Uncertainty

by Abigail Boyd

  "So you wondered why I took that file from Bernhardt. My grandmother was committed there."

  "I kind of figured that. I didn't think she was there on vacation."

  "She saw ghosts," I continued. "No one believed what she was seeing was real, though." I took a deep breath, and closed my eyes so I wouldn't have to look at her. "And now I'm seeing them, too."

  There could have been crickets chirping. When I opened my eyes, Theo's face was as blank as an unmarked grave.

  "When did this start?" she asked.

  "Last year. Around my birthday. The thing is, according to the files, that's when it started happening for Eleanor, too. When she turned fifteen. Only she and everyone around her thought she was going nuts."

  Theo was silent, thinking over what I'd told her. I was worried that I was right, and any minute she would bolt from the table and say 'see you later.'

  "Okay, I'll admit, this is a little wild. It does explain an awful lot, though. The seance last year, going to that asylum, ghost obsessions...I just thought you were an undiagnosed goth."

  That got a little laugh out of me. I had been taking myself so seriously.

  "It's kind of cool. It's like a superpower," Theo said, shrugging. "As long as you don't start digging up graves, I think we're good. You were really scared to tell me, huh?"

  "Yeah."

  "Well, wait. Does that mean..." Her eyes became huge, and round. "Oh, Ari."

  "Yeah. I see her all the time." Tears spilled down my face, and I wiped them away, trying to breathe. "All the time. But she doesn't believe she's dead."

  Theo's hands were up to her mouth, covering her shock. She looked like she might start crying, too. "I'm glad you told me," she said finally. "That's a tough thing to keep to yourself."

  "That's why I knew to look around Lainey's dock. And the gas station, that wasn't released in the paper or anything, she told me."

  "So now what?" Theo asked, handing me a tissue out of her purse. She had transferred all of her pins that used to be on her backpack to the patchwork satchel.

  "Now I was going to ask you a favor. I need to go back to the orphanage, because I had a vision of her being there. That's where I go when you seen me daydreaming. I have visions. I'm trying to retrace her steps, even if they're out of order."

  "Ick, that place?"

  "Yeah. I know you hate it there."

  "It just give me the creeps. And after last year..." She looked off, her expression cloudy. "But I don't mind. If you think we can find some clues, I'm willing to go."

  That settled it. I prepared myself for going back to the setting of my nightmares.

  CHAPTER 19

  "I WOULDN'T HAVE asked you if I wasn't desperate," I told Henry. It was Friday, and we were on an abandoned driveway where he'd asked us to meet him. His car, a shiny new BMW, was already hidden in the shadow of the trees. Alex had parked the Creep at an angle next to it. We were now all standing in a circle, as though gathering to perform a ritual. Maybe we were.

  "Thank God for your desperation," Henry said.

  "That's not funny."

  "Sorry." The first thing I'd noticed about him that day was that he was dressed in his old uniform of sweatshirt and jeans. Not a tie or a polo shirt to be found. I wondered if it was his way of trying to appeal to me.

  The four of us hiked out to the road. The spot was marked with two dead white birch trees, crossing into an X.

  It was mid-afternoon, and in the shade of the woods it wasn't too stifling outside, but it was still well into the eighties. The birds sang their infernal song, chirping multiplied by so many it was more like a shriek. Henry pulled out a big ring with what looked like a hundred keys on it, the kind that a janitor would use for school.

  "Is the key to every house in town on there?" I asked.

  "Close to it," Henry said with a wane grin. "He doesn't know I took it, either, so we can't linger too long."

  "Do you even know which one goes to the orphanage?"

  "There are three. They're all marked. One for the padlock on the gate, and two for the front and back doors."

  "So no climbing in windows this time?" Alex chimed in as we shuffled down the road and the fence came into view. "That's good, I didn't think my pants could take it."

  "Not unless you really want to," Henry told him dryly.

  Reaching the gate, I saw there was indeed a new chain and padlock keeping it shut. Henry fit the key into the lock and pulled the chain off, while we watched for cars on either side of the road. We slipped inside the gate and he shut it behind us, dangling the chain through the bars.

  Standing around awkwardly, the we looked at each other.

  "The four musketeers, together again," Alex said with a nervous chuckle. He ran his hand through his sandy blonde hair.

  "We're more like the ghostbusters," Theo said. She would not look at Henry, and I had a feeling she was just as uncomfortable being around him as she was about Dexter.

  The building itself looked menacing, even with the afternoon sunlight cheerily beaming down between puffy clouds. The sky seemed so far away. I marveled again how much it looked like some sort of haunted castle, even worse than Bernhardt Asylum.

  For a moment, I saw a shape on the shadows in the porch. I squinted, and could make out the form of a coal-furred dog. Growling loudly, the dog raised its trembling, lanky body on its haunches.

  I tugged on Henry's sleeve. "There's a nasty-looking dog on the porch."

  Shielding his eyes with his hands, he looked. "No, there's not. It's just shadows."

  I looked closer, and sure enough, it was only the shadows from the porch overhang. "Maybe I need glasses. Let's get going," I said.

  Cutting across the lawn, it seemed like a hundred years since I'd visited this place in the moonlight. Maybe it had only been a dream, after all. The SOLD sign was gone, and the place had obviously seen some new construction, although nothing as extensive as what was happening to the ballroom.

  A gentle tugging feeling suddenly sprang from my chest. I stopped, while the others kept strolling towards the building. The last time I'd felt this feeling, I'd found Eleanor's medical file. It had been a while since it had appeared by itself.

  I shut my eyes, and started moving my feet in the direction the tugging sensation carried me. It felt like a straight line, but I couldn't be sure. I just moved one foot in front of the other and had faith I wouldn't trip.

  "Where is she going?" I heard Alex mutter, but I ignored him.

  "Follow her," Theo said. I tried to tune them and the other sounds around me out, to tune the brightness of the sun out, and just focus on the pulling. It was harder outside, with people around, than it had been in the records room.

  After a minute, I halted. The pulling feeling had turned into more of a lead weight in my belly, and I took it as a sign to stop. I opened my eyes. I was standing right in front of the shed door.

  In the moonlight, the door looks like it's cracked open. On closer inspection, the door is actually ajar.

  "That's right. I went inside the shed," I said to myself. But when I tried to remember what happened next, it was as if a steel door slammed down, separating me from any recollection of the rest of the night.

  I turned, and my companions were standing behind me, watching me carefully.

  "We're going in there," I said, with some trepidation.

  "It's like going back in time," Henry said, and they followed me into the dark shed. Sunlight filtered in just enough to create a gray haze, with dust motes swirling like a snowstorm inside. Bugs scurried along the floor, fat black beetles that made me cringe.

  "Gross," Alex complained.

  The first thing I noticed was that the table had been moved. I don't know why I knew it, I shouldn't remember the exact position. But the table had been shifted, the imprint of the picture on my memory disturbed.

  I walked over beside it. The old rug that had been on the floor was bunched up carelessly in the corner. The trap door beneath was uncovered
, and the top was scratched. Visible, obvious scratches, like an animal had clawed at it. A chisel was tossed carelessly to the side.

  Beneath the paint, I saw as I leaned down, was a symbol.

  "No way," I said in shock.

  It was a copper symbol, like a bundle of sticks. One that I'd dreamed about a long time ago but had never actually seen in real life. I felt my heart tick hard, like the seconds hand on a clock, as I ran my fingers over it. I couldn't believe it was real.

  "Everyone else is seeing this, right?" I asked.

  "The bad paint job?" Alex asked.

  "The symbol," I clarified.

  "The metal thing. Sure," Henry said, kneeling beside me. He scratched more paint off with his fingernail. "What's it for?"

  "I have no idea," I said. "But it means we have to go down there."

  "Are you suddenly psychic or something? Are you going to read our palms next?" Henry asked. He was trying for a joke, but it wasn't funny to me. Alex snickered and I heard Theo tell him to shush.

  "Something like that," I said. I was prepared to rip the thing apart if I had to. The first time we'd all come into this shed, both boys had tried to open the trap door without success.

  But as I reached out and yanked on the brass ring handle, the door flew open, knocking me backwards. Henry caught me, but I wriggled out of his grasp and pushed myself up. We looked at each other awkwardly. He didn't seem to know how to act around me, and I had no idea how to act around him.

  I had a flashback to the night of Lainey's party. His arms around me, our mouths together, wet and needy. The scent of him filling my senses. We both looked away from each other at the same moment, so I guessed he was remembering, too. And that made my blood run hot.

  "You have the flashlights, right?" I asked Theo. She nodded and retrieved them out of her purse. I had bought four of them at the dollar store in anticipation of our trip here.

  The beams were surprisingly bright for such cheap things, but mine kept flickering. Like the battery connection was faulty; I had to keep slapping it against my palm. I shined the beam into the hole where the trap door had been. A ladder bolted to the top led down into the dark. From what I could see, a dirt floor sat at least ten feet below.

  "You're really going to make us go down there, aren't you?" Alex asked.

  "I'm not going to make you do anything," I said. "But I'm going down. You can stay here, if you want. But I have to go."

  "What is this all about, Ariel? What are you looking for?" Henry asked. He had turned on his flashlight as well.

  "Secrets. Everyone has secrets," I said, echoing his long ago words to me as we entered the school basement, before we'd discovered that Warwick was a murderer. Henry didn't believe in ghosts or anything supernatural, being a science buff, and there was no way I'd let him know the truth.

  I had already swung my legs around to the hole and started balancing to pull myself on the ladder.

  "We're all going with you," Theo said, in a don't be silly kind of voice.

  Clutching the flashlight beneath my chin, I righted myself on the ladder and started climbing down. The light sent bouncing spirals onto the dirt wall I was facing. The ladder shook a little, but I could see that it was bolted to the ground below, and I didn't topple off despite my lack of grace.

  At the bottom, I hopped off. I didn't wait for the others to struggle down. I was caught up in fascination now, wondering what I had done the night that I'd lost, and what was pulling me here.

  It was a wide chamber, the floor bare earth, the walls made of dirt. There had been some attempt at adding structure: a wooden support system had been constructed out of beams that ran up the walls, up to a makeshift ceiling that looked half-finished. Exposed tree roots had broken through in places.

  Water dripped down into galvanized buckets set up around the perimeter. Each drop echoed hollowly in the musty space. It meant someone other than me had been here recently, although by the way the buckets were overflowing, it had been a while.

  "This looks like a troll's hideout," Theo said, shining her light around. Everyone else had joined me at the bottom of the ladder. "Or a hobbit cave."

  "Not exactly five star," Alex agreed.

  There were two tunnels coming off of the main chamber. It reminded me of the inside of a honeycomb. We split up, the boys together and Theo and I together. The girls took the right tunnel, while they took the left.

  "Will you know what you're looking for when you find it?" Theo asked me after a minute as we made our way through the dark. I didn't know if she realized it or not, but she was clutching my sleeve. She had a fear of jump-out-and-get-you scares, and I felt bad for bringing her here without knowing what we'd encounter.

  "I think so," I said unhelpfully. "But it's not like Jenna will pop out and go eureka."

  The tunnel ended in another wide chamber, this one even bigger than the first. More buckets lined the outside. I wondered how much danger the place was in of collapsing. In the center was a circular cement dais, about four yards across. Theo and I walked closer, her grip on my sleeve tighter than ever.

  "There aren't any boogeymen down here," I said, trying to be reassuring. "I don't think anyway."

  "Well, somebody had to mess around with the paint and the trapdoor," Theo said.

  "I think that was me," I admitted. "I came here one other time, a while ago."

  "Doing snooping without me? How dare you," Theo said, but she seemed to relax a little.

  Drainage channels ran from the center of the dais to round holes around the outside. Rust colored stains marked the holes. I shined my light on the center of the dais itself. There were straps along different parts of the symbol, five of them. Two for the arms, two for the legs, one for the neck, I surmised.

  And then it was as though I'd opened up a lock in my brain.

  Walking inside the shed, I felt pulled to the trapdoor. Thick brown paint had been slopped on. I found a chisel and scraped off the paint, because I had to know what was beneath it. I found the door already unlocked. I'd made my way to this chamber, to the same position I am now.

  There was a symbol on the dais. Much more complicated and intricate than the one in my dreams, one drawn in blood. Something new yet ancient, and looking at it filled my head with a buzzing like angry wasps had invaded my skull.

  I took bucket after bucket of the water and dumped in on the symbol, as though it were on fire. The blood was no match for the water, and it broke up and washed away. The evil feeling receded, and left me empty.

  The pulling feeling disappeared.

  The knowledge was suddenly just back inside my head, in a split second, like it had always been there. Like I'd never forgotten a thing. I felt like a dementia patient, who had just taken a miracle medication.

  I walked up to the dais and placed my hand on the cold cement.

  Jenna was here. Tied down. Blood dribbled from cuts all over her arms and legs. Cut so deeply it was the purple-red of arterial blood. Blood to feed the ground. I have to feed the ground, or it might take a bite out of...

  I yanked my hand back, and tears sprung in my eyes. I choked, my throat closing up.

  "Are you okay?" I heard Henry's voice. He and Alex had entered the chamber, which was now lit up from the multiple flashlights. I had collapsed against the dais on the floor, crumpled into a ball.

  "Ariel?" he asked.

  Alex came over swiftly and snapped his fingers in front of my face. I pushed his hand away.

  "Alex, c'mon!" Theo said, and both she and Henry were glaring at him.

  "What? That's what they do in the movies when somebody goes bananas," he said defensively.

  "What is it with you passing out around this place?" Henry asked me gently. "I think its bad luck for you." He looked like he wanted to reach out and touch my hair. I stood up instead, wobbling on my legs, and took a few steps away from the dais.

  "What is this thing?" Alex asked. He was looking over the dais himself, peering closer at the channels. "Not you
r typical decoration. It almost looks like some kind of old gardening thing. And it smells in here."

  He sniffed at the air. It smelled of many things down there, damp and decay.

  "Not to sound all Bugs Bunny, but does anybody else get the feeling that we're being watched?" Theo asked suddenly, looking at the ceiling. "I just got the creepiest feeling." She rubbed her shoulders.

  "Now that you mention it..." Alex said, and I saw his tall body shuddering. "How about we get to higher ground? I'm hungry, let's go get —"

  A high-pitched, keening sound blew through the chamber, from somewhere down the passage. All four of us looked at each other. It had sounded like a train whistle.

  "W-what was that?" Alex asked. I thought I could hear his teeth chattering.

  I broke away from them, shining my flashlight on where the sound had come from. It wasn't that I felt brave or scared; I felt nothing at all, disconnected from everything around me. Numb.

  At the other side of the chamber was another passage, but I had no interest in continuing further. Shining my flashlight around, I saw a crumpled mass of dirty yellow in the corner. I went over and picked it up.

  "What did you find?" Theo asked from behind me.

  I let out a sigh. "Jenna's sweatshirt."

  CHAPTER 20

  AT DANTE'S LATER that evening, we were sitting together in a booth. The sun was beginning to set outside. Not many words had been exchanged on the ride there. Clustered by the window, we were all unusually quiet, lost in our own worlds. It was an odd throwback to our days sitting in the commons Sophomore year.

  Alex was eating french fries in a daze, the only one of us more than picking at the food we'd ordered. He didn't look like he was enjoying himself. Every since the chamber, he'd acted spooked.

  "She was sacrificed," I finally said. Saying it out loud left a bitter taste in my mouth.

  "How do you know that?" Henry asked, his voice a little hard. He was sitting in the space across from me.

  "I just do." Our eyes met and held there. I dared him in my head to argue with me. "All the signs were there. There was blood in those channels on the cement pad, I'm sure of it. And it was her sweatshirt."