Grave Refrain: A Love/Ghost Story

by Glover, Sarah M.

  Through the blinding rain she saw it. Set not far off was the cemetery. Old gravestones jutted from the ground like macabre decorations, bowing in supplication around a central mausoleum. The name “Belden” was chiseled into the cold dead stone. Beyond that stood a farmhouse that had fallen into ruin.

  She circled the cemetery, desperate to find a clue. Shoving her hair from her eyes, she attempted to find a wall, or anything that would show her where Nick was buried. Pulling Andrew’s coat around her body, she searched and searched for what felt like hours. Nothing, she could find nothing. Nearly hopeless, she thought of clawing at the soil to unearth a hidden grave with her bare hands. Nick, where are you?

  Yet how much longer could she risk being here? She fell down on her knees in exhaustion and muttered aloud the lines of the poem, the rain lashing in her mouth. “I dwell in a lonely house I know, I dwell in a lonely house I know…in a lonely house.”

  The house—she had to search inside the house, not look for a grave! Trudging through the downpour, she staggered blindly to the imposing outline of the old farmhouse. She stopped dead. Shouting, she heard shouting. Pure fear, like a white hot strangulation, gripped her. She couldn’t move. How, how could he have found her so soon? No! She had to hide. Mired in the grip of viscous mud she struggled to free her feet, looking around wildly in panic, desperate for a place to run. The barn.

  Dashing to the faded red door, she shoved it open with her shoulder; it moved silently despite its battered appearance. Inside, the sweet scent of hay hit her. Its warmth enveloped her.

  Her breath rose up in wisps in the dim light as she wrenched the door back into place. In the shadowy light she saw the rafters of the barn rise up like a cathedral, the missing slates in the roof sending beams of gray down to the hay-strewn floor. The barn was empty; there was nowhere she could conceal herself where he couldn’t find her.

  Swallowing down her fear, her gaze whipped up high to the rafters, and there she spotted it—a loft with a window. If she could reach it, she could conceal herself under the hay and then escape out the back. But she had no time—the cries were coming closer by the second.

  “Emily!” She knew that sound. Her knees wavered, and she struggled to stand.

  “Emily!” Andrew screamed in fury now. The sound unleashed her visions: him hunting her, the earth giving way on the cliffs, his hands gripping her throat.

  Trapped in the back corner, she panicked. She had to run. Just then her foot hit against a ring on the barn floor. In one last desperate attempt, her hands swept away the hay and she saw the outlines of a door. She yanked on the ring and the door creaked open. Below was a hole no bigger than a coffin—a storage bin at one time. She didn’t have time to think. The shouting had almost reached the barn door.

  Dragging her satchel, she shimmied down into the space and lowered the door shut with a resounding click, sealing herself in. The wood was inches away from her face, and the scent of mold and decay permeated the earth around her. Her eyes widened, fighting to adjust to the pitch blackness. The suffocating confines forced her to lie flat on her back, cramped, with her hands clutched over her heart.

  Thundering footfalls erupted from above. She could hear the mad dashing of two sets of feet running across the floor. Her throat choked, and her eyes burned from the dirt dislodged around her. She fought back the urge to cough, slamming her hands over her face.

  “She’s not here,” panted Simon, out of breath.

  “No! She’s here, I know she is. Her footprints—we saw her footprints!” cried Andrew, his own footsteps circling the room. Emily’s hands shriveled into fists, and her eyes clenched tight.

  “Those could have been anyone’s footprints, Andrew. This is where those blokes are going to have their party tomorrow night, yeah? Lots of people come up here.”

  “No, they’re hers. I know—”

  “Margot said her stuff wasn’t at the cottage. Dwayne and the guys didn’t spot her in Mendocino. Maybe she’s on her way back to San Francisco. Maybe this was all too much for her to take? I’ll call your mum and send her over to the house to wait for her—”

  “No! She’s running. She’s running from me. Don’t you see that? She thinks it’s all true!”

  Andrew’s pacing pounded the boards.

  “Then why the hell would she come here if she’s running? We know she’s in the minivan. Let’s have the cops track her down. Claim it’s a stolen vehicle.”

  Emily breathed a fraction, thankful that they had not spotted the minivan where she’d hidden it off the road.

  “You don’t understand!” Andrew shouted back. “She’d come here—to find Nick. She has the key and Nora’s ashes. She has everything she needs to reunite them. She doesn’t give up on things…Oh bloody hell, I…I could kill her for this!”

  “Might want to keep that to yourself,” Simon muttered, before he reasoned more loudly, “Hans said we could have his car for a few hours—which personally I think is a miracle after the way you were threatening him with dismemberment—but regardless, let’s phone the police, get an APB out on her or whatever they call it, get ourselves another rental, and then sit down and make a plan.”

  “Listen to me! We have to find her! She’s going to disappear, I know it. I can feel it. And Christ, she’s alone, and she’s probably terrified to death. You know how she is…she believes everything, every bloody thing. If we don’t find her now—”

  “Calm the hell down.”

  “You were there; you heard her. You saw Emily’s face. Did you see the horror in her eyes? She believed it. Oh God. Fuck. What if it is true…?”

  The pacing ceased. Heavy, labored breaths were the only sound. “That ghost knew everything about me. Everything. How the hell could she have known that? I just…I don’t trust myself anymore. I’m so fucking angry. I…I can’t control it. Control myself…this hatred…There’s something wrong with me. That monster was right—there’s always been something wrong with me.”

  “Andrew. You don’t believe that shit, do you? I mean really believe it?” Simon asked, his voice suddenly serious. “You’re not a killer, man. You’re just not. But you need to stay away from Emily. Don’t look at me like that, you need to get out. This shit is wrong, don’t you see it? The girl’s been nothing but a nightmare of trouble since you met her. Get yourself out of here while you still can.”

  Andrew laughed, bitterness lacing his voice. “Get out while I still can, Simon? I don’t know if you’ve been paying attention or not, but I don’t think there’s any going back. And you know I can’t live without Emily. I’ve spent my life trying to find her. She’s my muse.”

  “I know.”

  “Don’t you fucking care?”

  “I care about you. The rest can go to hell.”

  Andrew made no response. Emily could picture how he looked standing there, his skin flushed, his lips cold and blue from the freezing rain. Her heart beat so loudly, hammering against her ribs and through to her spine, that she swore he must be able to hear it. Sweat beaded on her face. The air was getting thinner and thinner in the blackness.

  “We’ll go back to town and call the girls,” Simon said, his voice muted but no less uncompromising. “She’s not here. We better move. Come on, Paulie, you have to go.”

  Reluctantly, the weighted footsteps moved away from where Emily lay. They moved to the door, moved to the gravel, moved to the sloping hillside. Moved—away. Silence claimed the space once again, and she listened to the last faraway sounds fade to nothingness. She pressed her hand to the wood above her. Tears streaked silently down her cheeks, burning the sides of her face before falling into her hair.

  Was this how the dead felt, left in the earth to hear but never speak? To reach but never touch? Never again would she feel the warmth of his arms, laugh at his smiles, or lose herself to him. In her mind, she could see the door shutting, the end. His hand letting go of her lock of hair, stepping away, disappearing back into the world.

  Alone and trembli
ng, she shoved her hands down into her pockets like a small child. Nick’s ring brushed her knuckle, and she shoved it on her finger, rubbing it over and over again in an attempt to keep herself from breaking. Then something else in the pocket fell between her fingers. She fumbled for it only to realize what it was: a guitar pick.

  She felt the blunt edges of it, and the press of sorrow robbed her of any strength. She lay there silently and closed her eyes, remembering the sound of his fading footsteps, the guitar pick nestled in her palm. She waited a long, long time. Deep in that blackness she counted her breaths, waiting until she was sure of the silence. Her body stilled…she hummed weakly, her breaths slowed.

  Emily woke with a start, her hands striking against wood, and she cried out in pain. Fear overwhelmed her. Where was she? Then her memories forced her awake and crushed down on her chest like a vice, making breathing impossible. She had fallen asleep for how long? Oh God, how long had she slept?

  Desperate to be out of the hole, she pushed at the trap door above her face. It didn’t move. She bashed again. The latch rattled, but the door wouldn’t budge. She shoved again; the latch held firm. She was locked in.

  Oh no. No. This couldn’t be happening. Struggling with all her might, she slammed her hands against the wood, her fingers clawed and pried at the sides, and splinters sliced under her nails. She cried out, the cuts throbbing.

  “No!” she screamed. “No!” The air was so thick that when she gulped down a mouthful, her lungs felt like shriveled balloons, unable to expand. She shoved until sweat soaked her body.

  “Help!” she screamed again, pounding the door with both hands. “Please! Please!” The darkness loomed like a hand over her mouth. In her delirium, she thought she heard the sound of stones being dragged across the floor and a slow wheezing chuckle. Raw panic descended on her.

  “Help!” She screamed until her throat was raw.

  Time passed. For how long, she didn’t know. There was no air left; speckles flashed in the darkness and tears trickled down the side of her face. With one last gasp, she wrenched her knee up and smashed it as hard as she could against the door; it shifted. The pain was excruciating but her heart raced like mad. A waft of fresh air poured into the gap. Gasping, she kicked furiously. Another inch.

  “Damn it!” she cried, and jerked her knee into the wood and wailed. The door burst open.

  Her body catapulted upward like an animated corpse, and she screamed, her hands pawing at the surrounding earth. She heaved herself out of the dank hole, gulping in mouthfuls of sweet air.

  Thank you, God. Thank you, she gasped as she laid her head on her arm and drank in lungful after lungful of air.

  Panting like mad, she fought to gain her bearings. With some effort she managed to wrestle her satchel from the ditch, eager to put herself as far from it as possible. The barn stood ominously around her. Night had descended, and the rain continued to beat on the roof. Still, she was grateful for the darkness, as she could pass unnoticed so much more easily. She sat on her knees, rubbing her bloodied fingers against her jeans, and went over her plan. She would abandon the minivan. She couldn’t risk the police finding it. So she’d get a cab or hitchhike to Fort Bragg where she could catch a bus or a train. But she needed to find Nick first; she couldn’t leave here without him.

  Somewhere an owl cooed, and she could hear the scuttling of animals along the rafters. Stumbling to her feet, she made her way to the barn door that swung slightly ajar in the wind. She needed to find a crumbling wall inside the house—that’s what the poem had said. Would there be a grave near the crumbling wall?

  She had reached the threshold when she heard the sound of a single shuffle, like gravel on dirt. She was not alone. All her senses sprang to life, and she stepped away from the open door, back into the darkness. Someone or something was standing outside—unmoving, waiting. Every hair on her head tingled in complete attention, but her feet felt like lead. Her imagination made pictures in the dark of what stood there: another ghost, an animal, a killer. She stopped dead. Whatever it was had gasped.

  She knew that breath.

  “You…cannot…believe…her.”

  Andrew stood there, his breathing ragged as though he had run the entire length of the hillside. Had he heard her cries, or had he waited in the downpour knowing she would return?

  “But Christ, you do believe her.” It was a statement, not a question, and the menace in his voice was undeniable.

  Emily took another step back. She had to run. She dropped her satchel and bolted, racing to the back of the barn. In the dark, her hands flung out in search of a door, a loose board, anything.

  “No!” he commanded.

  Nightmares of him bore down on her, of the inhuman grip of his hands wrapping around her throat. She stumbled backward.

  “Damn it! Stop! So help me, Emily! Stop.”

  The loft. The window at the back of the loft—if she could reach it, she could jump. With a lunge, she grappled up the ladder and hurled herself into the hay. Struggling through it, she lurched toward the opposite wall. Behind her she heard his feet pounding across the floor and thundering up the ladder. She was inches from the window when he bounded across the planks. She threw her back to the glass.

  Andrew’s eyes were black, and bruises of crimson stained his cheeks. His pulse hammered in his throat, and his dripping sweater was drenched, plastered to his body.

  “I am not letting you go!” he screamed, the cords of the muscles on his neck rigid in anger.

  She scrambled away from him, throwing herself into the corner. “Don’t hurt me, please, don’t hurt me.”

  If she ever thought he could kill her, it was now. Rage exploded around him, and every muscle was poised to strike. He glared at her, thunderstruck.

  “You heard her. You know it’s true,” Emily implored, playing for time while she tried to figure out a way to escape. “She knows everything. About you and about me. About how I’ve tortured you your whole life. I can’t be near you. It’s the only way. You have to let me go.”

  “I don’t care about some bloody curse!”

  “Don’t you see? It’s already started. The van, the motorcycle, Vandin, everything. Then it’ll be you—you killing me. I’ve seen it. We can’t stop this. It’s always been like this, for all of them.”

  He still stared at her as though she had lost her mind. “We die, is that it? I murder you with my own hands? Kill you because some curse says I have to?”

  “Yes! That’s why our palms say what they do. We’re part of this curse. For whatever reason, you and I—Nick and Nora, we’re the ones. No Chamberlain has ever lived to marry a Thomas—they kill each other before they can—and then…and then they can’t even be together in the next life. But I can’t…I won’t let it happen to us this time. The Lady in White told me that if I left…if I never saw you again—you could be safe, you could live. If you love me, if you ever did, you have to let me go because I can’t do this. I can’t stand back and watch you die.”

  Andrew took a step toward her. Her shoulders pressed flat against the wall. She swallowed her fear; the window was only a foot way. She still had one last chance to reach it.

  “No Chamberlain has ever lived to marry a Thomas,” he said, his voice eerily quiet and at the same time edged with anger as though he had already lost his mind.

  She closed her eyes and nodded, praying he would understand, that the last vestige of sanity in him would allow her to escape. But before she could even hope, she felt his body loom over her. Vehemence poured off of him in waves.

  “But I can.”

  His words hung in the air between them. She had no idea what he meant, and her heart crashed through her ribs waiting for what was to come next.

  “But I can,” he repeated with a strange tilt to his face, a challenging look, as if his own words had taken him unawares. He reached out and seized her shoulders, pulling her to him. His eyes sought hers, fierce and alive.

  “If a Chamberlain marries a T
homas, that must change fate. It must. The curse was made to keep them apart, to keep them from marry-ing. Lifetimes and lifetimes of them came so close. Nick and Nora on the way to their wedding; the couple before them, they wanted to, I know they did. I can feel all of them, but they never made it.”

  “I…I don’t understand.”

  “Vows declared before each other. It doesn’t need to be anything more. Marriages—they were nothing but that for ages and ages. People were sworn to each other, pledged, with nothing apart from an oath and a promise.”

  He stared at her hand and started tugging off her ring.

  “I refuse to lose you. Please, just please, don’t run. Just listen. I’m not religious, Emily, I never have been. But if there is a God I’m asking, no, I’m praying, that he’s listening right now.”

  Andrew pulled them both down to the hay and positioned her until they were kneeling face to face. His whole body seemed to shake and stopped only when his grip on her hands tightened. His eyes found hers.

  “I, Andrew Hayes Chamberlain —”

  “No, Andrew, it won’t work, it can’t.”

  He did not release his hold, the pulse in his palm echoed in her own. Inside of her, lifetimes of souls railed at her, their hundreds of hearts began beating as one, wanting, waiting.

  “Take thee, Emily Thomas, to be my wedded wife.” He kissed her now, and it was not tender; it drove her to the earth, to this place, and to this time. Her fingers shook inside his. “To have and to hold from this day forward.”

  His lips trembled an inch from hers. Tears slid down along her face. Or were they his? “For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer. In sickness and in health. To love and to cherish.”

  His mouth kissed her temple and swept down until it reached the flesh below her jaw, and he whispered, “Forsaking all others.”