The Piper

by Lynn Hightower

  ‘Oh, come on, Livie. When you ask me about Marianne, do I rub your nose in that nobody knows how I feel kind of shit?’

  Olivia’s voice went small. ‘No.’

  ‘Sorry. Really, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be such a bitch.’

  ‘It’s just – I’m finally home, okay? And it feels good for me here. I just want to be happy, I’m not looking for trouble. I’ve got my hands full making a living and raising my kid. Things are looking better for me. Or are you going to tell me I should never have come home?’

  ‘No, that’s not what I’m saying. The call from Chris came when you were in California, remember? It would have happened no matter where you live. I just wish I understood what your brother meant, don’t you? Doesn’t it worry you at all? And hearing about this Metro link thing – it just makes it feel more real. More like you better pay attention. The phone call was a warning, Olivia. Don’t turn your back.’

  ‘Fine, then, Amelia. What is it you suggest I do?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Exactly. I just need to remember not to be happy because something bad is going to happen and I better watch out. That sum it up?’

  ‘I’m not saying don’t be happy.’

  ‘Well, hey. Thanks for that.’

  EIGHT

  Olivia was restless after Amelia called. Upset over their fight.

  She went to the kitchen to unpack a box, but found she did not have the heart or the energy to open it up. She opened the refrigerator and looked inside. Nothing interesting to eat.

  Finally, she went to the sunroom, opened her briefcase and fired up her laptop. It was dark out, lights from houses down the block reflecting in the window panes. She wondered why Chris and Charlotte didn’t have any blinds or curtains or shutters in the sunroom. Of all the rooms in the house, this one had the most charm. Olivia wasn’t quite sure why she didn’t spend more time here. It had been the heart of the house, when she was a child.

  She took her laptop and curled up on the couch in the living room, where all the windows were tightly shuttered. She felt more private here, more safe. In the sunroom she felt watched.

  She pulled up a search engine, and entered phone calls from the dead plus warnings. She looked over her shoulder, while the screen began to fill, and tapped a finger on the edge of the keyboard. She wasn’t sure she wanted to do this, look at her brother’s phone call this way. But Amelia, annoying as she was, definitely had a point. Maybe she was hiding in southern denial.

  Olivia looked over at the fireplace mantel, at the picture of Chris and Charlotte and all three of his kids. An old picture, Cassidy was just an infant. The picture had actually been taken here, in front of the fireplace, and Chris looked happy, unshadowed. God, she missed him. They had had the usual family squabbles and irritations, but there was no one quite like a sibling, someone who had lived so much of your life. So easy to ignore a big brother when you lived hundreds of miles away. To take for granted that you could visit, share a meal, go for coffee and talk. Little things you never thought about until you couldn’t do it anymore, and then they seemed more important than anything else in the world.

  Thinking about the afterlife and ghostly visitations was fine, Olivia thought, as long as the thoughts and experiences were good. As long as the experience was a spiritual comfort.

  When it went south to the dark side, Olivia wasn’t sure she wanted to know. She had enough problems just dealing with everyday stuff.

  But she went to the search engine, and found a chat room, not joining or signing in, just lurking, reading old posts that came up under warnings from the dead.

  TORN & IN LOVE (posted eighteen months ago): But he’s perfect. I never expected to find a man like this. My daughter lives in San Francisco, but she came down for Easter, and they hit it off. He charmed her, that’s for sure. He never loses his temper, like my first husband. He cares about me. I’ve been happier the last six months than ever in my life. I can’t help feeling like I deserve a man like this. I can’t imagine not having him in my life. It would be crazy to throw a relationship like this away, over something this, well, vague.

  WORRIED IN PHOENIX: But TORN, when your mother called you, did she actually use his name?

  TORN & IN LOVE: Yes. That was what’s got me so scrambled up inside. She said ‘stay away,’ then there was static, and then she said ‘Clark.’ And I know it was her voice, it was unmistakable. She sounded good, she said she loved me. God, I miss her so much.

  WORRIED IN PHOENIX: How long has your mother been dead?

  TORN & IN LOVE: Two years last Christmas.

  WORRIED IN PHOENIX: You can’t be sure what she meant. With the static and all. Maybe you should just go slow with the relationship, sort of keep a watchful eye.

  TORN & IN LOVE: Yes. That’s good advice. The thing is, he’s asked me to marry him. He got me a ring. He has this whole destination wedding-honeymoon planned, and my God, it’s so cold here, I’d go to Jamaica with him just to get warm.

  WORRIED IN PHOENIX: You should come live here in Phoenix, you’d have all the warm you want. Where are you?

  TORN & IN LOVE: Vermont. It’s still snowing at the end of April.

  Olivia kept scrolling. Nothing else from TORN & IN LOVE. She pulled up a new search window and typed in various combinations of Vermont, Clark and weddings. Nothing. Well, women rarely put a wedding notice in the paper for a second marriage later in life. No surprise. On a whim she added San Francisco, hoping for some smalltown newsy item that included a daughter coming in for a wedding from out of town. She came up with a notice then – but not a wedding announcement. An obituary from the Burlington Times.

  Burlington, May 21st: Juliana Hargreaves Cavannaugh, aged forty-nine, known to friends and family as ‘Jules’, died yesterday of an apparent heart attack in her home. Her body was discovered at 2:00 PM by her husband, Clark Cavannaugh, who returned home from work concerned when Mrs Cavannaugh did not show up for a lunch date the couple had planned. Mr and Mrs Cavannaugh had recently been married at a destination wedding in Ochos Rios, Jamaica, returning from their honeymoon just one week ago. Visitation will be held from four to six tomorrow, at the Grayson Funeral Home, with burial at the Burlington Cemetery on Tuesday, at 3:00 PM. Ms. Cavannaugh is survived by her husband, Clark, a daughter and son in law, Mr & Mrs Vaughn Melrose of San Francisco, and two grandchildren, Cary and Silas, aged six and three.

  Olivia set the laptop on the coffee table, and put her head in her hands, feeling sick to her stomach and sad. There was no doubt in her mind that TORN & IN LOVE was dead. She had a name now, Jules, and she was a presence in Olivia’s mind now, whether she liked it or not.

  Juliana Hargreaves Cavannaugh had received a phone call from the dead too – a warning call, told by her mother to stay away from Clark. Now she was dead, one week after marrying the guy. Had Jules somehow been murdered by this Clark, who had given her a drug or something to fake a heart attack? Olivia would never know. There was nothing she could do for Juliana, who was now dead, no way she would know for sure if it was at the hands of her new and perfect husband, Clark.

  But the lesson was there. And Chris had told her to be careful of the mysterious Mister Man. Shit. How exactly was she going to do that?

  NINE

  Olivia’s work day was a total loss. One canceled appointment, a lot of phone calls that brought her annoyed customers and no sales. Her mind had not been on the job, her thoughts divided between warning phone calls from beyond the grave, and, on the practical side, how she was going to approach Charlotte about Janet telling Teddy scary stories about the house. She considered what she was going to say as she passed through the second light on Ebenezer, on her way to pick Teddy up. She was threading the suburban maze when her cell phone rang.

  As always, now, she tensed, but it was Hugh’s name that came up on the caller ID. She hesitated, then said hello, pulling to the side of the road. She was not one of those people who could talk and drive at the same time. Not when the
caller was her ex husband.

  ‘Olivia? Look, is this a good time for you? Are you somewhere private, where Teddy can’t hear?’

  The hum of the car’s air conditioner was noisy. Olivia shut the engine down. It was a hot day, the car full of afternoon heat, and the coolness seeped quickly away.

  ‘What is it, Hugh? Is something wrong?’

  ‘That’s what I was going to ask you. I have three missed calls from Teddy today, and a weird text message, all between eleven fifteen and noon. Is she sick? Did she go to school?’

  Olivia knew that tone of voice. She could picture Hugh, running a hand through the thick, graying black hair, pacing and light on his feet like a thoroughbred horse, nervous energy to spare. ‘Of course she went to school, and no she’s not sick. That’s her lunch break, eleven fifteen.’

  ‘Surely you’re not letting her have the phone at school?’

  ‘No, Hugh, I’m not, but I’m not in the habit of searching her backpack, either, every morning before she leaves. What do you mean by a weird text?’

  ‘It said, let me see, I wrote it down. It said provoking malign troubles.’

  ‘What? That doesn’t make any sense.’

  ‘No, and it doesn’t seem like something an eight year old would say just out of the blue. I wondered if maybe someone got hold of her cell phone.’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ll check. Look, Hugh, I know your heart was in the right place, but the phone thing just isn’t working out. She’s too young for a cell phone.’

  ‘Yes. That was a bad call. Look, let me be the bad guy on this, since it was my idea. Have her call me tonight and I’ll tell her we decided together to take the phone away. I need to talk to her anyway, she was pretty keyed up last night when we talked. Are things going okay at the new school?’

  ‘She seems to be settling in pretty well – better than usual.’

  ‘She seemed really upset last night on the phone.’

  ‘She was mad at me. We had a little incident in the basement, did she tell you about that? She knocked over a stack of boxes, then lied and said she didn’t when I bit her head off over it.’

  ‘Well, you did the right thing, calling her on it. This lying thing will probably get worse before it gets better. We’re going to have to tough this out.’

  ‘Yes, my thoughts exactly.’

  ‘I take it you’re sure she lied?’

  Olivia unclipped her seatbelt and twisted in her seat. ‘No, I’m not sure, but she was standing right there, and there was no reason for those boxes to go over.’

  Hugh sighed. ‘I miss you guys, Olivia. I wish to God I’d taken that job in Knoxville. I get that I made a mistake.’

  ‘A mistake? How about a betrayal.’

  ‘Yes, all right, a betrayal.’

  ‘On so many levels, Hugh. I moved with you God knows how many times, and when you had the chance, when we could have come home, all of us, together—’ She choked on it. She always did. ‘You betrayed me and violated my trust.’

  ‘And I’ve apologized a million times. But in my defense, Olivia, don’t you remember when we first got married? You couldn’t wait to get out of that town. You said it oppressed you there, you wanted to be free.’

  ‘What are you talking about? Free of what?’

  ‘Oh, hell, you know. The family. The past. Whatever.’

  ‘That’s not an excuse for deceit, Hugh.’

  ‘No, of course not. I don’t want to fight about this, Olivia.’

  ‘And anyway, that was years ago, Hugh. Years ago. You know damn well I changed my mind. Sometimes you have to leave your home to appreciate what you’ve got.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know, you’re right. I should have taken the job, or at the very least, discussed it with you when they offered.’

  ‘We might still be married if you had.’

  ‘And we might still be married if you hadn’t read my emails.’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it anymore.’

  ‘I’m still sorry, Olivia. About that, about all the constant moving.’

  ‘I’m a big girl, Hugh. I could have said no.’

  ‘Look, about Teddy. Something she said last night really bothered me. Is there any good reason she’s afraid to go to sleep?’

  ‘She actually said that to you? That she was afraid to go to sleep?’

  ‘Yes. I didn’t know if she was just, you know, being dramatic and up to her tricks. But she seemed so sincere. And I wondered if it might be something to do with your brother. Him dying in the house.’

  ‘That, and maybe one of her cousins. Saying things to scare her. Listen, Hugh, what about Teddy coming to see you in California for Labor Day? That would give her something to look forward to, a familiar place to go, to see her old friends.’

  ‘I won’t be here. I was going to tell you. I’ve accepted a job in Seattle.’

  ‘You’re moving again?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Of course you are. Goodbye, Hugh. I’ll have Teddy call you before bedtime. On my phone. I’m taking the other one away.’

  TEN

  There were no blinds or curtains to block out the sun on the Palladian window in the living room of Charlotte’s L-shaped house. The garage doors were open, Charlotte’s Honda SUV on the left, and Chris’s Ford Explorer on the right.

  Olivia pulled into the driveway, left her briefcase on the front seat, and paused by her brother’s car on her way up the walk. She ran a finger across the layers of pollen and dust on the hood. Her brother’s UT ball cap was still on the dash.

  For some reason, the orange appealed to her. Olivia had opinions about color, and she went through phases. Although all the clothes she owned, except blue jeans, were always either black or white. Just lately she had been attracted to the color of Italian blood orange. It felt like the onset of a completely new phase.

  She was on the front step when she heard soft sobbing coming from an open bedroom window in the front of the house. She frowned, and rang the bell. Saw Charlotte, through the window, motioning her to come in.

  ‘Maybe I lived in Los Angeles too long, but you ought to keep that front door locked.’ Olivia set her purse down in the hall and kicked off her shoes. Several months of unemployment meant she was going to have to get used to being in heels again, rebuild those calf muscles. She cocked her head to one side. Heard nothing but the faint noise of a television from one of the bedrooms at the back of the house. ‘Which kid’s been crying? Yours or mine?’

  Charlotte frowned. ‘I didn’t know anybody was crying. I don’t hear anything.’ She had a pencil tucked behind one ear. She wore khakis today, and an oversized man’s white shirt, probably one of Chris’s. She worked from home, architectural scut work for the firm that laid her off but kept her going with contract work. ‘You look tired. Bad day at work?’

  ‘My assistant is a bitch and the last financial advisor left the clients in a mess, but God am I glad to have the job.’ Olivia unbuttoned the snap on the side of her skirt. Her work clothes had gotten mysteriously tight.

  Little girl screams brought Charlotte’s head up. ‘That can’t be good,’ she said, leading Olivia down the hall.

  Charlotte was one step ahead, and Olivia ran behind her, vaguely aware of the short, beige carpeted hallway, the beige walls, the whole beige beige beige that she always hated in every new house she’d ever lived in with Hugh.

  They passed Charlotte’s bedroom first, door open to reveal a double bed, neatly made, blonde oak furniture, solid and dull, and on the walls, more beige. The next bedroom was painted lavender, and little Cassidy was curled up on a white canopy bed, sucking her thumb, watching cartoons on the television propped on the little white dresser. Olivia curled her lip. She refused to allow Teddy a television in her room, and she had a horror of pastel walls.

  The screaming stopped.

  The door to the third bedroom was closed. No noise, no light. Charlotte opened the door.

  Three little girls were sitting in a circle, holding
hands, a lit candle flickering, next to Teddy’s pink cell phone. Teddy’s face was tear streaked, and her cousins, Janet and Annette, looked solemn and wise.

  ‘What’s going on here?’ Olivia flipped on the light.

  ‘Mommy.’ Teddy, the baby of the group, scrambled to her feet, and grabbed Olivia around the waist.

  Charlotte snatched the candle up and blew it out. ‘Janet, what the hell are you doing? Where did you even get matches? What are you girls doing with a candle burning? You know better than that.’

  Annette pulled her knees to her chest, pushing hair from her eyes with trembly fingers. ‘You got to have a candle, it’s a seance.’

  Charlotte opened the blinds that were shut tight against the light, and closed the window, snapping the lock. ‘A seance? Are you kidding me? Why were you screaming?’

  Teddy looked up at Olivia. ‘Janet says our house is haunted. She says the house killed Uncle Chris. She says we have to stay here, because it’s not safe to go home. We need to go and get Winston, Mommy, he’s there all alone.’

  ‘Janet,’ Charlotte said. ‘How could you?’

  Janet straightened her back and folded her arms. Her hair looked oily and unwashed. Unhappy girl, Olivia thought. Unhappy and angry and sad. She needed to be patient with Janet. Chris’s little girl who had almost died.

  ‘It’s him again, Mama,’ Janet said. ‘It’s just like I told you. He’s after Teddy now. He’ll get her, too, if we don’t watch out. Once he starts watching you, it’s hard to make him go away. So we were asking Daddy to come and help. But Daddy didn’t come. He came instead.’

  Charlotte pressed both hands down on Janet’s shoulders. ‘I cannot believe you would pull something like this after everything we’ve been through.’

  Olivia watched her niece, waiting for the tears. There were none today and there had been none at Chris’s funeral. Nothing but pale, thin lipped anger.