Nightingale Songs

by Strantzas, Simon

  The next morning it was Jenn, not Doyle, who looked as though she'd been up all night. Doyle did not comment on it, however. He'd been warned by Doctor Mielke that she might be exhausted for some time -- at least until she became accustomed to her child's sleep patterns. Nonetheless, it was taking longer than he'd expected, and he did not want to prolong her troubles by mentioning what she could not control. No doubt adding to her discomfort was all the work left undone in the new house. Boxes sat in corners of rooms, waiting to be unpacked, walls were still only half painted, and had it been before the birth of their child, Jenn would have made sure Doyle was acutely aware of it all. She had become uncharacteristically silent of most matters since, though. Perhaps motherhood had calmed her.

  "I don't think I've ever heard anything as loud as Angella's crying last night," Doyle said, laughing over his coffee as he cradled his daughter in his arms. She made a warm gurgling sound, and a thin line of drool slipped down her chin. "I think she broke the monitor. My ears are still ringing."

  Jenn gave him a tired look from the sink as she washed the dishes, and he quickly changed the subject. "How do you like it here so far? The neighborhood should be good for Angella when she gets older. I've already seen a few strollers on the street. Have you met any of the other moms in the area?"

  "I haven't gone out much," she said, the words from her disused throat sounding forced. "It's just been me and Angella every day. All day."

  "Maybe I can try and come home earlier today, try and give you a bit of a break. I know it can't be easy."

  "It's just that--" She had trouble getting the words out. For a prolonged moment, all she did was stare at her wet hands, soaked to her elbows. "Sometimes I go in that room and I get this strange feeling..." She trailed off but Doyle knew what she meant. He'd felt it too. It was difficult to describe; it was as though someone had been in the room just before he entered it. Which was ridiculous, of course. Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling. He looked down into Angella's sleepy face and drew strength.

  "It's just your imagination, Jenn. Everything is fine."

  She said she believed him, though the dark bags under her eyes said something else entirely.

  The house had been a find. The two of them had always planned on moving out of the apartment one day, but it wasn't until Doctor Mielke gave them the news that they began to earnestly look. The pregnancy had been a surprise -- Jenn's medication hiding the truth until the beginning of the second trimester -- so when the tests came back they found themselves racing to find a home before the baby was due. "There's no way my baby's going to live in an apartment," she said. "Not even for one day." Doyle was certain their elderly neighbors shared the sentiment. The apartment was already too small for the two of them. Three would make things impossible.

  They looked every day they could spare and some they couldn't, and while Jenn's size increased rapidly they were no closer to finding a home. Nothing was available -- at least, not within the range of a young couple still struggling to reach middle-class. Everything they saw was either too expensive or uninhabitable for one reason or another, and as the due date approached they began to worry they might never find a home for their family. Even Doyle, usually the calmer of the two, felt a sense of nervousness stalking him.

  It was three weeks before Jenn was due that the real estate agent called with another listing. His wife apartment-bound, incapacitated with the weight of their unborn child, it was up to Doyle to go on without her. He brought his camera despite her dejected insistence that it was all for naught, that there would be nothing worth capturing. Their agent was in agreement. "Don't get your hopes up," she warned. "The neighborhood is pricey, and the houses there usually go for at least a third more. When an owner is this anxious to sell... well, I have my doubts."

  "But it never hurts to check, right?"

  It was clear from Jenn's smile that she was humoring him, and her opinion didn't change until he returned with photographs. They put an offer in right away and a scant two days later they found they had bought themselves a house.

  If there was a reason for the previous owners' anxiousness to sell, Doyle couldn't find it. Nothing at all was amiss, other than it was far nicer a house than he'd ever expected to own. Everything fell into place so easily that Jenn joked the house was destined to be theirs. Angella obviously agreed, as she couldn't wait to get there. When Doyle and Jenn returned from the hospital to the two-storey brick, Angella was squealing incessantly, and Doyle wished the moment would last forever -- standing there in the warm sunlight with Jenn and Angella, the lawn of their new home decorated with a dozen pink balloons floating lazily in anticipation of their arrival. He wondered if his life would ever again be so perfect.

  It was clear early on that Jenn's tolerance to crying was lower than Doyle's, so he took great pains to run interference when Angella began to call out in the middle of the night. Sometimes, their daughter made so much noise -- and for such an extended time -- Doyle joked Jenn must have had twins that no one had told him about. How else could the endless squealing and frequent diaper changes be explained? Jenn humorlessly informed him there had been only the one child, and she said it with relief, as though caring for a second would be the most terrible thing she could imagine. Doyle, secretly, imagined there could be nothing better than two angels in his midst.

  Ostensibly, they took turns with the nights, but reality was not so equally divided. Doyle was able to sleep without issue when necessary, but his wife was restless and far from eager to stay in place. For the first week Doyle would wake with a start to find he was alone in bed, Jenn gone. He'd get up to check on Angella and find the baby asleep but his wife sitting on the couch in a daze, watching late-night infomercials with the volume turned down. She wouldn't look at him -- it was as though he were a ghost floating through the night -- and when he tried to speak with her it was clear from her slurred speech she wasn't truly awake. Instead, she was between states, and he thought it best to leave her alone and let her return to bed in her own time, something she always managed to do. Even that didn't last long, however. Eventually, she'd be gone from the couch, and as he stood in the hallway he could hear her in the dark house, the soft padding of her bare feet on the floorboards, the quiet sounds of her sniffling. He tried his best in his half-slumber to pinpoint where in the house she was but it proved impossible. The darkness often lied. Sometimes, her footsteps would echo, and she'd appear to be in two places at once, making it impossible to find her. He eventually gave up, and each morning she'd be back beside him, blankets pulled up over her head as she slept.

  It was almost the end of the first month when he heard the horrified scream through the crackling monitor. It woke him with an icy start, and he leapt to his feet automatically and staggered down the hallway before he was conscious of what was happening. Yet, when he entered the nursery everything was quiet and undisturbed, Angella asleep peacefully in her crib. He couldn't shake the irrational fear that there was someone else there in the darkness though -- someone hiding even though the crib was the only furniture in the room. Someone hiding in plain sight. "Jenn?" Doyle whispered. "Are you here?" There was no response, no noise but the sound of his angelic daughter breathing slowly. Nevertheless, an overwhelming sense of dread came over him. He looked around frantically but nothing was amiss -- nothing wrong save that it didn't feel as though nothing were wrong. There was a low hum, a droning noise that dug deep into his body, into his soul, but it was a noise he could not actually hear. He only felt it; felt it growing colder, stronger, and as it did the empty nursery seemed to enlarge around him, its walls creeping outward while his vision focused tighter on Angella's crib. Every detail hidden by shadow revealed itself: the tiny nails that held the wood together; the nicks in the carved newels; every wrinkle in her small blanket. Angella moved her arms and the rustling was too loud -- the crib creaking like a tree groaning beneath a terrible weight, close to breaking. There was the sound of flesh on wood, Jenn's footsteps so slow, so sure
, that they could not keep time with the increasingly loud sound of Doyle's fluttering heartbeat. All the while the droning noise that Doyle could not hear only became louder, and he put his hands over his ears but it did nothing to mute it. The sound was so intense -- he had become so cold, the room smelled so stale -- that his eyes swam and knees weakened. The lights were flickering, but he wasn't sure if faulty wiring or the stars in his eyes caused it. He tried to call out for help and felt prickling in his bone-dry throat. He was about to pass out and as his vision dimmed he grabbed the rail of the crib for support. Suddenly, the sensation was gone. Like a shadow passing over him, it vanished, and with it the bottomless dread faded like so much empty smoke. All that was left was Angella asleep in her crib, a smile on her newborn face, oblivious to all that had transpired. He wiped his mouth, rattled by his hallucination, and when he returned to the bedroom, Jenn sat up in bed as though she'd been sleeping there the entire time, and when Doyle thought about it, he couldn't be sure she hadn't.

  "Are you all right?" she said with drowsy irritability.

  "I'm fine," he whispered. "I'm probably more tired than I thought. I think I was sleepwalking." He paused and looked at her to see if there was any reaction, any recognition. "I heard you walking in the hallway and it set me off into a dream."

  "What do you mean?" she mumbled. "I've been here all night."

  Doyle was confused. "I guess I dreamed that, too."

  She grunted, and then lay back down on her side, her back to her husband. "I guess you did."

  Doyle got into bed behind her and put his arm around her body but it didn't give. There were only two hours left until morning, but he could feel how restless she was. He tried combing her hair with his fingers, hoping the gentle stroking would soothe her back to sleep, but instead he was the one who faded out. Thankfully, the nightmare at Angella's crib did not resume.

  The next morning Jenn's eyes were dark circles on pale blotchy skin. She stood at the stove looking drab and colorless like the rest of the kitchen, the overcast sky giving the world the appearance of old plastic. She sniffled, as though she had a cold.

  "Are you sick?" he asked. "You shouldn’t be around Angella if you're sick."

  Jenn said nothing; instead she scraped a fried egg onto a plate and brought it to Doyle. He could see clearly how puffy and bloodshot her dark eyes had become.

  "Have you been crying?" he asked.

  "Of course not," she said. "Why would I be crying?"

  "Well, are you going to sit down with me at least?"

  She shrugged and walked away. "I'm not really hungry."

  "You need to eat to keep your strength up. Doctor Mielke said--"

  "I'm fine." Doyle stopped speaking and watched her. She was back at the stove, checking the cupboard overhead.

  "What are you looking for?"

  "I--nothing," she said. "Did you check on Angella?"

  "I did. She's fine, despite how weird things were last night." He put a fork full of egg into his mouth. The texture was soft, gelatinous, and he forced himself to swallow it. "Everything felt wrong somehow. Do you know what I mean?"

  She nodded while she continued going through the cupboards. Doyle reached across the table for the salt. The eggs tasted grey and lifeless.

  "It was as though someone was in the room with me," he continued. "I mean, I must have been half-asleep when I was checking on Angella, but -- you know what it's like to have a dream that sticks to you after you wake up? It's like that. It's stuck to me. Hopefully, it'll be gone in a few hours."

  She looked at Doyle with those puffy eyes, her unwashed hair clipped back carelessly, and though he knew she'd just woken up she still looked on the verge of falling down. It concerned him.

  "Is everything alright, Jenn? You don't look like you."

  She didn't say anything. Instead, she closed her eyes and slowly exhaled. Then, she opened her eyes again. "I'm fine. It's just a lot of work. It's a lot more work than I expected."

  "It'll get better. Doctor Mielke said the first month is the hardest to adjust to."

  "You're always the optimist."

  "If you need help, we'll figure something out. Maybe I can leave work early a few days a week?"

  She pouted. "You've never been able to get out on time. What makes you think you can now?" The answer seemed obvious. But she brushed it away before he could speak. "It's fine. Go before you're late for work. We can't afford to lose two salaries."

  "Well," he hesitated. "Just call me if anything comes up."

  She nodded. "Even if I hear footsteps in the hallway?"

  "Very funny," Doyle said, though both seemed too tired to laugh.

  Doyle felt strange going to the office, trading his new angel and home for a landscape of cubicles and copy machines, and he had to struggle to keep his thoughts from being replaced with the inanities of office life. It was so easy to give in, to forget the real world outside. Was that why some people preferred to work during internal strife? Because at home alone there was nothing to do but sit and stare at the state of things? Better to go to work and get lost in the familiar than stew and be destroyed by one's ill thoughts. Not that Doyle had those -- he could not be happier about the new house and about his beautiful Angella. He did not want her far from his thoughts, but once the routine of the office set in, Doyle could not keep the love of his life in mind for longer than a few moments at a time. Those moments, though, were among the happiest he'd had within the office's walls.

  It was a shock thus to get the telephone call, and when he heard his wife's voice, it filled him with ever-pressing dread.

  "Honey, what's wrong?" His mind raced, the most horrible things imaginable playing out. Jenn sounded as though she'd been crying.

  "Did you say you were coming home early?"

  "What happened? Is it --" He didn't know if he could put words to his fears.

  "Angella's fine." There was an uncertain pause, and then she repeated herself with added strength. "She's fine. I'd just like it if you were home. That's all."

  There was a noise over the telephone, a simple clap like a footstep, and Doyle spoke without thinking. Had he, he surely would have realized how insane the question would sound.

  "Jenn, is there someone else in the house?"

  Her breath hitched, and the sensation Doyle had experienced in the nursery while sleepwalking -- the deafening silence, the bottomless dread -- had begun to well.

  "Jenn," he said, his voice shaking. "What is it?"

  "I thought..."

  Her voice sounded so quiet, as though she were falling away, then suddenly she was back and there was no indication anything had been wrong. "I just wondered if you were coming home early so I'd know when to start dinner. Don't worry. I'll see you tonight."

  "Wait, I don't --" he said before realizing the line was already dead. He sat back in his chair. What was he supposed to do?

  It took Doyle almost two hours to get home -- the train had stalled on the tracks outside his station for emergency line work -- but when he arrived he found Jenn sitting at the kitchen table in her bedclothes, the cordless telephone at her hand. Doyle wondered if she'd spent the entire day there. Without realizing it, his eyes went immediately to the cold stove.

  "Is everything okay? I came as soon as I could."

  She nodded. "I'm fine, Angella's fine. Everybody's fine." She looked dazed. Doyle heard something above him through the ceiling. Was it a footstep? He looked up and saw a faded stain on the ceiling, the size of a foot. Jenn was suddenly agitated and stood quickly, her voice breathless with concern. "The dinner! I forgot to start dinner."

  "Never mind that," he said, hushing her. Was that another footstep? "Is there somebody upstairs?"

  Doyle did not wait for the answer. He climbed the stairs, quickly at first but slowing as he reached the top and that sickening feeling resumed. All other noise in the house vanished as he walked toward the nursery, but he could feel each fiber of carpet beneath his feet, could see each crack and bubbl
e in the paint on the walls beside him. The door to the nursery was open, a beam of light falling across the hall, and it wavered, as though someone were disturbing it. The doorway came closer and closer as he moved toward it, and through it Doyle could see first a sliver of the far wall, then more and more as he moved closer, all the while a part of him was screaming to stop, to turn back, to not look at whatever awaited him around the corner. And yet, he kept moving. He kept moving because Angella was in there, his precious little angel. He kept moving because he had to. And as he did more and more of the room was revealed and still he could not see the crib and still he could not hear anything and still he kept moving and soon he could see more of the room and then more and he wanted to close his eyes tight -- so tight -- but he couldn't. He couldn't even blink. They were dry and itched but he couldn't close them even for a second. They were stuck so wide he could no longer trust them to see what was real. Doyle turned the corner into the nursery and he saw the crib, there in the fading sunlight of the day, and he saw the door to the washroom across from where he entered, and he saw the slip of a shadow disappear behind that closing washroom door just before he blinked.

  The world snapped back into focus and he rushed to the crib. Angella was there, her tiny face glowing as she slept, oblivious to what had happened. Doyle looked at the washroom door. Had he really just seen it move? His eyes -- he was still blinking, trying to wet them once more. He walked to the door and, stealing himself for anything, opened it with a jerk. Yet there was nothing strange there. He turned on the light and saw the small washroom as he expected it to be -- the round mat; the shelves of disposable diapers, petroleum jelly, and oil; the small claw-footed tub and its fixtures, the curtain drawn aside -- but no person or thing hiding where he could not see. Despite what his memory told him, he had not seen the door close, had not seen the heel of a foot disappear behind it, had not seen a set of fingers slip into the narrowing crack. He'd seen none of it, just shadows cast by a setting sun. Yet even with that rational knowledge, his head still pounded. He returned to the crib to see Angella sleeping so soundly, and wondered what the hell was going on.