Jacob nodded. “Inspired.”
“So we went for it, got materials on the cheap, worked nights and weekends on it, just using our labor, our efforts, instead of money, just to see how far we’d get. And we got pretty far.
“But do you know how much electricians cost?”
“Quite a sum. I’ve hired a few, or tried to hire a few, I should say.”
“There’s no way we could afford that, unless we saved for years more, but we couldn’t save anything because we were having to rent a place at the same time. But I had all these books, my own little library. And I checked out a bunch more from the library. I read everything I could – I thought I knew exactly what I was doing, how to make it safe. Electricity, it’s such a wild thing, you know?”
“And no inspectors were involved, I imagine.”
“No, it was all undercover, behind the walls. We couldn’t get the city involved, because we couldn’t hire licensed people, and besides, we were afraid they wouldn’t let us do what we wanted, that it might violate their codes.
“Abby was nervous about the electrical, but I told her it would be fine. I told her I could do it. And I believed I could do it.
“By that point, our nerves were worn pretty thin. We were tired of being poor, and we were arguing all the time. Serena started having trouble in school, and we blamed each other. Abby said I was too busy, I didn’t spend enough time on it.
“Which was true. But I just wanted to get things done, get us moved in. I knew what was safe and what wasn’t safe. Those codes, they’re always stricter than they need to be, or so I said. It made me mad that she would question me like that. I knew what I was doing – I’d read all those books, and we really couldn’t afford to hire anyone. I wanted to spend that money on other things. I kept telling her it would be okay.”
“But it wasn’t.”
“For about two years, it was fine. I was so pleased with myself. I figured I could do anything. Then we started getting shorts, brown-outs. And I didn’t want to call anyone in, because I didn’t want them to see what I’d done.”
“And there it is.”
“And there it is. Nothing dramatic. Not the kind of thing you write books about, or turn into movies. No big thing. But then it’s everything.” Richard stared at his hands. “And there’s the other thing.”
“The other thing?”
“Childhood sweethearts. We’d known each other all our lives. But you love someone all your life, you start forgetting exactly why it is you loved them. You love them because you love them. It gets to be like breathing. Abby was pretty angry with me that last year, and for the first time I started wondering. I started imagining, and during those long nights working on the house, that imagining became my escape. I started imagining myself with other women, in other lives. I almost started hoping for some other life. Because everything I imagined, you see, had a lot more color, a lot more blood, than the life I actually had.”
“And did you act on that?”
“Never. Maybe if I’d had an opportunity, but it never happened.”
“You know, you’re not unusual in this.”
“Oh, I know. But when I think about the fire – it started by the bedrooms. There wasn’t that much time. I got Serena out first.”
“Parents put their children first. It’s why the species survives.”
“I know! I don’t know if I would have done it differently, but when I think about it, you know you love your children – it’s there in your body, you can just about touch it. You love them. But a husband, a wife, you don’t always know. You don’t always understand. Especially when you’ve dreamed of this other life, wondering how it would be.
“And maybe that slows you down. You grab your child. But beyond that, you don’t know. You’ve imagined so many other things. And now you’ve run out of time.”
“And now it’s time to leave?”
Richard didn’t think he meant it as a question.
“And now it’s time to leave, to leave all these beasties and ghoulies behind. To come out of hiding. For myself, and for Serena.”
“You do what you can do,” Jacob said.
“That’s right. You do what you can do. I really appreciate the opportunity, but now I can do something else. I went into the Funhouse to see what I could see, and believe me I saw plenty. I didn’t think I’d find my way out because of all the mirrors.
“Then I figured it out. Sometimes in the funhouse, a mirror is just another door.”
EPILOGUE
Some are not meant to live in the Funhouse, nor are they suited for the rarified entertainment that is the Phantasmagoria. That is perfectly understandable. We do not always know who may live and thrive here and who may not, and what effect they will have on us. We must use caution, for we may come to resemble them, and they us.
Earlier this week, I bade a sad farewell to Richard and Serena Carter. I trust their time here has been useful for them – I know it has been for me. I will miss Serena – she reminds me what a joy children can be, what a comfort as one grows old and faces what must be faced. It has been a bittersweet time with her, as it recalls old losses, old wounds.
Of course I will miss Richard as well. Some day, I think, we would have been friends. I have not had a friend in many years.
Ms. Abigail Carter has made the decision to remain here with us. I have not attempted to influence her decision, but I find that I am pleased. Her struggle with her husband and daughter has ended – she is ready to move on. I believe this is best for everyone concerned. I look forward to future conversation with her.
The small changes – an alteration in the light, the quality of the air, the movement of shadow, the pressure on the eye, a dangerous shift in mood – occur so rapidly they disorient, and make us doubt our ability to cope. The larger changes – like the pattern of dark limbs filling and refilling the Deadfall Grove, pushing it further toward the Hotel, and closer to cliff and lake – take a lifetime to complete. Someday we will lose this structure entirely to that greedy reach of dead limb, but not yet. Not yet.
We carry our fear with us, from forgotten pasts into unimaginable futures. It is not so much a burden or hindrance, but who we are. No one wants to be incidental; we struggle against irrelevance. But our days are short; for most of us, there is not enough time for more than a too-hasty stroke of the brush.
It is not that most of us are unable to accept such a fate. Most of us cannot even imagine its possibility.
The horror is in the not knowing, and in the knowing all too well. The horror is in the breathless and the breath, the loss of a future in order to be a shadowy figure in someone’s past. We become the furniture in the picture on the great grandchild’s wall.
We look at our world through holocaust eyes as Hiroshima flowers in our brainstem. Our Jack-the-Ripper hearts dissect every emotional pledge, as if counting on deception. We cannot see all that is at stake, because all is at stake.
We shudder when day becomes night and night becomes day. We shudder when our eyes close and we cannot tell if it is death or dream arriving. We shudder when lovers drift away and what we see in the mirror has no resemblance to our understanding. We shudder down all our days and nights, in hope of the one embrace that will take all this cold away.
– from the diary of Jacob Ascher,
proprietor, Deadfall Hotel, 1969-2000
Carl meets Annie Risk and falls for her.
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Deadfall Hotel Page 29
