Page 16

The next morning, we all sit silently at breakfast. The events of the night before have left all of us shaken. Josephine is stiff as a board. She looks toward the parlor, and when the grandfather clock chimes the hour, she flinches, spilling her coffee. Etienne looks exhausted. His face reminds me of my own father’s near the end, when he didn’t even have the energy to be angry anymore.

The children are similarly affected. Amelia stares down at her plate, her lips pushed out in a frown, her shoulders as stiff as Josephine’s. Gabriel’s eyes seem somehow wider and darker than usual. The rest of him is pale, and he seems smaller somehow, as though a part of him has been sucked away.

Philippa enters the room with a pot of coffee. She glances at Gabriel, then shivers and pours the coffee for each of us from as far away as she can. When Gabriel turns toward her, she flinches and looks down at the floor.

“May I have some water, please?” he asks.

Philippa nods once, then rushes from the dining room. She returns a moment later with a glass of water. She sets it in front of Etienne, then runs back to the safety of the kitchen.

I hand the glass to Gabriel, who thanks me in a slightly bewildered tone.

We complete the meal in silence. I should really start some sort of conversation with the children, at least, but I can’t bring myself to speak. My own memory of the night before is among the more terrifying of my entire life, and while the sunrise has convinced me that demons and ghosts still don’t exist, the other option is that I’m losing my sanity for the second time in my life, and that’s not encouraging in any way.

When the meal is finished, Amelia asks, “Can we have the day off of school, Mary? I don’t feel well.”

I don’t know if Amelia is telling the truth or if she’s being manipulative again, but frankly I don’t care. “Sure. I think that’s best.”

Josephine and Etienne make no protest to my decision. Etienne stands and says, “Keep the children inside today, Mary. Maybe you can watch movies again. Anything to take their mind off of… anything to help them feel…”

He sighs and leaves the room, giving up on finding an explanation that doesn’t involve acknowledging as reality what we dealt with the night before.

Josephine speaks next. “I’ve asked Dr. Yarrow to visit today, Etienne.”

Etienne shrugs at the door. “Sure. Fine. Whatever you feel is best.”

I frown. “Who is Dr. Yarrow?”

“He is a psychologist. He worked with Marcel for years. I think… I think the children need professional help. To overcome their grief.”

My frown deepens. I explain earlier that I have no love for psychologists. Perhaps a few of them are genuinely caring people, but most only exploit people at their most vulnerable. A reprehensible lot. “Ma’am, in my experience—”

“I wasn’t asking for your input, Mary.”

She's not angry when she says that, but it's clear that she's firm in her decision. My lips are thin, but what can I do? The last time I did anger this woman, she assaulted me. And it won’t help the children to get myself fired. “Very well, ma’am.”

Gabriel pushes his plate forward. Seeing him do this, Amelia follows suit and asks, “May we please be excused?”

Josephine’s lip curls. “Why don’t we let Gabriel speak for himself?”

Gabriel turns slowly to his grandmother. “Do you hear it, Grandma?”

Amelia squeaks. I pale. Josephine only allows her sneer to turn into a bitter smile. “I’ve been hearing it every day for years, Gabriel.”

We all sit in silence for a long moment. Finally, Gabriel averts his gaze. He stands and heads slowly from the room. Amelia and I follow. I risk a glance back at Josephine as we leave and see the same cold sneer follow us outside.

Amelia and I keep a safe distance from Gabriel as we head upstairs. I don’t feel good about this, but I’m too overwhelmed by everything that’s happened recently to feel much guilt.

It can’t be demons. It can’t.

But then, how did Philippa know Annie's name?

She didn’t, I tell the mocking voice of my conscience. She heard me say Annie’s name aloud when I was sleepwalking. As for claiming to have seen me play the piano, that’s just not true. She must have been mistaken. Or perhaps she mistook my talentless fumbling as one of the discordant elements of one of the later movements of Marcel Lacroix’s macabre magnum opus.

We reach Amelia’s room, and Amelia asks me, “Can you bring us some snacks? I’ll put on a movie.”

Under ordinary circumstances, I would chide her for waiting to ask until we’ve already reached the room. Today, I don’t have the energy.

I head downstairs and retrieve some snacks: cookies, chips, sodas, and popcorn. All of the essentials for a day of watching movies with children. On my way back upstairs, I catch a glimpse of the foyer out of the corner of the eye. Josephine stands in front of the grandfather clock, her lips moving soundlessly, her eyes swaying back and forth with the movement of the pendulum.

I sigh. Damn it, I don’t have time for this. There are too many demons in this house.

I walk to the foyer, my arm full of snacks, to confront this latest messenger from Hell. “Ma’am?”

“I’m fine, Mary,” Josephine replies. “I just need a moment.”

She says this without changing the movement of her eyes. She’s clearly not fine, but I’m too tired to deal with whatever’s happening to her. We’re all going insane, and as long as I’m not in the middle of an episode myself, I should focus my attention on the children.

I return to the room and place the snacks on the table. This movie is a new one, rented from a streaming service. It depicts a robot who crash lands on an island and ends up raising a gosling as her own. It’s a testament to the insanity surrounding this house that I find her story not in the least bit odd.

Gabriel sits close to the tv, his eyes riveted on the screen. I wonder if he remembers last night, or if it was all only a dream to him.

“I’m worried about him, Mary.”

Amelia’s voice is barely a whisper, too low for Gabriel to hear. I turn to her, and the fear in her eyes cuts through my own fright. I smile tenderly and admit, “I’m worried too.”

“He’s sleepwalking again,” Amelia says, “Well, you know that since you were there when he sleepwalked last night. And he keeps mumbling in his sleep.”

“What does he mumble?” I ask.

I don’t realize that I fear her answer until she says, “I don’t know. I can’t understand most of it. Sometimes I hear him say Grandpa’s name, but that’s the only thing I can tell for sure.”

I nod and put a protective arm around her. She sidles close to me and watches her brother with a mixture of love, grief and terror. “He did this before, when Grandpa died. He shut himself in his room and only came out for meals and showers. He wouldn’t even let me talk to him.” She sniffles. “I know he’s sad about Claude, but… I mean, it wasn’t like it was when Grandpa died. We liked him, but not that much.”

“People process grief in different ways,” I tell her.

I realize for the first time how utterly foolish and unhelpful that statement is, but what am I supposed to say? Your brother’s going insane, and I know this because I’m right behind him if not a few steps ahead?

She shakes her head. “This isn’t grief, though. This is… weird.”

I try to think of something more reassuring and land on, “Some people need to believe in spirituality to overcome tragedy. Your brother might feel that by channeling those he’s lost, he’s making it possible for them to live again.”

Yeah, I’m making this so much worse. I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but… Well, I had my chance to help. I failed badly. “Dr. Yarrow will be able to help you two understand the way you’re feeling a lot better than I will.”

Amelia bites her lip. “I just don’t want him to hurt himself. Last night really scared me, Mary.”

“It’s just music,” I say. “It can’t be as powerful as everyone’s making it out to be.”

“Not that. I mean, when he ran off in the city to go find the music."

“Oh.” Heat climbs my neck. “Of course.”

“What if he wanders off one night? What if no one hears him get up, and he just goes away? What if he thinks he needs to join Grandpa or something?”

I look at her and say firmly, “That will not happen. I promise you. I won’t let something that awful happen to your brother.”

She looks at me with despair. “You can’t stop him, Mary. If that’s what he really wants, no one can stop him.”

“Amelia, I don’t know what’s happening here,” I admit. “I don’t know if we’re all sleepwalking or having nightmares or hallucinating or just grieving. But I will promise you one thing: whatever’s happening here, it will all be nothing more than a memory someday. One day, years from now, we’ll look back on this. Maybe the memory won’t be pleasant, but it will be over . And we all will survive to keep it in the past where it belongs.”

She smiles softly. “You’re very brave, Mary. Thank you for helping me feel better.”

Oh no, I’m not. Not even close.

I kiss her on the forehead and limit my response to “Thank you.”

We both turn toward the tv to see Gabriel staring at us. I feel the blood drain from my face and see Amelia's expression mirror that feeling. Gabriel looks between both of us. Then he says, "I'm not going to kill myself if that's what you're worried about, Amelia."

Amelia’s lip trembles. “I just want you to get better, Gabe. You’re my brother. I love you.”

“We all want you to get better,” I add. “And I really hope you’ll listen to Dr. Yarrow. He’ll help you learn how to deal with everything you’re feeling.”

“Maybe you should talk to him too,” he suggests. “So you can deal with what you’re feeling.”

“Don’t be rude, Gabe,” Amelia scolds. “She’s trying to help you.”

“I’m trying to help her,” he replies. “She played the piano first, you know.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“She played it first. The night Claude died. She went downstairs and played the piece.”

“She doesn’t even play piano!”

“She played it a few nights ago.”

“Enough,” I say curtly. “We’re all upset. There’s no point in taking that out on each other.”

The children fall silent, but as he turns back toward the tv, I am almost certain that I catch a leer on his face. It reminds me of the smile the ghost of my sister wears the night before, the one present on all of the drawings hanging in Gabriel’s room.

As the movie continues, I find myself watching Gabriel with the same wariness his sister shows.