Frightful Tales #1: Rose's Thorn

by Wesley Thomas

  But in the middle of the bankrupt and isolated place comparable to Skid Row, lay a polished golden building that was three floors high and as wide as a cruise ship. Two things about the building's immaculate condition prodded at Declan's common sense. One, how had it not been ruined with graffiti and vandalised? And two, how had it not closed down? Fair enough the library was funded by the government, but if no one used it surely the money grabbers would cut their losses? And how anyone found joy in a book in such a location was beyond any rational explanation Declan could conceive.

  He stood before the glass doors, pondering these thoughts, with their golden frames and golden handles, which again stood out for miles in such an area of depravity. Walking in the library always filled him with joy. The thousands of stories waiting to be read: stories of sadness, murder, horror, happiness, fantasy, mystery, crime, and some informative biographies and autobiographies. After taking in the aura of such a fantastic place, a place where he felt safe and more at home than his actual house, he moseyed over to the newspaper archive. Which had papers and various documents dating back more than five hundred years; this excited him. But to make things easier he took an educated guess of the times he was looking for, which was pretty easy as he knew Emily's grandmother Rose, was a child during the holocaust. This cut down his search enormously, as the holocaust was a huge historical time which was known for the suffering inflicted on the Jewish citizens by the majority of Germans. Although he remembers watching a film which told the tale of one German that helped give Jews homes and jobs to establish a greater style of living, and this man even helped them escape the clutches of violent, prejudice Germans, who wished to gas every last Jew on the planet. Declan had often imagined how horrifying and excruciatingly painful it must have been to be a Jew during those times, always hiding, fearing for your life, not to mention your family and friends. The spectacles observed of brutal beatings and killings, and for what reason? Just because these people were Jewish? Declan could never understand that. He could never understand prejudice against people due to their race, religion, sexuality or social status. He was the most open minded child that had lived. He would befriend anyone at school. His life's philosophy when it came to friends was 'if they were nice to him, he would be nice to them'. Treat people how you would like to be treated. He thought that was a great way to go through life, and hoped in time, people would share his opinion. But he knew that was a vain hope, he had witnessed first-hand, bullies tormenting kids at school due to a number of things, sometimes even their hairstyle or clothing, which yet again, Declan did not understand.

  These deep, serious thoughts soon drifted from his mind's wanderings and focused on the task at hand, finding out as much as he could about the history of the doll. Emily had mentioned many times it was passed down from her grandmother to her mother, and from her mother to her; it was both expensive, and held incredible sentimental value. There were millions of news articles about the Holocaust, which he anticipated. So to narrow down the search he typed into the system Rose Clarimonde, Emilys' grandmother. This brought up a much narrower bunch of choices.

  Each article was fascinating, emotionally abusive, and shocking, but each one was not relevant to the Rose he was looking for. He was suddenly aware of the eerie vibe the library had produced since his concentrations had taken him into a world of sufferings. He'd been oblivious to this feeling, that the usually bright and hopeful place had recently transformed. The light was dimming from outside; no longer was it a bright yellow eagerness jumping through the tall windows, its lustre was being drained by time. He would have to head home soon. But Declan refused to leave until he had unearthed more information that would justify his hours of solid researching. People were beginning to leave, one by one they took their loaned books, put away a few books they had been sampling and took a select few to the desk to be checked out. There were only a handful of visitors now. No one was in the archive section, which was dominated by big, brown, bulky tables, white computers, and fluorescent lighting overhead. The majority of people were on the mezzanine level browsing books and agonising over which ones to check out. The higher level was an arch of fine collections of every genre of book you could think of, kept in great condition, which again, shocked Declan. But then again, only people who enjoyed self-educating or exploring fantasy worlds would step through the threshold and antagonize over book choices, and he doubted they would be the type to vandalize. So this at least, he supposed, made sense.

  He became distracted by an old man who was in a fictional world, he held a hardback open and his eyes showed an undisturbed focus, one that made him unaware of his surroundings.

  A bomb could detonate, an earthquake could shake the building to its very core, and Declan was willing to bet he would stand, stubbornly trapped in a world that was built by several carefully selected words by a no doubt very talented writer. He wore a black jacket which trailed down to his knees, with green corduroy trousers atop shiny maroon stained leather boots. His attire made him stick out like a sore thumb, but the few bookworms that remained in these walls were unfazed by his extreme clothing. If he stayed here much longer though his safety was at risk when he left the library's grasp into the slums of darkness, Declan thought.

  FOCUS! Declan screamed at himself. A page stopped his inquisitiveness of the old man, and was pulled into an article that was finally relevant to his search. 'Girl miraculously survives under a house of rubble' read the headline. It told of a young girl who was identified as Rose Clarimonde, who was found by her father Augustus. Reporters told of their baffled minds as to how a young German girl ended up being found under the rubble of a Jewish home. The father, Augustus, told reporters that she had ran away and when he realised this he began searching for her, he searched far and wide, eventually stumbling onto her location. Her location and ability to be alive confused everyone that heard of the story, it was truly a God sent miracle. The report then goes onto say that two weeks later the father died. Coroners had declared official cause of death a heart attack due to the stress of the Holocaust and the safety of his daughter, and his wife having already died of natural causes. He was found on the floor of a conservatory in his home, and the glass roof of it was smashed. At first coroners thought he may have jumped from a balcony at the top of the house, committing suicide. But it was too far from the conservatory for him to have landed where he did.

  He would have had to have been thrown by the world's strongest man to reach and break through the conservatory roof. Psychologists predicted all of these angsts caused his heart to collapse and give in and that the broken glass was the work of vandals or even one of the many bombs that were being dropped into villages and towns. As Augustus' home was half an hour from a well known Jewish village, bomb-droppers may have got confused and thought it was the land of Jews.

  Rose, now being an orphan was forced into foster care, and that is the latest he could find of any further developments regarding her future and if she was adopted by a family or remained in foster care until she grew and found love, later giving birth to Elizabeth. But there was no mentioning of a doll, which she must have had if she passed it down to Elizabeth. This tragedy was sucking at Declan's curious nature, he was dying for more information, which seemed an inappropriate thought given the article he had just read. Just as he was about to retire from his hours of investigations of the Clarimonde family history and retreat to his home to rest his brain and watch some cartoons, another article sparked in his interest. It was again about the near death experience of Rose, but taken from a drastically different angle. This time the point of interest was not the nearby miss of a young girl's life, or the death of her father, it was of the small doll that she was found with.

  When police came to the house after being alerted to Augustus' death by a neighbour, Rose was found clutching a small porcelain doll. Below a chunk of text detailing Rose's emotionally distraught condition, was a photo of a young girl, at the tender age of eleven, found holding the doll, th
e same doll that Declan's father had smashed several days ago.

  “It can't be....” Declan muttered aloud, then looked around to see if this had disturbed anyone.

  Luckily the tiny group of individuals were so enthralled in their radical treks depicted through the inky words of crafted bindings, they remained absent to his outburst. It felt so surreal to look at a doll from a newspaper dated back several decades before he was even born, and aside from the hauntings, he felt so responsible for the old heirloom being destroyed. He began to feel an enormous weight pushing down on his conscience, his guilt was growing like a plant full on water and sun. But there was nothing he could do now, and even though he did feel like the one reason that had led his father to commit such an act was himself, he knew she was evil. So this fact gave him a gentle ease to the heaviness being inflicted on his shoulders.

  After a few more minutes of page skimming he found nothing of any further use, he was very grateful for the findings that he had been blessed with, but decided to head home. It was a useful trip and the knowledge he now had was helpful but he wasn't sure how. He knew the history of the doll, and Emily's family, but how was this to benefit the modern day situation?

  Chapter 7

  He quickly summarized his findings: Rose had survived under a house that had been knocked down and was found under rubble, after running away. Rose's father Augustus found her, took her home, where he cared for her for two weeks. At which time he himself died of a heart attack, at the presumable depression and distress of almost losing his little girl, and the fact that he had already lost his wife years before. Rose then went into foster care, and that is where the story ends.

  Until Declan's intelligence allows him the common sense that tells him she must have met a guy, given birth to Elizabeth, who married Paul and together they birthed Emily, along with her brothers Harry and Ryan. Also, Rose was found holding the doll when a neighbour alerted the police to her father's death. The doll must have clearly meant a great deal to Rose who kept it and handed it down from generation to generation, to stay in the family. His sense of satisfaction was short lived, as he was now consumed with a stronger sensation of frustration. Why was this doll so important?

  As he promptly walked home as daylight was fading like the colour of a well-worn t-shirt, he couldn't quiet the voice telling him, 'that was all nice to know, but that isn’t going to help you one bit'. The voice was irritating him, as he knew there was an element of truth in what it said. A part of his mind was forcing him to look harder and reach further into this mystery. But how else could he find out more? What other sources could he withdraw from? As the wind tickled his face and the light receded into a navy sky, he thought long and hard at what he could do next. A diary! Did Rose keep a diary? If she did it would no doubt be in the hands of Elizabeth. Declan was quite sure in one of the photos he had seen, books that looked incredibly similar to diaries were in the background, one was open on a bedside table with a pen beside it, in what resembled an attic bedroom. This may not be a diary, but he could dream and hope. People from that period tended to detail their devastating experiences, Anne Frank for example. So maybe Rose did the same? And this was also passed down to Elizabeth.

  But as Emily was still a child and not emotionally strong enough, they had not given it to her yet. Declan wasn't sure he was emotionally able to read a first-hand account of that time, but if he found the diary, which could resolve the enigma of Rose, he would force himself to read, no matter what.

  Declan smiled as he now had a further move in this deadly game of twister, he just prayed to a higher power that this progression wouldn't tangle him into more chaos and supernatural abominations than he could cope with.

  ***

  The phone began to glow, vibrating on the thick, wooden table. After which a loud ring began to somersault through the air. Seconds later an eager Elizabeth rushed down the steps, holding onto the bannister and headed for the handset. Long hair swept behind her head and a white blouse pulled tight around her small breasts, with custom made heeled shoes clonking on the hardwood floor. She grabbed the phone, raising it to her ear.

  “Hello,” she said politely, with a well-trained telephone manner. A manner she had developed over years of arranging charity balls, tea parties, functions and social events.

  “Hi Elizabeth it's Deirdra,” Deirdra spoke, clearly uncomfortable, as she was reminded of their last encounter.

  “Oh hi Deirdra, how are you? Can I help you with something?” this same wearisome was blatantly felt by Elizabeth as well.

  There was an unsettling pause where both women pictured that very encounter. Where they had discussed Rose the person, and Rose the eerie doll. But hating silence, Elizabeth burst in with, “How is the doll? Weren't you going to bring it here?”

  Deirdra didn't know what to say about the doll's condition. As it was now laying in pieces in a landfill or by now could have been grinded into powder. So even though she hated being dishonest, she chose to deviate from the truth.

  “Oh, things have calmed down now and I didn't want to risk anything else happening so I decided not to move it. If that's okay?”

  “Of course, as long as you are okay, that's the main thing,” Elizabeth sounded warm and sincere in that comment.

  “I am ringing because Declan wants to come round and see Emily, would that be okay?” Deirdra asked.

  “Of course, bring yourselves round whenever.”

  “Well, it will probably just be Declan and me, as David is.... it's just that he is.....busy with-”

  Elizabeth cut in, “That is fine, you two are more than enough company, would you like me to prepare some snacks?” Elizabeth politely changed the subject as she was very much aware of David's abuse problem and lack of motivation to do anything, other than drink himself into a horrendous state.

  “That sounds lovely, we will be round very soon, bye now,” Deirdra said, slightly raising her voice, as she often does when ending a phone conversation.

  “Come on Declan get ready, we can go round,” Deirdra shouted up the stairs to her son, who was eagerly awaiting the answer on whether he would be able to visit Emily today. But only he knew of his plan to sneak into Elizabeth's bedroom and rummage for a possible diary written by Rose. Declan raced down the stairs and crammed his feet into a pair trainers. Not long after that him and his mother had jumped in the car.

  “You seem very excited today, is there any particular reason?” Deirdra questioned her son's suspicious behaviour.

  “No, just miss Emily, that's all,” Declan kept looking out of the window and avoided eye contact, but maintained a believable tone in his voice.

  “Awwww,” Deirdra doted on her son's innocence.

  Little did Deirdra know, that inside of his baby-faced head was a muscle working overtime in the scheme to collect further information to solve a sinister puzzle.

  Eventually the car pulled into the impressive driveway to the home of Emily, and Declan rapidly unbuckled his seatbelt and grabbed his blue backpack.

  “What do you need that for?” Deirdra asked, curiously.

  “It has some toys in...... I hate always playing with her toys, it's not fair, I brought a few of mine.” Declan smiled and rushed past his mother, knocking on the large double door trimmed with gold.

  Deirdra almost wept at how she had miraculously managed to raise such an intelligent and thoughtful young boy, given that all he was exposed too was a drunken father, and a work crazy mother working every hour that God sent just to get them by; she was topped up to the brim with pride. Elizabeth and Paul may have wealth and respect in the community, but Deirdra had a smart and industrious son. A son that did not need a private, expensive school to blossom into a butterfly, she couldn't have been prouder.

  Elizabeth answered the door and welcomed them both in with soft, smooth skin, and thick hair full of volume, a clear by product of salon treatments that cost the earth, and an at home hair care that also, would cost more than an entire year's rent for De
irdra. A silk blouse hugged her petite figure that curved in all the right places, boasting her femininity, and black trousers that tightly wrapped her slim, toned legs. Her long legs in those trousers reminded Deirdra of a spider for a brief instance.

  Elizabeth shuffled back into the house insisting Declan and his mother follow her. They were taken through the pristine sublimity of the long corridors, decorated with antiques and huge photos on the walls, some of family, others they had won at art auctions, and some they had picked up at their local gallery. Elizabeth had once told Deirdra that they had paid twenty five thousand for one painting. That could buy a car, provide a years supply of shopping, or in Deirdra's case, a decades supply. She was flabbergasted that they had spent such an enormous amount of money on an object that could easily break if it fell from the wall, and they didn’t even bat an eye. Must be nice, Deirdra thought, loathing herself for feeling resentful. But what else could she do when surrounded by all the items that were no doubt worth more than the roof that sheltered her and Declan from the cold.

  But, either way, it did not stop her from loving Elizabeth and Paul, they had been such good friends to her and her family, and completely ignoring the dramatic contrast in family incomes. Elizabeth had offered a few select times to give them a loan, or just plain give them money, and as phenomenally tempted as Deirdra had been, she turned them down. She was too proud a woman, she was not a charity, and things would turn around, eventually. Maybe she would win the lottery, or inherit money, not that her family had a great deal of wealth that they could leave behind when they kicked the proverbial bucket. But she remained optimistic nonetheless.