Claus Trilogy (Boxed Set)

by Tony Bertauski

  Oliver accepts the botanical textbook and, despite being the property of the library, stuffs it into his book bag with the journal. When the bag is zipped, he sits back and stares, waiting for her to leave. A steady beat bleeds from the earbuds slung over her shoulders.

  “You really live at the Toye property?”

  “How did you…”

  She holds a plastic card between her fingers. The library card is crisp and warm.

  “I thought it was just the widow living there.”

  “That’s my grandmother. It’s just temporary.”

  “Temporary how?” she asks. “Days? Weeks?”

  “So far.”

  Her funny look shifts to confusion. “You going to school?”

  “Homeschool.”

  “So you stay there all the time?”

  “So far.”

  Molly looks around, but no one’s in sight. Still, she leans in. “What’s it like out there? No one’s seen the property in, like, thirty years, not even Google Maps. Check it out; there’s like a distortion field blurring the details of that place.”

  “What?”

  “I’m just saying, your grandmother keeps to herself. What’s it like out there?”

  What’s it like?

  How does he answer that? His tyrannical, choremaster grandmother is a shut-in. His lunatic aunt is a narcissist, and his cousin is most likely to be indicted on a future felony. There’s no wireless service in the haunted house, but there’s service in a hobbit hovel stashed in the woods surrounded by monster-things.

  And there’s the snowman.

  “It’s cool,” he says. “So, you know.”

  Molly waits for more. Instead, she takes the hint. “Well, get back to your old dirty book.”

  “It’s not a…dirty…”

  But she’s already plugged her ears with music buds. A few minutes later, a wheel squeaks across the library.

  Oliver checks the time.

  His mom won’t be back for another hour. He sits quietly for a few minutes. He shouldn’t let what just happened bother him. Besides, this is his chance to read the journals. Once he’s back on the property, reality will blend with fantasy.

  He might never find his way back.

  He searches his coat pockets and finds the wooden orb, runs his thumbnail through the intricate grooves. The snowman saved him from whatever’s across the river that comes out at night. Is that why Grandmother won’t let me stay out after dark? Of course it is. And that means she knows what’s out there. But does she know about the snowman?

  He carried Oliver across the field and fled just before Mom got there, but not before revealing a glint of metal. And that reminds him of the plans from the filing cabinet, the ones that called for a metal sphere the size of a softball. It looked like the one in his hand.

  It’s all a dream.

  But no matter how many times he thinks it, he just can’t believe it’s a dream.

  Because this is happening.

  Molly’s crossing the library. The squeaky cart stops somewhere in the fiction section. Oliver swaps the orb for his phone and pulls up Google Earth. It takes a few minutes to find the location and load the graphics. He goes to Street View and scrolls down the main road until he finds the gates leading toward the property. From there, he zooms up to a satellite view and swipes toward the house.

  It’s a green blur of trees. The house is a nondescript blob centered in a patch of fuzzy snow.

  Not even Google Earth knows.

  Oliver packs up and begins looking down the aisles. He finds her filing novels in the K-L section. With her back turned and head bouncing to music, he waits for her to turn around. When she does, the books fly out of her hands.

  She shouts in surprise, quickly covering her mouth.

  “I’m sorry,” Oliver says.

  “Don’t sneak up on me like that.” She pulls out an earbud and playfully shoves him.

  “Sorry, sorry.” He squats down to pick up the books. “How did you know about Google Earth?”

  “What?”

  “My grandmother’s property. You said it wasn’t on Google Earth.”

  “Everyone knows.” She begins shelving books and, like before, looks around before whispering, “No offense, but the place is haunted. I mean, ever since your grandfather disappeared, Ms. Toye hardly ever leaves the place.”

  “What do you mean ‘disappeared’?”

  “No one has seen him in decades. All I know is that people around here are a little weirded out about the Toye property. No one goes near it; no one knows what goes on out there. When she calls for groceries to be delivered, people say it’s creepy. You know, like that feeling you get when you just know something’s hiding around the corner.”

  Oliver’s stomach drops.

  “And then you can’t see it on Google Earth. I mean, North Korea hasn’t even figured out how to block satellite images. You all right?”

  “Yeah. Low blood sugar. What else?”

  “You need to sit?”

  He waves her off even though the shelves are beginning to swish. “I’m fine, really. What else do you know?”

  She studies him for a moment. Oliver watches her sway. She knows something about the property. Everybody does. Why didn’t he think of that before? There must be stories about the Toye property. The house has been there for over a century. There have to be urban legends, too.

  Every urban legend has a grain of truth.

  “Come on.” Molly abandons the cart. “You’re turning into a ghost.”

  Not until he falls into a chair does he realize how wobbly his knees have become. She pulls a bottle of water from the fishnet pocket on his backpack.

  “Are you diabetic?”

  He nods while taking a sip.

  “The shot kind?”

  “Is there another kind?”

  “My grandma controlled hers by diet, that’s all I’m saying.”

  “Type 2.”

  “I guess.” She watches him drink. He’s thirstier than he thought. “Do they hurt?”

  That’s usually the first question. He shakes his head and returns the bottle. “So what else do you—”

  “Molly?” Ms. Chatty Pants librarian approaches. “Is everything all right?”

  Molly explains that Oliver needed help finding a book. Good call. People can get weird when they meet their first real diabetic. The shot kind.

  The gold chains around her neck are wedged beneath her second chin. She suggests Molly finish shelving her cart.

  “Can I help you find something?”

  “No, thanks.” Oliver holds up the succulents textbook. “I got it.”

  Ms. Chatty Pants raises an eyebrow. There’s a long moment of uncomfortable silence before Molly says, “Okay, good. I’ll see you later.”

  “Wait.” Oliver grabs her arm. “Can I…I mean, I might need more help about…you know, what you were saying.”

  Molly pulls out her phone. A few seconds later, his phone buzzes. She goes back to her squeaky cart. Ms. Chatty Pants pauses long enough to make sure Molly doesn’t return before going to the circulation desk.

  He reads the text. Smile Café. Tomorrow morning at 9.

  He punches the phone number into his address book, types “Molly.” He still feels a little dizzy when he stands. He stays in Ms. Chatty Pants’s line of sight while walking toward the fiction section. At the K-L aisle, he snaps a photo.

  Molly bobbing her head.

  F L U R Y

  ten

  Mom drops Oliver off at the town square in the morning.

  He walks past storefronts, his reflection passing large plate glass windows with painted letters. Inside are dance studios and law offices, a bookstore and hairstylists. The Smile Café is on the far corner. Molly is in the front window, sunk into a low sofa chair.

  A bell rings when he opens the door.

  The smell of ground coffee beans and toasted bagels rides on a thick wave of Bob Dylan. Molly is wearing a Ramones T-shir
t with black leggings and fuzzy wristbands. She looks up from her iPad and smiles. He hadn’t noticed the gap between her front teeth in the library. Maybe she hadn’t smiled quite like that.

  “Get the chocolate pecan.” She raises her cup.

  Oliver goes to the counter and orders what she said. “You want room for cream?” the barista asks.

  He doesn’t know what that means, so he nods. She comes back with a tall, hot cup of coffee. Oliver passes a small platform, a miniature stage for poetry slams and acoustic guitarists, and places it on a small table. It smells better than Mom’s coffee.

  “I got you a present.” Molly slides a gift bag across the table. She dumps out the contents. A book hits the table.

  The Wonderful World of Succulents.

  It takes a moment to make the connection with the book he was using in the library. “I saw it at The Little Professor. It was just sitting in the window, isn’t that weird? I just had to buy it.”

  “Thanks.”

  He leafs through the glossy pages while Molly hums along to Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone.” She loves Dylan, she says, but doesn’t think he really knows how to play the harmonica. Now Neil Young, she says, he can play. Oliver agrees without conviction. He streams radio for background noise, not deeper meaning.

  Molly sinks into her low chair, duct tape hiding cracks in the vinyl armrests, and begins a countdown of her favorite folk singers.

  “Things are weird,” Oliver blurts.

  The words exploded from his chest, shot off his tongue like lead weights. The admission lifts the suffocating feeling. His shoulders wilt, and, for a moment, he’s afraid he’ll tear up.

  His whole life he’s wanted to tell someone that.

  He’s always felt like an outcast. A weirdo. He didn’t quite realize it until he blurted it out. He could never tell his mom, and he’s only known this gap-toothed hipster for less than a day. But he said it, just like that.

  “What kind of weird?”

  He stutters as his filters engage. He can’t tell her everything. People have their limits for weird, even Molly. But how to start? And where? He feels himself backtracking into panic.

  “The journal,” he spits out. “The book I was reading in the library, it’s my great-grandfather’s journal.”

  He pulls the leather-bound book from his backpack. He only brought the first one—the one that’s mostly normal. Molly’s eyes get big. She pulls her other earbud out and opens it, running her fingers over the worn cover and yellowed pages while Oliver tells her about the historic journey that ended in tragedy.

  The words thaw his tongue, so he keeps going. He tells her about his grandmother’s old mansion and the chores and exercise; how he’s required to be in the house before dark and if you touch the frozen windmill, you get zapped.

  She flips the pages, one at a time.

  “Very cool,” she says. “That’s worth, like, a fortune.”

  “There’s more.”

  He tells her about the garage and the car, the footlocker below, but not what’s in the other journals. Despite what he’s read, he’s still not convinced these aren’t simply diaries of a madman.

  “I wish I had something like that. I didn’t even know my grandparents.” She sits back, twirling her candy-red swatch of hair. “I’m sorry about yesterday. I shouldn’t have come up and asked all those questions. We’re not supposed to be looking through people’s personal information.”

  He fidgets. “I want to know about the property.”

  “Where you from?”

  “All over. Florida, Georgia, Louisiana…just about every Southern state, really. Moved here from Texas.”

  “Why?”

  “Mom lost her job.”

  “Sorry.” She shakes her head. “I need to shut up now.”

  “No, please don’t. I just…I want you to tell me everything you know. It’s just…I’d like to find out what others think.”

  He can’t tell her he doesn’t trust anyone on the property to tell him the truth. His mom doesn’t know it, and his grandmother is hiding it.

  “Well, I don’t know everything, but here’s what most people think. In case you haven’t noticed, it snows here a lot. Your grandmother orders out for supplies, and every deliveryperson says the entry road is always plowed, as in spotless.”

  “Okay.”

  “That’s not so weird except that no one has a contract to plow her property. People have checked into it, and no one has ever admitted to helping her.”

  “Maybe it’s someone with a truck and a snowblade.”

  “Nope.”

  “Maybe she made them swear to secrecy.”

  “Yeah, maybe. Only no one has ever seen equipment enter or leave her property. The county plow says that every time he does the main road, her drive is always clean and there are no tracks leaving. I mean, she could be plowing the road herself, sure. It’s just everyone says it’s always clean right down to the asphalt, like a snowflake never touched it.”

  “Maybe the road melts it, like heating coils.”

  “I suppose. Only folks say it’s been like that for as long as they can remember, way before technology like that was ever thought about.”

  Oliver’s heard weirder things, but she has a point. He shovels the roundabout, but the road is always clear no matter what time he wakes up. And why is it that tracks disappear in the field even when it doesn’t snow?

  “It used to be, way before you and me were born, that people just assumed your grandfather was doing all the work. But then twenty-seven years ago he went missing.”

  Oliver does the math. His mom would have been ten years old—about the time she went to boarding school.

  “I don’t think anyone would’ve known about it since he was just as reclusive as your grandmother, but he was always the one that picked up deliveries and signed checks and paid bills. One day, it all stopped. Not long after, your grandmother takes his name off all the accounts, changes her will, and pretty much erases his name off the deed. People in town got suspicious, so the police went out to see if everything was all right.

  “When they kept asking questions, lawyers started threatening lawsuits for harassment. Add to that your grandmother owns half the buildings in town and funds most of the schools, well, folks left her alone. After a while, they all just forgot. Your grandparents never hurt anyone, and they left it at that. But no one’s seen him since. And that road is still clean.”

  He doesn’t know much about his grandfather. Mom didn’t exactly carry family photos. But as far as he knows, there are no tractors on the property, and he’d never heard anything clearing the road. He always assumed that whoever was doing it arrived early.

  Or at night.

  “What do you think happens?” he asks.

  She takes a long sip and thinks. For a moment, she looks lost in the music. “Well, some people think she’s got zombies. Others think it’s robots or slaves. There’s one group that believes she hypnotizes animals to do it.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah. And hunters swear the closer they get to her property, the fewer animals they see.”

  The perfect silence on the property hits that urban legend close to home. He’s never seen a squirrel or heard a bird.

  “But the weird thing,” she continues, “is that every deliveryperson swears there’s something watching them as they drive up the road. There’s always an envelope waiting on the front porch where they dump the supplies, but no one ever comes out. But someone is always watching.”

  “The house has this window on the top floor. Sort of looks like an eye, maybe that’s what they mean.”

  “Maybe. Doubt it.” She shrugs. “Here’s another thing: she doesn’t receive power from the city, or propane or wood from local suppliers. And there are no records the house has ever been on the municipal power grid since it was built in 1901. That wouldn’t be so strange if she had solar panels or wind turbines, but no one has ever seen one on her property. I mean, it’s
possible she’s got them away from the house, but you said yourself the windmill was frozen.”

  Not frozen, but it’s not supplying power. Something’s supplying it with power.

  She sits forward. “Have you ever seen anything?”

  He searches his memory for any sign of a reflective solar panel or wires running from telephone poles, but the house seems normal.

  Big, old and cold, but normal.

  “The house is sort of heated. The garage definitely is.”

  “That’s what I mean. No one knows how her lights work or how she keeps from freezing. And that Google Earth thing? It sounds like magic, right? I mean, no one has figured out how to block Google Earth—not movie stars, drug smugglers, or the military. It’s all there, except your grandmother’s property. You got to admit, something doesn’t add up.”

  Oliver takes the journal off the table and squeezes it with both hands. When something doesn’t add up, that means there are missing numbers.

  “Why doesn’t anyone go find out?” Oliver asks.

  “Most people are scared, I guess. Hunters don’t go near her property. They say a compass doesn’t work.”

  She fiddles with the plastic lid on her coffee. Maybe that’s why she doesn’t notice him turn pale. Compasses don’t work, he knows that.

  “They sneak onto the property with their guns and ammo and end up walking right back to their trucks like the trees led them out.”

  Oliver puts the book on his lap to keep her from seeing his hands shake. He’d seen that beaver-gnawed tree twice, and he knows he didn’t get turned around. Now the weird feeling he left on the property has followed him into the real world.

  Molly looks up as an Eric Clapton song starts. She closes her eyes; her lips move with the lyrics.

  Then she says, “Why doesn’t she let you stay out after dark?”

  “What?”

  “You said earlier that you had to do chores and exercise, but you had to be inside before the sun went down.”

  Before he found the hobbit house, he could’ve told her he didn’t know without lying. But now he can’t tell her that when the sun goes down, things come out. Things that mess with your compass and move trees. And chase you.