The Curse Of the House On Cypress Lane Omnibus

by Hunt, James

  “I worked at a shipyard,” Owen answered. “Welding mostly. But I’m a machinist by trade. I started out in assembly at a GM factory when I was younger.”

  “A Jack of all trades, huh?” Marty asked. “Maybe I should have learned more so I coulda got yer job.”

  “Knock it off, Marty, will ya?” Jake asked.

  “Ah, hell, I’m just poking fun.” Marty turned around in his seat, sweat mixed in with the jet-black stubble along his face. “You can take some poking, can’t you?”

  “Sure,” Owen answered. “Just not in the exit only hole.”

  Marty bust out laughing and slapped his hat down on his knee a few times, and Jake smiled. Even Grandpa chuckled, though he didn’t break from his staring contest with the view outside.

  Marty was more amiable at lunch, now that he was certain Owen didn’t ‘take it in the exit only hole,’ though he still did most of the talking. Jake got in a word when he could, and Grandpa kept his focus on his basket of fried catfish and sweet tea.

  And to Owen’s relief, the food was actually good. He wasn’t sure how he’d adjust to Creole cuisine. Thankfully he didn’t mind seafood. He foresaw a lot of that in his diet moving forward.

  With full bellies and slightly more tired eyes, they paid the tab, but only after a good ribbing from Marty about how the new ‘boss’ should pick up the check. When they stepped back outside from the frigid A/C, the Louisiana heat clocked Owen in the face and he let out a low woof noise from the dense, humid air.

  “You’ll get used to it,” Jake said, noticing the flushed look on Owen’s face. “I had a cousin grew up in Ohio, and he moved down here about ten years ago. Now, it gets below seventy degrees and he starts complaining it’s too cold.”

  “Hopefully it won’t take me ten years to get to that point,” Owen said.

  “Hey, we got some time before we get back,” Jake said. “Wanna show Owen a little bit of Main Street?”

  “Ain’t nothing to see,” Grandpa said. “Just some shitty bricks and cracked concrete.”

  “Now, Grandpa,” Marty said. “Don’t go belittling our beloved downtown like that.” Marty leaned over to Owen. “It’s the finest shitty bricks and concrete this side of the Mississippi.”

  To be fair, Grandpa’s description wasn’t that far off. A handful of businesses lined the road: barber, grocery shop, gas station, insurance company, realtor, hardware store, a doctor’s office. It was standard small-town America as far as Owen was concerned. Not much different from some of the neighborhoods in Baltimore. It was like its own self-sustaining entity.

  “Not a lot of activity today,” Owen said, noting the lack of pedestrians on the sidewalk.

  “Most of the town works at the factory,” Jake said.

  “The big boss’s family has kept most everyone employed since the thirties,” Marty said.

  “And the bastard won’t ever let you forget it,” Grandpa said, spitting on the ground, his arms crossed and that permanent scowl etched on his face.

  “Ah, Grandpa’s just sore cuz he’s worked there longer than anybody and still has the same damn job,” Marty said. “Not the big boss’s fault that you never tried to climb that ladder.”

  “Ain’t no fucking ladder,” Grandpa said, his mouth downturned in a petulant frown. “Just a bunch of pussies playing dress up in those suits. I ain’t no fucking doll.”

  Owen watched the old man carefully. There was a sharp edge to his words. He aimed to cut, but what for, Owen didn’t know.

  With his eyes on the old man, Owen missed the table to his left and his leg knocked the corner hard, spilling some of the table’s contents to the pavement. He reached out his arms in a knee-jerk reaction to catch whatever it was that was falling but failed.

  “Oh, shit, someone’s gonna have some bad juju now!” Marty exclaimed, hysterical laughter shrieking from his mouth as he jumped up and down like a child.

  Owen bent down to pick up the merchandise, unsure of what his hands were touching. They looked like jewelry but were made out of rope, bones, feathers, and rocks. He picked up tiny packets with different-colored dust in them, and small glass tubes with a variety of different-colored liquids inside corked at the top. Two of the glass tubes broke and stained dark patches of grey over the concrete that quickly evaporated in the heat.

  Owen stood and put what he could salvage back on the table as a woman stepped out of the shop. He recognized her long dreads and baggy clothes from the day before. She stared at him now the same way she did when he drove past. Her face didn’t have the white paint like before, but the familiar shiver crawled up his back.

  “Careful, Owen,” Marty said, taking an over-exaggerated step back. “Miss Voodoo will cast a spell on you!” His accent thickened in satire and he waved his arms and squatted down, making some primitive noises with his mouth, then laughed while Owen gaped at the old woman, getting a better sense of her age now that he was up close. She was older, her face weathered and wrinkled, but what captured his attention most were her eyes. They were a light hazel, and tiny specks of yellow flickered like gold in the sunlight. Owen wasn’t sure if he’d seen a pair of eyes that beautiful before in his entire life.

  “It has seen you.” The voodoo woman’s words crawled from her mouth in a deep, slow drawl, hitting Owen like an unexpected wave at the beach. She clutched her staff, which Owen now saw had a large rock tied to the top of it with thin leather straps.

  Owen gestured to the broken items. “I can pay for what broke, I—”

  “Cana-linga-too-mara-hee-so.” She stepped forward and pounded her staff into the pavement. “Cana-linga-too-mara-hee-so. Cana-linga-too-mara-hee-so.” She repeated the words and motions in a rhythmic cadence as her eyes widened and locked on Owen.

  Owen heard Marty’s laugher and felt a tug on his sleeve, but there was something hypnotizing about the way she spoke. He couldn’t peel his eyes away from her.

  “C’mon, Owen,” Jake said, pulling Owen’s arm down the sidewalk. “Let’s go!”

  Owen stumbled after them, his head turned back to the woman slowly following to the edge of her store and tables of trinkets, repeating the same words over and over until her voice disappeared from the distance.

  “You all right?” Jake asked once they were at a safe distance.

  “I’m fine,” Owen answered, shaking his head like he had a dizzy spell. “Who was that?”

  “Our local crazy woman,” Marty answered. “You didn’t have one in Baltimore?”

  Jake’s eyes widened and he shook his head. “Her name is Madame Crepaux. That’s her shop. It’s got all kinds of weird voodoo stuff in it. I wouldn’t go near that place, man. I’m not a religious man, but I don’t need to push my spiritual luck.”

  “Yeah,” Owen said. “I can understand that.” He tossed one last glance to the woman’s shop and saw that she’d disappeared. They circled back to the truck at Crawl Daddy’s and drove back to the factory to finish out the day.

  But the ride back felt different for a couple reasons. One, Owen was cold, like he just stepped out of a freezer even though he’d been sweating like a pig just minutes before. His skin was almost icy, like how Matt’s felt last night.

  And the second was the old man. While Grandpa ignored Owen on the way to lunch, the old man didn’t take his eyes off Owen the whole ride back to the factory. And just before they all clocked back into work, Owen watched the old man snarl at Marty over something he’d said, this time wide enough to reveal a silver-capped tooth. The same silver-capped tooth that a young girl saw under the Louisiana moonlight twenty-five years ago.

  * * *

  Claire unpacked the rest of the dishes, loaded them in the washer, and turned it on. It’d been a while since she’d had that luxury. And it felt good. But despite the house, the financial stability, the knowledge that she’d be able to buy groceries next week and not have to stretch one meal into four, Claire couldn’t stop biting her nails.

  It was a habit she picked up as a little girl.
Her mother scolded her every time she caught her doing it, but the habit wouldn’t break. What Owen had said last night rang in her ears all morning. She’d barely slept a wink because of it, and she’d avoided her father all morning. She glanced out the front kitchen window and saw Matt playing catch with Chloe. When he moved his arms, the sunlight brightened the white of his bandages against his lightly tanned skin.

  She just couldn’t believe that her father would do something like that, failing mind or not. But she had to remind herself what the doctors had said. Alzheimer’s could unveil some frightening tendencies, and if that should happen, they should start considering their options. The only problem was that all the options were shit.

  “Gah.” Claire winced and looked down at her ring finger. She’d gnawed off a hangnail and was bleeding. She reached for the sink knob, and the pipes groaned. The faucet rattled, and instead of water a black sludge spewed from the pipe, which smelled of sewage.

  Claire covered her nose and quickly shut off the sink, letting the black water funnel down the drain. She backed out of the kitchen, still sucking on her finger, making a mental note to tell Owen about the pipes. She hoped that water didn’t funnel through the dishwasher.

  In the doorway between the kitchen and the dining room, Claire heard the faint murmur of her dad’s television in the den. She’d set it up just like the basement in Baltimore in hopes of giving him some familiarity. But she wasn’t sure if that mattered now.

  She paced the dining room, working up the nerve to go and speak to him, and in one swift turn marched down the right rear hallway, the television growing louder.

  Roger sat in his favorite chair, unaware of his daughter’s presence. Perhaps even unaware he had a daughter. She knocked on the door frame as she entered. “Dad, I need to talk to you.” When he didn’t respond, her heart cracked, and she took another step inside. “Roger?”

  He looked up at her, squinting the way he did when he wasn’t himself. “Yes?”

  She hesitated. If he wasn’t lucid, then maybe now wasn’t the best time. She raised her nails to her mouth but stopped herself and knelt at the side of her dad’s chair. She looked up at him like she did when she was a little girl. “Do you know who I am?” Her voice was small and quiet, fearful almost.

  Roger smiled. “Of course, Claire-Bear.” He cupped her cheek, his large hand calloused but warm.

  Claire leaned into it and then took hold of his hand in both of hers. “Do you remember last night?”

  The smile faded. “A little.”

  “Something happened to Matt, and—”

  “Oh my god.” Roger leaned forward, his voice suddenly frightened. “Did I—”

  “He’s fine, Dad.” She gave his hand a reassuring pat. “But there were some marks on his arm. Bite marks.” She felt him shudder. “Do you remember anything like that?”

  Roger’s eyes searched the floor as if the answers were written there in front of him. He squeezed her hands. Even at seventy-three, and with Alzheimer’s, he was still strong. Still resilient. “No.” He looked at her. “Did I do it?”

  “We’re not sure,” Claire answered.

  Roger wiped his mouth, the wheels of his mind slowly turning, some of them completely broken now, and then he dropped his hand and moved close. “Was there blood in my teeth?”

  Claire recoiled. “What? No. I-I mean, I don’t think so.” She thought about it last night. She didn’t really see her dad after it happened. But Owen never mentioned seeing anything like that, and she let herself feel hopeful.

  “Well,” Roger said. “I would have had blood on me if I did, right?”

  Claire reassuringly squeezed his hand back. “Yeah. I guess you would have.” She stood and kissed his forehead. When she pulled back, his face looked confused again.

  “Do I know you?”

  She smiled sadly, knowing that they’d have so many more interactions like this over the next few months. Just before she spoke to answer, Chloe screamed.

  Claire spun on her heel and sprinted out of her father’s room, Chloe’s high-pitched wail guiding Claire toward the front door and then out into the gravel drive. “Chloe! Matt!” The afternoon sun was bright, and she stumbled blindly. “Chloe!”

  “Mom!”

  Black spots from the sudden brightness clouded her vision, but she pivoted right toward the sound of her daughter’s voice. Shin-high grass brushed her knees as she weaved around trees and rocks. She blinked quickly, ridding herself of the blinding spots, and found Chloe next to a tree.

  Bright red blotches sat high on Chloe’s cheeks that were wet from crying. As she rounded the tree, she saw Matt on the ground, unconscious, a snake slithering away from his body.

  “Get back, Chloe!” Claire’s voice was angered, and frightened, and the tone only triggered another wail of sobs from her daughter. She knelt by her son’s body, his eyes closed. “Matt, can you hear me? Matt!” She gently shook him, then checked for a pulse. He was sweating profusely, but his skin was cold to the touch. She noticed the pair of punctured holes in his forearm next to one of the bandages. She checked his breathing and felt the light puff of air from his nose. She picked her son off the ground, struggling with his weight. “Chloe, get to the U-Haul, now!”

  Her daughter did as she was told, and she stumbled toward the moving truck, running ahead of Claire, who kept Matt close to her chest, her legs sinking into the soft Louisiana mud, slowing her sprint toward the U-Haul.

  With the muscles in her arms burning from Matt’s weight and mud speckled over her legs, she heaved Matt into the U-Haul’s passenger seat, and then helped Chloe inside after. “Put your seatbelt on and then put one on your brother.”

  Claire skirted around the truck’s hood to the driver side door and climbed inside. The keys were still stuck in the ignition, Owen’s way of testing true Southern hospitality. She cranked the U-Haul to life, then floored the accelerator and swerved down the gravel road.

  Matt shivered in his seat, and Claire removed one white-knuckled hand from the wheel and placed it on her son’s arm. His skin was ice-cold but he was moving, and that meant he was alive. Crying, Chloe laid her head down on Matt’s shoulder.

  A few low hanging branches smacked the top of the U-Haul and a truck driving in the opposite direction honked at her speed, but she ignored them. The National Guard couldn’t slow her down.

  Traffic thickened the closer they moved to town and the tires screeched as Claire maneuvered between the cars, their blaring horns growing angrier. Main Street appeared, and she leaned forward until her chest pressed against the steering wheel, her eyes scanning the row of buildings for Dr. Talbert’s office. She was scheduled to visit today at three for the bite marks on Matt’s arm.

  Signs for the hardware store, grocery, and gas station flew by, but she jerked the wheel sharply to the left of the road when she spied the letters MD in her peripheral.

  With the engine still running, but the U-Haul in park, Claire grabbed hold of Matt and pulled him across the seats. His limbs dragged behind him as he lay limp, and Claire cradled him in her arms. “Chloe, come on!” Her daughter followed, her short legs struggling to keep up with her mother, who shouldered open the doctor’s office door. “I need help!”

  Heads snapped in her direction, looking away from their phones, magazines, computers, and waiting room television playing a rerun of Friends. An elderly woman behind the reception desk rose from her chair as Claire adjusted Matt’s weight in her arms.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  “Snake bite,” Claire answered, her voice cutting in and out. “I don’t know what kind it was.”

  A man stepped out from behind the wall separating the waiting room and the examination rooms, and Claire noticed Dr. Talbert inscribed on his coat. “Let’s get him in the back.”

  Claire followed the doctor to the closest available room and laid Matthew on the table.

  Dr. Talbert opened Matt’s eyes and flashed a light in them, pressing his fingers again
st the side of Matt’s neck. “Rachel, bring in the cardiac monitor.” Dr. Talbert removed his stethoscope and checked the boy’s breathing as Rachel wheeled in a machine and lifted Matt’s shirt. She placed small suction cups over his chest and stomach. “Let’s get an IV hooked up as well.”

  “What about anti-venom?” Claire asked. “Don’t you have something like that?”

  “Without knowing what kind of snake bit him, we don’t know what anti-venom to use,” Dr. Talbert answered. “But the fluids will help keep his organs functional until it passes.”

  “How long with that take?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Matt convulsed on the table, and foam bubbled from the corners of his mouth. The nurse and doctor stabilized his head and placed a wooden bit in his mouth to keep him from biting his tongue off.

  “Oh my god,” Claire said, covering her mouth.

  “Mommy.”

  Claire spun around and saw Chloe in the doorway, her eyes locked on Matt. She went to reach for her, but one of the nurses in the hallway pulled her away from the traumatic scene.

  “Keep his arms steady!” Dr. Talbert said, but even with the nurse, they could barely keep all of Matt’s one hundred pounds on the table, the convulsions worsening.

  Claire jumped in to help and watched the foam bubbling at the corners of Matt’s mouth turn red. His eyes popped open and he screamed, spewing blood in speckled bits like a volcano. He arched his back, his legs and arms pinned by the three of them, and he squirmed.

  The green lines of the cardiac monitor spiked up and down in jagged peaks, beeping wildly. Matt’s body offered one final spasm and then he collapsed on his back, his body limp. The green line plummeted and the fast-paced beeps were replaced with a single monotone beep as Matt flat lined.

  “No!” Claire howled like a wounded animal, helplessly clawing at her son’s legs as the doctor pumped Matt’s chest, his small body convulsing with each heavy-handed compression. The nurse pulled at Claire’s arms, but she resisted, taking hold of Matt’s left foot that tilted lifelessly to the side. Her knees buckled as the steady beep of the EKG filled the examination room.