by Dan Poblocki
“Of course,” said Andy, nonplussed. He gestured to a small table next to the piano bench, where his phone sat. Neil trembled when he saw a large pile of sheet music stacked on the bench, on top of which lay “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder. Neil squeezed his fists to keep himself from shaking. Andy rose and stood between them and the door. “Anna’s probably dying of worry.” He leaned against the wall and watched them expectantly.
Neil noticed a framed document hanging on the wall at Andy’s shoulder — a certificate of commendation from the local Kiwanis club. A name leapt out from the center of the frame.
ANDREW CURTAIN
Curtain? It was Alice’s last name … Rebecca’s mother.
But how? Neil wondered frantically. We saw the killer’s ghost back at the aunts’ house.
Andy noticed the alarm written on Neil’s face and turned to see what had caught his attention. As he studied the certificate, his concerned expression transformed, looking both happy and sad, as if he had resigned himself to a difficult task.
After a few seconds, he spoke. “Rebecca was never my daughter,” he said. Bree dropped the phone receiver and turned around. “But her mother was my wife. Our relationship was … complicated, but eventually the girl did learn to think of me as her father.”
Daddy …
Andy reached down and allowed his hand to brush against the iron fireplace instruments: a brush, a shovel, a pair of tongs. But the piece he ended up wrapping his fingers around was longer, heavier, and sharper than the rest. The fireplace poker had a hooked tip. “Unfortunately, that didn’t last very long,” he said, stepping quickly toward them, his boots falling heavy against the hardwood floor.
THE ROOM FLICKERED AND, for a moment, a series of images flashed through Neil’s mind.
Andy stood in a different position, closer to the fireplace. He was shouting, towering over the woman from the yearbook memorial — Alice Curtain, his wife and Rebecca’s mother. Behind Andy, in the doorway, Rebecca cowered, an iron mask of terror locked upon her face.
Then Alice was lying on the floor, her hair matted with blood. On the way down, she’d hit her head on the andirons — the white birch logs were now spattered with red. “Momma!” Rebecca screamed.
Andy focused on the girl, swaying as if he was having a difficult time staying on his feet. Neil understood that the man had been drinking. “It was an accident,” Andy said, wide-eyed, guilt oozing from his lips.
“You pushed her!” Rebecca raced past him to cradle her mother’s head in her lap. “Momma, wake up,” she pleaded. “Please! Wake up.”
Andy gripped Rebecca’s bicep, her skin at his fingertips turning white. She peered up at him with a look of hatred and fear, but said nothing more.
When Andy spoke, his voice was low. “She slipped.”
Neil knew instantly that there existed a different kind of haunting than those he’d seen on television with Alexi and Mark. Here was the ghost of Rebecca’s memory.
She’d sent him all those pictures — the antlers, the piano bench, the birch logs — because she’d needed him to enter this room. The energy was powerful here. She was using it to tell him the rest of her story, just as she’d used the electricity from the aunts’ house to try to show Neil and Bree who had chased her through the reeds at Graylock Lake. Neil recognized now that what he and Bree experienced earlier that night had not been the ghost of Rebecca’s father coming for them but the memory of her last moments on earth. She’d been trying to reveal his identity.
The visions continued —
Andy bringing Alice’s body out to the road, calling the police himself to report a hit and run …
Andy visiting Rebecca in her room late at night after everything was over. Promise me you won’t tell …
Rebecca only staring back at him, her eyes wide with fear, keeping her mouth shut, as if that was what he needed to see in order for him to believe her.
“Who else knows about this?” Andy stood before them, clutching the fireplace poker like a police baton. “You mentioned your friends Eric and Wesley. What about Anna and Claire?”
“No one knows anything,” Bree answered quickly, backing up against the couch.
Andy cocked his head. “What did you think would happen when you started digging around? That you’d learn the truth about Rebecca, and everything would be fine afterward? You’d go back to your life in New Jersey?” he said venomously. “Who cares what happens to the folks up here in Hedston — the ones who had to deal with all this nonsense the first time around. Right?”
Against all better judgment, Neil opened his mouth. “So we were supposed to close our eyes? Ignore what we were seeing?”
“Why not? It’s what everyone else did.” Andy’s eyes sparked with lightning fury. A moment later, surprisingly, he seemed to let it go. He sighed. “None of this was supposed to happen.” Neil agreed silently. “Rebecca was a troubled girl,” Andy said, sounding full of regret. “More than anyone knew. But I loved her. You have no idea what she was capable of. The manipulation. When I found out about that poem in the yearbook, my heart almost stopped.
“She practically begged them to put her away in that place, though why she’d want to be locked up is beyond me. It was an insane request. Maybe the doctors were right. She was very sick.”
Bree spoke up. “You think Rebecca made it all up?”
“Oh, I’m sure she believed that I was guilty for all the bad things that happened to our family. But it’s only natural for children to blame their parents for their own problems.” This last sentence was like a knife to Neil’s gut, as if Andy had meant for it to hurt. He’d flung it so casually. Heartlessly. “Come on.” Andy nodded toward the door. “I’ll drive you home.”
Bree flinched. “You will?”
Andy sniffed, offended. “Your family is probably worried to death. Do you have another suggestion?”
Bree quickly shook her head. “No, sir.”
Outside, Neil marched silently next to Bree as Andy followed behind them dragging the poker through the dirt.
Neil did not believe they were going home. If Andy had intended to let them go, why had he brought the fireplace poker with him?
Maybe he’d simply forgotten he was holding it.
Andy had figured out what Rebecca had written in the yearbook. Daddy did it. That could have been what had tightened the screw. He’d come for her at Graylock during that long-ago storm to stop her from talking again. If he had no qualms disposing of his own stepdaughter, then what were his neighbors’ niece and nephew worth when it came to maintaining his illusion of innocence?
Unless he was being truthful and Rebecca had lied. Or maybe she’d gotten it wrong. Maybe she was confused, in life and in death?
Neil was kicking himself for not leaving a note before they’d left the house earlier that night. But then he wondered if a note would only have put the aunts and their father in danger when they inevitably came knocking on Andy’s door.
If Andy was innocent, he’d let them go. If not … they had to run. Now.
Neil grabbed his sister’s hand. Together they dashed into the wet bushes at the edge of the driveway, the darkness of the woods swallowing them whole.
THEY RAN, NEARLY BLIND. Mud and muck and leaves stuck to their clothes, creating a natural camouflage.
An occasional remnant of lightning lit the sky. The night made the seemingly endless woods treacherous. Low branches and tree roots reached out from both above and below trying to ensnarl them, as if nature itself were hungry for the taste of their blood. Still, the more distance Neil put between himself and Andy’s house, the better he felt.
Somewhere behind them, Andy called out. His deep bellow was familiar. Rebecca had remembered the sound of it for them back at the aunts’ house. Moments later, the truck’s engine rolled over, then groaned to life.
“The roads will be the first place he’ll look,” said Bree, struggling to catch her breath.
They splashed upon wet ground. Water
soaked their ankles. The sky lit up once more, and the island shined through the trees in the distance, its dark building appearing like a slumbering monster. The gravel path extended from the entrance and into the trees like a slobbering tongue.
“Once we reach the bridge,” Neil whispered, “we’ll find the way home through the woods.”
They circled around the edge of the lake, following the tall reeds that marked where the deeper water began. They listened closely to the sounds of the forest, rain dripping from leaves, the wind creaking branches above them. As Neil trudged along, he waited for the telltale sound of Andy’s boots splashing through the flood plain, but it never came.
When they were about halfway to the concrete bridge, he asked his sister if she’d shared the visions Rebecca had shown him in Andy’s parlor.
“It was so weird,” she answered, nodding. “It all happened so fast. Like a dream.” She wiped at her face. “I don’t understand why.”
“What do you mean?” Neil asked.
“I mean: Why would Rebecca show us all that and then leave us alone to deal with him?” Her voice quavered, growing almost too loud to be discreet. She caught herself and, whispering once more, added, “Is she trying to get us killed?”
Neil flinched. He hadn’t considered that.
Bree had said it herself a few days ago: Ghost stories were always sad. If Rebecca was lonely, what might she do to change that, to keep a couple of new friends to herself up here in Hedston? What if the visions she’d been sending them hadn’t merely been messages? What if her bread crumbs were meant to lead them directly into the wolf’s den? If so, her plan had worked so far.
“We can’t think about that right now,” said Neil. “Let’s get home.”
After hiking up a small incline, they reached the gravel path that led to the hospital. Beyond the chain-link fence that sagged across the path on their left, Graylock Hall waited, as if it had been expecting them to return for a permanent stay.
Shivering with a chill that went beyond dampness, beyond cold, Neil pointed across the road, deeper into the woods. “This way.”
Bree grabbed his arm. “What was that?”
Just then, a pair of headlights flashed on, blinding them. Several hundred feet to their right, Andy’s truck sat with its engine off.
Neil and Bree froze, unsure which way to go. With the lights illuminating a good portion of the forest, Andy would see whatever direction they ran. Any way they went, he’d be on them within seconds.
Neil thought about that sharp hook at the end of Andy’s fireplace poker. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Bree shudder. He suddenly had an idea — a dangerous idea, but it might have been their only option. “Come on,” he said. “If we make it to the water, we can swim out. Hide on the other side of the lake until we’re sure he’s gone.”
“What about the weeds? Isn’t that how Rebecca —”
“We’ll just have to be careful,” he interrupted. Bree groaned in protest. “We have no choice!”
Up the road, the truck’s engine roared to life, and the headlights lurched forward.
NEIL AND BREE LEAPT OFF THE ROAD and scurried down the incline, bypassing the chain-link fence, which towered high on the threshold of the bridge above them. When they reached the reeds in the shadows at the water’s edge, the bright lights went out and the engine died with a whimper. Somewhere in the darkness, they heard Andy curse — he obviously hadn’t meant for the truck to lose power.
The reeds were thick. Neil and Bree had to push hard through them. Mud sucked at their feet, trying unsuccessfully to hold them in place. Carefully, they made their way into the bog. The first wall of greenery closed behind them, hiding them from the possibility of Andy seeing them in the water.
Up on the road, they heard the truck door open. Footfalls scattered stones across the path. A crunching sound came down the incline toward the water’s edge. Andy had seen them descend.
Neil and Bree forced themselves forward, the water growing deeper, lapping at their waists now. Lily pads swirled all around them, long stalks entangling their legs. With every step, Neil found it harder to move. Just ahead of him, Bree bent down, trying to pull the plants away from her body.
Briefly, Neil imagined gray hands emerging from the water, grabbing his sister, and dragging her under. He quickly blinked the thought away.
Coming down this way was a mistake. There was no way they’d make it past this barrier toward the open water. They should have taken their chances back in the forest.
A loud whooshing noise slashed at the air behind them. Andy was using the poker to break through the reeds.
Straining forward, Neil couldn’t help but imagine how strange it would be to die in the same way as Rebecca. Remembering his frightening dreams, Neil thought with an odd giddiness, At least I already know what it’ll feel like. Pins, needles, and infinite darkness.
“Neil,” Bree whispered, bringing him back to reality, “I can’t.” She was stuck, her hands trapped below the surface.
“No,” he insisted, pushing at her shoulders. “Don’t stop.” To his horror, Neil watched Bree sway forward under his touch, rippling the water’s lily pad cover, as her feet sank in the muck.
But at the last moment, just before her head went under, something strange happened. Bree wrenched her arms up in front of herself and then jerked forward several feet toward Graylock Island. Neil saw his sister land with a groan on the steep shore. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought someone had pulled his sister to safety.
Another whack of the reeds came from close by. Andy was making his way quickly through the water behind him.
Neil tried to pick up his feet, but the harder he heaved, the more the mud sucked on his sneakers, as if it wanted him to stay put.
Something brushed his face. It felt soft. Fleshy. Neil nearly screamed. Then he heard a voice in his ear. “Shh.”
A dim shape appeared before him, reaching out as if from inside an impossible pocket of darkness near the shore. Five delicate fingers wavered slightly. A hand. It came closer. Neil gasped. When another splash sounded from the water behind him, he instinctively took hold of it.
A sharp, icy cold enclosed his wrist with surprising strength. Neil felt his breath being stolen from his lungs. Before he knew it, he was lying on the beach.
Speechless, Bree grabbed his arms and helped him to his feet. Dizzy with confusion, they sprinted up the small embankment together and found themselves standing amidst the rows of tall pines that lined the rocky path to the hospital.
Another slicing sound came from the water at the base of the bridge. Another curse. Andy was nearly at the opposite side of the small channel.
“Which way?” Bree said to Neil, glancing back toward the chain-link fence. Imagining what might happen if they got caught in its teeth, Neil shook his head.
Everything that happened that week had led to this moment, this decision whether or not to seek refuge in the empty asylum, to enter its shadows and hide from the man who had killed Rebecca Smith.
The ghost had wanted this to happen.
But, Neil wondered as he reluctantly turned with Bree to face Graylock Hall, can we trust her?
GRAVEL AND DIRT SPAT UP FROM THEIR SHOES as they splashed through sodden ground. Their wet clothes clung to their skin. The hailstones had mostly melted, and the sky that had created them was almost clear. A bright-white half-moon was coming up over the horizon ahead. Neil and Bree raced along the side of the building, past the boarded-up window where they’d first entered the hospital, toward the shattered patio at the other end of the island. Their ears pounded with sounds of their own making, so that by the time they reached that broken back door, they were both unsure if Andy had heard where they’d gone.
Standing on the concrete among the invasive weeds, Neil grabbed the handle of the door to the youth ward, feeling both panic and relief when it turned. Pulling the door open with a nearly imperceptible slowness, he managed to dampen the possibilit
y of squealing hinges until he’d opened a wide-enough gap for Bree to squeeze through. He followed her briskly onto the platform just inside, then just as slowly as before, he closed the door, wishing there was a way to lock it.
All they had left was a slight hope that they’d been quiet enough to escape. They only needed to hide in here until they were sure that Andy had given up. Gone home.
And then what?
Neil knew Andy wouldn’t stop there. What about Wesley and Eric? What about the aunts? No. He and Bree couldn’t merely hide. They needed to get back. To warn everyone else. To tell them what they’d learned.
Someone was walking outside the door. Heavy boots kicked gravel.
Neil’s heart sank. He imagined that fireplace poker reaching out for the doorknob, the hook catching hold.
Neil held the inside handle as tightly as he could, his palms slipping over the smooth metal. The door rattled. Bree took hold of the handle as well, leaning backward with all her weight. But it wasn’t enough. The door creaked slowly outward.
Through the slight crack that appeared, Andy peeked in at them. His eyes were wide, lifeless. Practically robotic. The man had a mission. He would not be talked out of it. Raising his top lip in a canine grimace, Andy threw his shoulder backward, yanking the door even farther open. Neil and Bree strained with every ounce of strength to simply hold on, and somehow, they managed to keep their feet just inside the jamb.
“I can’t,” said Bree, her strength fading.
“Let go,” Neil whispered. “On three.” He nodded and they released the door.
Andy stumbled backward.
They had only seconds to run.
The staircase led up to the youth ward’s common room and down to the mysterious depths of the boiler room. It wasn’t even a choice which direction they’d take.
At the top step, Neil and Bree slammed themselves against the cage gate. It swung wide and hit the wall. Behind them, the outside door yawned open too. Neil reached out and shut the cage as Andy burst through the entry onto the platform at the bottom of the stairwell. He glanced up at them, clutching the poker in both hands. Then he came, taking steps two at a time.
