The House

by Eden Darry

  “I had a run in with a ditch. I’m fine. Really.”

  “Why did you run into the ditch?” Liam asked and Fin ruffled his hair.

  “It wasn’t intentional, believe me. It was dark and I took a misstep. You should be in bed.”

  “He wanted to make sure you were okay. Did you find the child?”

  “No.” Fin winced. “I’m going to get some ice. I think I twisted my ankle. Night, mate.” She hobbled off into the kitchen.

  Sadie took Liam back upstairs to bed. While she was tucking him in, his eyes began to droop and close as he fell asleep. She leaned over and kissed his forehead.

  “Sweet dreams, darling,” she whispered.

  His eyes opened and stared intently into hers. “Mummy, he’s coming.”

  Sadie flinched. She tried to stay calm. “Who, Liam?”

  But Liam was asleep again—if he had even woken up in the first place. Sadie ran a shaky hand through her hair and stood. He’s coming. Did Liam mean Lance Sherry?

  Liam’s ability to know things before they happened was unnerving. It was never anything major—he’d tell them someone was at the door, and a moment later the bell would ring. Now and again, though, he would say something that sent shivers up Sadie’s spine. Usually it was times like now, when he was asleep or, at least, on the way to being asleep. Sometimes, the things he said meant nothing, and sometimes they did. She hoped this was one of those times it meant nothing.

  * * *

  Liam woke up to the sensation of warmth flooding his pyjama bottoms. Oh no! He scrambled out of bed, flicked on the light, and threw back his duvet cover to avoid getting pee on it. His pyjamas were soggy and cold and beginning to itch, so he took them off and hung them over the chair.

  Liam felt like a stupid baby. Even Lucy didn’t wet the bed any more. He knew his parents wouldn’t mind, but they would want to know why, and Liam didn’t want to tell them about the dream. He had an idea lately, that if he didn’t tell anyone about his bad dreams, then the bad man couldn’t get out of them and hurt people. It was like the opposite of when you made a birthday wish—if you didn’t tell about the bad dream, then it didn’t come true.

  Liam went to the bathroom and washed himself to get rid of the pee. He took a clean pair of pyjama pants from the cupboard. He decided to leave his bottoms to dry on the chair and keep the duvet off the bed so the sheet would dry too. Hopefully his parents wouldn’t notice he’d wet the bed.

  On his way back to his bedroom, Liam heard the click of a door as it opened. The sound came from downstairs. Maybe one of his parents was up? He crept along the hall and peered over the banister and saw the basement door was open and a light was on inside. Liam was scared. He didn’t think it was his parents down there. His legs itched to run back into his bedroom, until he heard a giggle. Lucy.

  Why was Lucy in the basement? Mum had told them they weren’t to go down there alone because it was dangerous. Lucy never listened, though—she did whatever she wanted.

  Liam went down the stairs. Lucy was a snot, but he didn’t want her to get hurt. At the top of the basement steps, he called out to her in a whisper, so he wouldn’t wake his parents.

  She giggled again but didn’t answer. Liam was annoyed. She was such an idiot. “Lucy,” he hissed and took two steps down. He didn’t want to go all the way into the basement because he wasn’t allowed.

  Lucy still didn’t answer. “I’m telling if you don’t come up right now.” He went down further, so now he was about halfway down the steps. He glanced behind him guiltily, expecting one of his parents to catch him. They always seemed to be there when he did something he wasn’t supposed to.

  Liam crouched down and peered through the banister rails into the basement below. He could make out Lucy standing in her pyjamas. It looked like she was speaking to someone because she was nodding her head. “Lucy.” He tried again.

  This time she turned around and smiled at him. “Liam, look, it’s Koosh.” She pointed at something Liam couldn’t see. It made him scared nonetheless.

  “There’s no one there, and we aren’t allowed down here. Come up now.”

  Lucy shook her head. “We playing.”

  “I’m telling on you.”

  Lucy frowned at Liam. “You made him go away now.”

  Liam still couldn’t see who she was talking to, but he had a bad feeling about it. “Please, Lucy. Before—”

  Behind him, the basement door clicked shut.

  * * *

  Sadie sat up in bed. She felt like she hadn’t been asleep for more than half an hour. Something woke her. Her first thought was of Lance Sherry before she pushed it away. Of course it wasn’t Lance Sherry—he didn’t know where they lived and the house was alarmed. Nonetheless…it wouldn’t hurt to check. The alarm box was just inside the basement door and had a read-out to show which parts of the house were armed. She’d have a look just to put her mind at rest. Sadie pushed the covers aside and got up.

  At the bottom of the stairs she could see light shining from under the basement door. That was odd. She could have sworn she’d turned it off on the way to bed. Sadie turned the handle, but the door wouldn’t budge. She pushed against it with more force, but it was jammed. Sadie rattled the handle in frustration and pushed again. From the other side, she heard crying. Liam.

  “Liam? Are you in there?”

  She heard footsteps running up the stairs towards her. “Mummy! Mummy, we’re stuck.”

  Sadie leaned her ear against the door. “How did you get in there?” She rattled the handle again. “The door’s jammed. Did you lock it from that side?”

  “No. It closed, and then I couldn’t get it open again. Please let us out. I’m scared.”

  “Hang on, darling.” Fin must have some kind of tool in her workshop Sadie could use to bash the door. As she turned away, she heard a click and it swung open.

  Liam came charging through and into her arms. He was shaking and crying. Sadie held him close and stroked his sweaty head. “Hey, hey. It’s okay, darling. The door just got stuck, that’s all.”

  He buried his face in her stomach and continued to cry. Lucy ambled out after him, seemingly unaffected by the whole thing.

  Sadie reached out with one arm as Lucy went to walk by her. “Lucy? Are you okay?”

  “Yes,” she said. “We was just playing.”

  “Why were you and Liam playing in the basement when we asked you not to go down there?” she asked.

  “Sorry, Mummy,” she said.

  “It’s late, and you need to be in bed. We’ll talk about this in the morning. Liam?” Sadie held him out at arm’s length. “Did you hear me?”

  He nodded and wiped his nose on his pyjama sleeve.

  “Come on then, it’s late.”

  Sadie decided she would put a bolt on the outside of the basement door tomorrow. High enough so the children couldn’t reach.

  She walked them back up to bed.

  Chapter Eleven

  Fin rolled onto her side, dislodging Lucy who squealed in protest. She clambered back on and began that irritating tapping on Fin’s nose again. Fin felt Lucy’s breath on her face as she leaned in close.

  “Mama-mama-mama-mama,” she said in time with each tap. Fin tried not to laugh.

  In a flash, she rolled onto her back and caught Lucy, bringing her close and blowing a loud raspberry on her neck. Lucy screamed and flailed her arms, laughing.

  “For crying out loud, you two,” came Sadie’s muffled voice from beneath the duvet. “Give it a rest.”

  Fin gave Lucy a mock scowl. “That was your fault,” she whispered.

  Lucy giggled. “No, your fault.”

  “I’m serious.” Sadie did sound serious.

  Fin swung Lucy up into her arms and got out of bed, relieved her ankle felt fine after last night’s fall. “Come on, let’s go and get some breakfast before we wake the monster.”

  “Mummy’s a monster! Mummy’s a monster,” Lucy shouted.

  A pillow sai
led past Fin’s head as she ducked out of the room.

  Downstairs, Liam was sitting at the kitchen table looking at one of his dinosaur magazines.

  “Hi, mate.” Fin kissed his head as she put Lucy on a chair next to him. “How long have you been up?”

  Liam shrugged. “A while.”

  Fin put the kettle on to boil and found two bowls for cereal. “I thought we’d pop into the town today—Lucy, the bowl doesn’t go on your head.”

  “Okay,” Liam replied.

  Fin looked at him, but he wouldn’t take his eyes off the magazine. She knew he wasn’t reading it because most of the words were still too difficult for him. “Want to tell me what’s up?” She shook out some cereal into the bowls and added milk.

  Liam shrugged.

  “Is it about last night?” she asked.

  Liam remained silent. Fin made her cup of coffee and sat at the table. “I’m not a mind reader, Liam. I can’t help if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.”

  “I don’t like this house.”

  He said it so quietly, Fin had to lean forward to hear him. “Why don’t you like the house?”

  He shrugged. Liam shrugged a lot.

  Fin sighed and rubbed her eyes. They felt grainy and sore from lack of sleep. The police had come by about two in the morning to say they couldn’t find the child. She and Sadie spent another twenty minutes giving statements. It was after three before they got to bed, and now she was up again at six thirty.

  She tried again. “Is it because you aren’t near your friends any more?”

  “It’s the house. I don’t like the house.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s weird.”

  “The house is weird?”

  “I don’t like the house,” he said again.

  Fin took a moment and sipped her coffee. “Look, I know it’s a big adjustment moving house. And before, living with Granny and Grandad. You’ll get used to it, though. You’ll make new friends and we’ll all be happy here. I promise.”

  Liam stood up and pushed his chair back. The legs squealed along the tiled floor. “You don’t understand.” He picked up his magazine and walked out.

  Christ. Sometimes it was like dealing with a sixteen-year-old instead of a six-year-old. Fin reached over and brushed cereal out of Lucy’s hair.

  * * *

  Lance Sherry saw the problem immediately. The bitch’s new house was down a quiet, narrow lane. He’d driven all the way down to where it dead-ended and back again. Most likely anyone who saw him would think he was lost. He couldn’t risk driving down again, though. People noticed strange cars on roads like this. Some busybody neighbour, or maybe even the bitch herself. He’d almost panicked when he thought he saw someone looking at him from one of the upstairs windows. It looked like they were waving him in. Strange. Turned out to be a trick of the light, thank God.

  He would have to find another way of scouting out the place. The area was surrounded by fields and a small bunch of trees too small to be called a wood. He could come at the house through the fields and watch from the trees, he guessed. It wasn’t ideal—the old house was ideal—but he didn’t have much choice.

  Lance indicated and turned back onto the main road. The next time he came here, the bitch would die. Maybe he’d do her little family as well, teach her a lesson for moving somewhere which made it so difficult to stalk her. He laughed at his own joke.

  * * *

  Sadie was in the spare bedroom with the boxes, trying to unpack and sort them. Fin slunk off a while ago after making an excuse about going to fill in the ditch she fell in last night. Sadie didn’t blame her—these boxes were a bloody nightmare. The amount of absolute junk they’d decided to keep hold of was unbelievable. The annoying thing was, most of it was hers.

  She’d been a bit wary about coming back in here, particularly when there was no handle on the inside. She’d dragged several of the heaviest boxes over to prop the door open. Liam was taking a nap, and Lucy was playing in her bedroom directly opposite this one, where she could keep an eye on her. Sadie watched her now, cramming the plastic unicorns she was obsessed with into a doll’s house she’d pulled all the windows and doors off of.

  Lucy was talking to herself, and Sadie smiled. She turned back to the box in front of her and pulled out a pile of electricity bills from 2004. Why had she kept these? What was wrong with her?

  “Mummy?”

  Sadie looked up to see Lucy had come into the room. “Yes, darling?”

  “Can we play monster?” she asked.

  Monster was a game Fin invented and the children loved it. It was basically hide-and-seek, except Fin clomped around the house and roared when she found them. “I’m a bit busy right now. Maybe Liam will play when he wakes up.”

  “No. Can we play monster? Me and Koosh?”

  “Who?”

  “Koosh.” Her little brow furrowed and she pursed her lips to pronounce the word properly.

  Sadie frowned. “Lucy, who is Koosh?”

  “My friend. We were playing unicorns, and now he wants to play monster. Can we?”

  Lucy’s last imaginary friend was a few months ago, but in the past couple of weeks she’d seemed to have forgotten all about him. It looked like he was back and now called Koosh. Usually she named them after cartoon characters or children from school.

  “Okay, fine. But play up here where I can see you.”

  “We will.” Lucy ran out and Sadie went back to sorting through old bills and bank statements.

  * * *

  Fin stepped into the ditch. It wasn’t as deep as she remembered it from last night, and on closer inspection didn’t appear to be a ditch at all. It sloped down on one side and ended at a trapdoor which was partially covered by weeds and grass that had grown up where it hadn’t been used in a long time. When she fell into it last night, she must have kicked some of it away, because part of an old wooden door with a rusted metal handle stuck up out of the ground.

  Fin wondered if it was an access point to an old sewer, but that wouldn’t make any sense, because the sewerage ran beneath the lane at the front of the house. This must be something else.

  She used the spade she’d brought with her to clear away the grass and weeds, revealing a plain wooden door set into the earth. She reached down and lifted it, surprised at how heavy it was. The door groaned and squealed in protest as she pulled it back and released the smell of damp earth and rotten vegetation.

  Fin turned on the torch built in to her phone and shone it into the hole. A set of wooden steps led down and illuminated a sodden dirt floor. Because of the angle of the steps, she couldn’t see beyond the floor without going down.

  She tested the first step, and it seemed to hold her weight without much trouble, though it did groan. She was reluctant to go any further in case the steps were rotten. She could go back up to the house and get a stepladder. That was probably the safest bet. The only problem was if Sadie saw her, she’d probably try to rope her into helping with the boxes. If she told Sadie about the trapdoor, she’d want to come down and look with her, and for some reason, Fin wanted to investigate it on her own. Sadie didn’t even like the house. It was Fin who’d found the place and fallen in love with it, so she should be the one to discover all its nooks and crannies and secret places.

  Fin pulled the trapdoor closed and kicked some dirt over it to cover it up again. Maybe she could persuade Sadie to take the kids into town this afternoon on her own. That would give Fin plenty of time to have a look around down there.

  * * *

  Liam opened his eyes. He’d been dreaming about the bad man again, except this time, the bad man’s face changed and became another man. The new man was just as bad. He was in the basement last night when the door shut, and Liam couldn’t get out. Lucy laughed but Liam didn’t think it was funny. She thought it was just a game, but Liam knew better. The new bad man didn’t like children at all. Liam didn’t think he liked anyone, really.

  Liam got out of bed a
nd walked over to the window. He looked out and saw his mum walking back across the lawn. The new bad man was walking next to her. He was whispering something in her ear. Liam was scared.

  Chapter Twelve

  Fin waved to Sadie, who was sitting at the kitchen table on the phone, and went to the sink to wash her hands. It sounded like Sadie was talking to Rachel. Rachel was keen to come down and see the place, and from what Fin overheard, it sounded like she was badgering Sadie again. Fin liked Rachel well enough, and she seemed to be a good friend to Sadie. But there was something about her that always put Fin on edge, a feeling she maybe looked down on Fin and thought Sadie could do better. That maybe she would be better for Sadie. Fin thought she still carried a torch for her wife. Unlike Treven, Rachel never said anything, but Fin wondered what she told Sadie when Fin wasn’t around.

  Fin dried her hands on a tea towel and got a bottle of water from the fridge. She hadn’t realized how thirsty she was until she took a sip.

  “How did it go?” Fin turned at the sound of Sadie’s voice.

  “Okay. Was that Rachel on the phone?”

  “Yes. She keeps on about coming down and seeing our new place.” Sadie bit her lip.

  “What?” Fin asked and sat down at the table.

  “I invited her for tomorrow evening. For dinner.”

  Fin sighed. They really weren’t ready for guests. “We haven’t unpacked all the kitchen stuff yet, and there’s no food to cook.”

  Sadie leaned over and grinned. “How about if you give me the list, and I’ll go to the supermarket for you?”

  Fin remained silent.

  “And I’ll unpack the kitchen?” Sadie upped her offer.

  Still, Fin didn’t speak.

  “Okay, fine. I’ll also do the dishwasher for a week.”

  Fin laughed. “Deal. I’ll invite Rose and her new girlfriend Janey as well.”

  Sadie shook her head. “You’re a negotiating genius.”