Cauchemar Read online

  “I know it’s real. The pissing every hour was a tip-off. I’m so bloated I could take off my shoes and fly away.”

  “Do it for me,” Callum cajoled.

  “You’ll owe me big for this,” Hannah muttered, raising her right cheek for a kiss.

  The hospital gown was lime green and left a visible sliver of bare skin in the back. While they waited for the doctor, Callum fiddled with the ultrasound machine. He lifted the probe from its holder and used it to nudge her thighs apart. “How much time do you think we have?” he asked, and slipped her feet into the stirrups as if she were Cinderella.

  “Not much.”

  His face disappeared below the table.

  There was a deep throat-clearing from the door. Dr. Merrick, clumps of white hair rising from his bald pate, closed the door behind him. “Condoms are in the drawer.”

  Callum smiled sheepishly. “I bet this happens all the time.”

  The jelly was cold as the doctor smeared it over her belly. “Let’s have a look-see. Now, don’t expect too much. This will be one of the less exciting ultrasounds. You’ll hear a heartbeat and see something that looks a little bit like a crawfish curled up.”

  Callum settled beside the bed and braided his fingers with Hannah’s against the cold metal. The room filled with the sound of a heartbeat, steady but submerged. “Is that it?”

  “No. That’s the mother’s. Are you nervous, Hannah?” Hannah shrugged, and the doctor put a gentle hand on her shoulder. She felt safe then, a circuit closed by these two men touching her. “Don’t be. There it is.”

  Hannah shut her eyes. Against the dark theater of her eyelids, she saw a hiccup of static on the screen, a moment of shadowed confusion. While the doctor fumbled with his machinery, Hannah would glimpse webbed feet and a long, tapered tail. Beady eyes affixed to hers through the thin skin of her belly, through the wavering screen of the monitor.

  As soon as she’d begin to make sense of it, it’d be gone.

  To her right, Callum let out a single burst of laughter. “That’s wild,” he said. She rolled her head to the side and looked at him. His eyes were wide. This was what a waking dreamer looked like.

  The doctor squeezed her arm. “There,” he said, and with a rough draw of breath, Hannah followed his finger. There, a little seed. Dr. Merrick punched her arm lightly in congratulations. “Healthy as can be.”

  It was real. Relief and fear rushed into her. Her speeding heartbeat echoed through the room. Her every experience of love had ended in pain, but now she let herself consider the possibility that she might be safe.

  Callum ran the back of a finger under her eyes. She hadn’t felt the first tear, but he was ready and waiting to catch the second.

  That night, Callum sat in bed and studied the sonogram they’d received.

  “What are you doing?” Hannah asked, lying beside him.

  “Imagining what it’ll be.” He illustrated how the shape might grow graceful dancer’s legs or the hands of a pianist. With a dreamy swirling of his finger, he described the brain of a doctor who’d spend his or her nights poring over the intricate mutations that flowered into cancer and would awake one morning with the cure plain to see in the scribbles. Hannah could only look up into Callum’s joyous face. Our child, she thought, still not quite believing.

  Eventually, Callum’s eyes closed. Hannah took the photo from his limp hands and studied the cloudy black and white. It was like a Rorschach. Blink, and it was a snail arching under layers of silt. Blink, and it was a seed uncoiling.

  Something fell in the kitchen.

  “Graydon, knock it off,” she called out. A sleepy meow sounded from the corner of the bedroom.

  She got out of bed, squinting into the darkness beyond the bedroom’s open door. Callum snored below the covers as she inched into the hallway.

  In her mind’s eye, she could almost see the creature ahead of her, snouting the floor. Her hands closed into fists, although she wasn’t sure how much good they’d do against its ribbed back. She’d seen it in bright sunlight and in the vague dark, but its reptilian muscles had rippled like a promise since she’d first glimpsed it as a child.

  But what she heard was the fast patter of bare feet hurrying through the kitchen. “Callum,” she cried out, almost exhaling in relief before realizing what the sound meant. “Someone’s in the apartment.”

  “What?” Callum asked sleepily from behind her.

  To her left, she caught a glimpse of a shape ambling awkwardly into the bathroom, white hair trailing like a puff of smoke.

  “Someone’s here,” she whispered roughly.

  Callum creaked on the floorboards behind her just as the woman burst from the bathroom, something glinting in her hand. She moved with shocking speed, and Hannah felt herself being pulled backward. Callum flung her behind him with such force that she fell onto the bedroom floor. As she lifted herself, she saw Callum wrestle the woman to the ground. A pair of scissors dropped from the woman’s hand.

  Callum turned on the hall light and stood over the woman, his chest heaving. Her dress was pushed up to reveal tangled threads of varicose veins. “Who are you?” he yelled at the woman. “What are you doing here?”

  His fist hovered above her head, and Hannah wanted to call out for him to stop, but couldn’t find her voice.

  The woman’s eyes rolled back into her head and she hissed two simple words, “We’re coming.” It sounded like wind circling through eaves.

  “Who’s coming?” Callum asked, punching the wall above her.

  The woman slumped and said nothing more.

  “Jesus,” Callum breathed. “Hannah, call the police.”

  Hannah stood up in a daze. She dialed the number but stuttered over the words. “Someone broke into our apartment,” she finally said. The woman wouldn’t look at either of them, but instead stared steadily at the wall in front of her. Dimpled flesh hung in hammocks from her slender arms, and every so often, she parted her lips to show a toothless mouth.

  Two cops with holstered guns arrived and hoisted the woman into a car, making note of the dropped scissors. “She’s not talking, and I’m not sure I’d hold my breath waiting on her words,” one of the cops said on his way out. “She might not be all there, you know? Do you want to press charges?”

  Hannah shook her head and closed the door behind the cop. She was certain that it was the same old woman who she had bumped into in the street that day, who’d then bided her time. Hannah knew that she shouldn’t be surprised. Her happiness didn’t equate to safety.

  Callum’s shock, however, was obvious from the way he paced the apartment. “She came in through the fire escape,” Callum repeated to himself, an echo of the cops’ earlier verdict. “Why?” He directed the question at the room, rather than at Hannah. He stared at the spot where she’d dropped the scissors, as though that square inch of worn wood held the answer.

  Hannah let him stalk the length of the apartment until she felt weariness sag her body, then gently patted the couch. “Come sit,” she said.

  He kept walking, still filled with nervous energy. “We’re not safe here, obviously.”

  “No,” she said simply, and something in her voice made him finally stand still. “I saw that woman in the street a few weeks ago. She must’ve followed me here.”

  Callum scratched his ear impatiently. “I don’t understand. Why would an old woman do that? Why would anyone?”

  “The town doesn’t want me here.” Hannah nudged a glass of wilting purple wildflowers back from the edge of the coffee table in front of her. We’re coming, the woman had said.

  “One crazy old broad bursts in and you think she speaks for the town?” His voice had an edge to it.

  “One crazy old broad running at me with scissors, yes.” Hannah shrugged. “Maybe her husband went with Christobelle,” Hannah’s voice rose as Callum shook
his head, “or maybe it was her son. Maybe nobody she was even particularly close to, but I’d bet anything that it was a hatred of my mother that brought her here tonight.” Hannah put her face in her hands and breathed in the sweet chamomile hand lotion that Callum had bought for her earlier that week. “No, that’s not quite right. I won’t bet this baby.”

  She didn’t lift her head until she felt Callum’s weight on the couch beside her. His arm clasped protectively around her shoulders. “So what do we do?”

  In the early morning light, his skin looked waxy. She thought if he smiled in that moment, his face might crack. “We?” she asked. With that one word, she gave him a way out.

  “We,” he agreed, and touched her stomach. “The whole lot of us.”

  For several days, they ferried his life into hers by the swamp. Then a heavy morning downpour barricaded them in his dusty, mostly emptied home, and he laid a tattered red blanket on the floor. The rain brought sleep easily, but Hannah was startled awake by thunder. She rolled over to see Callum on his back, his eyes wide open, a vacant expression on his face. “Callum?” she asked, and felt an electric shock when she touched his chest.

  Callum blinked rapidly and shook his head. “Sorry, I was spacing out. Guess it’s just this sleepy weather.” He reached down and massaged his right thigh. “In fact, my leg’s still sleeping.”

  She plaited her leg with his, pressing her toes into his shin. “Is it all happening too fast?” she asked, giving voice to a fear that had plagued her for weeks.

  He didn’t answer and the stretching moment panicked her. “It’s not the usual order of things. First comes love, then marriage, then the damn baby carriage, but that’s a flawed schedule. Ask me, it’s for cowards who need exits at every turn.”

  Hannah considered his words, then went back to the basics of childhood friendship. “What’s your favorite color?”

  “Green. Yours?”

  Hannah closed her eyes and saw a deep maroon. She tried to describe it, but Callum wrestled his way on top of her. “The real question is, what’s your favorite breakfast? I’m ravenous.” He gummed lazily at her neck.

  On the last day of the move, she sat on a tree stump by the water, watching bullfrogs bloat and belch while popping blueberries into her mouth.

  “That’s the last of it,” he said, kicking a box of records.

  When she smiled, her teeth were black.

  He approached her and peered into her mouth. “I’ve heard that women let themselves go after they’ve found themselves a man, but good God.”

  “I’m practically dating a pirate. I’ve heard you don’t have the highest standards.”

  “Pirate?” he exclaimed. “Try expert navigator of these here dark waters. International waters, stern and bow, hull …”

  “Even I know those nautical terms, Mr. Expert Navigator,” she said, and yelped as he lifted her into his arms and walked unsteadily to the back door, declaring he had to carry her over the threshold.

  Later, Callum made a cacophony of metal against metal in her kitchen drawers. “Where am I going to put all this stuff? Mae was so well stocked, there’s barely room for me in this house. Could I try the shed out back?”

  Hannah suddenly remembered what she’d seen in the shed, and even months later, it set her heart racing. “No, not in the shed,” she said quickly. She toed a pot on the floor. “The shed’s full of emergency supplies. Water, canned goods, things we’d need if we were ever stranded here.”

  “You have your very own boat captain now,” he said in a booming voice, flexing his chest. “There’ll be no more stranding for you, missy.”

  Hannah raised an eyebrow. “Oh, captain, my captain, who can’t use a pan to save his life.” She plucked at a piece of plastic still wrapped around a frying pan.

  “Pretty young women tend to find me when I’m hungry, and are more than happy to oblige.” He fit her face between his hands and eased the scowl off her face with callused thumbs.

  On her way upstairs, she stopped by his guitar stands and ran her fingers down the necks, frets like the ridges of a spine. She tried to pluck out a melody, but the sound came out wry and stilted, as if the guitars were mocking her attempts.

  She’d never had a knack for music, and as had been the case during the last few months, the list of things she didn’t know seemed to be growing longer. Knowing how to catch a frog and cook it, or how to pick out tarragon in a dish, had always seemed like enough for now. She’d toyed with a half-formed notion of going to college someday, but the thought of leaving Mae alone in the house had seemed unbearable. Mae had always listened patiently to Hannah’s far-fetched plans, then gently changed the subject. Someday was transforming into a future with priorities she’d never imagined for herself, but maybe this was what it meant to live. An equation forged through the summation of choices.

  Callum moved Hannah’s dresser and desk into Mae’s bedroom while she stripped the bed of its sheets.

  “It’s time to let go of her.” Callum took the sheets from Hannah and stuffed them into a black garbage bag. “My sheets have seen better days, so let’s just get new ones. I was thinking pirate ships,” he joked.

  “It’s a waste of money.” She’d always liked nestling against the daisy pattern after a powerful nightmare.

  “I don’t want to sleep on a dead woman’s sheets. If you think about it carefully, I think the creepiness will dawn on you, too,” he said, hoisting the bag over his shoulder. Then, seeing her smile shrink, he lowered his voice. “I’m sorry, that was glib. I wish I’d known her.”

  “She would’ve liked you, I think.” Hannah squeezed the corner of a pillow as he pulled it from her hands. She watched it disappear into a black bag, and imagined several strands of Mae’s hair going with it.

  James visited with tools—“Some things Callum asked me to pick up”—and bagfuls of peaches and strawberries for her. He congratulated her on the pregnancy, hugging her tentatively and slapping Callum forcefully on the back. He looked different, softer, in khaki shorts and a blue polo shirt as he awkwardly handed her a bouquet of sunflowers.

  “You know that bugs nest in here?” Hannah shook out the flowers gently.

  “As long as they’re not carpenter ants, they’re welcome to join the parade of fat spiders and millipedes I’ve already spotted in this house,” Callum called from the hallway.

  She poured James a glass of iced tea as he looked around the kitchen. “We’re still adjusting,” Hannah explained, seeing the disorganized room through his eyes. She wasn’t used to playing host.

  “Looks good,” James assured her, then added, “You’re really doing this? The two of you together?”

  “Stranger things have happened.” Hannah halved a ripe peach and removed the fat black pit. She handed him half, then shrugged when he shook his head. “I wouldn’t have planned this for myself. I thought twenty years old meant years yet to think about it.”

  James fingered a dried vine hanging from a hook above the sink and released the smell of herbs. “People say it always happens when you least expect.” His eyes stalled on the melted candle on the windowsill. Hannah had found she missed their warming light, and it comforted her to echo Mae’s habit of setting out candles at the beginning of each week.

  “You think you’ll stay in this house?” James asked.

  “We’re safer here than in town.”

  James sighed. “I heard about that. Mallory Thames was her name, if that means anything to you. We found a very expired driver’s license in her pocket. She’s been shipped off to a mental institution. The old bat kept babbling about things tying her to the bed at night, entering her body during the day. She used the old ‘the voices made me do it’ defense. Schizophrenic, must be.”

  “She scared Callum.”

  “Not you, though?”

  Hannah flicked the black peach pit into the sink. “I
’m used to it.”

  James stepped back to lean against the counter and sipped his iced tea slowly, deliberately. “I can promise we’d keep an eye on you in town, and I can give Callum the name of a top-notch security system. Ask me, I’m not convinced bringing a pregnant woman out to the swamp is exactly ‘safer.’”

  “And why’s that?”

  “Rumors,” James said quickly. “You know, people running their mouths. If the swamp alone isn’t enough to spook you, then hell, crazy things come out in holding cells or in the drunk tank after a few hours of quiet contemplation. Men claiming they’ve seen or heard things.”

  Hannah snorted. “What? Voodoo in the swamp? Bare-breasted women bedding gators? Yeah, that’s old news.” She gestured around the room. “As you can see, it’s just timber and brick like any other house.”

  James laughed, dismissing his words before he even spoke them. “I know, I know. I’ve heard from various entirely untrustworthy, drug-addled sources that this house in particular is special. They say it’s easier to call on spirits here, that it’s some kind of summoning ground. They call it a crossroads.”

  “Are you really buying into the boogeyman?” Hannah raised an eyebrow. “Okay, I’ll bite. What kind of summonings?” Hannah was curious. As a child, she’d heard the townspeople’s accusations and snatches of their stories, but when she came home, brooding over some new bruise and full of questions, Mae would dismiss their words. Eventually, after the bullying in town became unbearable, Mae had pulled her out of school and limited her contact to others who lived on the swamp. Others who, probably at Mae’s prompting, knew better than to bring up Christobelle.

  “I don’t know,” he muttered. “The locals claim the space draws spirits, that there have been hauntings. Others say that Mae had the ability to speak to orishas. They say that’s the reason she was so skilled at medicine.”