‘You worried us last night,’ she says. ‘Are you feeling better?’
Malorie, realizing now that she fainted the night before, turns a little red.
‘Yes, I’m okay. Just a lot to take in.’
‘It was like that for all of us,’ Don says. ‘But you’ll get used to it. Soon, you’ll be saying we live a life of luxury.’
‘Don’s a cynic,’ Cheryl says good-naturedly.
‘I’m really not,’ Don says. ‘I love it here.’
Malorie jumps as Victor licks her hand. As she kneels to pet him, she hears music come from the dining room. She crosses the kitchen and peers inside. The room is empty, but the radio is on.
She looks back to Cheryl and Don at the sink. Beyond them is a cellar door. Malorie is about to ask about it when she hears Felix’s voice coming from the living room. He is reciting the home’s address.
‘… Two seventy-three Shillingham … my name is Felix … we’re looking for anyone else who is alive … surviving …’
Malorie peeks her head into the living room. Felix is using the landline.
‘He’s calling random phone numbers.’
Malorie jumps again, this time at the sound of Tom’s voice, who is now peering into the living room with her.
‘We don’t have a phone book?’ she asks.
‘No. It’s a constant source of frustration for me.’
Felix is dialling another number. Tom, holding a piece of paper and pencil, asks, ‘Want to see the cellar with me?’
Malorie follows him through the kitchen.
‘Are you going to take stock?’ Don asks as Tom opens the cellar door.
‘Yeah.’
‘Let me know what the numbers are.’
‘Sure.’
Tom enters first. Malorie follows him down wooden stairs. The floor of the cellar is made of dirt. In the darkness, she can smell and feel the earth beneath her bare feet.
The room is suddenly lit as Tom pulls the string on a light bulb. Malorie is frightened by what she sees. It feels more like a warehouse than a cellar. Seemingly infinite wooden shelves are stocked with canned goods. From ceiling to dirt floor, the place resembles a bunker.
‘George built all this,’ Tom says, fanning a hand towards the woodwork. ‘He really was ahead of things.’
To the left, only partially lit by the light, Malorie sees a hanging, transparent tapestry. Behind it rest a washer and a dryer.
‘It looks like a lot of food,’ Tom says, gesturing towards the cans. ‘But it’s not. And nobody worries more about how much we have left than Don.’
‘How often do you take stock?’ Malorie asks.
‘Once a week. But sometimes, when I get restless, I’ll come down and check things again the day after I already did it.’
‘It’s cool down here.’
‘Yeah. A classic cold-storage basement. It’s ideal.’
‘What happens if we run out?’
Tom faces her. His features are soft in the light.
‘Then we go get more. We raid grocery stores. Other homes. Whatever we can.’
‘Right,’ Malorie says, nodding.
While Tom marks the paper, Malorie studies the cellar.
‘I guess this would be the safest room in the house then,’ she says.
Tom pauses. He thinks about it.
‘I don’t think so. I think the attic is safer.’
‘Why?’
‘Did you notice the lock on the walk in here? The door is really old. It locks, but it’s delicate. It’s almost as if this cellar was built first, years ago, before they decided to add a house to it. But the attic door … that bolt is incredible. If we needed to secure ourselves, if one of those things were to get into the house, I’d say the attic is where we’d want to go.’
Malorie instinctively looks up. She rubs her shoulders.
If we needed to secure ourselves.
‘Judging by how much stock we have left,’ Tom says, ‘we could live another three to four months off it. That sounds like a lot of time, but it passes quickly in here. The days begin to mush together. That’s why we started keeping the calendar on the wall in the living room. You know, in a way, time doesn’t mean a thing anymore. But it’s one of the only things we have that resembles the lives we used to live.’
‘The passing of time?’
‘Yeah. And what we do with it.’
Malorie steps to a short wooden stool and sits. Tom is still making notes.
‘I’ll show you all the chores when we get back upstairs,’ Tom says. Then, pointing to a space between the shelves and the hanging tapestry, he says, ‘Do you see that there?’
Malorie looks but can’t tell what he means.
‘Come here.’
Tom walks her to the wall, where some of the brick is broken. Earth shows behind it.
‘I can’t tell if this scares me or if I like it,’ he says.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, the ground is exposed. Does that mean we could start digging? Build a tunnel? A second cellar? More room? Or is it just another way to get inside?’
Tom’s eyes are bright and sharp in the cellar light.
‘The thing is,’ he says, ‘if the creatures really wanted to get into our house … they’d have no problem doing it. And I guess they would have already.’
Malorie stares at the open patch of dirt on the wall. She imagines crawling through tunnels, pregnant. She imagines worms.
After a brief silence, she asks, ‘What did you do before this happened?’
‘My job? I was a teacher. Eighth grade.’
Malorie nods.‘I actually thought you looked like one.’
‘You know what? I’ve heard that before. Many times! I kind of like that.’ He feigns fixing the collar of his shirt. ‘Class,’ he says, ‘today we’re going to learn all about canned goods. So, everybody, shut the fuck up.’
Malorie laughs.
‘What did you do?’ Tom asks.
‘I hadn’t gotten that far yet,’ Malorie says.
‘You lost your sister, huh?’ Tom says gently.
‘Yes.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Then he says, ‘I lost a daughter.’
‘Oh God, Tom.’
Tom pauses, as if considering whether or not to tell Malorie more. Then he does.
‘Robin’s mother died during childbirth. It feels cruel, telling you that, given your condition. But if we’re going to get to know one another, it’s a story you’ll need to know. Robin was a great kid. Smarter than her father at eight years old. She liked the oddest things. Like the instructions for a toy more than the toy itself. The credits of a movie instead of the movie. The way something was written. An expression on my face. Once she told me I looked like the sun to her, because of my hair. I asked her if I shone like the sun, and she told me, “No, Daddy, you shine more like the moon, when it’s dark outside.”
‘When the reports came on the news and people started to take it seriously, I was the kind of father who said I wasn’t going to live in fear. I tried very hard to carry on with our daily life. And I especially wanted to convey that idea to Robin. She’d heard things at school. I just didn’t want her to be so afraid. But, after a while, I couldn’t pretend anymore. Soon, the parents were taking their kids out of school. Then the school itself shut down. Temporarily. Or until they ‘had the confidence of the community to continue providing a safe place for their children’. Those were dark days, Malorie. I was a teacher, too, you know, and the school I taught in shut its doors about the same time. So we suddenly had a lot of time together at home. I got to see how much she’d grown. Her mind was getting so big. Still, she was too young to understand how scary the stories were on the news. I did my best not to hide them from her, but the father in me couldn’t help but change the station sometimes.
‘The radio got to be too much for her. Robin started having nightmares. I spent a lot of time calming her down. I always felt like I was lying to her. We agreed neither of
us would look out the windows anymore. We agreed she wouldn’t go outside without my permission. Somehow, I had to make her believe things were safe and horribly unsafe at the same time.
‘She started spending the night in my bed, but one morning I woke to find she wasn’t there. She’d been talking the night before about wanting things to be how they used to be. She talked of wanting her mother, whom she’d never met. It crushed me, hearing her like that, eight years old and telling me life was unfair. When I woke and didn’t find her, I told myself she was just getting used to it. This new life. But I think maybe Robin lost something of her youth the night before, as she realized, before I did, how serious it was, what was happening outside our house.’
Tom pauses. He looks to the cellar floor.
‘I found her in the bathtub, Malorie. Floating. Her little wrists cut with the razor she’d seen me shave with a thousand times. The water was red. The blood dripped over the tub’s edge. Blood on the walls. This was a child. Eight years old. Did she look outside? Or did she just decide to do this herself? I’ll never know that answer.’
Malorie reaches for Tom and holds him.
But he does not cry. Instead, after a moment, he steps to the shelves and begins marking the paper.
Malorie thinks of Shannon. She, too, died in the bathroom. She, too, took her own life.
When Tom is finished, he asks Malorie if she’s ready to go back upstairs. As he reaches for the light bulb’s string, he sees she is looking at the patch of open dirt along the wall.
‘Freaky, no?’ he says.
‘Yeah.’
‘Well, don’t let it be. It’s just one of the old-world fears, carrying over.’
‘What’s that?’
‘The fear of the cellar.’
Malorie nods.
Then Tom pulls the string and the light goes out.
‘Creatures,’ Malorie thinks. What a cheap word.
The children are quiet and the banks are still. She can hear the paddles slicing the water. The rhythm of her rowing is in step with her heartbeat, and then it falters. When the cadences oppose, she feels like she could die.
Creatures.
Malorie has never liked this word. It’s out of place, somehow. The things that have haunted her for over four years are not creatures to her. A garden slug is a creature. A porcupine. But the things that have lurked beyond draped windows and have kept her blindfolded are not the sort that an exterminator could ever remove.
‘Barbarian’ isn’t right, either. A barbarian is reckless. So is a brute.
In the distance, a bird sings a song from high in the sky. The paddles cut the water, shifting with each row.
‘Behemoth’ is unproven. They could be as small as a fingernail.
Though they are early in their journey along the river, Malorie’s muscles ache from rowing. Her shirt is soaked through with sweat. Her feet are cold. The blindfold continues to irritate.
‘Demon’. ‘Devil’. ‘Rogue’. Maybe they are all these things.
Her sister died because she saw one. Her parents must have met the same fate.
‘Imp’ is too kind. ‘Savage’ too human.
Malorie is not only afraid of the things that may wade in the river, she is also fascinated by them.
Do they know what they do? Do they mean to do what they do?
Right now, it feels as if the whole world is dead. It feels like the rowboat is the last remaining place where life can be found. The rest of the world fans out from the tip of the boat, an empty globe, blooming and vacant with each row.
If they don’t know what they do, they can’t be ‘villains’.
The children have been quiet a long time. A second birdsong comes from above. A fish splashes. Malorie has never seen this river. What does it look like? Do the trees crowd the banks? Are there houses lining its shore?
They are monsters, Malorie thinks. But she knows they are more than this. They are infinity.
‘Mommy!’ the Boy suddenly cries.
A bird of prey caws; its echo breaks across the river.
‘What is it, Boy?’
‘It sounds like an engine.’
‘What?’
Malorie stops paddling immediately. She listens closely.
Far off, beyond even the river’s flow, comes the sound of an engine.
Malorie recognizes it immediately. It is the sound of another boat approaching.
Rather than feeling excitement at the prospect of encountering another human being on this river, Malorie is afraid.
‘Get down, you two,’ she says.
She rests the paddle handles across her knees. The rowboat floats.
The Boy heard it, she tells herself. The Boy heard it because you raised him well and now he hears better than he will ever see.
Breathing deep, Malorie waits. The engine grows louder. The boat is travelling upstream.
‘Ouch!’ the Boy yelps.
‘What is it, Boy?’
‘My ear! I got hit by a tree.’
Malorie thinks this is good. If a tree touched the Boy, they are likely near one of the banks. Maybe, by some deserved providence, the foliage will provide cover.
The other boat is much closer now. Malorie knows that if she were able to open her eyes, she could see it.
‘Do not take off your blindfolds,’ Malorie says.
And then the boat’s engine is level with them. It does not pass.
Whoever it is, Malorie thinks, they can see us.
The boat’s engine cuts abruptly. The air smells of gasoline. Footsteps cross what must be the deck.
‘Hello there!’ a voice says. Malorie does not respond. ‘Hey there! It’s okay. You can remove your blindfolds! I’m just an ordinary man.’
‘No you cannot,’ Malorie says quickly to the children.
‘There’s nothing out here with us, miss. Take my word for it. We’re all alone.’
Malorie is still. Finally, feeling there is no alternative, she answers him.
‘How do you know?’
‘Miss,’ he says, ‘I’m looking right now. I’ve had my eyes open the entire trip today. Yesterday, too.’
‘You can’t just look,’ she says. ‘You know that.’
The stranger laughs.
‘Really,’ he says, ‘there’s nothing to be afraid of. You can trust me. It’s just us two on the river. Just two ordinary people crossing paths.’
‘No!’ Malorie screams to the children.
She lets go of the Girl and grips the paddle handles again. The man sighs.
‘There’s no need to live like this, miss. Consider these children. Would you rob them the chance to view a brisk, beautiful day like this?’
‘Stay away from our boat,’ Malorie says sternly.
Silence. The man does not answer. Malorie braces herself. She feels trapped. Vulnerable. In the rowboat against the bank. On this river. In this world.
Something splashes in the water. Malorie gasps.
‘Miss,’ he says, ‘the view is incredible, if you don’t mind a little fog. When’s the last time you looked outside? Has it been years? Have you seen this river? The weather? I bet you don’t even remember what weather looks like.’
She remembers the outside world very well. She remembers walking home as a schoolgirl through a tunnel of autumn leaves. She recalls neighbouring yards, gardens, and homes. She remembers lying on the grass in her backyard with Shannon and deciding which clouds looked like which boys and girls from class.
‘We are keeping our blindfolds on,’ Malorie says.
‘I’ve given that up, miss,’ he says. ‘I’ve moved on. Won’t you do the same?’
‘Leave us alone now,’ she commands.
The man sighs again.
‘They can’t haunt you forever,’ he says. ‘They can’t force you to live like this forever. You know that, miss?’
Malorie puts the right paddle into a position where she believes she can push off the bank.
‘I ought to remove
your blindfolds myself,’ the man says suddenly.
Malorie does not move.
He sounds gruff. He sounds a little angry.
‘We’re just two people,’ he continues. ‘Meeting on a river. Four if you include the little ones. And they can’t be blamed for how you’re raising them. I’m the only one here with the nerve to look outside. Your worries only keep you safe long enough to worry some more.’
His voice is coming from a different place now. Malorie thinks he has stepped to the front of his boat. She only wants to pass him. She just wants to get farther from the house they left this morning.
‘And I’ll tell you what,’ the man suddenly says, horribly near, ‘I’ve seen one.’
Malorie grabs for the Boy and pulls him by the back of his shirt. He hits the steel bottom of the rowboat and yelps.
The man laughs.
‘They aren’t as ugly as you’d think, miss.’
She shoves the paddle against the bank. She is floundering. It’s hard to find something solid. Feels like twigs and roots. Mud.
He is going to go mad, Malorie thinks. And he will hurt you.
‘Where are you going to go?’ he yells. ‘Are you going to cry every time you hear a stick crack?’
Malorie can’t get the rowboat free.
‘Keep your blindfolds on!’ she yells at the children.
The man said he’s seen one. When? When?
‘You think I’m mad, don’t you?’
At last the paddle is planted hard against the earth. Malorie pushes, grunting. The rowboat moves. She thinks it might be free. Then it bangs against the man’s boat and she shrieks.
He’s trapped you.
Will he force their eyes open?
‘Who’s the mad one here? Look at you now. Two people meet on a river …’
Malorie rocks back and forth. She senses a gap behind the rowboat, some kind of opening.
‘… one of them looks to the sky …’
Malorie feels the paddle sink into the earth.
‘… the other tries to steer a boat with a blindfold on.’
The rowboat is almost free.
‘So, I have to ask myself …’
‘Move!’ she screams.
‘… who here has gone mad?’
Bird Box Page 5
