The House of Canted Steps

by Gary Fry

  “Hey, look, don’t worry. I’m not conducting a witch hunt. This has nothing to do with your enviable administrative skills.” He splayed the pictures across his desktop until all were visible: the good, the bad and the hideous. “You know, you’re probably right,” he added, despite not believing a word of it. “Or maybe there was just a fault with my camera—I did consider that possibility earlier.”

  “Yes. A fault with your camera. Yes, that will be it, won’t it? Won’t it, Mark?”

  He didn’t have the heart to add more. Stepping aside to let her return to her own desk, he nodded. “Of course. That’s all it is. I’ll tell you what: use the best pictures for marketing, the ones I took before this problem developed.”

  “You still want me to get it up on the website today?”

  “Well, the guy wants a quick sale.” Mark glanced again at the red stain on the wall in what must be the child’s room. “I guess the quicker the better for all of us, eh?”

  Jenny shivered, her shoulders settling only several seconds after this involuntary response. “Ooh, yes. Creepy,” she finished, and then exited the office, closing the door firmly behind her.

  It wasn’t as creepy as the knowledge Mark had withheld from his colleague. He sat again in his chair and lifted the exterior shot for what he hoped would be a final time. Maybe only he could perceive the resemblance to Gayle’s parents in the two distorted images at that upper-floor window, but this alone wasn’t enough to chill him in the centrally heated warmth of his premises. The question as to why his ex in-laws should appear in a property unrelated to them was insignificant compared to another fact Mark only now summoned enough courage to confront.

  His ex-wife’s mother and father had been dead for five years, a terrible car accident in Hantley.

  And Mark had often wondered whether this experience had led to Gayle’s erratic behavior and the breakdown of their previously contented marriage.

  4

  On his way home from work that evening, Mark stopped off at a pub for half a lager, hoping to strip away everything preying on his mind. He sat in an inglenook, nursing the drink, and once alcohol began performing its reliable magic, he sensed his tangled thoughts assuming some kind of order.

  He should forget about the house in Nester Street. The property was on the website, the promotional leaflets would follow in a few days, and his staff could deal with any inquiries from potential buyers. If these people wanted showing around the place, Mark could ask Ben, his junior evaluator, to take them. Ben was levelheaded, and at only twenty-two had yet to realize how crazy the world could be.

  Mark’s energies were better deployed figuring out what had happened at Gayle’s. But while reassessing the events of that afternoon—had he and his ex-wife really achieved an impromptu truce?—all he could see in his mind’s eye was the picture of his ex in-laws on the kitchen wall.

  He was determined not to dwell on what he’d seen in that photo of the Nester Street house, however. Short of finalizing a sale, the property was out of his hands and he could be excused for pushing it out of his mind. He knocked back the remainder of his lager and then stood to leave.

  “Thanks, mate,” said the landlord as Mark set his empty glass forlornly on the bar top. “Hey, it’s either money or a woman. Whichever’s troubling you, I hope it works out.”

  “Yeah, cheers,” Mark replied, and felt in his jacket pocket for his car keys. Several youngish guys were seated at the bar, each observing him with sympathetic if jaded expressions. Of course: it was that delicate period between the end of work and putting children to bed, and here was a group of duplicitous buggers who’d no doubt tell their wives that they’d been delayed at their jobs. At least Mark had never been that bad with Lewis.

  He drove slowly to the quiet district he’d half-helped Nina settle on. After parking in slots reserved for tenants around the back of the flats, he climbed out and glanced up at the window of their second-floor accommodation. It was a cool night and a quarter-moon cast a spectral glaze over his surroundings. For a moment, he fancied someone had looked out of his window—his dead father, perhaps—but then suppressed such foolish ideas. He’d obviously just seen his girlfriend peeking from behind the curtains, presumably about to serve dinner.

  He entered and advanced upstairs, noticing how level each step was, the risers flush against the staircase—all quite unlike those in…But again he was growing distracted, getting sucked into issues that didn’t concern him. Focusing his attention on more trivial matters, he keyed open his flat’s door and stepped inside. After hanging his jacket on a hook in the hall, he paced through to the lounge, where Nina stood smiling in the kitchen area, her usual cheerful self.

  “Hiya,” she said, and came across to greet him, holding out a glassful of wine. “Here, you look like you need this. The grub’s almost ready. Why don’t you take the weight off your feet while I dish up?”

  His girlfriend worked part-time at the town center library. After Mark had suggested setting up home together, a tacit agreement had been struck between them: he’d pay most of the bills if she dealt with housework and made most of the meals. This had proved to be a mutually convenient arrangement, even though it remained unspoken. Relationships were full of such mysteries, Mark realized. He sat on the couch and listened to steak spit gloriously in a pan.

  “Thanks,” he said, having accepted the wine and watched Nina’s slender body (she was only twenty-three, six years his junior) move back towards the oven. “I’d better be careful, though—mixing my drinks. I called in for a swift half on the way back.”

  “Oh dear,” his girlfriend replied, stirring a pan full of vegetables and then flipping over two slabs of meat. “I assume you’ve had a hard day? Do you want to tell me about it?”

  This was very different from whenever he’d made a similar confession to Gayle about visiting a pub—not that he’d ever been much of a drinker. But it was refreshing not to be rebuked for alleviating the tensions of a working day in this way.

  “Maybe later,” he replied, and realized he owed Nina a little attention, too. That was something he had learned from his failed marriage. “Anyway, how about you? Did you do anything interesting today?”

  “Oh, I’ve just been swatting up for my exam next month. In fact, I have some good news.”

  Oh God, she’s pregnant, Mark thought. The steak, the wine, the infectious good humor…But then he realized his girlfriend was always like this and listened as she went on.

  “I got a call this morning from Sheila Crabtree—you know, the Puritan at Head Office who speaks as if she’s still got the silver spoon stuck in her mush. Anyway, there’s apparently a vacancy for a senior librarian coming up in Hantley. So if I can pass my exam, I reckon I’m in with a good chance of getting the post. Cool, eh?”

  “As a cucumber chomping on a spliff,” Mark replied, but just then a serious issue occurred to him. He swallowed another mouthful of wine before asking, “And would that involve you going full-time?”

  “I’m not sure yet.” She spooned roasted potatoes from a baking tray onto plates already laden with many other delights. “I guess that would be up for negotiation. I’ll worry about the details if I get that far. Encouraging, though, isn’t it?”

  “It’s great news,” Mark said, thinking that if Nina was seeking more hours of employment, she couldn’t be considering having a family of her own—at least, not in the immediate future…After joining his girlfriend at the dining table in their big bay window, however, he felt ambivalent about this thought. Did he want any more children? But it was too complex to figure out right now, and he decided not to make the effort. He sat in a chair, just as his wonderful meal was set in front of him.

  “This looks sexy,” he said, and rose to peck Nina on the lips. “Almost as sexy as you.”

  “Well, all that red meat’ll put lead in your pencil, old-timer,” she replied with a promising wink, and then sat opposite to enjoy her own serving. The bottle of red and two glasses stoo
d on the tablecloth between them; a couple of candles burned in tiny metal holders. This would certainly be a peaceful evening. Who needed kids around to spoil such occasions?

  Halfway through the meal, which was indeed delicious, Nina asked, “So anyway, you were going to tell me about your day. Did things not go so well at your ex’s?”

  Mark’s girlfriend was worldly, and had been involved in unsuccessful relationships in the past. She could talk comfortably about the complexities of life without feeling embarrassed or vulnerable. That pleased Mark. With Gayle, he’d always felt obliged to navigate around her petulant tendencies…Ah, but there he went blaming her again. If he was going to get beyond that, he’d have to face up to his own shortcomings, too.

  “It wasn’t too bad, actually,” he told his girlfriend, hoping to shift his mind from troubling ruminations. “A bit awkward in the early stages, but I think we managed to reach an…understanding of sorts.”

  “An understanding? I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Nina replied, smirking while sipping her wine.

  Mark also smiled, but the expression didn’t last. He felt as if it was crucial to articulate what had happened before he’d left his former home.

  “It was as if some broken pieces had been fixed. As if we’d met each other halfway and decided not to keep fighting.” He paused, smiled again. “Oh, I don’t know—it was very odd. Maybe the fact that it was Lewis’s birthday helped. This was his first one since…well, since the divorce.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean. It’s weird, isn’t it?” She put down her drink, took up her knife and fork again, and continued working at her food. When she went on, however, her voice sounded distant. “Nothing stranger than the human mind, darling.”

  “Indeed,” Mark replied, and then, ascribing his girlfriend’s sudden reticence to the early effects of wine, revealed his news as quickly as he’d been told it. “They’re moving house. Gayle, Lewis and…Justin. What with the new sprog on the way, they’re looking for somewhere bigger.”

  “Makes sense,” Nina said, back to her sprightly self, and Mark was glad she’d spoken with such practical simplicity. Perhaps everything he’d felt since leaving his previous home was self-indulgent nonsense. After all, Eric Johnson hadn’t exhibited such regrets while pitching his property to Mark, had he? Quite the opposite, in fact.

  “I suppose it does,” Mark said, trying to untie a knot of thoughts that had formed in his mind. This certainly involved the house in Nester Street, just as much as it did his former home. Indeed, each aspect of the situation seemed inexplicably connected. His ex-wife was linked to the new property on Addisons’ books via those two photographed faces in an upstairs window, her late parents in a room they had no right to occupy, even if they had been still alive…

  It was very mysterious, but then Mark thrust it all aside and concentrated on his food and drink, letting the rich flavors dominate him. Neither he nor Nina spoke again until they were done.

  Later, just as he and his girlfriend put down their cutlery, the telephone rang.

  Here was another implicit rule of their relationship: when they were both at home, Mark always answered the phone. It was usually for him, anyway—either a colleague from the office who needed to discuss something on Mark’s day off (never a problem; he’d always taken his management role seriously) or his mom making sure everything was okay. Nina, an only child, didn’t get along well with her own parents, and so the few people who called her tended to be friends.

  After excusing himself from the table with a double-handed gesture meant to read, “That meal was excellent,” Mark paced across the room for a small table and plucked the cordless handset from its base.

  “Hello, Mark Cookson here.”

  “Daddy, it’s me! I’m calling from my mobile!”

  Mark felt his heart swell at the sound of his son’s voice. “Oh, hi there, mate! Hey, what a clear line! You could be almost standing beside me!”

  The boy went quiet, which led Mark to believe that Lewis wished he was with his daddy. That prompted another concern about Justin and what terrible thing the man might have just done to the boy…but of course that was ridiculous. Okay, so he’d once skidded in his car when Lewis had been a passenger—that was hardly a major crime, was it, let alone an illicit one? Moments later, Lewis said, “Mommy says, why didn’t you tell her?”

  Mark grew puzzled. Why hadn’t he told her what? Some of the discomfort he’d experienced during his marriage now became manifest in his body, a racing pulse and sweating palms chief among them. He imagined this sort of thing was hard to eliminate so soon after separation.

  Then Gayle came on the line. “Mark?”

  “I’m here, yes.”

  “I’ll call you back on the landline. I don’t want to use all Lewis’s credit.”

  “Er, okay,” he replied, and could only listen as his ex-wife hung up.

  “Who was it?” Nina asked from across the room once Mark had shut down the already terminated connection.

  “It was Lewis. He was using the mobile I bought him this morning. He seemed pretty excited about it.”

  Mark’s girlfriend smiled. “Ah, bless,” she said, and Mark thought her voice had veered dangerously close to maternal affection. But as she tidied away crockery, he couldn’t prevent himself from giving her a taste of real family affairs.

  “But then his mom came on the line. She wants to speak to me about something.”

  “Such as what?”

  “I don’t know,” Mark said, and that was when the phone started ringing again. “But I guess I’m about to find out.”

  After he answered the call, Gayle said, “Mark?”

  “I’m still here, yes. What’s up?”

  His ex-wife went quiet for too long, a pause pregnant with many horrible implications…but then she said, “Why didn’t you tell me earlier about the house that has just appeared on your website?”

  He was shocked. Despite every part of his mind other than consciousness telling him it was obvious this would happen, he was unable to control his thoughts or words. “The house? Uhm…which house?”

  “The one you’re selling at such a crazy price, of course! Justin spotted it on the Internet this evening. He was using one of his search engines or whatever they’re called. Then this property came up…and we were surprised to see that it was on with Addisons.”

  “Ah, I—”

  “It’s perfect for us, Mark. In a nice area…roomy enough…and a great price. Justin reckons they usually go for around three-hundred over there.”

  Justin this, Justin that…But despite his escalating bitterness, Mark finally got his mind under control again. “Look, I only valued it this…this afternoon—just after I’d left you, actually.”

  “But you were going to let us know about it?”

  “Well, I mean…” He was having to think quickly, despite needing time to gather his thoughts, which were now filled only with concern about his son. Even his white lie a moment earlier had been for Lewis’s benefit, and what followed certainly was; but even as he spoke, Mark struggled to work out how. “The house needs a lot of work, you know. I wouldn’t risk putting a…a newborn baby in there before it’s received serious attention. The garden is a mess, and God knows what the structure of the building is like.”

  Beneath the sound of Gayle breathing into the mouthpiece with obvious excitement, Mark could hear Justin talking to Lewis. Their words were too quiet to be intelligible, but were undeniably friendly in nature. Perhaps the prospect of a new home together had bonded them as a new family in a way few other things could.

  Mark had grown too resentful to listen properly to his ex-wife babbling on. “Let us be the judges of that. The pictures on the site look good. Can you get in touch with the vendors and ask them whether we can view it tomorrow morning?”

  “Huh? What?”

  “I said,” Gayle replied, and then did what she’d always done during the long decade he’d put up with her reckless, needy nature
: repeated her comment with emphatic volume.

  Mark noticed Nina washing up in the sink. She looked unnecessarily dutiful in the corner, in direct contrast to the hectoring woman on the phone. Then he said to Gayle, “Yes, okay, whatever. I’m tied up with HQ most of the day,”—another small, puzzling lie—“so I’ll have to get one of my colleagues to go with you. The sellers both work full-time and probably won’t be home.”

  …but your dead parents might be, my dear.

  He silenced that thought (which he believed had been spoken in the voice of Vincent Price), and after his ex-wife promised to arrive at his office at ten sharp, he said goodbye and hung up.

  His girlfriend turned, her small hands enfolded in marigold gloves. “That sounded a bit fraught!” she said and paced towards him, dripping foamy water.

  “Oh, you know what she’s like,” he replied, again ascribing his disquiet to his wife’s peculiarities, because he didn’t know how to make sense of it otherwise.

  “And after the day you’ve had,” Nina went on, rounding the couch to meet him in the middle of the room. On the second floor, nobody could see into their home from outside, even if the curtains had been open. And when his girlfriend placed the wet rubber gloves on his groin, which began stirring with the proverbial mind of its own, she added, “Well, then, let’s see what we can do to relax you…”

  Later, after they’d made love in bed and were watching some lighthearted television, Mark’s mind returned to the way he’d inadvertently passed on to his ex-wife the details of the house in Nester Street. More worryingly, he’d now involved his son in whatever was going on in that property.

  But surely what Mark had begun to suspect about it was nonsense. Those faces he’d seen in the photo—they’d simply been reflections or something like them, just as his colleague Jenny had suggested. They must have been, because the only alternative was…