by Harper Lin
Despite all the rational thoughts in my head, my gut kept twisting as if I were missing something staring right at me. I remembered Jake’s words about trusting his gut, and I felt really afraid.
Mysterious Creatures
It was still so early in the evening that we all regrouped back at Bea’s house.
Jake had already headed off to work. The house was quiet except for Peanut Butter, who greeted us with a stern look.
“What’s happening?” he asked.
“Oh, you know, the usual. Creepy spirits. Mysterious creatures. For us, that is just another day on the farm.” I reached down to scratch his head as I passed.
Bea scooped the kitty up from the floor, and we all went into the kitchen without saying a word.
I took my usual seat at the end of the counter as Bea quietly cut up some apples, got some cheese out of the fridge, and tore a loaf of day-old bread from the café into small pieces, piling it all on a plate for us to eat.
Surprisingly, after such a gut-wrenching excursion, I found myself gobbling up the stuff, even the healthy apples that I usually shied away from.
“Someday you’re going to cook hamburgers for me for breakfast, aren’t you, Bea?” I asked, trying to break the silence with a little humor.
She smiled and winked at me.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll call the real estate agent and schedule us an appointment to get into that house. But I’m going to schedule it for the first thing in the morning. I mean as soon as the sun is up. I’m not taking a chance that we’ll get stuck out there in the dark.” I shivered at the thought of being there again with the sun sinking and shadows getting longer.
“I’m going to check into the history of that place,” Aunt Astrid said. She hadn’t touched any of her food. “Maybe there was something done on that property that has attracted those creatures. Knowing that might give us a slight advantage.”
“I’ll check with Jake and see if he learned anything else from Mr. Eshelman when he lived there,” Bea added. “I have the feeling he would have stayed on his medication had he not been staying in that house.”
After we all had our own tasks assigned, we sat there without speaking.
“What’s going on?” Bea finally asked. “We’re never this quiet. After an experience like that, we’re usually like a couple of blue jays, hawking it up.”
“I was thinking that too,” I said.
Aunt Astrid, who still looked very stern and had not relaxed since we left that house, shook her head slowly from side to side. “I don’t know, girls. I don’t know what it is.”
Aunt Astrid didn’t know what it was? She didn’t have an answer for us? She didn’t have a theory? What kind of alternate universe had we stepped into? This scared me even more than the black-eyed children.
I couldn’t explain it, but I wanted to be home in my house. I wanted to be alone.
After I walked my aunt to her home, she went to the window and watched me get inside my house without incident. The familiar scratch was not at the window that night. Treacle had obviously found something interesting to keep him out a little longer.
I took one of the bundles of sage from my kitchen table, inhaled it deeply, and felt its soothing effect. I lit the dried herbs in a small bowl with pretty pink flowers around the edges and let the smoke surround me. Then I took it from room to room, just in case. To be on the safe side, I said the cleansing incantation that I had learned from my aunt when I’d first moved out on my own.
“You don’t know how other people have treated the property before you. Fill it with light and positive energy right away and reapply as needed.” I remembered Aunt Astrid saying that with a smile and a tear in her eye.
I had moved out of her home when I was nineteen to live in my parents’ old house. She’d still had Bea with her, but she and Jake were on the fast track to matrimony. It was only a matter of time before Aunt Astrid would have her big home all to herself.
But, as if the stars had aligned themselves for a purpose, the Brew-Ha-Ha began turning a good profit, and Bea and Jake had bought a house on our block.
And we both did our sage cleansings. Aunt Astrid put up protection spells with the help of the cats. So far, all had been safe and sound up until that moment when we were all feeling the need to isolate ourselves within the walls of our homes.
“That’s it,” I mumbled out loud to myself. “Isolation is one of the first things people do when they start to get depressed.” I waved the sage around more and more. I burnt the leaves and let the smoke reach every corner of the house. With each breath, my head felt clearer and clearer.
“They put the whammy on us,” I said out loud. “Those little brats got to us from that far away. They got inside our heads, and they followed us home.”
My house was so full of the sage smoke, I was sure the fire alarms were going to go off. Once I was finished, I breathed deeply. It was as if I had taken a long nap and felt refreshed and awake.
I heard scratching on my window. I thought it was Treacle, and I pulled the curtain aside and reached for the latch, only to see four jet-black eyes staring in at me.
“Whoa!” I yelled, backing away from the glass. They thought they would be able to get in. I didn’t look at their eyes. Instead, I focused on the point between their eyes. It was hard to do, but I knew if I looked into that blackness, I would be a goner.
“You aren’t welcome here! The stars and the moon see your deeds! By the four winds, I command you to leave this place!” I took a shaky step closer to the window. “I said, leave this place and don’t come back!”
All they did was scowl at me. Their sinister mouths pulled into painful and distorted grimaces, but I stood firm.
“Leave this place! You are not welcome!”
As quickly as they were there, they were gone. I had no time to lose. I grabbed my remaining bundles of sage from the kitchen table and ran across the street. I pounded on my aunt’s door then fumbled with my keys and let myself in.
“What is the matter with you?” she asked, emerging from her bathroom with soap on her face.
“I don’t have time to explain. Here. Burn this. Burn it right now and do the incantation you taught me.”
“But Cath, I have a protection spell on the—”
“Please, Aunt Astrid! Just trust me and do it. I have to get to Bea.” I slammed the door shut behind me and ran the few houses down to Bea’s place.
I rang the bell and banged on the door so hard that I was sure one of the neighbors would call the cops and send Jake speeding over here. Finally, when she didn’t answer, I let myself in.
“Bea!”
She still didn’t respond.
“Bea!”
Nothing.
I called Peanut Butter in my mind, but he didn’t reply either. I bound up the stairs and found Bea lying on the bed, sobbing. Peanut Butter was huddled in the corner and looked afraid to move.
“Cath, what’s wrong with Mom?” he asked, and my heart just broke for him.
“She’s got a germ,” I said bitterly. “She’ll be all right in a few minutes. You just come and stay close to me.”
“Bea. Hey, Bumble Bea, come on. Snap out of it,” I said while I lit the sage.
“Jake called,” she said. “Another man tried to kill himself tonight. His name was Monty Krueger. He tried to hang himself from a tree in his front yard.”
“Bea, you need to inhale some of this. Sit up, girl.” I gently blew the smoke over her body and waved it into the air.
“Feel that?” I asked Peanut Butter. “Feel that change in the air?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Something followed us home from that house, and it’s making your mom see nothing but bad things. This will help. And you just curl up with her. That will help too.”
Peanut Butter was all too happy to do as I said. He snuggled up to Bea, but she just lay there. She stared ahead with red eyes, crying for a Mr. Krueger that Jake had told her about.
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sp; “Just take a couple deep breaths. You’ll feel better in a few minutes. Trust me.” I blew on the embers until they glowed white and waved the smoke throughout the entire room.
“Bea? How you doin’ over there?” I looked at her as she reached down to pet Peanut Butter, who was purring loudly.
“Keep it up,” I said to the cat. “I’ll be right back.”
I don’t know if it was because Bea was a healer or if it was just because she was a downright good person, but whatever whammy those little beasties had put on Aunt Astrid and me seemed to especially get her against the ropes.
Quickly, I went through the house. I recited the incantation over and over, making sure the sage fumes reached every corner. Finally, when I had cleansed every part of the house and even the basement, I charged back up to Bea’s bedroom. She was sitting up, her face in her hands.
“Bea? You feeling better?”
Peanut Butter was on her lap.
“Yes,” she said weakly. When she looked up at me, I could see she had stopped crying. “What the heck, Cath?”
“Those kids did something to us. I don’t know what. But if we weren’t Greenstones, I think that we’d all have been found dead tomorrow. Suicide. And since we’re family, can you imagine the kinds of gossip would go around? My gosh, Aunt Astrid’s library alone would be enough for everyone to assume we’d made some pact with the devil.”
Bea chuckled, but then her eyes widened with worry. “My mom!”
“It’s okay. I already stopped there. She’s all right and burning her sage too.” Sitting down on the bed next to Bea, I put my arm around her.
“What made you think of it, Cath? The sage, I mean.”
“I don’t know. When I got home, I was feeling the weight of the world, and it just seemed to call to me, you know. I had to burn it. And when I did, it was like pulling off a heavy, itchy wool sweater.”
Peanut Butter stood on Bea’s lap and pushed her head into my arm.
Just then, we both heard the door downstairs open and Aunt Astrid call for us.
“We’re upstairs!” we both yelled in unison.
“Bea! Thank goodness you’re okay. Good call, Cath.” She rushed to hug the both of us. “I noticed before I came over here that something had been chewing on the protection spell at your house, Cath. And my goodness, Bea, they nearly punched a hole right through yours.”
“Figures they’re after you,” I said. “You always did have the looks in the family.”
“Yeah, you’re the one the boys found so mysterious like a rebel,” Bea teased back.
I laughed. I had been on a few dates here and there, but whether it was because I was rebellious or mysterious or just too hard to please, the majority of those never resulted in more than two dates.
I found it hard to be interested in a guy who found so much pleasure in drinking beer or watching sports or both. I just hoped for a bit more. Because I did have these standards, I really didn’t date too much.
“You think that is why those little things were creeping outside my window?” I asked.
“No, Cath. Were they really?” Aunt Astrid asked.
“Sure were. Ugly things, staring in at me. But I called their bluff and wouldn’t let them in. It was the sage. They must be filthy little monsters, because the smoke cleared them and their depression spell or whatever it was right out of my house.”
“If that is what they’re doing to the people around here who are killing themselves, my heart just breaks for them,” Bea said.
“I don’t think they’re able to do it to everyone,” Aunt Astrid replied, once again taking on that faraway look. “They didn’t get a hold of Min or his mom. And Cath, you seemed to be able to rationalize your way through whatever it was they were trying to do. But Bea, you didn’t handle it well.”
“What about you, Mom? How did you keep them out?”
“I don’t know. I felt them and the sad thoughts worming their way into my head, but I can see so many layers of dimensions that I couldn’t help but see what they were saying was lies. They were more like pesky, spoiled children not getting their way than anything so dangerous as they were to you.”
After a little more talk and a phone call to Jake, letting him know to stop and check on Bea after we had left, we all repeated our tasks regarding the creepy house and made our plan to go back to Prestwick as soon as we were armed.
Plysberger
It took a couple of days, but I finally got a hold of the real estate agent who was supposed to be showing the house off Butternut Drive.
“Good morning. Chelsea Plysberger,” said an older, pleasant voice over the phone.
“Good morning, Chelsea,” I said cheerily. “My name is Cath Greenstone, and I’m interested in seeing one of the homes that lists your number on the sign.”
“How wonderful!” Chelsea said enthusiastically. “Wonder Falls is a lovely place to live. What address are you interested in, Miss Greenstone?”
“I’d love to see 3494 Butternut. That cobblestone driveway is amazing.”
For several seconds, I didn’t hear anything on the other end of the line except the shuffling of papers.
Finally, Chelsea Plysberger cleared her throat. “When did you want to see the home?” Her bubbly nature was suddenly gone.
“Well, the sooner the better.”
“It’s a very large home. Do you have a family?”
“I do,” I said, getting annoyed. “A big one.”
“Um, I think I should tell you 3494 is also a bit of a fixer-upper. Do you have an interest in a house that needs a little TLC?”
“Oh, we assumed as much. Yup, got a plan in place already.”
Chelsea gave no reply back.
I continued to talk. “You know how flipping houses is all the rage, right?”
“Do you really think that’s such a good idea with such a big place?”
Now I was just getting angry. It was none of her business if I wanted the house to rebuild or to live in as is, whether by myself or with all the Greenstones, still living and even some of those who were not.
“Well, since it’s off the beaten path, I’ll only be able… that is, there isn’t much time and…” She shuffled more papers and cleared her throat.
“I was hoping this afternoon that maybe—”
“No. Not in the afternoon. No, I’m sorry.” She chuckled nervously. “Um, I can give you the keys to look around Friday morning. That’s my only opening.”
“That would be fine and—”
“I’ll meet you at the residence at, say, seven a.m.”
“Can we make it six thirty? I have to be at work by eight.”
“All the better. I’ll see you there at six thirty a.m. on Friday, Miss Greenstone.”
Chelsea Plysberger hung up quickly, and I sat back and scratched my head. Either she was the worst real estate agent in the world, or she didn’t want anything to do with that particular house. I took it as the latter. I wondered what she knew that we didn’t.
Later at the café, I told my family we had an appointment to go back and told them about my exchange with Miss Plysberger.
“That leaves us just barely enough time to prepare ourselves,” my aunt said. “But I have a gut feeling we’re in for a bumpy ride even if we had a month to prepare.”
“Then maybe we should take a month,” Bea said with a shaky voice, smiling through her nervousness.
“Did Jake tell you anything more about Eshelman or anyone else for that matter?”
“Not really. No. He let me look at his file, but the guy didn’t say anything too unusual. I mean, he was off his medication and didn’t seem to remember too much about the house. Or if he did, he wasn’t saying.” Bea ran her hand over her head, pulling her red hair back behind her. “He was mostly just apologizing for what he’d done in the past to Mrs. Roy and expressing his condolences about Mr. Roy. But he was ready to move on. He didn’t leave us much to go on.”
I hitched up my jeans as if I were J
ohn Wayne. “I guess we’ll just have to see the place for ourselves.”
To tell the truth, I wasn’t exactly looking forward to this adventure. At first, I thought bringing the fight to them was the best idea. But after a little thought and a couple of bad visions, well, I was scared, black-eyed kids aside.
Everything about the situation felt backward. Monsters were disguised as children. That was unnerving enough. But then they were residing in a home that was in the most expensive part of Wonder Falls, yet the real estate agent said it was a fixer-upper.
Prestwick was known for having more than one neighborly dispute over a person who had let their grass grow too long or another who had planted a tree on the wrong two inches of the property line. Yet they had allowed this house to fall into disarray and didn’t seem interested in calling out the unknown owner. That was a peculiarity in itself.
Bea had hoped she might be able to get into the hospital to talk to Mr. Krueger, who had tried to hang himself, and maybe help him feel better while picking his brain. Unfortunately, he had died as a result of his injuries.
Aunt Astrid spent the next few days researching concealment spells and digging up talismans for us to carry. She also stepped into the potion business and made a brew for us to drink before we went on our journey.
“What’s in it?” I asked, smelling the dark liquid.
“Oh, you know. The usual. Eye of newt, tongue of frog, just a dash of spider web, a pinch of snake venom.”
Both Bea and I chuckled.
“Actually, it’s just got some green tea leaves, a pinch of arrowroot, and a few special flowers from Romania that have an enchantment all their own.”
“Oh, yeah? What do they do?” I asked.
“Well, to put it simply, they should make us invisible. It isn’t for long, but it might be just enough time to get in and get out.”
My eyes widened. “Wait. Are you serious? We’ll be totally invisible.”
