I was actually looking forward to this week’s outing too. Miss Watson scolded me for finishing the summer reading list for the upcoming seniors instead of the juniors. I told her I’d already read the juniors’ list last summer. To make matters worse, Alex walked right by me in the lunchroom without a passing glance. So much for getting noticed for something other than my staggering wit this year.
The point is that it would have been nice to get my mind off of everything out on the water. Instead, while Mom and Dad get to gallivant about on their own, I have to spend my Friday night alone in the house with Patrick. He always orders anchovies on the pizza. It’s disgusting. In fact, I might tie him down if he tries it tonight. Details to come.
Caroline’s account of that evening conflicted with the story that the town told. If she and Patrick were grounded that night, it meant they had never boarded their parents’ sailboat. It meant that they never died in the accident that night. It meant that they spent their Friday evening safe and sound within the comfort of their big, empty house. But if that were true, where were the Winchester children now?
“All we have is leftover pizza from Lido’s,” Bodhi announced as he reappeared in the bedroom. He carried a mug of hot tea and a paper plate piled high with pizza. “I hope that’s okay. If you want, I can run into town and pick up some soup.”
“Pizza’s fine. Any problems downstairs?”
“Not a whisper of our visitor. I even checked the basement. I think she’s taking that deal of yours to heart.”
I sipped from the mug. Bodhi had made some kind of turmeric and ginger tea. It tasted foul, but I knew from experience it would help with the inflammation in my body. I offered him Caroline’s journal. “Bodhi, will you read this?”
He skimmed through the last entry. “This is what you were talking about earlier. Caroline and Patrick never got on the boat, right?”
“Not according to Caroline.”
“So what does it mean?”
I folded a slice of pizza in half and took a bite. Grease dripped from the crust, pooling on the paper plate below. “Do you think they might still be alive?”
“The kids?”
“Yeah.”
Bodhi scratched the back of his neck, thoughtful. “I’m not sure. I mean, that would make sense, wouldn’t it? If they didn’t die in a boat crash, then they should be alive. But if they are, then why does an entire town think they’re both dead?”
I tapped Caroline’s journal. “What if that’s what the house is trying to tell us? The ghost or whatever is what led me to Caroline’s diaries in the first place. What if Patrick and Caroline are still alive? Maybe they’re in trouble, and we’re meant to rescue them.”
Bodhi’s gaze softened as he rested a hand over mine. “Bailey, if they are still alive, you have to remember they’re not kids anymore. They’d be able to take care of themselves.”
“I’m not so sure.”
“Maybe Caroline didn’t write everything down,” suggested Bodhi. He snuck a piece of sausage from my plate and popped it into his mouth. “You never know. Their parents could have changed their minds about grounding them. Maybe they ended up on the boat anyway.”
“I guess that’s a possibility.”
“It’s more likely than the Winchester children wandering around with amnesia for twenty years,” Bodhi answered.
The pizza was less appetizing than I’d hoped. I set it down and dusted my hands off. “I just have a hunch that something else happened to them.”
“A hunch?”
“I know it sounds strange,” I said. “And I don’t mean to scare you or anything, but I feel connected to this house somehow. It’s nothing concrete. It’s something intuitive.”
“And you felt this as soon as we got here?”
“Maybe. I don’t think I knew what it was at first.”
He sprawled across the foot of the bed, carefully avoiding my broken ankle. “We’ll figure it out. We have to now.”
“What do you mean?”
He gave me a look before playfully squeezing the big toe of my uninjured foot. “You sold us out to a ghost, remember?”
12
A Trick of the Light
For the first time in a number of years, Bodhi and I willingly slept in the same bed that night. For so long, we had had trouble sharing intimate space. It wasn’t that we were repulsed by each other. Our marriage hadn’t inexplicably crumbled due to lack of interest. It was that we had more in common with the Winchesters than expected. We, too, had experienced a run-in with death. Five years ago, we lost our three-year-old daughter. Kali’s absence took its toll on our relationship. I couldn’t look at Bodhi without seeing her dark curls. He couldn’t look at me without seeing her hazel eyes. She had been all the best parts of us, and when she died, she had taken those parts to the afterlife with her. Bodhi and I had emptied ourselves out. We had nothing left to give to one another. The knowledge of that became unbearable in the hushed space between us, where our bodies no longer connected and the sheets remained cold and unforgiving. It was easier to avoid each other. It was easier to sleep apart. That way, when my nightmares came, only one of us suffered through them.
So when Bodhi returned from the bathroom, still damp from his shower, it was with some hesitation that he slipped in under the quilt. We breathed together, side by side. I stared at the ceiling of the small room. The master bedroom had been massive, and even at night, it was illuminated, the moon smiling in through the windows of the French doors. Bodhi’s room was smaller and darker. Snug and private. Maybe that was why I found the courage to sneak my fingers across the distance between us. To rest them lightly on his warm skin. Everything was easier in the dark.
His fingers intertwined with mine, rustling the bandages around my palm. We stayed like that for a while, clutching at each other. Then Bodhi turned on his side to face me. Before I lost my nerve, I shifted. Haltingly, I scooted closer to him, dipping my body to fit in the valley of his. His hand found my hip and then my waist before he draped his arm firmly around my midsection and hugged me toward him. His lips brushed against the back of my neck.
I tangled my legs in his, ignoring the plaster cast around my ankle. His heartbeat thumped unevenly against my spine. There, in the middle of the bed rather than on a designated side, I felt the familiar pull of unconsciousness and slipped comfortably into it as though greeting an old friend.
Everything was dark. Icy. Hopeless. The crushing weight of water held me down. I struggled, flailing my arms to find the surface. My chest burned with the effort of holding my breath. I couldn’t do it anymore. I inhaled. The bitter chill of freezing cold saltwater filled my lungs.
“Bailey! Bailey!”
I woke in a frenzy, drenched in sweat. Bodhi sat above me, his knees trapping my hips. He held my hands to the mattress, but as soon as he realized that I was awake, he let go. I gasped for breath, massaging my throat.
“It’s all right,” Bodhi said as he shifted his weight off of me. “You’re all right, Bailey. It was just a dream.”
“What happened?” I rasped.
He gently removed my hands from my throat, lifting my chin to check if I had done any damage to myself. “You were thrashing around like someone was trying to kill you.”
“I was drowning.”
He went still. Normally, I didn’t share the details of my nightmares with him. “You were asleep,” he reminded me. “You wouldn’t stop kicking me. That’s why I was holding you down.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. It’s not your fault. Sit up.”
I obeyed, letting Bodhi strip the damp T-shirt from my body. He replaced it with a fresh one of his own, carefully navigating my bandaged hand through the sleeves.
“Better?”
I nodded. The cool dry cotton soothed my flushed skin. Bodhi slipped off the bed.
“I’ll get you a glass of ice water.”
“No.” I took his hand in mine and pulled him back to bed, k
icking the quilt off of my feet in the process. If he went downstairs now, increasing the distance between us, there was a good chance we would never get back to how we had fallen asleep. “Stay. Please stay.”
He curled up next to me, holding my hand. His voice was already thick with drowsiness. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. What time is it?”
Bodhi checked the nearby clock, its numbers casting a green glow across the bedside table. “Five o’clock. The sun won’t be up for another couple of hours. You still have time to sleep.”
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled again, hugging a pillow to my chest.
I was already asleep when he replied, “I’m sorry, too.”
I woke alone in Bodhi’s bed, squinting in the bright light of the morning sun. Outside, deep voices shouted to one another. Some kind of hammering was happening on the roof. Bodhi had called the construction crew to resume renovation work on the Winchester house.
I got out of bed, maneuvered a pair of shorts on over my booted foot, and headed downstairs. I found Bodhi in the kitchen, sipping coffee as he fielded instructions to the crewmen through a walkie-talkie. Behind him, a skillet sizzled on the stovetop, and the sweet scent of real maple syrup filled the air.
“Hey there,” he said with a smile when he saw me in the doorway. “I’ve been waiting on you.”
“You have?”
“Yeah, I wanted to make sure you were okay before I went outside to help the guys,” he said. He pointed to my bare feet. “Put your shoes on. The crew has been trekking through here all morning. I’m sure they dragged in a whole bunch of crap, and I don’t want you to get a nail in your foot or something.”
I raised my booted ankle. “Shouldn’t be a problem with this foot,” I said jokingly. Nevertheless, I slid my unguarded foot into one of the flip-flops at the bottom of the stairs.
“I made breakfast,” he said, brandishing a frying pan full of eggs. “Would you like some?”
Before I knew it, I was reclining on a deck chair in the front yard, balancing a plate of blueberry pancakes and scrambled eggs on my lap, and watching Bodhi and the crew fix leaks in the roof. I mopped up a puddle of maple syrup. I’d forgotten how good of a cook Bodhi was. In the early stages of our relationship, he impressed me with everything from roast duck to chocolate soufflé, but just like everything else, he stopped cooking when Kali died. We relied on bakeries or cold donuts for breakfast nowadays, and it was a refreshing change to wake up to Bodhi’s famous pancakes once more.
Caroline’s journals kept me company that morning. I read through her older entries, trying to glean additional information about the Winchester children. One particular passage caught my eye.
January 12th, 1995
Far be it from me to downplay the melancholia of a funeral, but can I just say how good Alex looks in a suit? For a guy who says he’s most comfortable in a football jersey or boat shoes, he sure can pull off a three-piece. It was tailored too! He didn’t swim around in it like most teenaged boys do. Mom has to practically drag Patrick to the tailor for his clothes. He says it’s a waste of time. Sometimes I wonder how he and Alex ended up as best friends. Teaching me how to throw a football would clearly be a superior use of Alex’s time. I already know how to throw a football of course—Patrick taught me—but for Alex, I would happily feign ignorance.
Anyway, other than Alex’s irrefutable virility, today remains regrettably morose. I liked Mr. Powell Senior. He always answered my questions about running his own business, no matter how many times Dad told me to stop pestering him. Once, he even let me try smoking a cigar. It was disgusting and I may have forsaken a lung, but that’s not the point. Dad would never have let me done something like that just for the experience. Mr. Powell Senior was a good guy. Why do the good guys always have to go so early?
Mr. Powell Junior keeps trying to get me to call him by his first name. Even today, when my mom made me offer him my condolences, he said, “Call me Ethan, darlin’. Mr. Powell was my father.” And then he dissolved into a puddle of tears. I feel bad for him, even if he does like Patrick better than me. He’s supposed to run the lumber mill all on his own now. Dad offered to help, of course. He’s been working wonders with the other businesses in town, but Mr. Powell Junior adamantly refuses every time.
The wake is at our house since everyone in town wanted to come and the only place big enough to hold everyone in town is here. It’s all still going on, and even though Patrick pilfered a bottle of Mom’s most expensive champagne, and I could be up on the widow’s walk with them watching Alex’s priceless attempts to chug said champagne without cringing, I just couldn’t be with people anymore. I’ve seen enough tear-streaked faces, enough black suits and dresses. I stole a cigar from Dad’s desk drawer to smoke in Mr. Powell Senior’s honor. I haven’t brought myself to light it yet, but keeping it in my mouth as I write seems just as good as puffing away at it. Plus, you know, cancer. Anyway. To Mr. Powell Senior. If I were wearing a hat, I’d tip it to you. May your afterlife be as loving and as caring as your former one.
“Good morning, Bailey!”
A shadow came over the journals, darkening the pages. Ethan Powell himself had approached my chair from behind. He was a stout, brawny man with a full head of luscious gray hair and an ample beard to match. Today, he wore a polo shirt with the name of his lumber mill embroidered across the pocket, jeans that looked thin in the knees, and a pair of steel-toed boots. His blue-gray eyes twinkled in the sunlight as he smiled down at me. I smiled back. Ethan was the unofficial mayor of Black Bay. The locals went to him for everything from simple advice on how to naturally remove a tick from a dog’s coat to heavier subjects such as possible unemployment and coping with loss. Ethan covered it all, treating everyone with warmth and respect. As such, I closed Caroline’s diary, unsure if Ethan had seen what was written on the page or not. It wasn’t my place to dredge up old memories.
“Hi, Ethan. How are you?”
One massive hand came up to shield his eyes from the sun. “I’m swell, thank you very much. Whatcha got there?”
I waved Caroline’s journal. Ethan already knew about my discovery. The day I’d unearthed Caroline’s journals from their hiding spot in her old bedroom, Ethan and I had discussed the possibility of donating them to the local library to further preserve Caroline’s personality for the rest of Black Bay to appreciate. For some reason, I didn’t like the idea of letting go of her journals just yet.
Ethan’s beard bristled. “Still reading those, eh? Anything good?”
I debated whether or not to ask Ethan about his father. In the short time that I’d known him, he had never mentioned his family or that he had inherited the lumber mill from his father. I casually glanced at his left hand. No wedding band on his ring finger either. These days, that didn’t mean much. The gold band on my own finger was enough proof of that. No matter how far Bodhi and I drifted apart, the ring remained as a reminder that we were going back on our promises to each other. Still, Black Bay was born out of tradition. It was inhabited by generations of families that had lived here for years. Ethan was a successful business owner, and he was the heart of the town, so why had he never married?
“Not really,” I said, nonchalantly casting the journal aside. I decided against asking Ethan about his dad. There was nothing to be gained in reopening old wounds. Caroline provided enough information. Apparently, the former Mr. Powell was just as adored back then as Ethan was now. “She mostly complains about her brother and talks about her high school crush. Teenaged girl stuff, you know?”
Ethan chuckled, bracing his hands on his belt. “Afraid I don’t.”
“Take my word for it,” I said. “It’s all nail polish and pillow fights and the occasional rousing game of Truth or Dare.”
“Sounds like fun.” He tapped the cast on my foot. “Riddle me this, Bailey. How is it that it’s been less than twenty-four hours since I’ve seen you last and you’ve somehow managed to go and break a foot between now and then?”
>
“It turns out the basement stairs are particularly tricky,” I explained. Once again, it was a half-truth, but half-truths were easier to keep up with than a plethora of lies. “It’s only fractured though.”
Ethan shifted nervously from one boot to the other. “And, uh, what about your ‘friend?’”
I feigned ignorance. “My friend?”
“Yesterday, you and Bodhi told me a ghost chased you out of the house, remember?”
I smacked my forehead as if suddenly recalling the conversation. “Right! Of course. No, I think your advice was on par for that one, Ethan. We just needed a good night’s sleep.”
“Really?” asked Ethan. “But you said—”
“I’m so glad you suggested I go see Dr. Marx,” I interrupted. Dr. Marx was Black Bay’s one and only psychiatrist, and while my ghastly nightmares were more than enough reason to pay her a visit, it wasn’t until the Winchester house really spooked me that I went to see her. “She’s clearing up a lot of stuff for me. It helps to talk it out, you know?”
Ethan knelt next to me so that I didn’t have to squint into the sun to see him, leaning over the arm of my chair. “I absolutely agree. I’m glad you’re on the road to recovery. It just seems a little rushed to me.”
“Rushed?”
“Bailey, you were convinced that your house was haunted.”
I moved away from Ethan. The paper plate of pancake crumbs tipped to the ground, and a rogue blueberry rolled through the dirt. “Ethan, I’m confused. Did you want me to continue thinking that ghosts exist? Should I call Mystery Inc.?”
“No, Scooby-Doo can rest easy,” Ethan assured me. “I just wanted to make sure that you and Bodhi were all right. What about him? How’s he doing?”
I looked up to where Bodhi crouched on the roof, grateful for the change of subject. Perhaps comparing the situation in the Winchester house to the ridiculousness of a children’s cartoon had finally convinced Ethan to let it go. Bodhi and I decided that the best course of action would be to keep everyone else in Black Bay ignorant of our spiritual problem. After all, there was a fine line between small town charm and legitimate insanity.
The Haunting of Winchester Mansion Omnibus Page 12
