The Cabin on Souder Hill Page 18

  He studied her as she looked to the side then at the table, at his empty breakfast plate, mesmerized as if some movie played in her head, one she didn’t care much for.

  “Loudon said you killed Isabelle then disappeared?” she finally said.

  “Loudon didn’t tell her anything like that, Mama. Don’t you get it? Mrs. Stage is delusional—schizophrenic or something. Maybe she has one of them multiplied personality disorders, like that Sybil picture with Sally Moore or whatever the hell her name was.”

  Mattie stared through him.

  “Let’s look at the facts, Mama,” Pink said, screeching the chair legs along the floor as he pushed away from the table. “I’m here. You’re here. And I’m pretty sure Isabelle is still at home. Ain’t nobody disappeared, and I can guarantee you there ain’t no damn dead bodies buried up at the cabin. She’s abnormal, and that’s all there is to it. Now, let’s get this circle of yours decorated up so I can get on home before Isabelle starts calling here again.”

  Burrito barked as Pink stretched to his feet. Mattie didn’t move, still seated and staring. The dog ran to her chair then to its empty water bowl and whimpered. Mattie stood slowly and walked over to the sink, absently picking up the dog’s dish and filling it with water. Several pieces of dried dog food floated to the top and bobbed like flotsam. Burrito nosed the chunks for a second then jumped back and barked at them.

  *****

  Pink had not planned staying at his mother’s as long as he had. Isabelle called again.

  “Can’t she set up her own damn circle?” Isabelle said.

  “We’re almost done, Sugar Plum. Probably another hour,” Pink said, trying to paint a pleasant face on his side of the conversation in case his mama was listening.

  “That’ll give you time to come up with a better story than the one you told me last night, you bastard. You keep fucking Claire and you’re gonna get your damn balls snapped off. I’m telling you. I swear, Pink, you get her pregnant, you’ll be putting a down payment on hell. You’ll regret it the rest of your miserable, fucking life.”

  “Save the sweet talk for when I get home, Gumdrop. Okay?”

  Pink kept talking, even though Isabelle had already slammed the phone down. “Yes, not much longer. Need anything from the store?” He glanced toward the living room to see where his mama was. She was studying the plastic box of ashes, rotating it slowly as if trying to figure out how to get into it. Pink wasn’t sure himself. It appeared to be sealed, but he wasn’t about to call Emerson.

  They carried more things down to the circle and worked in silence. Pink wrapped the red and gold scarves around the trellis, alternating them the way his mother had shown him. Standing on the ladder, he wrapped the top of the trellis, then stepped down to finish the sides. His mama was busy setting up candles, adjusting the cauldron stand so the metal pot would hang over the center of the firepit. Anytime Pink saw her cauldron, which was no bigger than half a watermelon, he always pictured those enormous iron vessels requiring two hands to stir, a wall of eerily-lit jars behind, the tiny eyes of dead critters staring bleakly at the fire. But this was nothing like that, and he often wondered if his mother’s demure approach to witchcraft was a disservice to the occult. Maybe if she wore all black with a pointed hat and donned a ridiculously large wart on her nose and employed a scorching inferno beneath her caldron, maybe he could believe something supernatural could happen. As it was, her ceremonies were no more mysterious and frightening than a Tupperware party. In fact, they bordered on boring. Nobody’s eyes rolled back in their heads, no one spoke in tongues, or burst into flames. And for the few he’d attended, his biggest obstacle had been staying awake.

  When Pink tied off the last scarf, he adjusted them so the red and gold seemed evenly spaced. If they weren’t, his mama might make him take them all down and start over. Even though the sun burned high in the sky, the air was still plenty cold, his fingers turning numb. “Maybe we should get us a fire going in that pit of yours,” Pink said, blowing into his palms.

  Mattie looked first at him, then at the scarves. She scratched the line of her jaw with her gloved fingers. He took this as approval. Pink recalled the afternoon he’d found Lulu’s body, about the stone his mama had wiggled from the hearth.

  “Remember that silver box you took from Lulu’s house, the one with Lulu’s belly button cord?” Pink asked. “What are you going to do with that?”

  Mattie was bent over at the west side of the circle, fitting a blue cloth over one of the four small altars. The circle was laid out in the four directions, each with its own color, its own unique accouterments. Pink had no idea what any of it meant. Mattie straightened and stretched, arching her torso with her head laid back. Pink thought she looked weary.

  “Why, Pink? You don’t care about any of this.”

  “It’s kind of freaky, don’t you think? Somebody sticking their damn ripcord in a little jewelry box and stashing it in their fireplace. No wonder folks knock down your mailboxes and burn your tool sheds.” Pink remembered his mother’s friend Jesse’s little wooden outbuilding in flames, a sign stuck in his yard saying witches weren’t welcome in Ardenwood. “Sane folks don’t do things like that.”

  Mattie turned away, then pulled a yellow cloth from the box and arranged it on the east altar.

  “Is there anything else you need me to do, Mama? I told Isabelle I’d be home around two o’clock,” he said, glancing down at his wrist even though his sleeve hid the face of his watch.

  “You’re coming tonight for Lulu, aren’t you?” she said.

  Pink didn’t want anything to do with whatever corny shindig his mother had in mind for poor, dead Lulu’s spirit. He told her Isabelle didn’t like him gone at night, that he needed to be there for his wife.

  “Lulu was like a grandmother to you,” she said. “She loved you, watched after you . . . protected you.” His mama’s eyes grew so hard he thought they were going to crack under the stare. “Lulu—” She stopped as if to consider what she was about to say. “Lulu did things for you that you didn’t even know about.”

  “Maybe if I knew all these wonderful things she did for me, I’d feel different,” Pink said, his breath hanging in the frosty air, the sound of his own words repugnant to him. He tried to apologize, but she gave him her back and hurried toward the house. Before she’d turned away, her expression flashed anger first, then hurt. It was the hurt that bothered Pink the most.

  *****

  The look his mama had given Pink as she’d left the circle still burned in his head. He hated arguing with her and hadn’t intended on saying mean things, but the truth was, he was embarrassed she carried on the way she did, lighting candles, chanting out in front of trees and God, cutting circles in the air with her sacred knife, talking about deities, names he’d never heard and couldn’t pronounce. The knife had a special name too, but he couldn’t remember what it was. It had a sharp, curved blade that looked like it might be handy for cleaning squirrels or trimming carpet. Once he’d suggested that very thing while rolling it over in his fingers. It was the closest he’d ever come to being slapped by his mama. “Don’t ever touch that, Pink!” she’d yelled, snatching it from him and marching off to the spare bedroom she used as her sacred space. He’d peeked in there on occasion and was surprised by how unremarkable it was. The glass trinket case at the 74 Truck Stop was more interesting.

  Pink turned onto Howdershoot Road and thought about stopping at the office. Not that there was anything to do there, but it beat going home and dealing with Isabelle. He glanced at the dash clock and figured Isabelle was probably worn out from anger and waiting and most likely had fallen asleep. Over the past twelve years anger and waiting seemed to be at the heart of her diet, the food that propelled her forward, like jet fuel to a 727. Now with her unidentifiable illness costing him hundreds of dollars a month in diagnosis technology (he figured he’d probably paid for one of those MRI
machines over the past four years), Isabelle could only endure an hour or so of anger and waiting before it sapped her strength and put her flat on her back.

  He wondered if Claire was still at the house, or if she’d crawled home, soggy-eyed and filled with remorse, to Kenny. What Claire saw in Kenny, Pink could never figure out.

  Snow melted in the driveway, the rectangular bare spot where his Suburban had been parked overnight completely dry, with sprigs of green grass struggling up through the gravel. The argument he’d had with his mama rumbled through his brain. It was her hurt he couldn’t cleanse from his mind.

  Claire was painting her nails at the kitchen table when he walked in. He heard the sizzle of something cooking on the stove, the smell of fried chicken layered with the pungent stink of lacquer. Claire looked up. “Where have you been all day?”

  “Don’t start. And why do you have to do that in here?” He glanced at her spread fingers. “It ruins half the pleasure of having fried chicken.”

  She waved him off then screwed on the lid of the red bottle with her thumb and ring finger.

  “Isabelle sleeping?” he asked.

  Claire nodded, getting up to turn the chicken.

  “Just you and me for dinner, huh?”

  Claire smiled at him and, for a moment, he didn’t trust her kindness, but it seemed sincere. She’d never smiled at him like that before.

  “I rented a movie to watch with dinner,” she said, pulling a tin of rolls from the oven. “It’s that one with George Clooney, the one about the big storm. I’ve never seen it, have you?”

  Pink sat at the table. “I don’t know who George Clooney is, but if you like it, I’ll watch it.”

  “How was your day?” she said, smiling over her shoulder at him.

  “Fine. I helped Emerson load a dead guy in somebody’s pickup today. The top of his head looked like a barbecue grill.”

  Claire spun from the stove, her face twisted painfully. Her smile returned slowly, the one Pink was uncomfortable with. “You’re kidding, right?” she said.

  “No. Fool shot his brains out. His wife found him out on the deck this morning, frozen. Loudon and Elmer couldn’t get up the hill so I—”

  “Stop, Pink! I don’t want to hear anymore of this. Let’s just eat and watch the damn movie.”

  Chapter 25

  “Your sister’s here,” the nurse said, her vague shape moving away as the silhouette of someone else passed through the bright doorway. The dusty, blue light of evening had settled over the room like smoke, leaving everything bleary. Michelle tried to push herself up from the bed, her arms as heavy and useless as damp laundry. She wanted to snap on a light, flush the fatigue from her head and her bones, but she could hardly move.

  “Don’t get up, sweetie.”

  Michelle recognized the voice, still unable to focus. Darcy touched her hand.

  “Where am I, Darcy?” Michelle knew she was in a hospital, but had no idea where, Ardenwood or Atlanta, or how long she’d been there. She remembered the police officer talking to her in the car, asking if she was warm enough, turning up the heat, the police radio bleating serious sounds and garbled sentences. She even recalled the sun reflecting off the metal letters of the hospital sign on the side of the building. That was her last memory. Everything had gone black at that point, and she’d been swimming in her pool at home, the water cool and too blue, the sun soothing and steady, dependable and shadow free. But all the other houses had disappeared. Even the stockade fence Cliff had built was gone, nothing but pool and sky, as if they were reflections of each other, the pool expanding as she pulled herself forward through the water, her body cutting a path toward the horizon.

  “Ardenwood, Michelle. I left Atlanta as soon as the sheriff called.”

  “What day is it?”

  “Sunday. Sunday night.”

  Michelle remembered Cliff, his body solid and unmoving, caked and powdered with snow. “My God, Darcy.” Michelle couldn’t stop the tears. Darcy placed her hand on Michelle’s forehead, brushing back her hair.

  “It’s my fault, isn’t it?” Michelle said. “What have I done?”

  For a moment, Michelle blamed herself for not accepting Cassie’s death or Cliff’s pleas. Was she insane like Cliff had told her? That notion brought more tears, more remorse, followed by the memory of Cassie’s voice on the phone at the cabin. Had that been a dream? Would she wake up to find Cliff alive? Was his suicide a dream? In the turbulence of conflicting truths, Michelle felt something curl in her stomach, then lurch. She tried for the bathroom, but was too late, losing her stomach on the floor near the bathroom door. Darcy jumped up, helping Michelle back into bed, trying to calm her.

  “That’s probably the meds, Chelle. It’ll pass.”

  After the nurse placed a cold washcloth on the back of Michelle’s neck, she cleaned up the room. Why had she come back to Ardenwood? She could’ve stayed in Atlanta, waited out the impulse to prove everyone wrong about Cassie, give herself time to catch up to Cliff’s reality. If only she could have trusted Cliff . . . but she’d never been able to. Is this what it’s like to be mad? she thought. Is this how it will always be, believing one thing is real and then believing its opposite, each notion as authentic as the other? She couldn’t stand it, couldn’t stand the thought that the rest of her life could be a jumble of truths, one no more real than the next.

  “We’ll head home in the morning if you’re up to it,” Darcy said.

  Michelle closed her eyes, easing her hand from Darcy’s, a throng of faces staring at her from the darkness deep inside her head. For a moment, she couldn’t distinguish one from another, until they stepped forward—Cliff, Pink, Cassie, Sheriff Fisk, Cliff standing in his tux at the altar on their wedding day, Cliff sitting on the bed, his finger missing, then a beautiful young woman Michelle didn’t recognize, her hair wet and stringy and dark—

  Chapter 26

  “Where are you going? I have another movie,” Claire said, taking the disc out of the DVD player. Pink hated the stupid movie. Claire insisted The Perfect Storm was a true story, and Pink said it was based on a true story.

  “What’s the difference?” she said.

  “Reality!” He tried to explain that no one could know the details depicted in the movie if everyone died in the storm.

  “Well, I like true stories,” Claire said. “They’re more exciting because they really happened.”

  “The only thing that really happened was the damn boat sinking. The rest of it is horse shit.”

  “Well, how do you know it didn’t happen that way? Maybe somebody recorded it from the radio?”

  “The radio was dead.”

  “I guess you don’t think shows like Survivor are real, either?”

  “I’ve got to go. Mama’s having a ceremony for Lulu tonight.”

  “Doesn’t that witchcraft stuff make your skin crawl? It does mine. I don’t know how you can think Survivor and The Perfect Storm is all horseshit and then believe in witchcraft. That makes no sense.”

  “Who said I believe in witchcraft? Anyway, I gotta go. The roads are gonna turn bad when the temperature drops.”

  “What am I gonna do here alone? My puzzles are all at the house.”

  “Watch your movie. I’ll be home by the time it’s over. Then we can . . . you know . . .”

  “Why don’t I pull down my jeans and you can give me a good screwing before you leave,” she said, unsnapping her pants.

  Pink stopped putting on his coat, even though he was pretty sure Claire was being sarcastic. “We could . . .”

  “For Pete’s sake, Pink! What about some kissing and cuddling? What about a little foreplay?”

  “Foreplay? I’ve been thinking about sex ever since last night. Doesn’t that count?”

  Claire hurled the DVD box across the room, clipping Pink in the forehead.

 
“Damn, Claire. You’re ornery as your damn sister.”

  Pink was thankful for the slap of cold air when he walked outside to his Suburban, glad to be free of the house, of Isabelle—even though she had slept most of the evening—and especially to be away from Claire. How could he live with a woman no smarter than a leather belt? Then he thought about Claire’s breasts, her plump round ass, the way she cooed and moaned when they screwed. He’d have to find a hobby that kept him out of the house most of the time. That’s probably why Kenny took up walleye fishing and cocaine.

  Pink turned the key in the ignition, squinting toward the house, half-expecting to see the curtains pulled back, Claire peeking out into the darkness.

  Where was Kenny? He hadn’t bothered to call Claire at the house or drive by, Pink thought, finally mustering a little anger over the stunt Kenny had pulled at Burtran Lake. Pink had felt some humiliation, but it was quickly drowned out by fear then a bit of amusement over the scenario: he and Claire practically naked standing on the railing of the bridge in the middle of the night. Picturing Claire’s panties rolling down her hips as he’d dragged her up the hill aroused him again. It was hard to stay mad with a mind full of stimulating images.

  Pink turned off the radio as he drove along the winding road to his mama’s house, passing the road sign with his name on it. He hated that sign, almost as much as he hated these ceremonies.

  Before he pulled into his mama’s driveway, he saw the orange glow of fire flickering off the tree trunks. A serpent of smoke crawled up through the naked limbs. He half expected to walk around to her backyard and find an angry mob waving lit torches, his mother in the center tied to a huge pine stake, dry straw crackling in a tribe of flames. What he saw when he began the long trudge down the hill was far less dramatic but nearly as surprising. His mother stood in the center of her sacred circle completely alone. He couldn’t believe no one had shown for Lulu’s farewell.