The Haunting of Winchester Mansion Omnibus

by Clarke, Alexandria

  Music of the Night

  When I answered the front door, Ethan Powell smiled in greeting before his gaze wandered south to the ragged skin of my knees. His brows knitted together in worry.

  “Dear Lord. What happened to you, darlin’?”

  “Took a spill. Did you ring the doorbell?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “We thought it was broken.”

  As I waved Ethan inside, I caught a glimpse of myself in the hallway mirror. The woman staring back was unfamiliar. Gaunt. Drawn thin. As though an artist once known for graceful, unbroken brush strokes had used a cheap mechanical pencil instead.

  “Let me look at those knees,” said Ethan, leading me through the living room. “Thought I’d stop by and check out the house. See how you and Bodhi are coming along. Good thing I did. Look at that kitchen!”

  He gazed with wonder at the demolished wall between the kitchen and the living room, treading carefully amongst the debris.

  “Bodhi’s not finished,” I said. “Obviously.”

  “How long do you think it will be until it’s all done?”

  Ethan patted the countertop beside the kitchen sink. I hopped up, rolling the hem of my shorts away from the bloody mess as Ethan ran a clean dish towel beneath the steaming stream of tap water.

  “This is our biggest project yet,” I said. “Usually, it takes us anywhere from four to eight months to completely renovate a house, but who knows? We could be here for a good year.”

  He dabbed tenderly at my shredded skin, cleaning dirt and dust from the wounds. “How do you and Bodhi decide what to do with the renovations?”

  I sighed, massaging the bags beneath my eyes with the pads of the fingers. “Depends on what sells, the trends in the housing market, et cetera. Lots of research. Bodhi handles the construction side of things. I focus on design and real estate, so we don’t clash often.”

  Ethan wiped off my shins methodically. Professionally. Perhaps he’d dealt with similar injuries at the saw mill. Perhaps he’d dealt with worse.

  “That’s lucky,” he said. “You got a first-aid kit, Bailey? These knees are going to need some bandages.”

  “Under the sink.”

  He fished around in the kit, extracting a roll of gauze and a tube of antibacterial ointment. In a few minutes, he’d expertly wrapped my knees in the clean white bandages. As he rinsed off the bloodstained dish towel in the sink, he gestured to where my left hand rested on the countertop. “Whatcha got there?”

  The leather journal was pinned beneath my fingers. I had carried it like a torch from the basement, taking comfort in the texture of its weathered cover. I showed it to Ethan. “Someone’s journal. I found a bunch of them in one of the upstairs bedrooms.”

  Ethan patted his palms dry on the thighs of his jeans. “May I?”

  “Sure.”

  He flipped through the first few pages of the diary, his beard bristling as he combed the contents, then shut it swiftly. “Hmm.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s Caroline’s personal diary.”

  “The Winchesters’ daughter?”

  “Surely,” he confirmed. “I can’t say I feel comfortable reading them. It’s an invasion of privacy. You said there were quite a few of them?”

  “I found a whole stack of them in the window seat of her old bedroom.”

  “I can take them,” Ethan offered, tucking the journal into the back pocket of his jeans. “I’m sure you’re uncomfortable with them in the house. Besides, the library might be interested in preserving them. History of the town, you know?”

  “Actually,” I said, levering myself off the counter. My knees ached as I planted myself between Ethan and the staircase, blocking him from the path to Caroline’s bedroom. “I’m going to hold on to them for a while longer.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “Because I respect that this house belonged to someone else before we got to it,” I said, holding my hand out for the journal. “And—I don’t know—I feel connected to the Winchesters somehow. It might be interesting to see what life was like from the perspective of one of Black Bay’s most prominent residents.”

  Ethan, somewhat reluctantly, handed over the journal. “I suppose that’s admirable.”

  “Don’t worry, Ethan. The library can have them when I’m done.”

  In the inside flap of the journal, Caroline had signed her name in neat, loopy cursive. Beside that was a to/from date. This particular diary detailed Caroline’s inner catalogue of thoughts from January of 1995.

  “I know Patrick was the golden boy, but what about Caroline?” I asked Ethan. “What do you know about her?”

  Ethan straightened out his blue collared shirt and sat down on an overturned cabinet that Bodhi had been using as a saw table. “She was precocious. Fifteen years old and only a year behind Patrick in school. She was as smart as a whip and headed for the Ivy Leagues.”

  “I noticed her bookshelf.”

  “Intimidating, wasn’t she?”

  “To say the least,” I said, recalling Caroline’s copy of The Ethics of Ambiguity. “I don’t think I even knew who half of those authors were when I was fifteen. I was still reading young adult fiction.”

  “I think Christopher and Elizabeth had always expected Patrick to take over the family business,” said Ethan. “And then Caroline declared that she would be the one to learn the tricks of the trade. Somehow, I don’t think Patrick minded.”

  “What did her parents think of that?”

  Ethan stroked his beard. “I think they were thankful to have two healthy, intelligent children who both had a passion for something productive. They were proud of Patrick and Caroline. A football star and an intellectual prodigy, both on their way to bigger and better things. How could a parent complain?”

  “I certainly wouldn’t.”

  The rumble of an engine outside disrupted our conversation. Raucous voices filled the air as Bodhi and his crew pulled up in the workman’s truck we had borrowed from someone in town. They piled in through the front door, carrying takeout containers from the Sanctuary and other restaurants. Bodhi chatted boisterously with a few of the other men, a half-eaten hamburger cradled in one hand. As he took another bite, he noticed me and Ethan in the kitchen.

  “What’s going on?” he asked through a full mouth. He looked at my bandaged knees. “What happened to you?”

  “She fell,” Ethan answered, saving me from having to explain my nightmarish basement adventure. “Nothing major. Got her all patched up.”

  But that didn’t stop Bodhi from leading me down the hallway, out of earshot of Ethan and the rest of the crew. I rested against the basement door, my mind wandering to the bottom of those stairs where my blood now decorated the concrete slab.

  Bodhi forgot about his hamburger. It idled wistfully between his clenched fingers, dripping some kind of pepper sauce onto the hardwood floor.

  “What happened?” Bodhi asked again. “Are you all right?”

  “I fell, like Ethan said. I’m fine.”

  In actuality, the skin of my knees already felt stiff as it began the process of scabbing over, and if the dull ache was any indication, I’d wake up the next day with a colorful array of bruises.

  “Where?” Bodhi demanded. “How?”

  “Don’t worry about it.” The scent of the burger wafted up between us. My stomach growled. I hadn’t eaten at all that day. “Did you happen to pick up lunch for me?”

  A sheepish expression crossed Bodhi’s face. “No. I’m sorry. Honestly, I got caught up with the guys.”

  “They seem like a good group.”

  “They are.” He offered me the rest of his burger. “Want this?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “I’ll eat the pickles.”

  We performed a familiar choreography, Bodhi dislodging the pickles from the bun before trading the burger off to me. The sour taste of dill lingered. I crinkled my nose as I chewed. Bodhi almost smiled.

  “Do y
ou mind if I chip in today?” I asked him. “I need a distraction.”

  Bodhi hesitated. “I don’t think that’s the best idea.”

  “Bodhi, come on.”

  “Do you not remember slicing your thumb off? Or the hair incident?”

  I fingered my shorn locks, cropped short around my chin. I wore it that length for a reason, ever since I’d found myself on the wrong end of a blowtorch. “That was years ago.”

  “Still.”

  “You act like I’m incompetent.”

  “I know you aren’t incompetent,” he countered. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt. You should rest anyway.”

  “I want to work,” I insisted. I wanted to knock down a wall or jimmy up tiles or even transport loads of garbage out to the dumpster. Anything was better than dwelling in the recesses of my own thoughts.

  “Look at your knees, Bailey. Not today.”

  “Seriously? You can’t tell me what to do.”

  Bodhi crossed his arms. “I wouldn’t take that bet.”

  I shoved the burger into his chest, splattering his shirt with pepper sauce, and stormed off. In the kitchen, the construction crew still rowdily devoured their lunches. Someone had offered Ethan a chicken sandwich, which he munched heartily between anecdotes. They quieted as I passed, the conversation dying like a candle flame on a windy night. Had Bodhi confided in them? How much did they know?

  “Bailey—” began Ethan, but I plowed through the workmen, kicked open the back door, and emerged onto the gray wooden deck outside.

  I didn’t pause to marvel at the blanket of clouds that encompassed the sky. It matched my mood, and I marched through the wilderness of the backyard without a specific location in mind. I only knew that I had to get away from Bodhi and the Winchester house. At the edge of the garden, as I plunged through the overgrown weeds, I ran straight into Milo.

  “Ooph!”

  “Whoa there.” He held me by the shoulders to steady me. Today, he wore a blue-and-white striped nautical shirt. A captain’s hat balanced jauntily on his head, as though he had planned on spending the day on a boat in the bay with everyone else. “Everything okay?”

  I shook him off. “Why does everyone keep asking me that?”

  “Maybe because you’re making that face.”

  “What face?”

  “With the crinkle.”

  I smacked a palm to my forehead in an attempt to hide the crinkle. “There’s no crinkle. What are you doing here, Milo?”

  “It’s a small town, Bailey,” Milo said. He tipped his hat, swept his unruly hair back, and trapped it again beneath his headwear. “And you’re forgetting my indifference toward most of Black Bay’s population. You, though. You, I like. I thought I’d ask what you were up to.”

  “Nothing, apparently.”

  “You’re bleeding.”

  I looked down. Sure enough, the gauze around my knees was already discolored. Milo took me by the elbow, guiding me to the smooth surface of a nearby tree trunk.

  “Sit,” he said. It wasn’t an order, but it didn’t seem like I had much of an option to resist either. I sat. Milo knelt down and began to rearrange my bandages to cover more skin.

  “Aren’t you going to ask me what happened?”

  “I figured if you wanted to tell me, you already would have.”

  “Milo, please pass that nugget of wisdom on to my husband.”

  Though my view mostly consisted of the top of Milo’s head, I saw his cheeks plump up in a smile. “Not sure it would help. I was never much of a relationship guy.”

  “Why not?”

  “You may not have noticed, but I’m a bit of a loner.”

  I had noticed. Milo wasn’t exaggerating when he said he never went into town. The people of Black Bay didn’t even know what he looked like. His Walden-esque existence warred with his handsome smile and amiable personality. To me, Milo looked and acted like a guy who would’ve been popular and adored in high school, especially in Black Bay.

  “Did you have an argument with Bodhi or something?” he asked, helping me to my feet.

  I gingerly tested my weight on each leg. “Of sorts.”

  “I don’t mean to pry,” Milo said. He extended an arm for me to balance on as I checked his handiwork. “But the two of you don’t seem like you’re entirely on the same page. Or am I reading that incorrectly?”

  It became evident that Milo did not care to keep up with Flipping Out. If he did, he would be solidly convinced that Bodhi and I were ensconced in a blissful life of love and construction. There was a metaphor in there somewhere, one that I’d exploited regularly online, but Milo wasn’t falling for it. I considered shutting him down. There was no point in confiding in a temporary someone. On the other hand, I boiled over with the hot turmoil of my mental state in the thick silence between me and Bodhi so often that maybe talking about it with someone else was exactly what I needed.

  “Bodhi and I,” I began. Separate. There was no “we” anymore. Or at least it didn’t feel like there was. “—were perfect. Were. Past tense. Honestly, as soon as I met him, I felt at ease. It was like that at first. Easy.” Milo lowered himself to sit on the tree stump as he listened. I paced back and forth, carving a pattern of footprints in the earth. “We went everywhere. We did everything. I don’t have a lot of family, and neither does he. We bonded over that. We became each other’s family. Did I ever tell you that we got married six months after we met each other?”

  “No, you didn’t,” Milo said softly.

  “I just knew,” I declared. “I knew it was him. No doubt. It wasn’t hard to believe in the concept of soulmates then. We got married in Nepal.”

  “Exotic.”

  “And then we got married again in the States because the ceremony in Nepal didn’t officially count.”

  Milo laughed. “It sounds like the two of you had quite the adventure.”

  “We did,” I said. I snapped a branch off of the nearest tree and swung it through the air like a director’s baton. “We had a ton of adventures, one right after the next. We surfed big waves, white-water rafted, climbed mountains, explored ancient ruins. You said you wanted to go to Machu Picchu, right? I’ve been there.”

  “Wow. How was it?”

  “Magical. Like everything else we did.”

  “Past tense?”

  I nodded sadly. “Past tense.”

  “What happened?”

  “I got pregnant.”

  Milo’s eyebrows shifted upward in surprise. “Oh.”

  “It was unexpected,” I blathered, circling around a tree Singing in the Rain style with the jagged stick as my umbrella. “We were young still. Or we felt young anyway. I was twenty-five. We had a decision to make.”

  “Did you—?”

  “No,” I replied sharply. The twig snapped. I’d been bending it at an extreme angle without realizing it. I threw the pieces to the ground. “We had a daughter.”

  Milo must’ve sensed that he was venturing into dangerous territory because his voice barely rose above a whisper as he asked, “What was her name?”

  My throat tightened. I hadn’t said it in so long. “It was Kali.”

  “Past tense?”

  “Past tense.”

  I made the mistake of looking at Milo. His eyes had darkened with a sorrowful understanding. I looked away.

  “It’s ironic really,” I said with a choked laugh. “I thought the name was pretty, but Bodhi warned me not to call her that. Kali was the Hindu goddess of destruction, and my God, was our Kali a destroyer herself.”

  Milo waited patiently for the other shoe to drop. I dropped it.

  “She was three when she died.”

  There was a shine in Milo’s eyes now, his lips pressed tightly together.

  “It was an accident,” I plowed on, determined to get through my story. “One that could’ve been prevented. Bodhi blames me. I blame Bodhi. Things are easier that way, you know? If there’s someone to take the blame.”

 
“Did you see someone? You know, did you talk to anyone?”

  “We went to therapy together,” I said. “It didn’t help much. Bodhi wouldn’t talk, not even to me. He internalized everything. That was when I knew things were going to change. He used to never shut up.”

  “That’s why the two of you seem so distant.”

  “I don’t remember the last time I had a genuine conversation with him.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Me, too,” I mumbled, wiping my eyes with the collar of my shirt. “Me, too.”

  It was the soft melody of piano music that woke me from my slumber that night. I pinched myself hard enough to bruise the tender flesh of my inner arm just to make sure that I wasn’t dreaming again. Nothing happened. All was at peace in the master bedroom. The French doors remained closed, the baby mobile was hidden away in the closet, and the light of the moon tickled the cozy carpet. Still, the music drew me out from under the bedsheets like an enchantress in the night.

  I padded down the steps to the first floor. We had moved everything that we hadn’t sold from the living room to the office near the rear of the house. I followed the gentle peal of piano notes down the hallway, lingering outside the closed door of the office to listen. Then I twisted the doorknob and peeked inside.

  The music petered off as soon as I opened the door, yet another illustration of my woefully scant sanity. The piano waited beneath the moonlight of the window, its keys unmoving. Tired and sad, I wandered over to it. The music was so beautiful. I wished that it had continued to play. I rested my finger on the middle C key then pressed down. It was still out of tune. There was no possibility of this piano producing such a lovely song.

  I sighed, running my fingers along the length of the keys. Near the bass end, something warm and wet met my wandering touch. I examined my fingers, squinting in the pale light of the moon to see what coated them.

  It was blood.

  A loud creaking noise caused me to whirl around. The grandfather clock teetered forward, balancing for a moment on its front edge before crashing to the floor with a boom. The glass pane shattered. At the same time, the piano bench slid out, sweeping my legs out from under me. I landed with a grunt, banging my head against a spare dining room chair. My vision swam as a folder of sheet music launched itself into the air. Pages swirled around me like a tornado, filling the room with crescendos and codas. I gripped the piano bench, desperate to hold on to something real. A small, shadowy figure stood in the open doorway of the office. Watching me.