Nine

NINE

Miraculously, I do fall asleep… and drop straight into the same damn memories.

I'm not in the cafeteria anymore. After the guys left, I'd been uncomfortable with the séance talk, so I'd "remembered" something I needed to do before next class.

The séance idea doesn't die there. Suddenly, it's all my friends can talk about. In retrospect, I understand it wasn't about teenagers wanting to contact the dead. It was about teenagers dealing with their curiosities and their insecurities.

Patrice wanted to try the mushrooms. Drug experimentation was an area of interest and frustration for her, with two best friends who wouldn't even try pot. For me, it was the ingrained warnings about smoking in general—with my lungs—plus a discomfort with ingesting anything that might interact with my medications. For Heather, a lifetime of "don't do drugs" messaging had done its job. Patrice, though, was curious, but being a girl who really only had two friends, if they wouldn't experiment, she was stuck, being smart enough not to try anything without supervision.

The other dynamic at play here was Heather and Patrice's relationship. There had always been a clear leader and follower. Heather might have refused Patrice's drug-experimentation hints, but she felt guilty about it. Didn't her art teachers always tell her that she needed to relax and let the creativity flow?

Patrice wasn't dropping the séance idea because it involved drugs. Heather wasn't dropping it because for once, Patrice wanted something only she could deliver.

That Friday, as I'm waiting for the bus, Patrice marches over, with Heather in tow, and announces, "We're doing it with or without you. Tonight. In the woods behind the school."

"You don't need to take the mushrooms," Heather says. "One of us shouldn't, and that can be you."

I bristle at the emotional blackmail. She's saying I can watch out for them. I can make sure they do this safely. And if I'm not there? Who knows what will happen, and it'll be my fault.

"Fine," I mutter.

Patrice grins and hugs me. "You're the best."

I turn away to hide my annoyance. As I do, I spot Anton, a few feet away with Cody and Mike.

Cody is leaning toward Anton, saying something with a smirk, and Anton's gaze is on me, his expression unreadable.

Cody socks Anton in the arm, pulling his attention back. Mike leans in then to say something. Anton makes a face. Whatever they're talking about, he doesn't like it. But he glances my way, and then he nods.

The sound of footsteps tugs me from the dream. I listen, but it's only someone up and about, probably using the bathroom.

I refocus on the dream. I'd forgotten about the guys being there. It was a tidbit that had seemed meaningless, just Anton talking to his friends. Even admitting I'd noticed would be embarrassing, because it meant I was paying more attention to Anton than I wanted. But in retrospect, knowing what I do from Anton, it's significant because—

The creak of a footstep breaks my concentration. I glare toward the hall. I understand needing to use the shared bathroom or even going downstairs for a glass of water, but why do I keep hearing footsteps right outside.…

My thoughts trail off as I track the slow, deliberate steps. My face turns up to the ceiling.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

I swallow and inch back in the bed.

Those footsteps aren't down here. They're in the attic.

No, I'm hearing things. Another trick of my treacherous mind.

Sorry, there isn't any history of hauntings with this house. It is one hundred percent ghost free.

You think so? Here's a moaning voice in the dumbwaiter shaft and rattling doors in your bedroom and footsteps in the attic. How's that for a not-at-all-haunted house?

I shake my head. The voice in the dumbwaiter was just me remembering Anton's story about his brother spooking him. The rattling door was the wind—I proved that.

And the attic?

The steps pace back and forth. Then, with a scuffling sound, they stop right over my head, and I swear I hear a soft sob.

Someone is crying in the attic.

Someone is trapped—

Goddamn it. That was the story Cirillo told tonight. Ghost in the attic, moving around, crying.

I rub my face.

Coming here was a bad idea. A phenomenally bad idea.

Sure, let's hold a séance in Anton's grandmother's old lake house, with its creepy dolls and empty dumbwaiter and locked basement and a million creaks and groans to prey on my fractured mind.

As soon as I think the word "fractured," everything in me rebels. Fractured? Damaged? Me? Of course not. I'm grieving, yes, but otherwise…

Otherwise I'm fine? Fuck no. Otherwise I'm a goddamn train wreck, plowing through my days, pretending nothing is wrong. Unable to sleep without drugs. Unable to function without therapy and exercise and endless stern self-talk. I'm gliding across thin ice with a smile plastered on my face as I pretend I'm dancing over a slab three feet thick.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

I clench my fists, glare up at the ceiling, and say through gritted teeth, "You're not there."

The footsteps continue. I press my hands to my ears and squeeze my eyes shut. Not there, not there, not—

The steps stop above me again, and I hold my breath, heart racing. Then they resume.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

I'm not imagining it. I definitely hear footsteps—

Because there's a door to the attic. It'd been locked when I'd been here with Anton, but he'd told me all about it. It was a walk-up attic where he'd once had a play fort. The last time we'd been here, he'd been talking to the owner, who said it was a mess but she was hoping to renovate it into a children's suite. I hadn't thought to see whether it was open and finished.

I hear footsteps in the attic? Yes, because someone else can't sleep and has gone exploring.

I roll out of bed and grab my wrapper. Cinching it around me, I head into the hall.

There's enough moonlight coming from a window that I can leave the lights off. I make my way toward the attic door, hands out to feel along the walls. I reach it and—

It's still padlocked.

I try the lock and the door itself. Both are firmly shut.

I turn, putting my back to the door and tilting my head to listen.

Nothing.

I stay there a few minutes. When no sound comes, I slowly make my way back to the bedroom, slip inside, and stare up at the ceiling. Still silent. I climb onto the bed and carefully balance as I stand, shut my eyes, and focus on listening.

It's so quiet I can hear the ticking of the cheap alarm clock.

Because I imagined the footsteps. I'd been dreaming and thought I woke up, but I might not have.

I exhale. Of course. Earlier, Cirillo told that story about the ghost in the attic, and then I fell into memories of Patrice and Heather, only to be woken by my door slamming and rattling in the wind. My brain was chock-full of ghost stories, and so what did I imagine, in my state of half-sleep? Footsteps and crying from the attic.

I had a hypnagogic hallucination.

I'm settling back into bed when something thuds downstairs, and instead of jumping, I only groan.

Really? More noises? Forget sleeping pills—I need earplugs.

When another thud follows a minute later, it pokes a memory of my first childhood home, out on the prairies. Our old house had storm shutters, and occasionally one would come loose and thump in the wind, just like that.

Does this house have shutters? It might. I know from my visits that—like the prairies—Lake Erie can get some incredible winds.

I should ignore it, but after my door slamming and rattling, and then my footsteps-in-the-attic hallucination, I am not sleeping until I know what's making this latest weird noise.

Yep, I definitely need to pick up earplugs. This is the loudest "quiet house in the country" ever.

I grab my phone a pad from my room and pause at the top of the steps. Everything below is still. I haven't heard any more of those thuds.

Again, I consider going back to bed, but I'm sure I know what this is, and it's easy to check. Better than startling awake every time a shutter smacks against the house.

I'm halfway down when something plucks at my nightshirt.

I jump, feet tangling as I stumble. The only reason I don't fall is because my mother taught us to use the railing. She'd had a friend who suffered a serious accident on stairs, and here I must send up a whisper of thanks to her spirit, because her teachings just saved me from the same fate.

That's when I remember why I stumbled, and my breath catches. Someone had grabbed my nightshirt, startling me and nearly sending me tumbling down the steps.

Hand tight on the railing, I look up the stairs. No one's there. I sprint back up, as if I can catch the culprit, but the hall is empty. I listen. Silence.

So if no one grabbed me, what happened?

I go back to where I stumbled, peer down at the railing, and spot the culprit—a splinter coming off the underside. It must have caught on my nightshirt—one of Anton's old tees, billowing around me.

Could a sliver do that? From the underside of the railing? There's no lint caught on the splinter or prick mark on the shirt.

Another thump from below. I dismiss the splinter and stride down the rest of the steps. I'm looking for a loose shutter. I head to the front door—

A sound stops me.

That wasn't the thud I've been hearing. I don't know what it was. A hollow noise. That's all I can say, and I'm not even sure what that means. I only know I heard something, and it sounded distant, but it definitely came from behind me.

I head straight for the most obvious spot: that dumbwaiter shaft. I unlatch and open the door. No, the dumbwaiter itself has not somehow re-formed from the ether, a grinning porcelain doll going along for a ride. The shaft is, as always, empty. I carefully poke my head in and shine my cell phone light up and then down. Yep, empty. No moaning voice from below, either.

I walk while mentally replaying the sound, trying to pinpoint the direction, like Jin had with the laugh. It leads me near the kitchen, and I'm heading that way, certain that's my destination, when I stop to stare at a closed door.

The locked room.

I shake my head. The sound did not come from a locked storage room, because that would be as ridiculous as footsteps in a locked attic. The door is very clearly still locked, and I know what's in there. Cleaning supplies.

But there's a whole locked basement to store supplies in now. Why not open up this room?

Because according to Anton, this is just a walk-in pantry.

Isn't that all the more reason for them to reopen it? The kitchen cupboards are stuffed so full of dishes that all our groceries are on the counter—

A creak.

I jump and spin.

That did not come from the locked room.

But the other sounds…? The thumps? That hollow something ? Could they have come from in here?

It's a cleaning closet. At most, it holds stuff for special bookings. Champagne fountains for weddings. Extra glasses for parties. Hell, maybe high chairs and cribs for little ones. Something in there shifted or fell.

But I heard more than one noise down here.

What if a high chair began to topple, sliding until it clunked over. Or a bunch of brooms and mops, one falling after the other.

Did that sound like what I heard?

I have no idea what—

"Nic?"

I wheel and stumble back against the locked-room door as Jin hurries over to steady me.

"Shit," he says. "I'm sorry."

I run my hands through my hair, as if raking out sleep tangles while I let my heartbeat slow.

"Were you down here?" I ask when I recover.

His brow furrows. "Huh?"

"I heard someone down here a few minutes ago. Was that you?"

"No, I just came down."

The creak. That'd been the stairs.

He continues, "That buzzing was freaking me out. Is that what you heard earlier?"

My brain takes a moment to engage. Buzzing? Right. I heard buzzing earlier this evening.

"So it wasn't my imagination?" I say.

"Nope. Like I said, you have good hearing. What is it anyway? It seems to be outside." He looks at the locked room. "You think it's in there?"

"No, I heard a thump that seemed to come from in there." I start to relax, sliding back into myself. "I think one of those stacked bodies woke up."

He jabs me in the side. "Sure. Now you play along… when it's the middle of the night and I'm freaked out by weird buzzing. You don't want me getting any more sleep tonight, do you?"

"I just know the proper time and place to tell spooky stories. Which is now, in a strange house, in the middle of the night. So where's the buzzing coming from?"

"Outside."

I roll my eyes. "Obviously."

"Hey, you asked."

"Come on then, let's go check it out."

When I open a window, I can hear the buzzing. I flip on the rear hall light and we move to the back door, where it seems loudest. When I peer out, I can only see darkness.

"Where's the outdoor-light switch?" Jin says, scanning the wall.

"Somewhere I don't see it."

"So we open the door?"

"Seems like it. Got your baseball bat?"

He gives me a hard look. "You jest, but if I saw one, I'd grab it. It's pitch black out there. We could be opening the door to a killer luring us out."

"With weird buzzing noises?"

"The fact it's weird is our downfall. It doesn't sound scary or threatening. Just odd. So we open the door and he's right there, waiting."

"He? That's a little sexist."

Jin shakes his head and grabs the doorknob.

"On the count of three," I say. Then I meet his eyes. "I gotchu, boo."

"Fuck off."

I bite back a laugh as he pulls the door oh-so-casually. It swings open and—

Bugs rush at us.

"Holy shit!" I say, lunging to grab the knob in his hands even as he shoves the door shut.

We both lean against it, as if we have indeed just slammed it on a serial killer. I lift my head toward the hall light, where a dozen bugs circle. Then I burst into a snickering, choking laugh.

"So… killer bugs?" I say.

"How do you know they're not?"

"Because they're attacking the light instead of us."

That's not exactly true. While the hall light drew them in, they aren't buzzing around it. Some have landed on the wall, and I peer at one. It looks like a mosquito, with the narrow thorax and long legs, but it's obviously not, since they aren't bothering with us.

"Guess we're going to be the killers tonight," I say as I take a tissue from a nearby table. I smush the bug, and it almost disintegrates, leaving an oily smear. When I rub at the smear, it stays on the wallpaper.

"Well, shit," I say. "This is going to take a little more finesse. What are they anyway?"

"Ugly." He swats at one as it bumps into his face, as if it didn't see him there. "Also stupid."

"Hey, no insect shaming." I shut off the hall light and pull back the curtain on the door window. Still nothing but darkness. "I think the light brought them in. We should be fine with it off. I'm going to open this again."

"I'll be right behind you."

"Uh-huh."

I carefully open the door. When it seems safe enough, I ease outside onto the porch. The buzzing is louder, but I still can't see the yard. Everything is dark. I move toward the railing and—

"Holy shit, " I say. I step forward and grip the railing. "Are you seeing this?"

"If you mean a giant cloud of flying insects filling the entire freaking yard? Yes, I'm seeing that, and I'd really like to get back—" He swats a hand. "Fuck. They're—" Another swat. "Fuck!"

Bugs float past. They're flying, but it looks more like floating, that aimless, lazy flight as they bump into us. I open my mouth… and one sails in. I back up fast, spitting as we retreat into the house and quickly close the door. I may even turn the lock for good measure.

Jin bends over, coughing as he runs his hands through his hair. I pluck at my nightshirt and shake off bugs.

"What the hell are those?" he says. "You can't tell me that's normal."

"Not being an entomologist, I cannot tell you anything about them. Except that, while creepy as hell, they don't seem to be biting. I'll contact the owner in the morning and ask."

"You do realize you're being unnaturally calm about an entire yard full of buzzing insects."

I shrug. "Shania and I saw a black cloud over the lake under clear skies. I heard buzzing last night when no one else did. I'm just happy to have a logical explanation. It's bugs. Lots and lots of bugs, which don't seem to be biting or attacking. They just leave stains on the walls, so kill them carefully, keep the windows shut, and I'll get answers in the morning."

He exhales. "Fine. Yes. It's creepy but probably not a sign of the apocalypse. Probably. " He looks at me. "I am not going back to bed, though. Not for a while anyway. Drink?"

I smile. "I will definitely have a drink."