by Marina Cohen
As she walked farther and farther into the darkness, she heard a soft sound. She spun round, fully expecting the white beast, only what she saw was far more frightening.
28
IN THE CLOSET
The room began to dim, and the air suddenly smacked of moss and decay.
When Kallie looked back at the inside of the closet, something had changed. Beyond the door, where a moment ago all her father’s clothes hung in neat and tidy rows, was a darkness that seemed to stretch out infinitely.
I must be dreaming, she thought. Kallie closed her eyes, and gripping the box in one hand, she reached out the other. Surely it would stop once she felt a seersucker sleeve or crisp cotton shirt, but her hand extended farther and farther, meeting nothing. She nearly tipped over, caught her balance, and opened her eyes.
The darkness had enveloped her. Ghostly gray shapes rose up on either side, crooked and looming like tall trees. Before her lay a mass of shimmering white. Her glasses had fogged, but she was still sure of what she saw. A pile of bones.
Kallie took a step backward. She opened her mouth to scream, but before any sound could emerge, a flash of white leaped out, hurdling over her.
It was the white animal Kallie had seen in the middle of the street, what now felt like so very long ago. It came out of nowhere and landed with a thud on the hard ground. The beast scrambled to its feet, shook itself, gave her one last look, and then bounded off into the shadows.
Kallie squeezed her eyes tight. She was hallucinating again. She stood frozen for a moment, then mustered all her courage, reached out a trembling hand, and found the hard, flat surface of the closet door. She slammed it shut with a hollow bang.
“What’s going on up there?” said her father.
“N-nothing,” said Kallie, the blood beating in her ears. She opened her eyes. She was in her father’s room. All was still and quiet. It no longer smelled of rot and decay, but faintly of his aftershave.
It’s that Narnia book, Kallie thought, scowling. And the box. They had infected her brain like a disease. She must have imagined it all—the white beast, the pile of bones, the shadowy world beyond the closet door. Nonsense. Folly.
She took a deep breath, gripped the doorknob firmly, and opened it again. All her father’s clean suits and crisply ironed shirts hung neatly in their place. Nothing was out of place. She exhaled.
Footsteps creaked across the downstairs hall.
Kallie startled. She had to get out of the room quickly. Her father would be up any moment. If he caught her with the box, she didn’t know what he might do. She gripped the door handle firmly, but before she swung it closed again, she caught sight of something. Another box. Only this one was large, made of cardboard, and filled with paper and a large manila envelope with something scrawled on the front.
Kallie scrambled back into her room, hiding the box in her satchel as her father climbed the steps. She got changed and climbed into bed.
“Were you happy?” she asked when her father came in to check on her. “You and Mom?”
“What?” he said, looking upset and bewildered. “What makes you ask that?”
“I don’t know,” said Kallie, fumbling with her covers. “I’ve just been wondering.”
He sighed. “That was a long time ago, Kallie. It doesn’t matter anymore.”
The look on his face gave her the answer his words would not.
Kallie lay in bed, but sleep would not come. All she could think about was the white beast, the shimmering pile of bones, and Grandpa Jess lying in the hospital bed wasting away.
And about the two words on the envelope in the box in her father’s closet:
Insurance policy.
29
BENEATH THE SURFACE
The house was silent and still. Victor Jones was long gone. He had told Kallie the night before he needed to set out early for the office to sort out a few things. He promised he would return for her in the late afternoon so they might go to the hospital together.
Kallie sprang out of bed at the sound of her alarm. She’d set it a whole hour and a half early. With no time to waste, she prepared herself quickly, forgoing all her usual routines. And the strange thing was, she didn’t seem to miss any.
Getting to Plattsburgh and back by the afternoon was her only focus. It would be difficult at best, if not impossible. She couldn’t squander a moment.
Wrapping herself in her mother’s maroon sweater, she slung her leather satchel over her shoulder. In it, she tucked the box. The bones rattled and clattered violently as she fled down the porch steps, as though fighting to get loose.
It was one of those September mornings that reached for autumn with icy fingertips. The cool air quarreling with the still-tepid waters of the lake conjured up a thick, shapeless fog. It rolled off the surface and into town, consuming everything in its path.
Kallie could barely see three feet in front of her as she picked a path around the side of the house toward the garage and got out her bike. Fog pressed in on her from all sides as she made her way toward the school. Though she felt solid and sure on her bike now, she rode extracautiously, stopping at each intersection to make certain it was safe to cross.
Anna was waiting in front of the old building. She greeted Kallie with a cheerful wave. Together they rolled down Main Street toward the lake and the Burlington Bike Path.
The path followed the old Rutland Railroad route. In 1901, the trains trundled passengers and freight from Vermont to western New York and on into Quebec. It was never a solid financial operation, and the company declined steadily until it was abandoned altogether. Eventually a recreational trail was created over the old trestles. The path wound through Burlington, Colchester, and then over a marble causeway toward South Hero.
Kallie had traveled only short distances on the path. She had never ridden all the way along the fourteen-mile trail. After the first few miles, she began to huff and puff, but she pressed herself to continue at top speed because there was little time to spare. Anna rode out ahead, swallowed up entirely by fog. Luckily, her incessant chatter was like a beacon of sound for Kallie to follow.
The path took a sharp turn and left the mainland, continuing out on the narrow causeway over the foggy lake. Kallie paused a moment before venturing onto the single-lane path that disappeared into the fog. She could hear Anna’s disembodied voice calling to her but she could no longer see her. She put a shaky foot back on the pedals and began moving onto the path. Glancing over her shoulder, she could no longer see solid land. It was as though she were gliding out of reality and into a dream.
“Slow down,” she called to Anna.
“It’s like flying over the water!”
“If you’re not careful,” said Kallie, “you’re going to fly into the water!” The only response was a soft giggle.
As they continued toward the center of the lake, the fog began to change. It lifted off the surface like a layer of sunburned skin. Then the wind teased it, pulling wisps upward like ribbons of cotton candy, stretching them long and lean, twirling them toward the sky like wispy vines.
“The dance of the steam devils,” whispered Kallie.
She had watched this phenomenon many times with Grandpa Jess from the safety of the swinging benches. But out here, on the lake itself, it was as though she had become part of the dance.
Suddenly, she heard Anna screech to a halt. Kallie snapped from her trance and hit her brakes. The path ended abruptly at a little white shelter with a bright-blue sign announcing: WELCOME TO THE LOCAL MOTION ISLAND LINE BIKE FERRY. They had halted just in time. Another few feet and they might have broken through the barrier and gone into the lake.
The two girls dismounted and headed down the ramp. The ferry arrived in no time. It was a small vessel. They paid their fare, anchored their bikes, and sat opposite each other on white wooden benches. A heavy silence filled the space between them as the ferry dipped and swayed, shuttling them quickly across the two-hundred-foot gap between causeway
s known as the Cut.
It took only a few minutes. Before she knew it, Kallie had left the ferry and was pedaling on toward Grand Isle and the second ferry—the one that would take them to Plattsburgh. She and Anna purchased their tickets at a small wooden hut, boarded the large ferry along with several cars, and waited for it to leave the dock.
Kallie hadn’t been worried on the bike ferry—that was like being out on the Escape. But taking this particular vessel was different. A lump began to form in Kallie’s stomach as she stared out at the choppy water, thinking. Wondering.
The captain blew the whistle, and the ferry began to drift. Once out on the open water, the boat rocked and swayed. Kallie kept far from the railing, while Anna insisted on hanging over it and looking out. The last vestiges of fog rose from the surface, reaching up with misty tendrils before dissolving into nothing.
“Get away from the edge,” warned Kallie, but Anna wasn’t paying attention. She had dropped her big backpack onto the deck and was leaning farther over the railing. “Be careful, Anna,” Kallie tried again, but the girl paid her no mind, practically dangling over the side.
“Look!” shouted Anna suddenly, pointing and stretching her arms as if to touch something elusive. “It’s Champ!”
In one slow, spiraling moment, Kallie watched, paralyzed, as the ferry hit a rogue wave and dipped downward so sharply that Anna lost her balance. She flapped like a sheet in the wind and then flew over the railing and into the dark water, disappearing under the waves.
Was this how it had happened all those years ago? Had Kallie’s mother simply lost her footing? Drowning wasn’t the loud, splashy panic people imagine it to be. Kallie had researched it extensively. Drowning was quick and quiet. People just slipped beneath the water and were gone.
Searing and strangled thoughts snapped Kallie back to the moment and spurred her into action. She wasn’t going to let Anna slip away from her, too. She let out a guttural cry for help and then jumped into the lake, clothes, satchel, and all.
The air left her lungs as her body smacked the cold water. The lake sucked her downward, but she battled hard, kicking wildly, reversing direction, and losing her shoes in the process. She breached the surface, gasping for air, swallowing greedily.
Her glasses were in place, but it was like trying to see through a rain-soaked windshield. She searched frantically for Anna. In the distance, she glimpsed a head bobbing in the waves. It came up briefly, hands clambering as if to climb an invisible ladder, and then she was gone again.
“Anna!” Kallie screamed, taking in a mouthful of musky water and gurgling it back out. “Hold on, Anna! I’m coming!”
The leather satchel and wool sweater, saturated and heavy, threatened to drag Kallie back beneath the waves. She disentangled herself from both and began swimming as hard as she could toward the spot she had last seen Anna. Straining every muscle, she struggled against the current. In the distance, she could hear a cacophony of voices coming from the ferry. They had heard her call. That was good.
Kallie’s arms and legs ached, but she pressed onward. The head came up once more and then was gone again. But Kallie was close—only about twenty feet away. She swam harder, her muscles burning, until she reached Anna, who was now facedown in the water. This was a good thing, because a panicked victim could turn the would-be rescuer into a second victim.
Kallie thrust her arms under Anna’s. She lay back, bringing Anna’s head above the water. She began to whip-kick toward the ferry, which had stopped. Two men had jumped into the lake as well and were heading toward them with a flotation device. Kallie was quickly running out of steam. The two men reached her just as Kallie felt herself sinking.
Anna coughed and sputtered water as they were pulled back onto deck. Someone threw a scratchy gray blanket around Kallie’s shivering shoulders as she hovered over Anna, watching one of the men check her ABCs—airways, breathing, and circulation.
“I’m fine,” Anna insisted. She sat up, grinning. “Really. Just a little wet, but no worse for wear.”
The other man handed Kallie her sopping leather satchel. He had fished it out of the water along with her sweater. She had forgotten all about the satchel. And the box.
Kallie opened the satchel and shook it frantically, but it was empty. She cast it aside, despondent.
“I-I’m sorry,” said Anna, reaching for her arm.
But it was too late. The box was gone and along with it all hope Kallie might return it to the faceless man.
“Grandpa,” she whispered softly.
30
A LIGHT EXTINGUISHED
Despair sunk like a concrete block in Kallie’s stomach. Without the box, how would she un-entangle herself?
The Plattsburgh paramedics were waiting on the other side. They checked out Anna and Kallie thoroughly, and even when it was certain both were in excellent health, they insisted parents must be notified.
“No!” shouted Anna and Kallie at once.
“We’re fine,” said Kallie.
“I swim all the time in the lake,” said Anna.
“My father is extremely busy with work. And my grandfather is in the hospital. And we have a very important meeting we are late for…”
“So, if you’ll be so kind as to shut the doors of the ambulance and allow us to change into some dry clothes, we’ll be on our way…”
“Dry clothes?” said Kallie.
“Yes,” said Anna. “I always keep extra clothing in my backpack for just such an occasion.”
Anna handed Kallie a pair of ruby-red sweatpants, her yellow T-shirt, and a worn pair of flip-flops. Kallie felt odd—as though she were not just slipping into Anna’s clothes, but somehow into Anna. Everything was a tad too small and far more color than Kallie was used to. When she was ready, she packed the wet clothing into her now-empty satchel. She took a deep breath and sighed. Returning the box to the faceless man was her only hope of ending her connection to the bones and saving Grandpa Jess.
“Don’t worry,” said Anna softly, stroking Kallie’s arm. “We’ll find the faceless man. You can talk to him. He can tell you what to do.”
Kallie didn’t have the energy to argue. There were only two more pieces. A dagger. And then nothing.
Nothing. As though everything Kallie knew and loved would be gone. As though her life as she knew it would be over. And possibly Grandpa’s along with it. She couldn’t waste more time scolding Anna. They were late—soon the children’s festival would be over. They had to move quickly.
They thanked everyone again, got on their bikes, and sped off along Margaret Street toward Cumberland. Kallie found it difficult to pedal in the flip-flops, but they had lost valuable time; they couldn’t lose any more.
In front of an old, picket-fenced house with a sign that read KENT-DELORD HOUSE MUSEUM, there was a huge commotion. Throngs of people dressed in period costumes and carrying wooden muskets milled about. Kallie overheard someone say they were preparing for a battle reenactment. The crowd was so thick Kallie and Anna were forced off their bikes and had to walk. They stopped only briefly to ask for directions.
They reached Trinity Park with little time to spare. The festivities appeared to be wrapping up. There was a clown making balloon animals, a juggler, a petting zoo with goats and a donkey, and a man walking on stilts. There was a tent set up, and it appeared kids were dipping wax to make candles. There was also a puppet theater with dancing marionettes. Kallie was worried. She didn’t recall seeing these performers at the Festival of Fools. They wandered around the park, but there was no sign of the faceless man. If he had been there, perhaps they’d missed him.
“You know,” said Anna. “One time, my mother and father were performing at a festival just like this … and then someone began…”
Frustration welled inside Kallie. “Stop it!” she said sharply. She turned toward Anna, her face contorted with a corrosive anger. “Just stop it!”
Anna flinched, her expression crestfallen.
Kallie c
ontinued to glare with withering scorn. She had had enough of Anna and her tall tales. How dare Anna remain impervious to the harshness of reality while Kallie had to face it—every last painful bit?
“I should never have trusted you! You’re a liar! None of what you say is true…” Her words flew at Anna like angry hornets.
Anna seemed to struggle with what Kallie was saying, with the shape and texture of the words, as though trying to form something solid out of a limp lump of dough.
“You aren’t the relative of the long-lost Russian princess. Mrs. Winslow isn’t rich. You don’t live in a mansion on Prospect. You live in a tiny apartment in the Old North End. You don’t have any nice clothes, and you barely get anything to eat.”
Tears welled in Anna’s eyes. She shook her head slowly. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”
“Yes,” said Kallie. “I do. I know exactly what I’m saying. You keep telling everyone your parents are coming home. But they’re never coming home. I know it. And you know it. And it’s time you face the truth.”
Like a marionette with its strings cut, Anna crumpled. She looked at Kallie with a hurt so raw it blistered.
Regret tugged at Kallie, trying to drag her back, but like a runaway train, her mouth kept moving and words kept flying out.
“I heard the secretaries at school talking. I know the truth. I know what really happened. You say your father put your mother in a wooden box—a magical box. Well, he put her in a wooden box and he went in after her all right, only it wasn’t a magical box at all!”
Tears streamed down Anna’s face. Her expression implored, Why did you have to say that? “M-my mother is in a box,” she said. “A wonderfully fancy wooden box. You have your truth. I have mine. What makes yours more valid?”
“Your parents are gone,” said Kallie. “Just like my mother. I’ve had to accept it. And so do you. They’re gone and they’re never coming back. That box you keep talking about—that fancy wooden magic box—it’s nothing but a plain old coffin.”