“The one carrying the bloody arm?”
“Yup, that’s her.”
I turned, smiled at her. “You two really are perfect for each other,” I said.
She sank back into her seat, grinning.
“Though I think you may have scarred a few small children for life,” I added.
She laughed. “That’s kind of the point, Mom.” She looked down at her mask, fiddled with the horns. They looked so sharp at the tips—Iwanted to warn her to be careful. “To remind people, even little kids, that there’s evil in the world. We can try to pretend there isn’t, that the only thing sneaking around in the night is Santa with his bag of toys, but that’s just bullshit, right? And the sooner we see the truth, the better off we’ll be.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
THE THREE-AND-A-HALF-HOUR DRIVE TOWoodstock Monday morning passed in a blur. One minute I was leaving home; the next I’d reached the driveway of my mother’s house, listening to the robotic voice on the GPS that had guided me the whole way:You have arrived at your destination.
I stopped at the mailbox, grabbing the hefty stack of mail inside and skimming through it: catalogs, junk mail, a few bills, all addressed to my mother. The only thing with Paul’s name was a magazine,Art in America.
I put the car in drive and continued down the long driveway.
As I approached the house, I thought,Oh, hell no, and considered turning around. I slowly crept forward, eyes on the house, which seemed to be waiting for me.Expecting me.
It was smaller than I remembered, though no less foreboding. In my mind, it had always been huge and looming, a monster covered in weathered cedar shakes the color of smoke. I navigated the Volvo down the crushed-stone driveway and parked. There was a detached garage to the right and a carriage house off to the left, where Paul had lived for the past fifteen years. The building that had originally been my father’s art studio, but I hadn’t been inside since I was a kid. It was where my father had died, and even though my mother cleared it out and got rid of all his things shortly after his death, I’d still avoided the carriage house. I knew if I entered, I’d look up, wonder which rafter he’d used, what hadhappened to the rope, imagine what he might have looked like when Ben found him. I also didn’t want to see it all cleared out, my father’s paintings and personal effects thrown onto the bonfire my mother had built in the yard, as if she could destroy all traces of him, make him drift away in the smoke. I wanted to remember the carriage house the way it had been when I’d go in and sit watching him work, standing on a ladder to cover huge canvases in bright splashes of color, turning to me and saying, “Do you see the giraffes, Moppet? I put another one hiding behind the tree. You’re the only one who’ll ever know she’s there.”
So I’d stayed away from the carriage house. Years later—when Ben and I were long gone—my mother had it refurbished, turning it into an apartment for Paul. Over the years, I’d wondered from time to time if Paul believed in ghosts. If he ever felt my father’s presence.
I pulled up to the front of the house, turned off the car, and sat staring at this place where my mother lived, where I’d grown up and hadn’t returned since I was a teenager.
I remembered the idea I’d had during that last visit, that my mother and the house were connected, that the house itself was an extension of her somehow.
It hadn’t always been such a foreboding place. Back when my father was alive, before my mother started drinking, the house had felt bright and cheerful. Then, as my mother changed, the house changed with her. The windows were locked, the heavy curtains drawn tight year-round. Family photos were taken down, as were my father’s paintings, even drawings Ben and I had done. My mother had most of the interior walls painted a dull gray—oystershell—that made the whole house feel like it was covered in a dense fog.
I grabbed my mother’s keys from my purse and my phone from the console, got out of the car, pulled my coat tight against the chill. I was standing under the shadow of the house, feeling it watch me, dare me to enter, the dark windows looking back at me like soulless eyes.
I stepped away, out of its shadow, then lifted my phone and dialed Mark’s cell, thinking that hearing his voice might make me feel better, give me the courage I needed to get through this.
“Hey, you,” he said when he answered. “Everything okay?”
I closed my eyes, imagined him there in our bright home full of holiday decorations, the girls’ artwork, our well-loved furniture—the antithesis of the cold and cheerless place standing before me.
“Yeah, just wanted to let you know I made it.”
“Early too.”
“Yeah, traffic was light.”
“Is it weird?” Mark asked. “Being there again?”
“Weird is kind of an understatement,” I said, looking up at the house. Behind me, wind rustled through the trees, seeming to whisper a warning.
“If it’s too much—”
“It’s totally fine,” I said. “I’m a big girl. I can handle this. I’ll do what I need to do and then get out of here. I’ll text when I’m on my way back. I’ll definitely be home by dinner.”
“Sounds good,” he said. Then, “Oh, a package came for you. Did you order books or something?”
My demon books.
“Christmas presents,” I said without missing a beat. “No snooping!”
