by Micol Ostow
I don’t think that happens. I don’t think Amity could ever really be gone.
She was hospitalized once before. Gwen, I mean. When she was younger. Believed she had, I don’t know, like magic powers, like she could move objects with her mind. There’s some story going around, a rain of stones over her childhood house, just out of the clear blue sky.
Crazy talk, right? So, into the loony bin she went.
They didn’t cure her. Couldn’t. There’s no cure for that kind of damage.
I should know, right?
It’s kind of like the way I was born bad. Rotten. Evil, even before … even before Amity came along.
Gwen and I are alike that way, you know? Who even knows where either of us’d be, if we’d never found Amity. If Amity’d never found us.
So Gwen burned Amity down. Which is weird enough, you know? But even weirder still—it happened during a thunderstorm. Flooding, up and down the Concord River: trees down, property damaged … and still, in the middle of it all? Amity went up in smoke.
She says she did it with her mind. Really.
Says it was the only way to save herself, to save her family from her older brother, Luke.
He was a demon, she told the doctors. Possessed. By Amity.
She found drawings, little notes and things, those articles in that scrapbook, same as I saw. In the red room, same as me. In her dreams.
The doctors think that’s funny, as much as anything like that could be. The guards heard them talking.
See, the red room never showed up on any blueprints after all. Not in any city planner’s records, not anywhere. And you know there’s no library in Concord anymore.
So the red room never really existed to anyone other than you or me.
Or Gwen.
Or Luke.
Yeah, the guards think it’s a crazy coincidence. Or maybe that’s just what they say—no one wants to drag up urban legends, like it would be some kind of jinx to admit what they think about Amity.
But you and I know the truth. And I think Gwen does, too.
Actually, there’s only one part of the whole story that’s ha-ha funny to me, Jules. And maybe to you, too. Because you used to get me. Most of the time.
Anyway:
Gwen says she was saved, she was taught things, shown things, by a friend. A young girl named Annie.
That scrapbook, the one she says she first saw in the red room—Gwen brought it with her to the hospital. The doctors asked how she got it out of the “red room,” real condescending, you know, but she didn’t say. Was all clutching it to her chest, like, during intake, didn’t want to let anyone else put a hand on it. It was filled with clippings, articles, photos, crap like that.
It was my scrapbook, Jules. The one I saw. When I was in the red room.
That picture of me, it’s still blurry. And that article lists the whole family, all of our names. Like yours:
Julianne Webb.
But you knew that, Jules. Right?
Or maybe I should call you Annie? Who you were when you were little. Young and innocent. Before the accident. Before Amity. Gwen says you were Annie to her, and that makes sense.
I’m not sure where you are, who you are now. But I believe you can still hear me, sense me.
I believe you understood me, and that you still do.
I believe that you still exist.
But, Jules?
I believe that Amity still exists, too.
I believe that Amity is forever.
—Connor
EPILOGUE
HERE
Here was a house; bones of beam and joints of hardware, stone foundation smooth, solid as the core of the earth, nestled, pressed, cold and flat and dank against the hard-packed soil and all of its squirming secrets.
Here was a house; sturdy on its cornerstones, shutters spread wide, windowpanes winking against the speckled prisms of daylight. Weather-beaten slats of knotted siding, drinking in nightfall. Tarred shingles surveying star maps, legends shared in the pattern of dotted constellations above.
Here was a house; not sane, not sentient, but potent, poisonous, drenched with decay.
Here was a house of ruin and rage, of death and deliverance, seated atop countless nameless unspoken souls.
Here was a house of vengeance and power, land laid claim by wraiths and ciphers, persistent and insistent, branded and bonded and bound.
Here are remains.
Here remains.
Here is more than physical matter.
More than layers of surface
or structure
or cell.
Here is where I live, not living.
Here is always mine.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
It was a surprise for me to discover that the process of writing a horror novel was as terrifying (if not more so) than the experience of reading one. My most sincere gratitude to everyone who came along for the ride.
First and foremost, thank you to Jodi Reamer for your unwavering faith, your vision for my career, and your enthusiasm for this dark and twisty story. Also, I must thank you for encouraging me to read The Fifth Child while I was pregnant with my first. Thanks, too, Alec Shane, for your swift and sound support.
Elizabeth Law is yet again responsible for all of the very best parts of this book. She is a unique blend of irreverence, brilliance, and loyalty—a true advocate for her authors. I’d say that every writer should have the chance to work with her in his or her lifetime, but selfishly, I’d prefer not to have to share.
Infinite thanks to Alison Weiss, always a wise, calming presence, but also exactly the right keen, clever, and capable eye at exactly the most critical time in this editorial process. What would this book be without your insight?
I’m indebted to the extended Egmont USA team: Andrea Cascardi, Regina Griffin, Bonnie Cutler, and Gordon Vanderkamp. Thank you for making me feel like such a valued member of the Egmont family!
Melissa Walker, Lynn Weingarten, and Nova Ren Suma—where to begin? Thank you for accepting my manic communiqués, and for alternately talking me down and propping me up. You are my goddess muses.
To Gwenda Bond and Katie Sise, thank you for early reads. To the Last Mondays Writing Group: Sarah MacLane, Morgan Baden, Lauren Mechling, Sara Lyle, and Lisa Chambers—thank you for reading this book so, so many times and offering so much brilliance amidst the wine and gossip.
To Libba Bray: thank you for politely allowing me to “explain” to you how plotting works. And for not laughing (too hard) when I realized with horror that I was trying to explain to LIBBA BRAY how plotting works.
Meg Leder, Jill Gottlieb, and Nancy Lambert—our early upstate retreat was the start of it all. I’m glad the house wasn’t (evidently) haunted.
Adele Griffin, thank you for saying some of the nicest things I’ve ever heard about my work from someone who wasn’t related to me. And for your boundless hospitality, which gave the work a much-needed jumpstart. Also, for the conversation with Jenny Han about mortally wounded guinea pigs, which did make its way into this book oh-so-covertly.
To the VCFA-sters and the Kindling Words-sters: Mariana Baer, Rita Williams-Garcia, Laura Ruby, Sarah Aronson, Shawn Stout, Gene Brenek, Mikki Knudsen, Varian Johnson, Louise Hawes, Tim Wynn-Jones, Leda Schubert, Trent Reedy, Jill Santopolo, Margo Rabb, Rachel Wilson, Sara Zarr. You are all divine vessels of creative beauty. Mwah!
To the masters: Stephen King, Shirley Jackson, Mary Shelley, Sam Raimi, George Romero, Wes Craven, Joss Whedon. Yes, please, more, thank you. (* genuflects *)
To my darling, sprawling family: Dad, Dave, Lily, Josh, Elizabeth, Len, and Fleur—how does one author wind up with so many viable writing-retreat options? Love, love, love.
To dearest Mazzy, so terrifyingly brave. You may not read this book until you are 40.
To Noah, love of my life, thank you for believing in ghosts. And in me.
And finally, to my mother, Carmen Ostow, who took me to the library every single Saturday mor
ning when I was growing up. She always pretended not to see me ducking out of the children’s section and hiding in the grown-up stacks to read The Shining in weekly installments. I love you. This book, especially, is yours.
