by R. L. Weeks
I sighed and collapsed back onto the worn bed in my dusty room. I thought back on old memories of the house. It was as cold then as it was now. It never warmed up inside, although no one knew why.
I’d liked playing out in the yard as a child, however. Some of my fondest memories were out back playing with Jackson, pretending to be princesses and dragon slayers.
I bolted upright. I remembered the small cottage behind the overrun garden and unkept yard, just in front of the tree line boundary separating Vera’s property from the woods. Jackson and I had used the little house as a landmark when we played outside during our childhood visits. We knew never to go past the strange, empty little house. The woods were dangerous; Vera had always warned us. She almost enjoyed frightening us with stories of werewolves, vampires, and evil witches that would snatch up pretty little girls like us, especially me with my fiery-red hair.
I pushed open Vera’s bedroom door without knocking and stopped dead in my tracks. The blind old woman was sitting up in bed with her hands folded in her lap and her eyes trained almost directly on mine. She looked as though she had been waiting for me, and I suddenly couldn’t remember the words I had rehearsed in the ten-second run down the hallway to her room.
“Well, spit it out!” Grandma barked at me.
“I just had an idea, about the garden cottage out back,” I stated.
Grandmother’s eyebrow cocked in amusement, and a smile nearly broached her lips which encouraged me to continue with my idea.
“I kind of thought that maybe Jackson and I could live out there? So we aren’t in your hair and invading your space in here.”
My lips quivered as I waited for her response. I knew Jackson didn’t like being in the big, old, creepy house, and ever since I saw the old man claiming to be the gardener, I was more interested than ever in getting out of here.
“I, uh, also wanted to talk to you about the gardener,” I told her before she could respond to my idea about the cottage. “He was in the house, Grandma,” I repeated, needing her to believe me. “I saw him late the other night when I couldn’t sleep. He spoke to me, told me he was the gardener.”
“Nonsense!” Grandmother snapped. “You were tired and delirious. Your mind was playing tricks on you, and that’s that. I haven’t had a live-in gardener since before you were born if you couldn’t tell by the state of things around here! Now, I don’t want to hear another thing about it. As for the cottage, that is completely out of the question. It’s uninhabitable and not to mention dangerous. You are not to go into that pit, do you understand me?”
I felt defeated. “Yes, Grandma,” I whispered and shrank back toward the door.
“Has anything strange happened recently? To you?” the old woman mentioned before I exited.
Grandma’s brow furrowed, and she sank back against the headboard of her bed and put one of her hands to her forehead.
“No,” I said quickly. “I mean, besides my parents dying—”
“That’s not what I meant.”
My eyes widened. I never knew what the woman was talking about half the time. Her mood swings were giving me whiplash.
“I’m tired. Take that tray with you.”
I followed her pointed finger at the brunch tray, which was still where I’d left it for her earlier.
“Jackson is going to want information soon about what’s going to come of her,” I said hesitantly. “She doesn’t want to go to school here, but she knows she has to or she’ll get too far behind and not graduate. Since you’re her guardian, you will need to set it all up. Mom would freak if Jackson didn’t graduate—”
“Your mother’s dead, so she can’t worry about anything.”
I choked on the words coming out of my mouth and stared at the old woman in shock. This was her daughter-in-law she was talking about, as though her death didn’t matter.
“I’ll call the school and tell them to let you handle everything,” she stated. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.” Vera reached for the old rotary phone on her bedside table.
I didn’t wait for her to finish her call or say any other hateful things to me. I slipped out the door, leaving the tray behind. The small act of rebellion made my heart beat faster. I had never defied my parents before. I was obedient, mature, and conscientious, but the way I had been feeling since my parents died was different than anything I had known before. I wanted to do the opposite of what everyone expected me to do, and the rush of being oppositional felt good… and almost scary.
“Jackson!” I called out down the hallway. “Come on!”
Jackson’s peeked out from her bedroom door. Her eyes were red and puffy, and she wiped her nose with the back of her hand as I jogged toward her.
“What’s the matter?”
Jackson shrugged. “Just missing Mom and Dad. I don’t like it here.”
“I know, I know,” I told her gently and wrapped my arms around her shoulders.
She had always been Mom’s and Dad’s favorite since the minute she was conceived, but it was okay because she was my favorite person too. My little sister was wild but kind, headstrong but loving, passionate but free-spirited. People had always told my parents I had an old soul. I was the mature, rational, observant one, while Jackie had always seemed new with a more adventurous spirit. I hated to see her breaking the way she was.
“Everything really sucks right now and feels uncertain, but we are going to get through this. Me and you. We will always have each other, no matter what. And guess what? Vera’s on the phone with the school right now. I told you she would handle things. I get to go register you right now. Let’s go pick out your classes, okay?”
Jackson yanked away from me, and if her eyes could’ve shot daggers, hers would’ve killed me. “No! I don’t want to go to school here. All of my friends are back home. Sean is back home, and I haven’t even talked to him. Everyone must be crazy, wondering where we are. Haven’t you even told Sabrina or Quinn where we are?”
Jackson was getting hysterical, but I couldn’t blame her. Even my emotions had been incredibly on edge, but I’d just attributed it to the trauma of our parents passing.
“I’m going to find somewhere to get on Wi-Fi so I can check my Instagram and send them both a DM. Why don’t you come with me and bring your phone too? I’m sure you’re dying without it,” I said, teasing my sister and hoping to lighten the mood.
Jackson’s eyes went from anger to elated within barely one second, and she turned around and dashed into her room. She came back out with her phone in her hand and a smile on her face.
“Let’s go hunting for Wi-Fi!”
“We’ve got to register you at Ridgeview High School first, and I’ll bet they have Wi-Fi.” I reminded her.
Her shoulders dropped slightly, but she clomped down the stairs to the main level of the home without protesting. As I took a step to follow Jackson, a cold chill ran across my back, almost like the tips of ice-cold fingers running across my neck. I gasped and turned around to see who was touching me, but I saw nothing. I rubbed the back of my neck vigorously to try to warm the cold spot still lingering on my skin. Just before I turned back to the staircase to begin my descent, an old, dark, bent figure sprinted across the hallway in in my peripheral vision. I snapped my head back to look down the hallway again. My heart was racing as I gripped the staircase railing. Whoever it was moved way too fast to be Grandmother.
“Come on, Pierce! What are you doing?”
Jackson’s voice pulled my attention away from the creepy hallway leading back toward the east wing, the forbidden wing where an imaginary gardener lived apparently. I knew I wasn’t making things up though. I’d seen the old man, and as soon as I was done with my responsibilities with Jackson, I’d be coming back to investigate. I just hoped grandma was right, and she was in the house all alone.
“Yeah, coming,” I called to my sister as I raced down the stairs without looking back.
Chapter Six
Jackson
The enti
re walk down the ridge and into town, Pierce was relentless in trying to convince me staying in Ridgeview was best for us. I knew we couldn’t move back to Manhattan without any money—at least not until I was eighteen and one of us had a job—but I didn’t understand her fixation on staying at Vera’s and fixing up the old cottage.
“Pierce, you said Vera forbade you from going anywhere near the cottage, and to make it worse, you’re talking about some guy living in the house Vera insists doesn’t exist!”
“I know what I saw. He spoke to me. I’m not crazy,” she stated.
Pierce stopped at the end of the long driveaway. The road to Vera’s house on the ridge had to be at least a half mile long. I looked behind us and dreaded coming back. The ascent was steep. The house was high enough on the hill that after a short hike through the woods, we saw the entire town from the ridge overlooking Ridgeview. It was how we figured out where the high school was. Down on the ground level, everything looked different, however, so I followed Pierce’s lead when she turned right and headed down the quiet street.
“I don’t think you’re crazy. You were probably just exhausted from the trip here.”
“Look at you, sounding all Dr. Phil over there,” my sister teased and gently nudged my shoulder forward.
“Whatever.” I rolled my eyes at her. “I hope Vera’s got a car or something you can drive me to school in. This walk is really going to suck every day, especially when it’s cold. If the road gets covered in ice, there’s no way I’ll be walking up it.”
Fall weather was already creeping into the mountains, and the breeze in town was much colder than in the woods at our grandmother’s house.
“I’m going to get a job. I’ll buy us a car soon. I promise,” Pierce proclaimed.
“You’ve never had a job before,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, well, I’m an adult. I suppose I need to get one.”
She shrugged and turned right to venture down the next street. The houses in town were a lot smaller than Vera’s manor on the hill. Most of them were only one story, and the larger two-story homes had small yards and no parking. I still couldn’t remember Vera or anything our father had ever said about her.
“Dad didn’t talk much about his family to you, did he?”
Pierce slowed and turned to glance at me before answering. “He was a really private person. He didn’t talk about family to anyone, not even to family.”
“Why does she not like her own son and granddaughters?” My voice broke at the end, and I covered my eyes with my hands. I didn’t know what could have possibly happened to them, but I couldn’t imagine ever cutting my sister or parents out of my life by choice. I desperately wanted them back, and I would have done just about anything to make it happen.
“I’m pretty sure the school is right around the next corner,” she said, trying to change the subject.
We turned another corner and saw she was right. Ridgeview Highschool was right in front of us. The long, beige brick building loomed in front of us. It wasn’t nearly as nice as the private school we had attended in Manhattan, but it looked well maintained for a public school. The grounds were even manicured and landscaped with all sorts of brightly colored, subtropical flowers and plants. The grounds were much more welcoming than the bland building, but it was the boy with the knit beanie pulled down over his wavy, shoulder-length brown hair, white fitted T-shirt, and low-rise skinny jeans sitting on the front steps of the school who caught my attention.
I stopped dead in my tracks and wiped the tears brimming on my eyes away. I had been crying more than usual lately, and I needed to stop and get myself together, especially before going into my new school. I didn’t want to be known as the sad girl with the dead parents from the start, and I definitely wanted to make a good impression.
Pierce looked down at me and followed my eyes to the boy and smiled knowingly.
“Come on then.” She playfully elbowed me, then slid her arm into mine and pulled me across the courtyard toward the school entrance.
We slowed when the boy suddenly stood and headed quickly into the building without so much as looking our way.
“Must be late for class. Make sure you find out who that boy was and tell me all about him after you get started in classes,” my sister teased.
“Duh! Finding out who he is will definitely be a priority of mine. Hopefully he’s single!”
We both giggled, and for a second, it was like nothing had changed. We were just two sisters walking to school and gossiping about boys and crushes. The normalcy of the conversation came with guilt, however. I stopped laughing and looked at my feet. I remembered our parents were dead, and Sean and our friends were all back home and hadn’t heard from us in a week.
I pulled out my phone and searched the Wi-Fi networks. The high school had password-protected Wi-Fi. I tried a few different passwords using the school name and falcon mascot painted onto the side of the school, but nothing worked. I looked over at my sister and saw her trying too.
“Any luck?”
“Nope. I bet they’ll give us the password when we register you though.”
I sighed and slipped my phone back into my pocket. “All right, let’s go then.”
Pierce pressed the buzzer on the intercom next to the door.
“Can I help you?”
“Hi. I’m Pierce Harrison. I’m here with—”
The door unlocked, and we were buzzed through before Pierce could finish explaining anything.
We walked through the doors and into the large open lobby. Multiple hallways jutted off on either side of us and in front of us. The school was much bigger than it looked on the outside.
A hall monitor sat at a desk clearly not meant for grown adults in the middle of the entryway where we stood. He barely looked up from his crossword puzzle as he pointed down the hallway to his right where a sign reading “Office” hung.
“Thanks,” I mumbled to him, and we walked silently down the tiled hallway lined with brown, dented and banged-up lockers.
“You’d think with as nice as it is outside they’d be able to spend a little bit of money making the inside nice too,” Pierce whispered sarcastically.
“Yeah, this is nothing like my school back home.”
I was getting more bummed out about our situation by the minute. I would probably never find the boy with the beautiful brown hair in a school this massive.
Pierce stopped in front of the main office entrance and pulled open the heavy black door, then ushered me inside first. The secretary looked up at us and dropped the papers she was shuffling when she locked eyes with my sister. Typical. Everyone, men and women alike, couldn’t help but notice how beautiful Pierce was. Her crimson hair made her exotic, and with her tall, lean frame, most people assumed she was a model. They had no idea who my sister really was though. She had no interest in seeking attention, and the staring usually made her uncomfortable.
Pierce cleared her throat and looked back at the middle-aged secretary.
The secretary flushed. “You startled me, I’m sorry! How can I help you?”
“I’m Pierce Harrison—”
“Oh, yes! Your grandmother called and said a lawyer would be faxing everything over soon and that you would be signing as her proxy?” She shuffled anxiously through the papers strewn across her large, black desk and pulled out a few different forms.
“I guess so,” Pierce responded and scanned over the pages the woman handed her.
“All right, well, we can’t get her a schedule until her transcripts from her old school come through,” the secretary explained.
“I can just tell you what classes I was taking and you can just plug me right into those, can’t you?” I interjected, hoping someone would start talking to me about me.
Both my sister and the secretary turned to look at me, and the looks on their faces told me they both had forgotten I was even there.
“Well, we may not have the same classes, but what were you taking?”
“Latin II, Greek philosophy, advanced pre-calculous, advanced literature, Medieval European history, U.S. government and politics, and PE.”
The woman’s eyes were wide by the time my list concluded.
“Well…” She laughed. “We can get you into PE, advanced lit, and U.S. government, but you’ll have to go to the community college to take philosophy or Latin. We only offer French or Spanish. There’s a life skills class you might like that could be similar to your philosophy class?” she asked as though she wasn’t even sure what she was talking about herself.
I scoffed and turned my nose up at her. “Life skills? What does that even mean? I have enough life skills. I need these classes or I won’t get into NYU.”
“Oh for God’s sake, Jackson. Stop whining.” Pierce rolled her eyes at me and got the secretary’s attention back on her. “Today’s Thursday. Why don’t we just come back on Monday morning ready for school and she’ll get her schedule then?”
“That should work perfectly!” The secretary beamed at my sister.
I turned and stormed through the door. I didn’t even look at the hall monitor when he asked for my pass. Instead, I threw myself through the double doors and out of the terrible school that was going to ruin my life, leaving Pierce behind to finish the paperwork.
I slumped onto the concrete steps and buried my head between my knees. Today was awful. The last week had been the absolute worst in my life, and I hadn’t even gotten the damn Wi-Fi password. There was no way I was going back into the office after storming out the way I had though. I would just wait for Pierce here.
