The Boarding House

by Sharon Sala

  Sophie frowned at Ellie’s blank stare. “Hear what, dear?”

  “That baby. I hear a baby crying.”

  “No, but you know how hard of hearing I am,” Sophie said. “I’m going to make myself a bite to eat. Come sit with me and have something to eat.”

  “I can’t. I have to find the baby.”

  Worried about Ellie’s strange behavior, Sophie hurried off in search of Wyatt.

  Ellie was still standing in the hallway when Doris came out into the hall. “Well, hello, Ellie. I’m finished in your father’s room and was about to do your room, but if you’re planning to take a nap, I can wait.”

  Ellie shuddered. The thought of sleep made her panic. “No, no nap.”

  “Then why don’t you get out of the house? Maybe go for a walk?” Doris asked.

  The notion clicked. “I might go for a walk.”

  “Whatever you want, dear, but I won’t be long in your room.”

  “Doris?”

  Doris paused on the threshold to Ellie’s room. “Yes?”

  “Do you hear a baby?”

  Doris’s heart skipped a beat. She’d lived too long in this house to ignore anything out of the usual order and this was definitely one of those times. “No, Ellie, there’s no baby here.”

  “But I can hear it cry.”

  Doris frowned. “There’s no baby. Maybe it’s a bird. You know how those mockingbirds are.”

  “Bird?”

  Within moments, the vacuum was going again, and Ellie left. She couldn’t abide the sound of vacuum cleaners anymore. When she took her purse and left the house, the tiny, high-pitched wail went with her.

  Outside, Ellie paused and lifted her face to the sun. It was warm on her skin with just enough of a breeze to keep from being uncomfortable. There was a loose thread on the fringe of her jeans—the ones she’d cut off at the knees last summer. They’d fit fine last year, but now they were hanging loosely on her hips. She pulled the loose thread until it broke off and tossed it away. Her yellow T-shirt seemed too large as well, but it couldn’t be helped.

  The decision to get out of the house was a good one. It felt natural to be doing something ordinary, even if she was hearing ghosts. About halfway down the block, a kid on a bike came pedaling up behind her.

  “Coming through,” he yelled, and swerved onto the grass to miss her, then swerved back onto the sidewalk once he was past.

  Ellie’s heart twisted painfully. He reminded her of Wyatt at that age—blonde hair and a smattering of freckles across a sunburned nose. Life had been simple then. It hadn’t been perfect, but it was something they’d understood.

  The light was red when she reached the crosswalk. As she waited for it to turn, she saw Cinnamon walking up from the other side of the street. Her red hair was short and spiky and her black shorts and cropped T-shirt were too tight, but Ellie envied Cinnamon’s ability to thumb her nose at what society deemed appropriate. It was obvious she was comfortable in her own skin.

  Cinnamon saw Ellie and smiled and waved.

  Ellie waved back. When the light turned, she walked across to meet her.

  “Hey, good to see you out and about,” Cin said. “Where are you going?”

  “The pharmacy. Come with me?”

  “Sure. I was coming to see you anyway. I’d just as soon see you out here as in that house.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Cin shrugged. “That house sort of freaks me out.”

  “Really? You never said anything before.”

  “Well, why would I? That would be rude. Can you imagine? Like, uh, Ellie, I like you and all, but your house gives me the creeps.”

  Ellie understood, although she’d never thought about what went on behind closed doors actually giving an inanimate object like a house a bad vibe, she supposed it was possible. She’d gotten so used to living with the Devil she hadn’t known he would rub off onto someone else. Of course it was probably worse now that it was haunted, too. She couldn’t blame Cinnamon for not wanting to be there.

  Cin cut a glance at Ellie, trying to read her expression. “Did I make you mad?”

  “No, I’m not mad.”

  “Good. You got so quiet you scared me.”

  “I was just thinking.”

  “About what?”

  “Stuff.”

  Cin grinned. “What stuff?”

  Ellie thought about telling her, but they were at the pharmacy. “We’re here.” She walked in, pausing a minute to scan the aisle signs, then headed for the one that shelved sleeping aids.

  Cin followed, then frowned when she saw what Ellie was getting. “Sleeping pills? What do you need sleeping pills for?”

  “I haven’t been sleeping. I thought they might help.”

  Now Cin was concerned. Those secrets she’d seen when Ellie was sick were getting bigger. She knew about secrets like that. They ate you up from the inside out.

  Ellie took a couple of bottles toward the register, pausing at the candy aisle to pick up two Hershey’s bars.

  “One of those for me?” Cin asked.

  “Sure. Want a cold drink too?”

  “Pepsi?”

  “I’ll get it,” Ellie said, then suddenly paused and turned her head. “Do you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Cin asked.

  “There’s a baby crying. Someone needs to pick it up. You shouldn’t let a baby just lay there and cry.”

  “I don’t hear a baby.”

  Ellie turned around. She was smiling, but there were tears on her face. “I do. It won’t go away. I don’t know how to make it go away.”

  Shock shattered the smart remark Cinnamon had been going to make. Something was really wrong with Ellie. “Here, honey. We’ll go pay for your stuff and then go home, okay?”

  “I don’t want to go home,” Ellie whispered. “There’s a ghost in the house.”

  Cin started to shake. She tried to laugh, but it was obvious Ellie was serious. “Now you’re scaring me.”

  “I’m scared, too,” Ellie whispered. “I did a bad thing and God wants me to suffer.”

  “That does it,” Cin muttered, and grabbed Ellie by the hand. She led her to the register, paid for her stuff, and dragged her out of the pharmacy.

  “Where are we going?” Ellie asked.

  “I’m taking you home.”

  Ellie started to cry. “It’s sad there.”

  “That’s what I’m figuring out, but we can’t fix what’s wrong until you tell me, and we’re not playing twenty questions out here in front of God and everybody.”

  “It’s okay. Haven’t you heard?”

  “Heard what?” Cinnamon asked.

  Ellie whispered in her ear. “There is no God.”

  “Oh shit, shit, shit,” Cinnamon muttered, and started walking Ellie home.

  “Want some candy?” Ellie asked, and broke off a square of chocolate and handed it to Cinnamon. “Hershey bars are my favorite. Don’t you just love the way they melt on your tongue.”

  Cin put the candy in her mouth and ate without tasting it as she continued to pull Ellie along. “We’re almost there. It won’t be long now.”

  “Have another piece,” Ellie offered.

  Cin put it in her mouth like a dose of medicine, chewed and swallowed.

  Ellie frowned at her. “You’re not doing it right. You’re supposed to let it melt on your tongue. Here, try again, and this time don’t chew, let it melt.”

  “Yeah, okay . . . sorry.”

  Cinnamon could see the house now and would have walked faster, but Ellie wouldn’t comply. The closer they got to her house, the slower her steps became.

  “I’m going in with you,” Cin said, and gave Ellie’s hand a tug to remind her she was there.

  Ellie’s eyes filled with tears all over again. “You’ll hear the baby soon. It’s louder there.”

  Ellie was turning into a stranger, and Cin had a horrible feeling the Ellie Wayne she’d grown to love was disappearing.

 
; “Don’t go anywhere, sweetie,” Cinnamon whispered. “I need you to stay with me. You’re all I have.”

  When they walked in the front door, Doris was dusting. “Back already?”

  Ellie pointed. “Cinnamon brought me home. I need to go lie down now.”

  Doris frowned but didn’t comment.

  As soon as they got inside, Cin locked Ellie’s bedroom door. “Is your dad at work?”

  Ellie shrugged. “I don’t know where he is. It doesn’t matter. He’ll never bother me again.”

  “Where’s Wyatt?”

  Ellie waved her arm up in the air, as if he’d disappeared.

  “Somewhere . . .”

  “Come lie down on the bed with me. We can talk while you rest.”

  “I’ve got to go to the bathroom first,” Ellie said.

  “Okay, but remember I’m waiting.”

  “Listen for the baby. You’ll hear it any time now.”

  She waited as Ellie asked, but when Ellie finally came out, she seemed to have forgotten Cinnamon was there. Instead of sitting down to visit, she crawled up onto her bed and rolled over onto her side.

  “I’m going to sleep now.”

  Cin crawled up beside her. “Talk to me, sweetie. Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Promise not to tell,” Ellie mumbled.

  “I promise.”

  “Daddy raped me and made a baby. I got rid of it and now its little ghost won’t let me sleep.”

  Oh my God. “Did you tell?”

  “Wyatt knows about the rape, but not the baby. Everyone else saw my bruises, and I said I fell in the shower.”

  Cin groaned, remembering the swollen eye and all the bruises on her face. “Why didn’t you tell the police?”

  Ellie’s eyes were closed, but she put a finger up to her lips and then lowered her voice to a whisper. “I can’t tell. If I do, Daddy said they’ll arrest him, and when that happens they’ll find the movies—years and years of movies. He knows I don’t want anyone to see them. Wyatt doesn’t know about the movies.”

  “What movies, sweetie? What movies would they find?”

  “All the bad movies. The ones Daddy made when he made me and Wyatt play the game.”

  Cin was suddenly sick to her stomach, realizing that Ellie and Wyatt’s entire childhood was nothing but a sham. “Have you seen them?”

  “Daddy made me watch so I would understand. I was Daddy’s special girl. That’s why we couldn’t tell.”

  Cin felt like throwing up. She’d had a hard life, but nothing like this.

  “Oh Ellie . . . sweetie.”

  “Do you hear the baby yet?” Ellie asked, and then choked on a sob.

  Cinnamon put her arms around her and held her close. “No, sweetie. The only baby I hear crying is you.”

  “Don’t tell. You promised.”

  “Sssh. Just close your eyes and sleep. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

  It was near suppertime when Ellie opened her eyes and saw Cinnamon sitting at the foot of her bed.

  “You’re still here?”

  It sounded more like a question than a statement, but Cinnamon didn’t press the issue. “I’m not leaving you. Doris knocked on the door a few minutes ago. She said supper was ready. Go wash up and we’ll eat.”

  Ellie squeezed her eyes shut and clasped her hands over her ears. “I can’t eat. I don’t want to eat. I just want to go to sleep and never wake up. It’s too hard to live. I’m tired. I wish I would die.”

  Cinnamon grabbed Ellie by the shoulders and shook her angrily. “Don’t say that. Don’t ever say that again.”

  Either Ellie didn’t hear her or she was ignoring her. She swung her legs off the side of the bed then got up. “Where are my sleeping pills? I need to find my pills. Then I can go to sleep like Momma did and never wake up again.”

  “No!” Cinnamon made a dash toward the bathroom, grabbed the open bottle of sleeping pills and dumped them all in the toilet and flushed. Then she remembered Ellie had bought two bottles and dug through the drawers in a panic until she found that one as well.

  “Don’t do that,” Ellie begged. “Please. You don’t understand. I can’t do this anymore. Daddy won. He beat me. I don’t want to be here anymore.”

  Cin pushed her away and flushed the second bottle as well, then pushed Ellie aside and ran out the door. She needed to find Sophie or Wyatt. Someone needed to get her to a hospital before she took herself to the morgue.

  “Help, help, somebody help,” she screamed.

  She ran through the house, looking in every room. Doris came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel and frowning at the noise.

  “What’s going on?”

  Cinnamon grabbed her by the shoulders. “I need to find Wyatt. Have you seen him?”

  Doris sighed. “Not in a while. He doesn’t like you, you know, so he may be ignoring you.”

  “Crap. I didn’t think of that. Sophie. I’ll find Sophie.”

  “Maybe she’s in her room. Ellie says she’s hard of hearing.”

  “Right.” Cin dashed back down the hall, shouting Sophie’s name.

  Sophie opened the door then peered out. “Is someone calling me?”

  Cin was in a panic. “Ellie tried to kill herself. You need to find Wyatt. She needs help.”

  Sophie gasped and began calling Wyatt’s name as she ran toward Ellie’s room. But by the time they got back into the bedroom, Wyatt was already there.

  “Where’s Ellie? What’s all the shouting?” he asked

  “Oh my God,” Cinnamon screamed and ran to the bathroom, but it was empty. “Where did she go?”

  Wyatt frowned. “What the hell’s going on?”

  “Ellie tried to kill herself by taking a bunch of sleeping pills. I flushed them down the toilet then ran to find you, but now she’s gone.”

  All of a sudden, Wyatt thought of the gun. He bolted for his room with Sophie and Cinnamon on his heels and found Ellie on her hands and knees by his bed. The only thing that had saved her was her lack of physical strength. She was too weak to crawl under.

  He pulled her to her feet then sat her on the side of his bed. “What’s the matter with you? You don’t quit. We’re tough, Ellie, we’re tough. Together we can get through anything, remember?”

  Ellie looked at him with a blank expression. Not only did she not recognize Wyatt, she didn’t appear to even know where she was.

  At that point, Wyatt crawled under his bed and pulled the gun out from its hiding place.

  When Ellie saw the gun, reality surfaced. “Give it to me. It’s mine.”

  Wyatt shoved her backward. “What’s wrong with you?”

  She hit the bed with her fists and started weeping, which frightened Wyatt even more. Ellie hadn’t cried in years. She’d been saving them for something that mattered. So what the hell had happened that he didn’t know about?

  “I know what’s wrong with her,” Cinnamon said.

  Wyatt turned in disbelief. “Why do you know that? I don’t.”

  “It has something to do with protecting you, I think,” Cinnamon said.

  “You promised not to tell,” Ellie mumbled.

  “But I didn’t say I would let you kill yourself.”

  Wyatt snapped. “Damn it. Someone better tell me something.”

  “Your Daddy has been molesting both of you for most of your life, hasn’t he?”

  Wyatt reeled as if he’d been slapped. “She told you that?”

  Sophie clasped her hands over her mouth in disbelief. “No! Why didn’t you tell me? I would have stopped that in an instant.”

  “Ellie said her dad had movies of the game you used to play. Lots of movies.”

  Wyatt flinched. All of a sudden the past began to make sense. Why Ellie went back to playing the game after she’d made Garrett stop—why she wouldn’t explain anything to him.

  “Ellie, Ellie, I didn’t know. I’m so sorry. Is that why you quit fighting him? To protect me?”

  “That’s not
all,” Cinnamon said. “You know all those bruises on her face?”

  The shock of this revelation was almost too much for Sophie to comprehend. Her chin was trembling and she was beginning to shake. “When she fell in the shower?”

  “No, when Garrett raped her.”

  Sophie moaned. “I’m calling the police this minute.”

  “She got pregnant, had an abortion, and now she hears a baby crying all the time. She calls it her ghost baby. She said she wants to die.”

  Pregnant? The son of a bitch got her pregnant? Rage shot through Wyatt so fast he forgot to breathe. He grabbed the gun and ran out of the room.

  Ellie moaned. “No Wyatt,” but it was already too late.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Garrett was on his bed, staring blindly at a video of him and Ellie after she’d turned thirteen—so pretty and already a little woman. He’d promised to take care of her.

  What had he done?

  He heard shouts in the hall outside his room but couldn’t draw enough interest to go see what was happening. Whoever it was would come to him if the need arose.

  His face itched. He thought about shaving and taking a shower, then discarded the notion as a waste of time. No amount of soap could get him clean.

  His focus shifted back to the screen as Ellie turned toward the camera, naked as the day she was born. He held his breath, knowing what came next. She stood there without moving—her eyes closed and her hands across her breasts as he picked her up and carried her to the bed.

  “Look at me. Look at me,” Garrett begged, as he had that day, but she still wouldn’t look.

  Someone screamed. It took him a few moments to realize that wasn’t part of his movie. They didn’t have any sound. So if he heard a scream, then what he was hearing was happening now and under his roof.

  At the sound of footsteps running down the hall toward his room, he glanced at the door to make sure it was locked. And it was. But when the doorknob turned and the door wouldn’t open, he expected to hear a voice, not the gunshot that blew the doorknob into his room.

  He screamed—a high-pitched shriek that popped his ears. Even as he watched Wyatt bound into the room with a gun, Garrett was still processing the fact he had screamed like a girl.