Then she was moving forward again, foot over foot, dragging and falling and rising. She tried to protest, but Abigail had taken her voice again. Blind and afraid. Step by step toward the window and the soaked, dirty cushion she’d used for a mattress.
She put out her hand, or Abigail did. She needed to catch herself, to feel her way across the floor, but her knees knocked against the window seat and she toppled forward—hand extended—and hit the window hard enough to push panels of glass out into the night, falling to the ground in pieces.
She gasped—even Abigail couldn’t keep her from gasping—and leaned back hard, but the shadow pushed again, and now she was flailing, both hands raised and both hands crashing into the frame.
It shattered this time. Her hands pushed out into the night, shoved across the shards that clung stubbornly to the rotting wood. They sliced so fine, so sharp on the old leaded glass, that at first she didn’t even feel the cuts. Dahlia flung herself backward, away from the window seat and the window and the sprinkles of glass, wrenching out of Abigail’s grip and into the middle of the room.
Then came the heat, and from the blood or surprise or simple pain, Dahlia found her voice.
She took her strength back from the icy shadow and yelped an objection that came out harsh and weak. But her second try worked better, and it was more like a yell. The third time was the charm, as she toppled backward onto the floor, flinging glass and gushing blood.
Finally, she screamed.
Now you have to stay.
She screamed again, and kicked at the shadow girl—not harming her, no, and not even pushing her away.
But she was on her hands and knees, and Abigail had either let her go, or she’d run out of energy to keep her, because Dahlia managed to scramble forward on bleeding arms, leaving terrible streaks of blood behind. The hot liquid pulsed and spit, from the right side worse than the left, but both arms were gushing in tandem with her pulse. She felt the blood throbbing out of her. She remembered a leak in a brake line on one of the old trucks, before her dad had bought the new ones. She remembered the way it’d spit and jerked with each twitch of the brake pedal, and she’d thought it looked like a fat, gruesome vein.
Thank God she couldn’t see her own arms. Thank God it was too dark, and thank God Abigail didn’t have her by the throat anymore. The ghost had let her go, maybe just to watch Dahlia suffer like she’d watched her family suffer through the years.
“Fucking brat,” she spit. Blood was everywhere, all over everything, but it was drying now—so it didn’t trip her up with slippery puddles beneath her elbows and knees as she crawled. It didn’t hurt. It didn’t flow. It only tasted like pocket change.
She staggered to her feet, trying to hold herself up on the doorframe, but her hands weren’t working right, and when she rose, sparkling silver static filled her head.
“This is bad,” she said, partly to see if she was able to speak at all, and partly to remind herself that she was still alive. “But Brad’s downstairs. Boy Scout,” she blabbered. “I need a Boy Scout. Can’t tourniquet both arms myself, now can I?”
She almost laughed, but it wasn’t worth the trouble. It was much more useful to scream with all the air she had left.
“Brad! Bobby!” she added her cousin’s name, in case he’d come back from the trucks with the ambulance crew. Was he back yet? How long had he been gone? She didn’t know. She couldn’t tell. She couldn’t see. She couldn’t remember if she’d been in the house for an hour or a year or a lifetime.
Dahlia was weak, but she was moving, and Abigail watched cruelly, like Abigail did best. Dahlia could feel those empty, frigid eyes somewhere above and behind her. She looked back and saw only more darkness, but she knew Abigail now. She knew what a monster … No: “What a brat,” she mumbled again, as she fell down the hall, and to the top of the stairs.
Hands and knees were easier. No, hands hurt too badly: they were too cut up, along with the light, pale skin of her forearms and wrists. The slashes were long and deep, by the ghost’s design; Dahlia was losing too much blood, too fast, to keep moving like this.
“Brad!” she tried again.
Headfirst, on her belly more than her hands or knees, she slid roughly forward, catching herself on her shoulder, on that platform where the staircase turned. She slithered, slipping in her own fluids, trying to arrange herself for less of a bumpy slide down the rest of the way.
Feetfirst, how about that? Better than headfirst, or hands first, when there was nothing left to hold on to, and everything past her elbows was on fire, or going numb. Or … both? Everything was supposed to go black, when you lost a lot of blood and passed out; but everything was already black in the ruined house, so everything went gray and fuzzy, instead. Everything was speckled with silver and white as the stars filled her eyes, but she wasn’t all the way down the stairs yet.
“Brad … Bobby…”
The door was open. It had to be. She’d left it open, but something might have shut it behind her.
She laughed, because the front door was the last door remaining. They hadn’t cut it out yet, so it was the only thing left to slam in her face—here in the real world, right now, where she was bleeding to death on the stairs.
No, she was sliding down the stairs feetfirst, on her butt and on her back. She could bleed to death on the first floor, if it came to that.
Her head banged hard on the edge of every step, but she was moving, and it wasn’t Abigail puppeting her through the house like a doll. She was doing this her own damn self, Abigail be damned.
Damn it all.
Damn her wobbly ankles when her feet hit the first floor, because she couldn’t stand any better than Gabe. Damn the red and blue flashing in the distance, and the sharp, cutting noise of something electric. Damn Bobby too, because he was yelling at her—and it ought to be the other way around. If anyone needed yelling at, it was probably Bobby. Bobby’d left her for Andy. That’s not how family was supposed to work.
But, Jesus, she needed him now.
If there’d been any rail left to follow the stairs, she would’ve pulled herself up on it. If there’d been anything to lean on, she would’ve grabbed for it. She struggled to her knees, thinking she’d give crawling another try, but fell over as soon as she got herself upright. Her elbows slipped out from under her.
Now you have to stay.
“Shut up,” she said. Or she thought she said it. It might’ve just been a tumble of vowels and bloody saliva, for all she knew—but who cared, when she could see the front door ahead. It was at the end of a tunnel. No. Everything was at the end of a tunnel, even the chandelier and the hole where the fireplace mantel used to be, and the space on the floor between her shredded hands. She saw it all in fits and starts, in the punctuation of lightning and of blue and red, and a pale bit of ambient glow from the lantern she’d lost downstairs, which was lying on the floor, on its side. She didn’t know how it’d gotten there. She couldn’t remember the last place she’d had it.
All sensation was bleeding out of her body. The gray fog was filling her up, taking the place of everything else, even the pain. Her hands didn’t hurt. Her arms only felt uncomfortably warm. Her knees ached, and so did the back of her head; but like everything else, that was something far away—at the end of a tunnel, or in someone else’s body.
In someone else’s dream, or afterlife. Whatever this was.
“If I die here,” she vowed with a thick slur. “Oh, I’ll stay, all right. I’ll remind you every day…,” she said, “every night … every hour … every minute … how you were wrong, and … your father was right. Except … except he shouldn’t have … fixed anything. He should’ve … sent you away for good. He never … should’ve … let you come back.”
When nothing hurt, it was all right to crawl again. If she could find the energy. She rocked back and forth like a baby learning to crawl, building up momentum. Forward. One hand, one knee. One foot, then the other.
Where the hell
was Brad? Where the hell was Gabe? What happened to Bobby? He was there, wasn’t he? She’d just seen him, she was pretty sure. She wanted to yell at him.
“You … want some company, Abigail?” A long strand of red spittle dangled from her bottom lip, then dropped to the floor. “I’ll give you … some company. I’ll haunt the fuck out of you, and I’ll dedicate … eternity … to making you miserable.”
Her elbows buckled, and she dropped to the floor, facedown. She had a dim idea that she’d cracked a tooth, but couldn’t bring herself to care. Her eyes wouldn’t open. Or they were already open, but she couldn’t see anything except that tunnel—except when she turned her head, and saw the open front door, and the storm beyond it.
“You’d better pray—you’d better hope and pray, that when I leave this place … when I leave this life … I’m gone forever.”
The last thing she remembered was a gust of leaves that billowed, and spiraled, and settled into her hair, and stuck to the floor, where her blood was already drying. Her ankles were chilled, like icy hands were touching them. Holding them. Feeling their way up her legs.
The last thing she felt was the cold, wet wind blowing inside.
The last thing she knew, everything was quiet. Everything was dark.
* * *
And the next thing she felt was pressure, cinched around her upper arms; both of them. Tighter than Abigail’s awful hands had ever held her. When she wiggled her feet, she didn’t feel that icy grip, not anymore. She smelled rubber, or latex. She heard voices, and didn’t recognize most of them.
But Bobby’s she knew. He was babbling nearby, making up explanations that only halfway made sense—but then again, she could only halfway hear them. “There’s a broken window … there’s a lot of broken glass … no, she didn’t do it herself … I think she fell in the dark…”
Someone lifted her. Someone set her on a board that was hard and uncomfortable; it rubbed on all her bruises, and made them ache. She didn’t open her eyes all the way because she didn’t have the energy, but through the slits where her eyelashes blocked the narrow view, she saw the glint of light on metal, and thought maybe it was a badge on someone’s uniform. Not a policeman. Not a man at all. A woman with a medical uniform, a jacket with an emblem on it.
Dahlia couldn’t read it.
The trip across the Withrow house’s swamped front yard wasn’t fun for anyone. She was strapped down and jostled as her porters stumbled, and their boots tangled in the wet grass and stuck in thick mud. Her head was braced so it couldn’t roll, but each thump and heave brought a swell of blood into her mouth.
Her arms ached, and she couldn’t feel her fingers.
Bobby shuffled beside her, holding up that big blue-and-white umbrella—shielding her with it, to the best of his ability. He was doing a shit job of it, in her opinion, but he got an “E” for effort. He was talking to her all the while, telling her to hang in there, that Gabe was in the ambulance; and they were going to get her to the hospital, too; and why did she call Andy? He’d called Bobby to ask what was going on, and he didn’t know what to tell him …
… his voice droned on, and she wanted to tell him to shut up, but it was better background noise than the rain, or the wind, or the radio static from the dispatchers calling back and forth to one another, talking in a code of numbers and commands.
Inside the ambulance. Closed doors. Quieter, and drier.
Someone was daubing at her face and neck with a towel.
To the left, she heard Gabe. She opened her eyes just far enough to see him through that fringe of damp eyelashes. He was bundled up, but he was looking at her—saying her name—asking her something. Like he wasn’t concerned about his legs at all, because it’s not like he was bleeding to death or anything.
There were needles, and there was a clear fluid in a plastic bag. She didn’t feel the prick of it, and didn’t feel any improvement. She only felt sleepy, and the rolling motion of the ambulance crawling along the asphalt was enough to lure her to sleep.
She dreamed of a carnival with spinning lights and chiming sirens.
She dreamed of coldness, and fog, and blood.
16
“HOSPITALS ARE FUCKING tedious,” Dahlia declared.
Gabe, who’d wheeled himself into her room in a chair, could only agree. “There’s not a damn thing to do, and it’s too noisy to sleep. I feel sorry for people who get stuck here for weeks at a time.”
“Ugh, don’t talk that way. Two days has already been long enough.” She sank back into her pillows, which were propped behind her back to let her sit up. “But they’re supposed to let me go tomorrow. Since I’m going to live, and all.”
“Supposed to?”
“Yeah, I have to take … it’s like … an exit interview. The guy ought to be here any minute. When he signs off on it, I can check out in the morning. How long did they keep you?” she asked.
“Not even overnight. Broken ankles aren’t do-or-die. They sent me home ASAP, with this sweet-ass ride,” he said, popping half a wheelie and setting the chair back down again.
“Are they both broken?”
He shook his head. “Naw, it just sounds cooler that way. The left one is busted in a couple of places, but the right one’s only sprained. Badly sprained,” he emphasized. “It ain’t a sexy new scar for chicks to dig, but it’s a good story. And I’ve got a scrip for some serious painkillers, so things are looking up.”
“I’m glad you’re making lemonade out of all this. Beats sitting around feeling sorry for yourself.”
“I kind of like the chair,” he said brightly. Then he quickly added, in case that was in bad taste, “You know, since it’s not forever. That would suck.”
“I’m very glad it’s only temporary.”
“The joystick is fun; I can pretend I’m in my own video game. But Dad says my cast is already starting to stink, and I think he’s right. In another five weeks … who knows what it’ll smell like.”
“Ass. It’ll smell like ass,” she assured him.
A knock on the open door announced a man wearing navy and gray business casual. Dahlia figured he was a little younger than her, maybe thirty. He looked clean and friendly. “Hello? I hope I’m not interrupting.”
“Nope. We were just discussing sexy scars and smelly casts. Are you Dr. Jacks?”
“Yep, that’s me.”
Gabe introduced himself, and said politely, “I was just leaving. But Dahl, Uncle Chuck says he’ll be here first thing in the morning with all your stuff, to drive you home.”
“Did he … is the house…?” She wasn’t sure what to ask, not exactly.
Her cousin piloted himself in a little semicircle, trying to navigate back around the bed. “Dad and Uncle Chuck hired a couple of local guys, and between them and Brad, they got the copper roof squared away this morning. I’m not sure how much else they mean to take … but it was quiet in there.” He glanced over at the doctor. “That’s what Dad said. You know what I mean.”
“Sure, it’s quiet—now that I’m gone.” She rolled her eyes. “Well, whatever. I’m glad they’re getting it finished up.”
“Me too. So I’ll see you tomorrow, all right? My butt is buzzing, so that’s probably Dad texting to say he’s here to get me. Nice to meet you, Dr. Jacks.”
“Likewise,” he replied.
With a good-bye wave, Gabe puttered out into the hallway, and was gone.
The doctor closed the door behind him, and pulled up a chair beside Dahlia’s bed. He adjusted himself on the seat, and fiddled with a satchel full of paperwork, withdrawing a recorder, and setting it on the bedside tray. He pressed a button to turn it on. “So … you know what this is about.”
“Yeah, the surgeon warned me, when he came in to check his work.” She wiggled her arms. They were bandaged from her thumbs to her elbows. “He says it’s not as bad as it could have been. I won’t lose any sensation, not permanently. And my fingers are all still working, so none of the tendons got sliced
too bad.”
He rested a clipboard on his leg, and pulled the cap off a pen. “You were lucky.”
“If you say so.”
“You wouldn’t?” He raised an eyebrow.
“Lucky to be alive? Yes. Lucky to have face-planted through an old single-pane window? Not so much.”
“But you understand there’s been some concern. Do you want to tell me what happened?” he asked, his eyes all wide and friendly. He was young, but he’d perfected his therapist’s air of “trust me, I’m here to help.” It was too polished. It made her trust him even less.
Even if the compassionate show wasn’t bullshit, Dahlia didn’t particularly want to talk to the guy. What could she say that wouldn’t sound completely insane? She’d been thinking about it ever since yesterday, when the surgeon had mentioned this little visit. Standard procedure, she’d told Dahlia. Obligatory, for a case like this one.
She didn’t take a deep breath. It would look too much like she was setting something up, or giving something away. Instead, she shrugged. “There’s not much to tell.”
“Tell it anyway, if you’re feeling well enough.”
“Gabe got hurt, and we were trying to keep him calm, and immobile. He wanted some painkillers, and I offered him a bourbon chaser—but I couldn’t find the bottle. I know he’s a minor, but man, you should’ve seen his ankles. I was trying to help.”
“Of course, I understand.”
“But the power was out, and it was dark in there, what with the storm and all.”
“Mm-hm.”
“While I was looking around, I heard a window break upstairs. I thought maybe a tree branch had come through it, or something like that—and we need those windows, and those old floors. Those kinds of things are the bread and butter of the family business. So I guess I thought maybe I could cover it up with plastic or something, if it wasn’t too bad. That way, the rain wouldn’t soak the floors.”