they called? Oh, yes, Super Soakers. A little girl was beside him in some pictures, wearing a yellow polka dot bikini, like the song. The bikini bottoms were practically shorts, the halter top prudish by today’s standards, but it still seemed a risqué choice for a little boy’s birthday party.
I inspected her face and my heart stopped. Lucy. Sam said they grew up together. Here was the proof.
After that, every photo of Sam included Lucy. Here was one taken the night of the school recital. She was wearing a poufy yellow dress (someone must have decided yellow was her color) tied in the back with a sash, and Sam was wearing black slacks and a button-down white shirt. Had he played an instrument? Those details never came up in conversation. Maybe I didn’t know him as well as I thought.
They aged before my eyes. I continued to flip pages, watching as Lucy’s boyish form developed curves. Now there were breasts spilling over the cups of those bikini tops, and Sam was taller and skinnier, his blonde hair shaggy with one lock falling across his eyes, the style he wore to this very day. He looked like a surfer, although he was far from the beach. My eyes fastened on a photo of them posing in bathing suits, Sam in boxy swimming trunks, Lucy in a black string bikini. Sam was standing behind her, his arms wrapped around her waist, and one of her legs was between his. He was leering at the camera. It was a sexually charged photo, probably taken by a peer. How had it migrated into the album of Family Memories?
You could tell this teenage couple was having sex, and lots of it, judging by the casual manner they were draped over each other’s dripping bodies. I shut my eyes tight against the tide of irrational jealousy. I never looked like Lucy, not for a single moment in my entire life. There was no universe in which Melody Ripple pranced around in a bikini, making hot guys drool, not even when I was a teenager, and that seemed unfair.
I shook my head to clear it. It was unfair that this young girl was murdered a short time after this picture was taken. Lest I forget.
Harden Family Announces Engagement blared the headline from a newspaper clipping pasted into the next page. The photographer had captured Sam cuddling Lucy, looking achingly young, as she gazed up at him adoringly. Ronald Harden of St. Anne’s has announced the engagement of his daughter, Lucinda Page, to Sa
muel Alexander Martin, son of Alice and George Martin, also of St. Anne’s. Both are 1993 graduates of St. Anne’s Central School. The bride is an education major at SUNY Potsdam while the groom is attending Hudson Valley Community College.
I blinked back tears. Not for Lucy, Sam, and their stolen innocence, but for me. I will always be second to this lovely young woman in my boyfriend’s heart. They’d be together someday in heaven, if such a place existed, and I’d be all alone, a reject. I was convinced of it.
I turned another page, holding my breath. It was the last in the album. I was expecting photos from Christmas, or maybe newspaper clippings about Lucy’s murder, although I didn’t know why anyone would memorialize such a thing. I gasped.
Slashed across the blank page in angry black letters were the words FUCK THAT BITCH.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I blinked at the words in shock, not knowing what to make of them.
Albums told a story, usually a story of love. This one was no exception, until the angry words at the end, like the entire book was being denounced as a fraud. Who was “that bitch?” Sam’s mother was the obvious answer.
No. Not quite. The obvious answer was the dead girl, the murdered girl, Lucy. The girl who filled her car up at the gas station off an I-87 exit and was never seen alive again. Lucy was the bitch. But who’d written the words? I could almost picture Alice Martin, Sam’s wizened mother, scrawling those words in a rage, angry because Lucy was stealing her son.
But that made little sense. If Alice felt that way, why had she lovingly included so many pictures of the girl in the album? Why hadn’t she purged her from Family Memories? Unless Alice wasn’t the one who made the album.
I was overthinking the whole thing. Anyone could have written those words, John even. Or Sam’s father. Surely the whole family was angry at the way Sam was treated in the aftermath of Lucy’s murder.
Which remained unsolved to this day. And I was alone in a creepy cabin near where her body was found.
I slammed the album shut, trying to quell the panicked thump of my heart. Lucy’s killer was long gone, perhaps someone just passing through. Or her father. Sam had painted him as a strict, possessive man who abused Lucy. But that didn’t make sense either. Would an overprotective father allow his daughter to prance around in string bikinis? Would he have proudly announced his daughter’s engagement in the local paper?
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