Laura barely had a chance to say hello, when Cassie started in. “I’m sorry to call you so early in the morning, but I thought you’d want to know that Tony called in the middle of the night last night. Your daughter apparently had a particularly nasty nightmare, involving, as best as I can make out, you and a dead baby?”
“That’s really weird,” Laura said, but didn’t elaborate. Cassie didn’t need to know that she and Lizzy seemed to be sharing the same night terrors.
“Yeah,” Cassie said. “Anyway, I gave Tony the number over there – found it on your speed dial – but he said he wasn’t going to bother you. Apparently your cell phone wasn’t picking up either.”
Laura nodded. “I had it turned off.”
There was a pause on Cassie’s end of the phone. “Well, he sounded really angry. No offense, Laura, but he can be a real asshole, can’t he? He just couldn’t believe that you might not be at home when he needed you. Or rather, when Lizzy needed you. I tried to explain you had a life, too, and that it was pretty late to call, but he hung up on me.”
Laura gave a soft chuckle. “That’s about par for the course, Cassie. He’s been particularly touchy lately. I’ll give him a call when we’re done. Other than that, how’d your night go?”
Laura heard Cassie take in a breath. “We did okay, I guess. For a fairly new house, this place sure has its share of creaks and noises. Finally I quit chasing the sounds down, lit some calming incense and fell asleep watching television. Only to have Tony call and wake me up.”
“Sorry,” Laura said. “About all of it.” She didn’t see the need to explain to Cassie that the house really wasn’t a new construction. “I’ll be home in a bit – need anything from the store?”
“Nope,” Cassie said. “I checked out the food situation and we seem to be in good shape for dinner. I’ll cook if you don’t mind.”
“That’d be heavenly, Cassie. Thanks.”
Laura sighed when she hung up the phone.
“Trouble?” Mike filled up her coffee cup again and patted the bar stool for her to sit down again. “Finish your food before it gets too cold.”
Making a face, Laura shook her head. “I should really call Tony soon.” She explained the call to Mike and she noticed his eyes grow angry.
“You don’t need to call him right away. Seems like he expects you to be sitting around waiting for his every move. I’m sure Lizzy is fine, or he’d have called here as well. As far as his being upset about you being here,” Mike shrugged, “tough shit. And you shouldn’t apologize for it either – we’re both single, consenting adults. So what if he doesn’t like it? He’s not exactly living the life of a monk, is he? Shacked up with your old college roommate?”
“Whew,” Laura said with a small laugh, setting the phone down and sitting next to him again. “Tell me what you really think, Mike, why don’t you? Although at least I know you’ve actually been listening when I’ve been talking.” She took another bite of her eggs. “I’m sure Tony’s just concerned about Lizzy. Her nightmares can be very intense. He’s also probably stressing about the wedding. And about leaving the girls with me while he and Susan go to Europe. So for no other reason than to reassure him about my fitness as a mother, I should call. Otherwise, he might decide to cancel their visit. I really want to see them.”
“I understand. I do. I can’t help getting angry, though, when people walk all over you.”
Laura smiled. “I do get angry, Mike, all by myself. But I pick my moments.”
“Fair enough. I only want you to be happy. So call the bastard if it makes you feel better, but finish your breakfast first. You must be hungry.”
Laura took another bite. “Starved, actually. And the eggs are fantastic. What a pleasant surprise to find you’re as good at cooking as you are at…other things.”
“And what things would those be?”
Laura blushed but didn’t answer. Instead she finished her plate, picked it and Mike’s up and put them both in the sink. Then she dialed Tony’s number.
He answered on the first ring. “Hi, Tony,” Laura said, “it’s me. I understand you were trying to reach me. What’s up?”
“Where are you? And who is this Cassie person who answered your phone?”
“Cassie is staying with me for a bit,” Laura said, “and I’m at Mike’s house. What’s up?”
“Lizzy wanted to talk to you. Insisted she couldn’t go back to sleep unless she did.”
“Cassie gave you the number over here. Why didn’t you call then?”
“God only knows what you were doing, Laura. I can’t keep up with you.”
Laura could hear Susan talking in the background. “I think you can guess what I was doing, Tony. Most likely the same thing you and Susan were. I can hear that she’s there. So drop the injured ex-spouse tone, okay? I’m not going to let you make me feel guilty for trying to put my life back together.”
“That’s not what I was doing, Laura, and you know it.”
Laura gave a low, rather unpleasant chuckle. “I know no such thing, Tony.” There was a pause on both ends of the line. Changing the subject, Laura spoke again first. “How’re the wedding plans coming along?”
“Not too bad,” Tony sounded relieved at the new topic. “You haven’t RSVP’d yet. Will you be coming?”
“I doubt it. I’m supposed to be working that day. But you’re still bringing the girls on Sunday, right?” Laura held her breath for the answer.
Tony sighed into the phone. “I don’t know, Laura. They’ve been a bit of a handful lately. Are you sure you’re up to it?”
Laura remembered that code quite well. “I’m sober, Tony. Completely clean and sober. I haven’t had a drink for over thirty days. Haven’t had a Valium in that time either. I worked hard at this, you know. I attend AA meetings, I have a sponsor, I’m 100% committed to staying sober. You might show just a little bit of interest, offer just a small bit of support; it wouldn’t kill you to be a human being for once. And if you can’t do that, then at least recognize that I am the mother of those girls and I have a right and a need to see them. They’re not tiny babies, after all.”
“Yeah, you’re right.” Tony’s voice hesitated – admitting he might be wrong about something was difficult.
Laura nodded and smiled. “So, I can expect them sometime next Sunday morning?”
“Sure.” He paused again then cleared his throat. “I’m glad you’re doing this well, Laura. I really am. We wanted to get up and visit you in rehab at least once, but with school and the wedding stuff, things are crazy around here.”
“I’ll bet.” Let him off the hook, Laura, she told herself. You can’t expect him to apologize much more than he already has. “Visitors’ Day was always pretty hectic, anyway. I need to go now, I think. Call me and let me know what time you’ll be coming by, okay? And tell Susan I said ‘hi.’”
Laura hung up the phone. Mike looked over at her while he washed those few breakfast dishes. “Good conversation?”
Laura smiled and gave a satisfied nod. “Yeah, it was. Satisfying.”
Mike snickered. “Sounded to me like you kicked his ass. Good girl. I’m proud of you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Things settled into a routine at Laura’s house. Cassie kept to herself mostly, closed away in her room. The smell of burning sage continually filled the hallway; Laura grew used to the odor and to having a stranger of sorts living in her home. When they were together, they got along fine, as long as Laura didn’t take anything that Cassie said too seriously. She allowed the self-proclaimed psychic to read her cards and her palms. The outcomes of these exercises were inevitably filled with doom and gloom, people falling out of burning towers or pierced with swords. They’re all only pictures on cards, Laura would think. She had no room in her life for otherworldly influences; everyday temptations proved to be a difficult enough task to master.
Getting to sleep at night seemed nearly impossible. Although she kept herself busy during the day
s – with work, preparation for her daughters’ visit, as many meetings as she could attend, and all of the other household chores – and would be exhausted when she lay down, sleep just wouldn’t come. Laura would toss and turn, each nerve and muscle in her body itching, crying out for help, help in the form of a pill or a long glass of something. Anything. She missed the slow burn of a shot of bourbon or scotch, missed the way it would hit her stomach and spread its numbing warmth all the way down to her toes.
Mike had been working nights this week, and she had day shift so she didn’t even have the comfort of his presence, the warmth of his body next to hers. She missed him as well.
The weather turned bitterly cold on Wednesday, a frigid snap unusual for October, but not completely unheard of in this area. To make matters worse, the circuit breaker to her furnace kept switching itself off, usually in the middle of the night, which would necessitate a trip down the cellar stairs into the dim, cobwebby, and now frigid gloom. While it was true that she wasn’t sleeping during those times, she’d have gladly forgone the whole thing. The fifth time this happened, she remembered her visit with Carolyn and the problem the neighbor had noticed with her lights.
Between her job, Cassie’s presence, and Mike, Laura never had a chance to get to know Carolyn better. They’d shared a few rushed phone calls, but that was all. Laura still was torn between wanting to know her neighbor better and wanting to avoid what seemed to be good old-fashioned snooping. Still, Carolyn had been a good resource for information and seemed happy to recommend a local handyman.
The handyman spent several hours in the cellar, coming up with no good explanation for the problem, at least not to Laura’s understanding. But with the bill for over five-hundred dollars he also issued her his personal guarantee that it probably wouldn’t be happening much from now on. “When it got so cold all of a sudden,” he explained, “your older circuit breakers just couldn’t handle the overload. But I patched it up the best I could without rewiring the whole damn place, which, trust me, you didn’t want me to do. I couldn’t find nothing wrong with the lights, though, so maybe your neighbor was seeing things. You should be okay, so long’s you’re not trying to run too many things at once. Have you had this problem before?”
Laura shook her head. “Not really – I’ve not been here that long.”
“The people before you, maybe?”
“I’ve no idea. The house sat empty for five years before I bought it.”
“Five years?” The handyman laughed. “What happened? A murder spree in the cellar?”
“Excuse me?”
“You know, like that movie about the haunted house in New York, I think. And that house only stood empty for one year before new folks moved in with the ghosts.” He paused for a second then nodded. “Anyways, that’s likely your problem.”
“Excuse me?” Laura repeated. “You must be as crazy as my roommate. Are you trying to tell me that there are ghosts down here in my basement playing with the circuit breakers?”
The man laughed again, louder this time, the noise echoing off the cellar walls. This man seriously creeped Laura out; so much so that she had goose bumps up and down her arms.
“Nope, lady, that’s not it at all. Although that’d be fun, don’t you think? Me, I don’t believe in none of that stuff – I just watch the movies. What I really meant was that if the house stood empty for five years without having the furnace run or serviced, that’s likely to be your biggest problem. Anyway with the maintenance I gave it today, you should be just fine.” He chuckled again to himself. “Ghosts playing with the circuit breakers. That’s a good one. I should write that up on the service ticket, just to give dispatch a good laugh.”
Laura looked at the bill in her hand – all it said was routine maintenance. “You’ll take a check, right?”
“No problem.”
She escorted him up the stairs and then later out the door with check in hand. Cassie came out of her room and gave Laura a little smile. “Maybe he’s right.”
“That there are ghosts? Give me a break.”
Cassie shook her head. “This house is poisoned. You know as well as I do that strange things have happened to you here.”
“True,” Laura said, thinking back over nights of bad dreams and odd noises, of feeling cold chills shooting down her spine, of sitting on the couch and catching movement out of the side of her eye. To say nothing of the banging of the cellar door all day and night. Although with the addition of a new, tighter fitting deadbolt, the noise had ceased. So, yes, odd things had happened. But she also had experienced similar events elsewhere. In rehab and at Mike’s house, she’d had some fairly nasty dreams, and a lot of touch-and-go moments which led her to chalk it all up to withdrawal of some sort. Cassie, of course, had the same problem. “But I hardly think you and I are good judges right now of what is real and what is not. We’d be jumpy anywhere. So, if it’s all the same to you, I vote for not burning down my house anytime soon. We’ll need more proof than a couple of ex-addicts could come up with.”
Cassie just stared at her. “That’s a bit of a low blow, Laura. If you only stopped to think, you’d know I was right. This house is poisoned,” she repeated, “I’ve done the best I could to shield us, but it may be more than I can handle.”
“Maybe,” Laura said the first thought that came into her mind, “you should just move out if it’s so horrible.”
Cassie blinked, tears forming in her eyes. “That’s not fair. I have no place else to go.”
Laura instantly regretted the words. “Oh, God, I’m so sorry, that was a rude thing to say. I don’t really want you to leave, Cassie. Just give it a chance, okay? Give it another week or so, when we’ve detoxed a bit more and we’ll look at it again.”
Cassie nodded. “You might be right, I’ve been a little off my game lately. So what are we doing for dinner? What should I cook?”
Laura could tell that she hadn’t convinced Cassie, but she seemed willing to drop the subject and that was good enough for now.
Tony and Susan stopped by the house early Sunday morning to drop the girls off. Tony carried their bags in and set them down in the front hallway. “We can’t stay, I’m afraid, we got a bit of a late start this morning and our flight leaves in about two hours. What with us flying out of the country, I figure security will be tricky. House looks nice, though. Maybe I can have the tour when we get back?”
Laura had hugged both of her girls, spending perhaps a little extra time with Lizzy, who looked tired and pale. “Wedding go okay?”
Tony nodded, “Yeah. We had fun – you really should have come.”
“I had to work,” Laura said, “I’ve not been there long enough to ask for a day off.” To say nothing of how little interest I had in attending.
“Girls?” Lizzy and Amanda went to him. He hugged each of them, gave them a quick kiss. “Be good for your mother, okay? And remember what we talked about.”
“Bye, Dad. Have fun.” The girls stood at the door and waved as he got into the car with Susan and drove away. Then they turned away from the door and looked at Laura.
“Feeling okay, Mom?” Amanda asked.
“I’m fine, sweetheart. Better than fine, actually.” Laura picked up one of their suitcases and Amanda picked up the other. “Let’s get you two settled in. You’ll be sharing a room – I hope that’s okay.”
Amanda rolled her eyes. “I thought you had three bedrooms.”
“I do, but I have a friend staying with me now. I figured your father would tell you.”
Lizzy laughed. “He told us to be good and to not make you crazy. Is your friend the cop?”
“Well,” Laura said, “I do know a policeman and you’ll be meeting him at some point. But this is another friend. A girl friend I met at rehab.”
“Friends are good,” Lizzy said solemnly. “They keep you from being alone.”
Amanda laid claim to half of the room, taking the bed closest to the window, unpacking her clothes in the top t
wo dresser drawers. “This is my part of the room, Lizzy. You stay away and we’ll do fine.”
Lizzy looked around. “I’m cool,” she said. “Where’s your cat, Mommy?”
Laura lifted Lizzy’s suitcase to the top of the bed and opened it. “Anubis? He’s around here somewhere. Do you want me to unpack your clothes?”
“Sure. Anubis is a funny name for a cat. What’s it mean?”
Amanda chimed in. “We read about Egypt in school last month, Anubis is one of those gods they had. He’s got a dog’s head and he lives in Hell.”
“It’s not exactly Hell,” Laura explained. “He presides over the afterlife. And he has a jackal’s head,” Laura said, putting the rest of Lizzy’s clothes in the last available drawer.
“But he is a cat, right. Maybe he’s the god of ghosts?”
Laura smiled, “Not really, sweetheart. I tell you what – I have a book here somewhere with all of that kind of information in it. We’ll find it when we finish here.” The last thing to come out of Lizzy’s suitcase was a bedraggled faded-blue velour bear. “You still have B Bear?” Laura smiled – Lizzy had received the stuffed bear on her third birthday and it had been her favorite toy since.
“She won’t let us throw it away, Mom,” Amanda said. “It’s gross.”
“It’s mine,” Lizzy took the bear from Laura and placed it in the position of honor right on top of her pillow. “And he’s not gross; he’s well-loved.”
“Whatever.”
Laura heard the cat door click. “Here’s Anubis now, I think.” Seconds later, he jumped up on Lizzy’s bed. “He doesn’t look like a jackal,” she said, and reached out a tentative hand to pat him.
Amanda moved away abruptly. “Susan says cats carry all sorts of germs and that they’re nasty, sneaking animals. She said not to get too cozy with him.”
Modern Magic Page 11
