Denise gave the nurse a long, hard look. She wasn’t sure if she believed her or not. Finally, she sighed. “Forget it. I appreciate the offer, but I can’t take you up on it. I can’t tell my parents. It’s not just the money … it’s the house. And whoever’s still in it.” She slung her bag around, and turned to leave. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come here. I need help, but you’re right. I don’t need it that bad.”
“That’s not the message I was trying to convey. Here, at least let me bandage you back up …”
“I’ve got my own Band-Aids.” She wrapped her hand back up again as best as she could while on the run, and fled the makeshift office just like Dominique had, embarrassed for different reasons—reasons she couldn’t quite put into words. She squeezed out around the fake wall, into the soft mumbling echoes of the drugstore with its rows of greeting cards, housewares, vitamins, and shampoo.
She hustled away from the pharmacy toward the front door. Around the first corner she went, her flip-flops squeaking on the floor, one after the other, going so fast that by the time she rounded the last aisle past the makeup counter, she was almost running.
That’s why it hurt, when she plowed into Dominique.
The other girl wasn’t coming from the other direction; she wasn’t moving at all. She stopped Denise cold, with the force of just standing there.
Denise bounced back—partly by reflex, partly by physics. “Sorry,” she said fast, and she meant it. “I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry about that—I didn’t see you.”
“I know.”
“Were you … were you waiting for me? You’re … you’re Dominique, right? From Crispy’s?”
“Yeah, that’s me. What were you doing in there? Were you asking for stuff? Stuff you could buy your own damn self?”
“No,” she told her. “I swear, I wasn’t. I wouldn’t take advantage.”
“You know Miss Ginny buys it for us. Out of her own pocket, sometimes—especially over the summer when we can’t just go to her office in the school.”
“Nurse Radlein … is Miss Ginny?”
“To us, not you.”
Dominique took a step forward, and Denise took a step back—stopping against a L’Oreal display that she couldn’t afford to mess up. She held up both of her hands, showing the bandage. “I went to the nurse for help, all right?”
Dominique looked at the half-bandaged covering there, and saw a spreading red dot. “Oh, crap. What happened?” she asked, like she honestly wanted to know.
Denise closed her hand and felt it growing damp. The puncture wound was bleeding again, a sharp little stigmata that just wouldn’t close all the way. “I got hurt, all right? I can’t tell my parents. I thought I needed a tetanus shot.”
“Why won’t you tell your parents? Go to your doctor, or something.”
“We don’t have a doctor! We don’t have money, either. God,” she said, using the hem of her tee to apply pressure. The shirt was black, and it wouldn’t show. “All we have is a craphole of a house and a ghost that’s trying to kill us.”
The door’s greeting bell rang louder than a gunshot, and a cop strolled inside, taking off his sunglasses and tucking them into his pocket. He was white, with hair that was almost white too, in a crew cut that said he meant business—probably all the time, whether he was in uniform or not. He gave the girls a side-glance.
They straightened up and fake-smiled for all they were worth. Dominique batted her eyelashes and said brightly to Denise, “Look, they have that new mascara. Is this the kind you wanted?”
Denise had been watched by enough security guards in enough makeup aisles to know how this worked. “Oh yeah, that’s it. Do they have anything except that blue-black? That stuff looks like crap on me; my hair’s too light for it. The dark brown looks better.”
Dom flipped through the offerings, pretending to look. “I see brownish black. Is that close enough?”
“Might be. Let me see …”
After a few seconds of suspicious observation, the cop gave them a nod of his head, the kind that said he was going to walk away, but he was still watching them. Then he lost interest and headed somewhere else in the store.
Dominique was rattled.
Denise was rattled too, but not quite the same way. “I hope he didn’t think we were stealing.”
Dom leaned in and whispered: “Don’t even say that, not so loud. You don’t want him coming back, do you? Jeez.”
“No, I really don’t,” she mumbled back.
Dominique had already turned away. She pushed her way past the glass door, and was gone.
Denise thought about going after her, but she saw the bus pulling around the corner, so she went to the stop instead, feeling a little lost. She looked for Dominique but didn’t see her, and she gave up when the bus drew up to a halt and the doors split open.
Inside, she gave the driver her transfer and took a seat right behind him—where she fiddled with the dirty little bandage and used her next to last fresh Band-Aid. It didn’t want to stick. Her skin was too messy from dried blood, or too damp with the blood that hadn’t dried yet.
She tucked her hand into her shirt and tried not to look as gross as she felt.
Back home, she tossed the note she’d left behind, because Mike was still snoring in the bedroom and her mom’s car was nowhere to be seen.
Then she washed her hands and very, very carefully applied her final sticky bandage.
When she was as first-aided up as she was going to get, she sat down at the dining room table with a Coke and poked idly at her phone.
As it turned out, her old school friends in Texas were mostly talking about some kid from her class who’d died in a car wreck. It was no one she’d known very well. He’d been a face in the hall, and she might’ve recognized him on sight, or then again, she might not. It was a surprise, but not a catastrophe. It happened a million miles away, to someone she barely recognized.
But jeez, everybody back at her old school was in crazy mourning, at least online. She shot Trish a text asking about it, hoping for details.
What kind of car wreck? She asked. Was it his fault, or somebody else?
Trish responded immediately, and briefly. Nobody knows yet. Rumor has it he ran a stop sign or something. Will let you know if I hear anything for sure.
Didn’t know him very well but it’s sad, Denise added.
He was a friend of Kierons. You should reach out, say something nice to your dear old ex.
No. She shook her head as she texted. It’d be more trouble than it was worth.
Then Trish said something about getting ready to catch a matinee, and turning off her phone, so Denise started to close hers too, but then her email pinged to say she had something new. She tapped the icon with her thumb, and frowned with confusion, then smiled.
Hello Miss Farber, my name is Eugenie Robbins. My father was Marty Robbins, and yes, a long time ago he was Joe Vaughn’s literary agent. As you may have learned by now, Joe disappeared decades ago. (And I regret to say that my father is now deceased.)
I was very excited to see the images you sent! I’m not familiar with that particular Lucida Might story, but Joe wrote so many of them. It doesn’t mean that Lucida Might and the House of Horrors was never published.
Your message mentioned that you live in New Orleans, and you’re afraid that you live in the house where Joe died. I suppose you might? I don’t know exactly where he was found, but I will try to look up an address for you. All I remember, off the top of my head, is that the house belonged to an older woman, and no one really knew why Joe was in her house.
I’d love to see the whole manuscript—if you have the time or interest in scanning it for me. Joe’s comics are all out of print, and no one remembers the TV show anymore, but a lost manuscript might revive interest in his backlist. As far as I know, Joe had no heirs or near relatives; at least, no one ever came forward to claim his estate.
I’m not saying that you’re sitting on a gold mine by
any means, but there might be some money to be made—you never know. I’d be happy to talk about representing the project for you or your parents, if you’re interested in shopping it around. My agency manages my father’s surviving clients (or their estates), and in all honesty, the thought of handling one of Dad’s authors (even indirectly, after all this time) makes me very, very happy.
It’s funny, my dad used to say that Joe sometimes hid “Easter eggs” in his stories, little pieces of autobiography, here and there. Does the house in the comic look anything like yours? That would be fascinating, wouldn’t it? Maybe that’s why he was there. Maybe he used it as an art reference. He must’ve known the lady who owned it.
Think about it. Let me know. Feel free to be in touch, and by all means, enjoy the reading!
At the bottom of the email, she’d included her office address and phone number.
“Huh,” Denise said out loud.
A grumble of gravel suggested that her mother’s car was pulling up beside the house.
She closed her phone and tucked it into her back pocket.
Around noon, Norman showed up for his new side gig with a large pizza. “Unclaimed at work,” he explained, deploying the box to the middle of the dining room table with a casual flip of his wrist.
“I love this guy!” a freshly awakened Mike declared with honest enthusiasm. “What are the toppings?”
“They’re free toppings,” Denise guessed. “The best toppings of all.”
Sally came down the stairs, shaking her head all the way. “No, no, no. Don’t be silly. Thank you, Norman—that was very thoughtful, but of course I want to pay you for it. You didn’t have to bring lunch.”
“No way, Mrs. Cooper. I got it for free, so you get it for free. My only condition is that I get a piece. I’d ask for two, but I had one at work already.”
They gathered around, pulled up chairs, and split up the free pizza.
When it was successfully reduced to crumbs, Mike slowly helped clean up, moving stiffly. He’d come home with stitches and an order to stay off his feet, but he wasn’t paying much attention to that order. He was still doing all the same stuff as before—just slower, and more carefully.
Norman leaned over and asked Denise quietly, “His foot’s still not any better?”
“It’s not his foot anymore,” she whispered back. “He fell through the porch and got hurt.”
“Holy crap. This place ought to come with hazard pay …”
On her way to the kitchen, Sally said, “Norman, today we’re going to pull down the rotted trim in the extra bedrooms upstairs, and prep for painting. There’s still some wallpaper that needs to come down, and probably some plaster in need of patching.”
“You name it—just point me at the supplies!”
She disappeared into the kitchen to grab some paper towels, and Denise’s phone buzzed on the table.
“Anything interesting?” Norman asked.
“Maybe?” She wasn’t sure if she should tell him about Lucida Might, but then again, she couldn’t see why not. “See, the other day I found this manuscript, up in the attic. It’s a comic book,” she explained. And then she told the rest as fast as possible, concluding, “Supposedly this guy’s papers are archived out at Tulane. Didn’t you say you work there, sometimes, during the week? At the cafeteria? Maybe you could show me where the library is. I’ve never been there before.”
“Yeah, sure. I can do that. It’s only a couple of buses and a little walking. Can I see the comic book, if I take you out there?”
“Sure.”
“Cool. Then what are you doing this weekend?”
“Not a thing.”
He bobbed his head from left to right. “We can do it on Saturday. Meet you at the bus stop outside the school?”
“Sounds awesome. What time?”
“How about eleven? We can change buses down by the market—and pick up some lunch or something, if you want.”
Oh, yes. She definitely wanted.
How are ur ghosts? Still ghosty?
Denise grinned down at the text. She’d only told Trish the bare basics of the spook situation. Still ghosty, but quiet ATM. Mike is doing better, I think. Not quite so grunty and stiff.
That’s good. I hope nobody else gets hurt. By ghosts or whatever.
She could only agree. Me too.
So what about school next year? UR still coming back, rite?
Planning on it. Got a good roommate waiting back in Texas.
Trish replied, Awwww.You mean me? You had BETTER mean me.
Always you, yes—you big dork :)
Eventually, after a slow-growing headache from staring at her ancient phone, Denise gave up and decided to hoof it down to Crispy’s. She badgered Sally to pick her up when summoned via text, and her mom agreed—just to get rid of her, Denise was pretty sure.
She brought two bucks because that’s all she could scare up. It was only enough to get a drink and a small order of fries, but that was okay. She wasn’t really hungry for anything except Internet.
She generally avoided the smattering of other kids who were hanging out in the dining area—all of whom were doing pretty much the same thing she was. One or two had phones, a couple had laptops open. One guy kept jiggling his power cord’s connection, and Denise knew that feeling. If she didn’t have hers positioned at just the perfect angle, it’d pop out easy as pie.
When she’d collected her food on a tray and picked a seat against the wall, she turned on her phone—but the only new message was a late closing volley from Trish, who declared herself QUEEN OF THE DORKS and don’t u forget it
The door chimed, and someone came in. Someone hung out in Denise’s peripheral vision, hovering. It was Dominique, acting like she wanted to say something.
“Hey,” Denise said. “What’s up?”
“Nothing,” the other girl said back, but she worked her way a little closer. “Except, I was gonna say sorry about the CVS thing. I didn’t know you were hurt, and then you played along later, and I appreciated it. So … are we cool?”
“Sure. We’re cool.” She wasn’t sure how to ask what prompted the apology, but she wanted to know so she stumbled around the subject. “You um … you mean about the cop?”
“Oh, that guy’s a jerk. He harasses us all summer—but I was standing next to you, in the white privilege zone,” she said with a grin. “Anyway, my grandma will kill me if I get banned from the drugstore, for stealing or mouthing off, or anything else. She sends me down there all the time, running her errands and buying her smokes.”
“But you weren’t stealing.”
“No, but that might not’ve stopped him, if he’d been in the wrong mood. Or if I’d been by myself. Or … I don’t know.” Dominique looked relieved and kind of embarrassed. “Anyway, that’s all. I just wanted to say that.”
“I’m just glad you’re not mad.”
“No, I’m not mad. See you around.” Dominique melted back into the lobby to join somebody else she knew, and then Denise was on her own again.
Until Terry arrived.
He strolled into the joint and made a beeline for her. He didn’t go to the counter to buy anything, but parked himself into the swivel chair across the table from where Denise had—once upon a time—had every intention of getting some sweet, sweet Internet-and-AC time.
He asked, “How’s your hand?”
She held it up and waved it around. “It bleeds a little, sometimes, but the nurse said it looked fine. Hey, I was gonna ask you: Do you have any extra Band-Aids lying around at your house? I’m running out, and I still haven’t told Mom or Mike what happened.”
“All we have is one first aid kit. My dad stocks it from work, when he can. We don’t have any extras, not Band-Aids or anything else. Sorry.”
“No, I understand. I um … I shouldn’t have asked.”
“The nurse didn’t give you any?”
“The nurse and I disagreed over whether or not I should tell my parents about the
whole thing. She says they should take me to get a tetanus shot, just to be on the safe side. I said we couldn’t do it, not after Mike’s accident.”
Terry nodded knowingly. He politely refrained from saying, ‘I told you so.’ “How’d your stepdad turn out, anyway?”
“They gave him a bunch of stitches, and he has some pretty bad bruises. He’s taking it easy for a few days so he doesn’t bust any of the sutures. Mom’s waiting on him hand and foot, and telling him not to get used to it. If I’m lucky, she’ll come and give me a ride home when I text her.”
“If she doesn’t, I’ll walk back with you.”
“Thanks, man. If she does, I’ll get her to give you a lift home too. If you want.”
He smiled, and his cheeks were as round as apples. “You’re awesome. So … have you read any more of the comic?” he asked, his voice dripping with the hint.
“Nope. I stuffed it under my bed.”
“You have a bed now? Not just the mattress on the floor?”
“I quit waiting for Mike to assemble it, and put it together myself.” A smidge of pride seeped into the declaration. “It took me half the afternoon, but I did it.”
He stopped hinting. “Go you. So … if you want, I could come over and we could read it together. If you want.”
She relented. It was easier than fighting him. “I’m sure it’s fine.” Her phone buzzed. It was Sally, saying she’d have to walk home on her own after all. “Great. Mom says she’s not going to pick me up. So it’s foot-power for both of us. What the hell. Let’s go.”
Terry predicted that the trip wouldn’t take them ten minutes, and he was right. They arrived at the Agony House before anybody’d sweated through their clothes too badly, and they found the place empty.
Sally had left a note on the dining room table.
The power’s on, so you can run your AC. Electricians are done for now. Plumbers are barely started, but they should be gone by the time you read this. They’ll be back tomorrow. Sorry I’m not home, and sorry you had to walk. I trust you survived the journey. I’ll be back soon. Mike blew out a couple of stitches, so I’m running him back to the doctor for a patch-up.
The Agony House Page 11
