by Peter Sacco
Billy could picture in his mind some evil entity hiding somewhere in the house, taking a time out to refill the water jug he was using to create the dripping noise to purposely drive Billy crazy. He stood for what seemed an eternity. The dripping noise did not start again. Billy climbed back into bed, and just as he got the covers over his body, he heard a loud thud come from his closet. Really!
It sounded very much like a heavy door had just been slammed shut. Oh damn! The room was deafeningly silent. Any moment his mother and Clair would come running into his room to see what he had done. They would be mighty pissed. The room was still and silent. Billy could hear complete silence in the house also. It bothered him miserably, that neither Clair, nor his mother had come to see what happened. “Holy cow! Are they deaf or something?” he muttered under his breath.
After ten minutes, still no one came. All was very quiet. Billy would have to go and see what the noise was about, on his own. He found this prospect extremely disturbing. He would go, all in due time. Thoughts began to race through his mind. What if there was someone in the closet waiting for him? On the other hand, what if this was all a dream?
“That’s it! I’m dreaming. No wonder no one else heard that loud sound,” he exclaimed.
With analytical thought in mind, Billy climbed out of bed and proceeded cautiously over to the closet. Creeping along the floor, Billy could feel whatever hair was growing on the back of his neck, standing on end. This is insane, he thought to himself. He finally made it to the closet and had his hand around the doorknob. Billy quickly pulled his hand away in surprise. His flesh stuck momentarily to the steel knob before it awkwardly tore away. The knob was as cold as ice. It appeared to be frozen. “You’ve gotta be kidding,” he said, thinking aloud.
After a moment, Billy pulled his pajama sleeve over his hand and grabbed the knob once more. Slowly he began to twist the doorknob open. “It’s all a dream. A frozen doorknob in the middle of California? Maybe in Boston, but not here,” he whispered.
With a sudden tug, Billy pulled the door open. There was nothing, or no one standing there ready to grab him up. It was, however, dark in the closet, so he screwed in the light bulb at the top of the closet. When Billy was finally able to make out the inside of the closet, following his blinding light experience, he nearly bit his lip off. “Unbelievable!” he whispered aloud.
There were footprints on the closet floor. Moreover, they were large footprints made of snow. There were two of them. The prints had to be at least one inch thick. They disappeared into the wall. Billy slowly stepped into the closet and pressed his hands against the brick wall. He was expecting the wall to be as cold as the knob, but it wasn’t. It was as cool and damp as brick walls normally are. The wall was just there. There was nothing to it. Where had the footprints come from? And where did they lead to? Billy would show his sister and mother the snow. Quickly, before the snow could melt, he collected it up and made a snow ball. He closed the closet door and was about to go to his mother’s room, when he thought better of it. “What if I’m dreaming, or sleep walking and there really is no snow? My mother will think I’m crazy.”
Instead of going to his mother’s room, Billy went downstairs and put the snowball in the top shelf of the freezer. If it was real, then it would be there in the morning. If not, then he had been dreaming, possibly even sleepwalking, and he would not look like a fool. Billy went into the living room and pulled the afghan off one of the chairs. He would make his bed on the couch. No way was he going back to sleep in his room that night.
***
The rattle of cutlery awakened Billy from his sleep. The morning sun streamed brightly through the living room window, which made it all the more difficult for Billy to pry his eyelids apart. He could hear the voices of Clair and his mother coming from the kitchen. With a squinting glance, Billy noticed that the anniversary clock on the end table announced nine-thirty a.m. It was definitely morning. Why had Billy been asleep on the couch? Why not asleep in his bed? He tried to figure out why he had come downstairs and slept on the couch, and then it hit him. The closet! Billy marched into the kitchen.
As Billy entered the kitchen, Clair flicked the back of his earlobe as he walked passed her. “Good morning, sleeping beauty,” Clair quipped.
“What were you doing on the couch, Bill?” Jean asked.
He thought about the footprints and snow in the closet. The loud thud! Billy didn’t hear his mother’s words as he opened the freezer door. He stared into the freezer with his mouth gaping open. There was no snowball. It was gone! Billy scratched his head as his mother came over to the refrigerator and looked into the freezer. She reached over him and removed the box of waffles.
“Are you all right?” asked Jean, as she placed the palm of her hand on his forehead. “You don’t have a fever.”
“I’m not hungry. I think I need to lie down. I don’t feel too well.” whispered Billy.
He exited the kitchen and headed to his room where he crawled into his bed. In the kitchen, Jean and Clair resumed their conversation. Jean put the waffles back into the freezer on the top shelf. “It’s nice to finally have a little space in here. I cleaned it out a bit this morning. You should have seen all of the frost that built up in here.” she said looking over at Clair. ”Some of the ice was so big, it looked like a snowball for heavens’ sake.”
***
It had been two weeks since the footprints appeared in his closet. Much to Billy’s surprise, he had actually begun to sleep throughout the night without hearing any dripping sounds, or other sound effects coming from his closet. As far as he was concerned, the closet incident had come and gone and he wrote if off as being a bad dream. He dared not discuss it with his mother or Clair, because Billy was always known as the fearless one, and if he showed any signs of softening, his new title of man of the house might quickly dissipate.
The only scary thing going on around the Thomas’ domain lately was that the elder male Thomas had been calling. It seemed he was not satisfied to let his wife live a peaceful existence. He needed to throw a wrench into her cog. He was planning on coming to Santa Barbara in the near future for a visit, the very near future. Jean was mighty pissed. But what could she do? After all, he was their father and he was entitled to visitation rights. Besides, Jean knew deep down that the kids did miss him and this was good for them. With all the single moms in the world, how many kids truly knew their fathers? Rather than throwing her ex into the potpourri of asshole fathers, she would try to keep some connection between her children and him.
As for Billy and Clair, Jean thought they had become quite adjusted to their new niche. Billy had become pretty chummy with the Webb boy. Clair hadn’t really formed any meaningful friendships yet, however, she did meet a handsome young man from around the block, who was a graduating senior at the high school she would be attending in the next couple of weeks. Jean thought she wasn’t making out too bad. Her job transfer was pretty good so far, even though she had only been two days on the job. Her duties were pretty much the same. The firm she had worked in back East was much larger than the one she was in now. It was very comfortable and she did have her own office. And she did find her new employer expected much less of her. Perhaps it was the laid back California approach to business. She figured with all the stress she had been under the last couple of years, this type of environment would be good for her.
Jean had actually made some new friends. A couple of the women at the firm had already invited her out for cocktails and dinner in recognition of her first week at the new office. Jean and two of the ladies had taken lunch in a very showy Italian restaurant on her second day. It was the typical get to know each other session. They exchanged photos of children, discussed differences in the two Coasts, the weather and the house Jean was living in. It came as somewhat of a shock when Jean told the women where she was living. It seemed the women tried to hide the looks of surpri
se on their faces.
“You mean to tell me you don’t know about the house?” asked one of her new friends.
“We heard there were some problems with the previous owners and that they were crackpots, but that was about it. Besides, it’s our home now and the past is the past. I’ve left my past behind to create a new beginning and I’m sure we’ll do likewise to the house,” said Jean.
Jean learned from the women how popular that house had been with the press the last year or so. One of the women even claimed the TV show Current Affair had done a segment about Jean’s new home. Dawn asked if she saw anything strange about the house. Was there any truth to the stories? Jean answered her by saying how the house was a typical not-well-kept house and needed a lot of work, but, all in all, was looking quite respectable. And yes, the house had been exorcised of all its demons. Tell them all they needed to hear, was Jean’s philosophy.
Deciding Jean either wasn’t telling or didn’t know more about the house, Martha changed the topic. “By any chance, did any of you notice how Ramsey is avoiding Monique?”
Trying to get juicy office gossip past Dawn was like trying to get a succulent piece of prime rib past a junkyard dog. Dawn loved all gossip even more so when it involved their boss, Mr. Ramsey.
“I heard his wife caught them! I heard she gave him an ultimatum!” exclaimed Dawn.
Jean rolled her eyes back. For the life of her, the gossip scene was never one of her strong interests. The conversation about her house was dropped at least, which was some consolation. Besides, if she really wanted to be a part of the group, she would have to pretend to be somewhat interested.
***
It was one week before school and the special effects in the closet started again. Billy was sound asleep, when he was suddenly awoken by what he thought was the most absurd sound. A chain saw! Who the heck was cutting wood at four in the morning! He thought he must be dreaming. Maybe it was a motorcycle or something. That’s what it must be, a dirt bike, he thought. He rolled over and waited for the sound to disappear in the distance, but it did not. It’s rhythmic gurgling sound rumbled from the closet. Billy struggled to open his eyes and peer in the direction of the closet. That damn closet! He didn’t see anything strange. Suddenly, the thought of the footprints came back to Billy.
The footprint dream, Billy thought to himself. This must also be some kind of dream, or runaway imagination. “Great, now there is a chain saw to go with the snow,” moaned Billy. “What next, snowmobiles?”
Groggily, Billy trudged out of bed and made his way over to the closet. Without any thought, because it was a dream, he popped open the closet door. Just as the door creaked open, the gurgling noise disappeared. Billy shook his tired head in disbelief. “Dream!” he exclaimed.
Just as Billy was about to close the closet door, something sharp and dangly poked his right eye. Confused, Billy flinched and fell back. He sat lifeless on the floor trying to collect his thoughts. Then he could smell it. It was the smell he loved so much as a little boy when his father took him skating on the pond. It was the smell of blue spruce. That clean, crisp, fresh scent. It was in his room. Moreover, it was in his hair. Billy reached into his hair and felt something sharp grab his fingers. Pulling his hands away from his hair, he saw he was holding what appeared to be a small branch of evergreen. In disbelief, Billy went over to the night table and grabbed his flashlight. He turned it on and there it was. Blue spruce! He also saw the scratches on his hand and could still feel the throbbing in his right eyelid. What the heck was going on?
Holding the flashlight, Billy walked to the closet and peered in reluctantly. There was nothing there but the wall. The closet was still bare as it always was. He wished his mother had used it as she had planned. Just as Billy was about to close the closet door, he noticed something on the floor. Throat dry, he reached out and picked up a pine cone. “A pine cone? Yeah, right.”
He closed the closet door, still shocked by his bizarre findings. He went back to his bed and placed his trophies under his pillow. He pulled the covers over his head and guarded his findings if it meant staying awake. Sleep eventually came.
That morning, Billy struggled to open his right eye as he lay awake in bed. Why did his eye feel so strange? After it finally clicked into his head what had happened earlier that morning, he bolted into a seated position in his bed and flipped his pillow. They were there! The branch and the pine cone were lying where he had put them.
Billy marched to the kitchen where his sister sat, engrossed in one of her Sidney Sheldon novels. Billy plopped down on the seat across from her and stared intently at the cover of the book. Feeling the weight of his stare, Clair peered over her book and met his eyes. “Okay, what do you want?”
“Where’s mom?” Billy asked slowly.
“She went grocery shopping.”
“Oh.”
Clair could tell by Billy’s squinting and blinking that something was bothering him. The Thomas’s could always tell when Billy was nervous or anxious from his blinking. He had picked up the habit a couple of years ago, around the time his parents were in the heat of battle. Jean made an appointment for Billy and Clair to see a psychologist. Surprisingly, Clair was better adjusted to the situation than Billy. It was somewhat of a shock to Jean because it was always Clair who let on verbally how she felt. Billy, on the other hand, kept things to himself, and Jean figured since he was showing no signs of anguish, then things must therefore be all right. Not the case!
The psychologist informed Jean that Billy was trying to repress all of his anger and fear, thus the blinking. The psychologist was very Gestalt oriented, easily picking up the blinking as a sign of Billy’s uneasiness. And for some strange reason Jean did not let Billy see the shrink again, even though she believed the doctor was probably right. Perhaps Jean blamed herself for what the kids were going through and Billy had always been the strong one. If in fact she was the cause of his problems, then she was the precipitating factor leading to his problems. Like most parents in Jean’s situation, it’s much easier to sweep the dirt under the carpet and hope that it would go away. Or at least pretend that it would. It hadn’t! Well at least something was back.
“What’s the matter Billy?”
“Nothing. I need to talk to mom.”
“Are you in shit?”
“No.”
“Then why the hell do you look like you’ve just seen a ghost?”
Slowly, Billy looked away from Clair and nodded his head. “I think I did.”
“You think you what?” Clair asked.
“Seen a ghost.” Billy responded.
Clair looked away and started to laugh. “You’re pulling my leg, aren’t you? What do you think I am, stupid?”
Billy stared at her and shook his head. He held the branch and the pine cone so she could see them. “What are those for?”
“They were in the closet.”
“So?” snapped Clair.
Clair grabbed the branch from Billy and examined it. She waved it around and mimicked ghost sounds. “Is this the ghost?” joked Clair.
“Whatever was in the closet left them,” Billy sighed.
Clair tossed the branch in front of Billy and closed her novel shut. “What gives little brother? Don’t tell me, let me guess. You came to tell me that I can have your room.”
Billy stared at her silently for a moment. He was still quite dazed over the previous night.
“Is that it, Billy boy?”
He did not answer Clair. “Well, are you going to give me your room?” asked Clair impatiently.
Billy shook his head, not at the question, but rather the subject. Clair interpreted Billy’s answer as a no, and got up to leave the kitchen. “Well, little brother, I’ve got to go. If you see anymore ghosts, and if he’s not bad looking, then give him my number. But if you find any acorns,
then you can keep them,” Clair chuckled leaving the kitchen.
Billy placed his tired head between his two hands and frowned. “Where’s mom?” sighed Billy.
A few minutes passed before Clair came back into the kitchen. She tapped Billy on the shoulder. Unenthusiastically, he raised his head and his eyes almost bulged from their sockets. Before him, Clair was holding a solid black cat in front. It’s stunning green eyes glared at him. “Where did you get it?” asked Billy.
“It’s been hanging around the house the last couple of days.”
“Does mom know that you have it?”
“Not quite,” answered Clair.
“Are you going to tell her?” asked Billy.
“Eventually.”
Clair handed Billy the cat, who couldn’t wait to hold it. “What’s it’s name?” asked Billy.
“I call him Emerald.”
Billy held the cat to his face and the cat sniffed his nose. The whiskers tickled his face and he flinched back with a smile. “Hi, Emerald.”
“He’ll sleep with you tonight, if you want. He’ll keep you company.”
Billy thought to himself for a moment before responding. “Sure. Are you trying to butter me up so I don’t tell mom, or are you just being nice?”
Clair smiled at him. “I suppose a little bit of both,” she answered.
That night Billy was putting off the inevitable by watching television and putting off sleep as long as he could. He did not want to go to his bedroom. He just could not fight the heaviness in his eyes. He had to go to bed. Like the cold, hesitant leap into the swimming pool, his index finger depressed the off button on the television set and the living room was dark and silent. Onward to his bedroom he made his valiant march. Once in his room he fought glancing at the closet door, but finally gave in. From what he could survey, all looked pretty much normal. Billy glided over to his bed and dove underneath the sheets. The sheets were pulled tightly to his nose, making him look like an East Indian bride to be. The moonlight reflected off the mirror at the far end of his bedroom. He could see particles of dancing light swirl in the corner of the wall below his loft. Given all that had happened, Billy actually felt quite secure, not to mention tired. He could feel himself slowly dosing off. Sleep was overwhelming him. He was now on the ice rink back east shooting pucks into an empty hockey net. Then bang! Billy bolted upright in a seated position.
