Sadie worked her way through the mug of tea and arranged piles of books by section and author name along the front counter. Mounting them onto a cart a few at a time, she returned them to their proper place before going back and repeating the process all over again. Though this work might have seemed monotonous for most people, she found it rather enjoyable. Looking through the different books that locals had checked out sometimes introduced her to new authors or subjects, and it wasn't uncommon for her to turn around and check them out herself. Her apartment was presently cluttered with some fifty or more books from the library's collection—and rare was the day that she didn't bring along a few more in her purse.
August came back to the counter and loaded up his cart with a wavering tower of books, and narrowly avoided toppling it as he sped back to the shelves. Meanwhile, Sadie made the rounds, switching off each of the computer workstations and unplugging the fountain. Dimming the lights, she returned to the staff office and gave the coffee station a quick clean.
It was as she emerged from the back room and started shutting down her own computer that she felt it.
A chill accosted her neck. It was so sudden, so powerful a feeling that she threw her hand up and pawed at her nape. Glancing over her shoulder, she half-expected to find August looking at her—but in fact, he was still across the room, humming to himself, his reddish hair bobbing along the top of the shelves. She looked to the thermostat, wondering if she'd accidentally bumped into it and turned the air down, but the temperature remained steady and the vent above her didn't seem to be blowing any air just then.
When the feeling persisted, she did a slow pan of the room, squinting through the dimness and courting a peculiar tightness in her stomach. The feeling was easy enough to identify; she felt like she was being watched. But from where? And by whom? She looked across the fountain to the tall windows at the building's rear, but saw only the empty field that stretched beyond. Sadie then stepped out from behind the counter and surveyed the entrance, the hairs on her arms standing to attention.
The library was fronted by a large concrete patio. The space was well-lit and largely unadorned, boasting only a pair of benches and a flagpole, but as she looked out onto this scene she noticed a new addition. And a rather unwelcome one, at that.
A person was standing just outside the door—was leaning into it as if to peer through the glass at her. Obscured by the shade thrown from the awning overhead, it was hard to describe the loiterer's appearance with any real thoroughness. They looked to be more than six feet tall, but little else could be glimpsed—
No, that wasn't all.
The eyes.
Like white headlights breaking out across a dark stretch of highway, the visitor's eyes were fixed in a wide, blank stare the color of milk. Without the fountain gurgling to her back, the sounds of the outdoors could be faintly heard now, and in her study of those chalk-colored, featureless orbs she heard a swell of nocturnal chittering as though the night insects were pleading with her to look away.
The person outside the door began to beckon. A malformed hand, hitherto limp at the figure's side, rose in a lolling wave.
At this, a scream unexpectedly raced up her throat, and it was only by clasping a hand over her mouth that she forced it back. Sadie promptly turned, steadied herself against the counter, and in so doing accidentally knocked her cup of tea to the ground. The mug gave with a crash and the liquid soaked into the carpet.
Returning to the desk with an empty cart, August eyed the mess on the floor and whistled. “Man, we're just about to clock out and you have to make another mess?” He paused, waiting for Sadie to reply. She didn't, though—not at once. She stood there, pale, her mousy face twisted like she'd just sucked on a lemon. “Hey,” he continued, kneeling to pick up a few ceramic shards, “don't worry about it. We can throw a rug over it, no one will know.”
With a shudder, Sadie stepped past him, then cast a finger back toward the door. “T-There's someone out there, looking in through the door.” She leaned against the counter, feeling suddenly woozy. “Please tell them to leave.”
August stood up, brows arched. “Oh, a last-minute visitor?” He started for the door. “I'll handle it.”
Latecomers to the library were nothing new. Often when working the closing shift, Sadie had had to turn away patrons after hours. Something was different this time, however. Something about this person made her ill at ease. No, it was more than that—her reaction to this individual had been visceral. Even though she was standing away from the door, out of the visitor's view, she could still feel those chalk-colored eyes on her.
“Er, which door, Sadie?” asked August from the front.
“Main one.”
There was a pause. “Uh...” August surveyed the entryway, hands on hips. “You sure?”
Annoyance broke through the icy fear that'd taken root in her stomach. “Of course I'm sure!” She turned, joined him at the front door, moved to point at it—
And then she stopped in her tracks.
There was no one there.
“Huh.” August shrugged. “Maybe they got the message and turned around. We do have the hours printed in the window. Maybe he was just trying to get a look at those, eh?”
Sadie's mouth was dry. She nodded but didn't say anything, instead stooping to pick up the remaining pieces of the mug. It's been a long day; your eyes are playing tricks on you. She took repeated glances at the main door and sought to assuage her inflamed nerves. It was just someone coming by to check the hours, like August said. There's no way it was—
She put it out of her mind as best she could and finished cleaning up the mess on the floor. Thankfully, the tea stain wasn't too noticeable on the dark carpet. She dabbed at it with a handful of napkins and left it to dry. When that was through, she took one last look at all of the staff computers, made sure they were shut down, and grabbed her purse. She joined August at the side door, and while waiting for him to put out the rest of the lights, she looked through the windows at the lonesome parking lot, at the nearby sidewalks. There was no one in view.
“Ready?” August shoved open the door and waved her out. When she'd finally exited—nervously, like a prey animal venturing out of its den—he locked up and led her across the lot to his Honda, whistling a jaunty tune. “Man, it's good to be out of there. I'm gonna get something to eat and spend a little quality time with my Xbox. What about you? Any plans?”
Even after she'd climbed into the passenger side and put on her seatbelt, Sadie never stopped scanning the parking lot. She looked from one side to the next, up and down the property, like her head was on a swivel. “Some dinner, I guess,” she responded. “Might read something.”
August started the engine and wheeled out of the lot. Tinkering with the radio, he settled on the oldies station and bobbed his head in time with some Beach Boys track. “Sounds like a wild night,” he said with a chuckle. Hanging a left out of the library, he darted down Whitmer Street, only to mash the brake at the next intersection. “Oops,” he said, putting on his headlights, “I need to be more careful here. This is where that guy got hit last week—you hear about that?”
Sadie leaned back in her seat. “No, what happened?”
“Some poor guy was trying to cross here. It was dark. I don't know if he lost his balance or didn't see it, but he stepped off the curb and got clipped by a bus. Probably died before he knew what hit him. At least, I hope so.”
A shiver coursed through her and her stomach was wrenched into a familiar knot. “Someone died here?” She turned and looked out the rear window. The library was still in view.
“Yeah. Pretty nasty. Surprised you didn't hear about it.” Not catching her discomfort, August cranked up the volume and sang along with the last bit of “California Girls”.
The rest of the car ride was mostly silent, except for August's obnoxious vocals. He belted his way through a David Bowie song and half of “Bohemian Rhapsody” before they finally entered Sadie's apartment co
mplex.
When he'd pulled up to her place, she jumped out at once, thanking him hastily. “Appreciate the ride, August.” Though I could do with less karaoke, she thought.
“Anytime!” Waving at her, he pulled out of the spot and whipped out of view.
Sadie hurried inside like she was allergic to the night. She burst in through the main door and stomped her way up to the second-floor landing. Rushing into her apartment, she made sure to lock the door and draw the curtains before doing anything else, and even then, she still felt attacked, pursued.
Who was that outside the library tonight? Could it really have been... All told, she'd only glimpsed into those blank eyes for a few moments, but something probing in that stare had left her shaken. She kept trying to rationalize it—half-convinced herself that it'd been a homeless person or night jogger.
Who else could it have been? she thought. A ghost?
The mere asking of the question only soured her mood further.
She wanted to laugh, to put it out of her mind completely. She would have liked to say, “Nonsense, there's no such thing as ghosts!”
But then, knowing what she knew, she would have felt like a liar.
The night wore on. Sadie choked down a quick meal and tried to make progress on any of the dozens of books she was reading, but it was only the next morning, after fitful sleep, that she managed to relax.
3
The knock came softly at her door. It was her mother again. “Ophelia, sweetie...” A pause. “Can I bring you anything?”
Drawing her knees closer to her breast, Ophelia managed only a strangled, “I'm fine.” Clawing up the blankets around her, she sank into the bed and shuddered. It was late in the morning now, though the room was so dim it might as well have been midnight. Upon returning home the night before, she'd drawn the blinds and curtains in her window dazedly, and had even torn apart a few shoeboxes and magazines, pasting the resulting shreds to the glass to further obscure the view. Not that it was the light she was aiming to keep out...
Her mother sighed outside the door, placed a palm against it. “Sweetheart, what's going on? You haven't been out of your room since you came home. Did something happen last night?”
Ophelia took up handfuls of her black hair and sank deeper into the covers. “Nothing happened, I'm fine,” she insisted. Her lips were dry and her tongue felt on the verge of crumbling. She hadn't been out of her room all night, it was true; not for a glass of water, a snack or even a bathroom break. The four walls of her bedroom seemed about as much as she could reasonably survey at that moment, and the prospect of venturing out into the rest of the house brought with it a fear that something might slip into this dim little sanctum of hers while she wasn't looking. The only safety she recognized at that moment was in isolation.
“All right.” Her mother turned to walk back down the hall. “Let me know if you need anything.” Softly, her footfalls retreated back downstairs.
She was free now to cower in her bed, to stew in the almost perfect quiet. Silence was a welcome commodity; so long as it reigned without interruption she could be sure of her solitude—could be sure that nothing was slipping past her distracted ears.
Wreathed in blankets, she leaned against the wall and closed her eyes, hands locked around her knees. Dark shapes paraded behind her eyelids—empty, transient things—but it took only an instant's focus on any one of them for her fevered imagination to lend it something of the horrible and familiar. Memories of the night before dropped in suddenly, vividly, and the dread they stirred in her never lessened.
Her mind was haunted by dark doorways, by black halls and staircases and the things that skulked through them unseen in the small hours. Now and then, an innocent itch on her clammy skin would feel almost like the wriggling of a maggot and she'd fly into hysterics anew, scratching at herself and casting the blankets aside in search of a pest that wasn't there.
The shape and mood of the house on Beacon Hill remained firm in her mind, but the actual events of the night prior felt as ill-defined to her as a nightmare in flight. She remembered entering the house with the others, getting separated from them. She remembered, too, the wax and wane of hope as she'd wandered blindly through its pitch-black halls for an exit. And there had been that last room...
Whatever relief she might have felt at discovering that empty, moonlit room had evaporated the very moment she'd looked into the tarnished mirror that'd hung upon its walls. She should have leapt from the broken window into the field outside at the first opportunity, should not have paused to take in what had, at first glance, seemed to be unthreatening surroundings.
But she had, and the mirror had shown her the true shape of things. That odious resident of the house had been dwelling behind her all the while—had probably followed her down every shadowed corridor and into that remote chamber from which she eventually made her escape. It'd been her screams at sighting the monstrous thing that'd alerted Joey and Leslie—and with no little effort the alarmed pair had reached in and pulled her outside through the broken window.
Neither Joey nor Leslie had seen the hideous face in the mirror, but if Ophelia closed her eyes and let her thoughts drift, the roiling lines of that devilish countenance would return to her at once. She couldn't forget it—and it was the reemergence of that face in her mind that continually scared off sleep whenever it threatened to overtake her. Even now, in her quiet room, she felt that the specter of Mother Maggot was close; that, no matter how far she'd run from Beacon Hill, the phantom was not far behind. Aside from blacking out the window, the other thing Ophelia had done upon arriving in her room had been to cover the mirror. She'd tossed a blanket over it—had even turned it so that it faced the wall—lest her wandering eye find something glaring at her from within it.
She tensed as her phone buzzed. The screen lit up, casting a bluish glow about the bed. A text from Leslie. It wasn't the first—both she and Joey had tried to reach her a few times since they'd dropped her off.
Are you sure you're OK? this one read.
Ophelia saw no reason to respond. All the messages she'd received were variations on same. How are you holding up? Is everything OK? Feeling better now?
Joey and Leslie had pulled her from the house and walked her all the way across the moonlit field to the car; Ophelia remembered that part clearly. And she could remember, too, that the pair had tried to calm her down, and to figure out what had her so worked up. Ophelia had exited the house a stammering, white-faced mess—the best she'd been able to do from the back seat of Joey's car between screams and groans had been, “It was her. Mother Maggot.”
Naturally, the other two hadn't believed her. Despite having run from the dark old house in a panic, they hadn't actually seen anything and in retrospect were willing to write off their experiences as commonplace. “I thought I heard someone on the steps, but it was probably just the floors buckling,” Joey had said on the car ride back. “It's possible that there was someone squatting there, too. That's probably what you saw—a homeless person or something.” Earlier, when they'd first approached the house, he'd insisted on the veracity of the Mother Maggot legend; later, with Ophelia gibbering and sobbing in his rearview mirror, he'd sought to distance himself from such tales and to become a voice of reason.
Upon arriving home, Leslie had helped her out of the car and followed her up to the front door. “Are you going to be OK?” she'd asked.
Without a word, Ophelia had slipped inside. She'd thrown all the locks, and in the resulting commotion of her mad dash upstairs, awakened her mother. She hadn't left her room since.
She stared down at the phone now, the battery icon in the corner reduced to a sliver of red. Her mouth ached for a drink of water. Squeezing the phone in hand, she emerged from the nest of blankets and moved to the edge of the bed. She wanted to leave her room—or, at least, to quench her thirst and retrieve the phone charger she'd left on the kitchen counter—but wasn't sure she had the nerve.
Ophelia stood
and was shocked at her wooziness. Her legs could hardly bear her weight. Steadying herself against a shelf, she made a slow walk to the door, wiping the hair and sweat from her face. Once she'd made it to the door, she listened for awhile, wondering what she'd find in the hall if she dared open it. The silence outside was weighty.
Drawing in a ragged breath, she placed her hand upon the door handle and toyed with the lock. Just a quick trip to the kitchen... to the bathroom. It won't hurt anything. The lock popped and she gave the handle a half-turn. What you saw in that house was real... and terrible... but this is your house. You're safe here. Surveying the dim room to her back, she nodded as if to reassure herself. You haven't seen anything all night. It's safe. And it's day-time, too. Even if something had followed you back from Beacon Hill, it wouldn't show itself during the day, right?
Overriding her fear, Ophelia wrenched the door open.
Sunlight turned up in abundance through all of the upper story windows. The air in the hall proved cooler, less stagnant. Her lungs drank it in as she took her first step out of the room. She looked to the right, toward the bathroom. Then, craning her neck, she peered to the left, which led downstairs. Both ways were clear. Bolstered by this, Ophelia crept into the bathroom.
She set about her business and then scrubbed at her face with a damp washcloth. As she did so, her eyes naturally moved across the sink, and, however fearfully, she couldn't help but glance at her reflection in the bathroom mirror as she dried off. The only thing waiting for her was her own face, however—there were no leering phantoms there, no monstrous spectators.
Emboldened further, she made her way to the stairs. Descending them gingerly, she found her mother in the living room, watching the news, and then segued into the kitchen, where she snatched up her phone charger and plucked two water bottles from the fridge. After downing one of them in a single gulp, she turned her attention to the cabinets, raiding them for whatever snacks she could find. With an armful of food and water—and a good deal more courage—she set off for her room again.
The Haunting of Beacon Hill Page 3
