Cauchemar

by Alexandra Grigorescu

  Christobelle sniffed. “I expect there’s much Mae didn’t tell you, but everything she did was in the hopes of keeping you safe. I believe she loved you. That was the important thing.”

  “I loved her,” Hannah said simply, and felt no regret saying the words in the presence of this woman. They were nothing to each other. “Was my—” Hannah hesitated, and scanned the shadowed windows. Had there been laughter tinkling through the hallways? Had there been a man who’d lifted her clear off the floor and spun her around? “Was my father here as well?”

  When Hannah glanced back, Christobelle’s face was filled with raw ache.

  “We were all here, at first. The three of us, although you were just a kicking in my belly then.” Christobelle’s gnarled hands, knuckles like the knotted roots of trees, covered her face for a brief moment. When they lowered, she was expressionless.

  My father, Hannah thought. She wanted to ask how he’d died, but a stab of sympathy stopped her. She wondered whether there was a grave she could visit. But Mae had always avoided the question, and Hannah knew better than to ask now.

  Christobelle straightened. “Come stay with us. After all, I am your family. Your only family.”

  Hannah laughed in surprise. There was a singular stillness on the property, as if all the creatures that shared it, the heron and the gators and the crickets, were rapt. “You couldn’t fill an hour with the words we’ve said to each other, and still I’ve spent my whole life hiding from people who blame me for your actions and beliefs. So, no, I won’t come with you. What kind of life would that be?”

  “Better than what you’d have here, and safer. This house is not right for you. Loneliness has a way of changing you. Of infecting you.”

  “I’ve had practice.” Hannah had trouble reconciling the unsettling tales she’d heard involving the woman standing beside her. Stories of men who’d left their houses for milk or a glass of rye and were next seen weeks later, looking as though they’d been ravaged by decades, and unwilling to speak of what had happened to them. Stories of men who never returned to their families.

  “Not like this, child. Our people are,” Christobelle looked up, searching the sky, “predisposed, you could say. We invite things in, sometimes without even knowing it.”

  “I am not your people,” Hannah said, spitting out the last word.

  “Care to gamble on that, child?”

  Hannah examined her mother. “I’ve spent my whole life here, between these walls, between these trees. It’s been as good a home as any. You said this was your house—is it still yours to give?”

  “What?”

  Hannah cleared her throat. “You gave this house to Mae while she cared for me. Do you want it back, now that she’s gone? Or could I stay here?” It was all she had left of Mae. It was all she’d ever known. The silence would be painful at first, but the memories would keep her company. “Could it be mine?”

  Christobelle watched her hawkishly, all signs of her earlier vulnerability wiped away. “It will be a different house now, child. The murk will seep. That life that Mae made for you—she took it with her when she went.”

  “I’ll make my own, then,” Hannah retorted.

  Christobelle’s eyes narrowed. “What makes you think that your gift is life? Have you ever considered that you were kept here not only for your protection but for theirs as well?” She swept her arm toward the house and the laughter that sounded from the kitchen.

  The fog that lay low across the water had reached them. The cool touch of it made Hannah’s body tighten. “I’m not like you.”

  “Maybe not.” Christobelle was silent for a long moment. Her head moved languidly from side to side, swerving from the house to the muddy water and back again. She smiled at something she saw there. “So it is,” she said softly. “The house is yours, child. Consider it a belated birthday present. We will wait and see what you make of it.”

  The memory of Mae’s chocolate cake made Hannah ache. It seemed impossible that only a week had passed since it’d been set before her, bright with birthday candles. “Thank you,” Hannah said, the words strange in her mouth. She didn’t know whether to feel relief at the small victory of remaining in her childhood home or worry that now there was something owing.

  Christobelle gestured to Samuel, who had returned and waited patiently by a nearby tree. “I should be going.” Hannah recoiled slightly as Christobelle took her hand and kissed it lightly, her lips dry and feathery as lichen. “You rest now, and eat up. Then we can talk about income. You should know that the congregation is well connected.”

  Hannah shuffled uncomfortably. She hadn’t even begun thinking of how she would support herself. Their needs had been few, but there’d always been food on the table. Hannah had never seen Mae’s patients, who stepped tentatively into their house but left strengthened in some ineffable way, pay with money.

  Christobelle seemed distracted. “How did she die?” she asked, as Samuel came to stand by her and offered his arm.

  “Her heart gave out, they think.” Hannah paused. “Why do you ask?”

  “No matter,” Christobelle said, looking askance at the house. “Keep safe, Hannah. Keep yourself closed, no matter how good it might feel to open. There are many who don’t have your best interests at heart, and you don’t know enough to spot them. Goodbye, child.” Samuel inclined his head as he passed, and Hannah wondered if somewhere a family still awaited the man’s return.

  “Goodbye.” Hannah watched her mother step gracefully into the small wooden boat tied to the dock.

  As Hannah headed toward the back door of the house, an avian cry pierced the silence. She whirled around to scan the waters, but the ripples left by her mother’s boat were already fading. The bayou was a cathedral, light washing over the ancient moss-coated roots, and she, slender and trembling, was the pulpit.

  Doug opened the back door and raised his eyebrows in question. “Everything okay?”

  “Thanks for coming,” Hannah said, squeezing his arm.

  “Of course. Anything you need. Mae was a saving grace after my little girl passed on. I wept at your kitchen table more times than I can remember, and Mae always knew which memory of Abigail would cheer my heart.” He cleared his throat. “That Ellis girl dropped by, too,” Doug said, fingering his beard. He didn’t notice Hannah’s smile fade. “Shame what happened there. She left the bayou so soon after, I never expected to see her again.”

  “It’s nice that she came.” Hannah tried to keep her voice normal, but found herself thinking of Sarah Anne’s periwinkle blue eyes. Blonde curls so perfectly formed that Hannah always expected them to be plastic, each time she fit her finger into them.

  Somehow she navigated the outstretched hands in the kitchen, all of Mae’s mourners clamoring to share their grief with her, and headed out the front door. She scurried down the gravel path, looking left and right, until she saw the woman. Hannah recognized her from the back, although her hair was straightened, her curls ironed to a faded white-blonde.

  “Sarah Anne,” she called out.

  The woman turned, a hesitant smile teasing at her mouth. Her body had lengthened, and her face, once sweet and round as peaches, was angular. “I wanted to give my condolences,” Sarah Anne said. “I’m so sorry, Hannah. I know how much you loved her.”

  “Thank you. It was a shock.” Her voice sounded strained to her own ears. “I didn’t realize you were back in town.” She wondered what it’d be like to hug Sarah Anne’s adult body, even as she wanted to push up the scalloped sleeve of Sarah Anne’s dress and see her right arm, the one she’d ruined that day, so many years ago. Hannah shook her head to clear her nose of the smell of charred flesh, pale hairs flashing like a comet’s tail then dissolved. The guilt, which had felt overwhelming in the years after and then slowly dulled, felt fresh again.

  “I’ve moved back for a bit.” Sarah Anne pulled at th
e sleeve of her trench coat as though reading Hannah’s thoughts. “My uncle has some business in the area, so he’s renting a house. The real estate agent insisted it was a coup—I was expecting a hole in the wall, but the price got slashed. Someone died there apparently, but it doesn’t really bother me. Look back far enough, and someone’s died just about everywhere.”

  “How are you?” Hannah asked, the words a paltry substitution for all she wanted to ask.

  Sarah Anne shrugged. “It’s slow as ever around here, but I’ve managed to find a distraction or two. I’m just happy to see these fine Southern boys haven’t changed a bit. Still dumb as posts but gorgeous as the risen sun.”

  Hannah laughed despite herself. “You haven’t changed, either.”

  “Everything changes,” Sarah Anne said, her voice faint.

  Hannah searched her old friend’s face and saw the evidence of her words. There was a heaviness there, as if she rarely smiled and only with effort. She wondered if it was the memory of that day, or the years since, that had eaten into her. “Come have some lemonade,” she offered.

  “Nothing reminds me of this place quite like the offer of drinks,” Sarah Anne said. “Sweet tea, lemonade, or a stiff drink if you look like you’ve had a day.” She kicked at something in the long grass, overturning the flattened body of a sparrow.

  Hannah immediately bent down to touch the bird, but Sarah Anne held up a hand. “It’s dead.” Sarah Anne’s dispassionate voice startled Hannah, and when she looked up, Hannah saw that her eyes were guarded, lashes like shutters. “I should go.”

  The tightness in Hannah’s chest coiled and her breath caught. She had the sense that her one chance at making amends was slipping away.

  “This is my address,” Sarah Anne said and passed Hannah a folded piece of paper. “No telephone yet, but drop by anytime.” Their fingers touched over the paper, and Hannah felt a static shock.

  Hannah opened her mouth, wanting to atone for everything that had happened. But there were too many words, too many apologies.

  “Take care of yourself,” Sarah Anne said as she turned away, and Hannah heard the echo of her mother’s earlier warning.

  Sleep eluded Hannah for most of the night. The trill of laughter seemed to hide just beneath the wind chime’s ring, and she could make out a deep moan as trees swayed laboriously outside her window. There were creaks on the stairs and at first, she thought it was Mae lighting candles and leaving food on white china plates as she’d been doing for years. It took just a few seconds for her to remember.

  When sleep finally came, it pulled her down deep and hard. Hannah woke at dusk, after a long night of flailing in bed like a landed fish. She’d lost a whole day, but even when her eyes opened to fast-fading golden light, she remained in bed. There was nothing and no one to lift herself up for. She held the reins of time and it was horrible.

  But yearning sounds came from her belly and drew her to the kitchen. She pulled out the heavy load of casseroles from the fridge. There was a bland-smelling lasagna, a mess of beef spaghetti, and a diluted gumbo with three crawfish curled meekly into commas.

  She remembered Mae’s blackened catfish, seared in paprika, garlic, and thyme and slathered in butter, wine, and lemon.

  “You sear it first,” Mae had told her, lifting up the black iron skillet to waft the smoke. The kitchen turned hazy with it. “Go on, pick out the spices.”

  “Garlic,” Hannah said, covering her mouth. Her eyes felt like they were leaking curry.

  “That’s easy. What else?”

  “Thyme,” Hannah said, coughing.

  Mae smiled, unperturbed, and put down the skillet. She lifted a bouquet of crackling dried thyme and cupped her hands around it. “Smell that. Remember it. It’s a generous herb, flavorful but not overpowering. It does a dish good. Put it in a tea and it’ll cure a cough. The Greeks said it gave people courage.”

  Hannah looked up into Mae’s dark eyes. “Is that why you’re always putting it in everything?”

  Mae pressed her warm lips against Hannah’s forehead. “Don’t read too much into it. It’s just tasty.” Then, “The Egyptians used it to embalm their dead” whispered against her skin.

  “I’m gonna die if I don’t get out of this kitchen,” Hannah moaned.

  “Now watch,” Mae instructed. She dropped a chunk of fresh butter into the pan, then drizzled white wine over it. The sizzle filled the room. “Squeeze a lemon. Go on.”

  Hannah did as she was told, leaning in to smell the trickle of citrus.

  “But take it off the heat quickly. You just want to warm it up a bit. Then pour it over your catfish. The sauce is like a balm over the wound.”

  “The wound?”

  Mae held out the skillet, the catfish dark and pebbled as if it’d been tarred. “Look for yourself.”

  Hannah poured the warm salve over the fish, and it settled between the cracked black skin with a sigh.

  “It’s all about balance, child. Cooking’s like a science. You have to temper the spice. That’s why it’s best to serve something cold with this dish.” She brandished a colander brimming with vinegary vegetables. “Pickled root vegetables. Or a chilled gumbo. Are you listening?”

  Hannah smacked her lips. The air tasted like black pepper. “Why do I have to learn all this stuff?”

  Mae turned off the burners and the kitchen quieted. “This is how it’s done, passing on knowledge. My momma taught me, decades ago, and now I’m teaching you. Someday I’ll be gone and you’ll have one of your own.”

  “One what?”

  “A child.”

  All she had left were memories. Crouching in every cubby, latent in every scent. Hannah thought she could busy herself with them for years. “That must be how madness starts,” she whispered. She was utterly alone, and yet she had the sense that there were eyes in the walls, watching her. Maybe the madness had started already.

  She must have heard the sound minutes before she recognized it. It sounded like the slow thud of Mae digging preserves out of the back shed.

  The shed was half-sunk into the ground and filled with shelves of aluminum cans, bottles of water, and canning jars full of pickled cabbage and cauliflower. Mae kept all the non-perishables there, behind a heavy wooden door.

  Graydon slunk into the kitchen, his yellow flashlight eyes scanning her. The shed door slammed again and he let out a mewl. “Ignore it, little guy,” Hannah said, reaching for him. “It’s just some baby gator mucking about.” Graydon’s ears were pushed back on his head, nails peeking through the dirty gray fur of his paws. He shrank from her hand.

  “Okay, okay,” Hannah muttered and stood up. She peeked out the window, half-expecting to see some staggering drunk looking for beer. But beyond the tall bushes, the shed door winked like an eye, swinging back and forth on its own.

  Graydon leapt onto the counter beside her and sunk into his haunches.

  “I’m going,” she groused, and pulled a long knife from the drawer. “Some guard cat you are.”

  Outside, the grass was arid and crackled underfoot. “Anyone there?” she called out.

  The chirps of birds answered, and she looked down at herself. Her black funeral dress was askew from sleep, the long knife shook in her fist, and she was glad to be the only witness to her insanity.

  Then she saw it, hunched down in the grass. It took her a moment to place the terrible ribbed back of it, white as a maggot. She drew a shuddering breath and gripped the knife harder.

  How many times had she seen it skulking out of the corner of her eye, or half-submerged in the grassy swamp? Its back was singular, fracture lines like a roadmap across the carapace-like surface. She’d always attributed it to the lasting fragments of some recurring nightmare, something meaningful but harmless, and as a child, she’d always been able to burrow into Mae’s skirts and rely on the scent of turmeric to right her. />
  But the sweat that drained down her back didn’t feel like a dream, and there were no more skirts to hide behind.

  Down in the grass, it released a wet, phlegmatic sound, and she saw its eye roll toward her. It had seen her. “Oh,” she breathed, and backed away.

  The phone began to ring inside the house and she focused on the sound, stepping backward. She clasped her hand around Mae’s copper bracelet, the knots firm against her palm. “There’s nothing there,” she told herself. “You’re still half-asleep.” She willed herself to believe the words, and found that she was picturing Mae speaking them.

  The shed door slammed shut with a splintering crash, and remained closed.

  Her whole body trembled with the urge to run, but she forced herself to walk evenly until she was back in the kitchen, where she clutched the counter for balance. Graydon’s eyes were still on the shed, his fur standing on end.

  The phone began ringing again, and she fumbled with the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Hi, Hannah? It’s James Robichaud. How are you?” James’s voice brought her back into herself.

  She tried to swallow down the fear with each gulp of breath. “I’m alright, thanks. You?”

  There was a pause. “Are you sure? You sound strange.”

  Hannah cleared her throat. “Yeah, everything’s fine. I’m still a bit shaken up, I think.”

  “I’m sorry. How are you holding up?”

  Hannah felt the silence like a presence, pressing against her, muffling her own urge to speak. She shook her head but answered, simply, “Fine.”

  “Listen, that thing I wanted to talk to you about? It’s Mae.”

  “What about her?” Hannah glanced at the urn still squirreled away on a corner of the kitchen counter.

  “We’ve received the results of the autopsy.”

  Hannah’s hand closed into a fist. She’d forgotten that in the confused haze of that afternoon, she’d given consent. Her Mae, cut open like a fish at market. “And?”