Eventually, the trees would suffocate under its weight.
Eventually, they would die.
When that happened, the vines would seek new hosts. They’d slither over fences and walls in search of healthy trees. The roots would burrow under a forest floor pockmarked with holes.
The soil in the woods was treacle brown and always smelled of decay. Rocks jutted out of the ground, colorless and jagged as broken teeth. In the few places the sunlight penetrated, there were weeds with knife-sharp leaves and fetid flowers. Giant tangles of pricker bushes formed a perimeter around the woods. The thorns were as big as arrowheads and the berries were the color of dried blood.
Mrs. Smith’s woods were always chilly, even in the middle of summer. Frost whitened the ground well before winter’s first freeze and clung to the ice and snow long after the spring thaw.
Natalie had never seen a squirrel or songbird in Mrs. Smith’s woods. Occasionally, a murder of crows would haunt the trees, and at night, moon-pale moths would flutter out from dark cavities, only to be devoured by swooping bats.
Natalie and her friends had spent countless garden clubmeetings complaining about Mrs. Smith’s property, but short of dousing it in gasoline and tossing a lit match into the heart of the eerie forest, there was little they could do about the neighborhood eyesore.
Gina’s laughter tripped down the hall, followed by Sid’s hyena chuckle.
Natalie rolled her eyes. She’d never flirt with their boss. She planned to earn her way to the top of the sales board without tossing her hair or giggling at his stupid jokes. But seeing as Gina was busy sucking up to Sid, Natalie decided to peek inside the folder on her coworker’s desk.
When she saw the property, a charming three-bedroom cape within walking distance of the elementary school, she felt a hot surge of jealousy. Natalie knew the house well. It was daffodil yellow with a covered porch and a spacious backyard. A family with young children would grab that house in a New York minute.
This should bemylisting. What does Gina know about kids? About all the food they eat. Or all the laundry they create. Or how their stuff takes over every room. Their clothes, their toys, their bikes, their video games. Does she have any idea how their noise travels through a house? How much energy it takes to make sure they’re safe, healthy, and happy?
“She doesn’t have to know,” Natalie grumbled. “That house will sell itself.”
Closing the folder, she returned to her desk to focus on her own listing. Pulling a legal pad out of her briefcase—an old one of Jimmy’s—she sat straight as a ruler and prepared to make a list.
Natalie loved lists. She loved tidiness and order. She loved organizing things and was happiest when she was given the chance to beat chaos into submission with colored pens, filefolders, and a pocket planner. With organization came control. And that was what she wanted. Control. Power.
It would take a lot of creative thinking to sell the McCreedy place. And the first thing Natalie had to do was to start seeing 9Idle Day Drive as the first house she was going to sell.
This meant finding a way to make Mrs. Smith’s property less threatening when potential buyers gazed at it from the McCreedys’ backyard. She had to find positive phrases to use when describing Mrs. Smith’s gloomy gray house and oppressive woods.
Natalie wrote:
Single occupant who keeps to herself
Quiet
Wooded buffer /?Nature preserve
Historic mansion
Studying her list, she wondered what she’d do if a potential buyer asked if Mrs. Smith’s house was haunted. And theywouldask. They might laugh nervously as the question left their mouth. They might blush in embarrassment, but they’d ask all the same.
Is the house haunted?
Are the woods cursed?
Gina returned carrying two cups of coffee, and Natalie put her pen down to accept the steaming mug from her new coworker. She took a sip and stared forlornly at her list. Next to her, Gina made a slurping noise that set Natalie’s teeth on edge.
She glanced at the other woman, taking in the lipstick stains on her mug. The gap in her blouse that revealed a red satin bra. The beauty mark on her round, smooth cheek.
When Gina slurped her coffee a second time, Natalie saw herself pushing the tip of her pen right through her coworker’s beauty mark.
Fed by this fantasy, something dark uncoiled from deep inside Natalie. It moved through her, seizing control of her muscles and nerves, causing her to add a note to her list in spidery block letters that bore no resemblance to her precise and elegant cursive.
LIE THROUGH YOUR TEETH
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