The Cabin on Souder Hill Read online

  “Open the door that hath no key, the door of dreams, only by wisdom shall man come to Thee, O Shepherd of Goats, answer unto me.”

  Blinding light rushed through the opening doors and Michelle felt herself falling backward. She opened her eyes to the piercing, glassy gaze of Mrs. Souder, radiant orbs glowing from her dark hood. Michelle blinked, startled, and the image vanished, leaving the image of the old woman speaking quietly to Pink, her back to Michelle. Michelle couldn’t tell what was real and what wasn’t. She wanted to speak, but her own tongue felt foreign and dead in her mouth.

  Mrs. Souder gestured with her hands toward the heavens, saying Hail and Farewell. Hail and Farewell. Michelle had no idea how long they had been in the circle. In that moment, cold rushed back into her extremities, snow collecting on the shoulders of her coat. She tried to kick warmth into her feet by tapping them on the ground discreetly, so as not to disturb the old woman. Mrs. Souder spoke incantations to the four directions then used her curved knife to slice an imaginary opening in the space beneath the arbor.

  “It’s time to go,” she told Michelle, pointing toward the exit. Pink yawned and followed Michelle out.

  “How about some pork chops before I drive Mrs. Stage home?” Pink asked his mother, walking under the arbor. “I’m sure that little soirée of yours made her as hungry as it did me.”

  Mrs. Souder took a deep breath as if to calm herself. Michelle plodded up the hill to the house, still dizzy, her skin like damp cotton. She felt like she’d just stepped out of a hot tub, both cold and sweaty at the same time. Never had she been so aware of every cell and molecule in her body, as if she could feel the blood swabbing her veins, the marrow feeding her bones.

  In the kitchen, Pink’s mother fried pork chops in a skillet on the stove, smoke swirling up into the exhaust fan in the range hood. Pink excused himself to the bathroom. The clock read almost three in the morning. Michelle wasn’t the least bit sleepy.

  “Is that it?” Michelle asked, after Pink left the room.

  “Is that what?” Mrs. Souder said, her back to Michelle, twisting to look over at her.

  “Is that . . . I don’t know . . . is that all there is? I mean . . . can I go home now? Back to my old life, the way it was before? My daughter?” Michelle’s words felt clumsy and stilted in the wake of what she had just experienced.

  Mrs. Souder turned her spatula toward Michelle. “That’s not what we were doing,” the old woman said. “I don’t know how to tell you this, but I can’t open it. I don’t have those kinds of powers.” The old woman spun back to the skillet as if Michelle should have assumed that all along.

  “I don’t understand . . . how . . . what can I . . .” Michelle muttered, confused by all the ceremonious rigmarole. What had that been about, the chanting, the fire, the shiny blade at her chest?

  “Lulu opened the portal for Pink and me,” the old woman said over the sizzling of the meat. “Then she closed it. I don’t have the slightest notion how she did it.”

  “But I thought that’s what you were doing, the stuff about the door and all? I saw light pouring through the opening doors.”

  “I was trying to understand what happened, why you ended up here, trying to get answers from the Outer Realm, from Lulu.”

  “And?”

  “Only one thing came to me,” the old woman said, shoveling a pork chop onto the waiting plate. “Isabelle.”

  “Isabelle?” Michelle asked.

  Pink padded back into the kitchen.

  Mrs. Souder slid her eyes toward her son, setting the plate down in front of an empty chair. “Oh, I bet they can smell these chops all the way over in Arkansas,” Pink said, rubbing his palms together as he sidled up to the plate. “Sure you don’t want one, Mrs. Stage? Put iron in your blood.”

  Michelle shook her head, glancing over at Pink’s mother, who was at the sink drying dishes, her back to the table.

  Pink finished both pork chops and sat a moment picking his teeth before he asked Michelle if she was ready to go. Mrs. Souder had left the kitchen and hadn’t returned. Michelle had no idea where she was, thinking maybe she’d gone to bed.

  “Mama, we’re leaving,” Pink called to the hallway.

  A moment later Pink’s mother appeared under the small archway to the kitchen in her bathrobe and slippers. “Why don’t you go warm up your car first,” she told Pink. “So Mrs. Stage won’t get cold.”

  “Sure, but it ain’t gonna do much good with the window broke out and all,” Pink said, pushing himself up from the table. Mrs. Souder waited to hear the front door close before she spoke. “I suspect that you will be able to return to your previous life tonight if you’re ready,” she said to Michelle, “if that’s what you want. But there is a catch.”

  Michelle waited, watching the old woman’s colorless eyes.

  “You will have to take Pink with you,” Mrs. Souder said.

  “Take Pink?”

  “I am almost certain Isabelle opened the portal. Isabelle wants him back.”

  “But I thought Isabelle didn’t practice witchcraft. And why would she—”

  “Not the Isabelle that lives with Pink. The Isabelle Pink killed. Isabelle from the other realm. That’s why you were given the pentacle.”

  Michelle was confused, trying to make sense of something that could not be reconstructed through reason.

  “Horrible images came to me in the circle tonight,” the old woman said. “Images I can’t begin to explain, things I have never seen before. I fear Pink has done something unspeakable with Isabelle’s body, something disgraceful to her spirit.”

  “How can I get Pink to come with me? He’ll never agree.”

  “I’ll take care of that,” the old woman said.

  “What about you?” Michelle said. “If Pink goes . . . you’ll lose him forever.”

  The old woman pulled out the chair and sat. “I lost Pink the moment Ida and I deceived him. We should have told him who he was from the start. I have tried to change what has happened, and it’s all gone terribly wrong. Now he must go back, or he’ll kill Isabelle again. At least if he returns, I can try to help Isabelle get well, so she can live out her life.”

  Michelle wanted to say something to Mrs. Souder, but could not find any words that seemed to make sense.

  “It was unforgivable what Ida and I did to those children.” The old woman hung her head, curtains of gray hair falling forward, covering her cheeks. “What hurts the most is . . .” she added, raising her head, “knowing Pink will be alone. In his whole life, he’s never been alone.”

  “I’ll try to help him if I can,” Michelle said.

  The old woman stared up at Michelle through glossy eyes, using her bent fingers to push the hair from her face. “He won’t know you, child,” the old woman said. “Once you pass through, Pink will have no idea who you are.”

  Michelle could not fully grasp the implications of what the old woman was saying, or how Pink might react, or what she might find when she “passed through.” She had no idea how much time had elapsed? Or how to explain Cliff’s death to Cassie, if Cassie were even there? Wherever there was. She couldn’t tell Cassie that her father shot himself—there would be no body, no funeral, just numerous unanswerable questions, impossible leaps of faith. Then another thought broke in: Where was Cliff’s body? Was it still in Ardenwood or on the way back to Atlanta? If she left, who would take care of his remains? Michelle felt a dizzying sensation, close to what she’d experienced in the circle, except this one left her nauseous.

  “You need to go now,” the old woman said. “Don’t be afraid, child. Isabelle only wants Pink back. She has no row with you.”

  Michelle felt a hollow opening in her chest, as if something had fallen out, leaving behind a flimsy space that could collapse at any moment. The emptiness spread to her stomach, her knees. She held her eyes on the old woman a se
cond longer, trying to restore balance, then turned down the hallway toward the front door.

  In the driveway, Pink’s Suburban pumped a tower of billowing steam up into the night sky. Michelle cinched her collar around her neck and dashed toward the car, stepping high to traverse the deep snow. When she got in the Suburban, Pink slid out the other side.

  “My mama wants something,” Pink said, motioning toward the house. “I’ll just be a second.” He hitched up his trousers as he trod back toward the front porch. Michelle saw Pink’s mother standing in the doorway, watching Pink approach, glancing occasionally in Michelle’s direction. Snow fell heavier now, nearly erasing both Pink and his mother as he climbed the steps and disappeared inside.

  Chapter 37

  Pink shot a glance up the hall. “Aw, hell,” he said. “Mama? I got to get going. Where’d you run off to?”

  She came out of her private room.

  “What is it you wanted, Mama?”

  She walked past him and motioned for him to sit.

  “Mama, I need to get going. My damn eyes are starting to feel like sand pits,” he said, plopping down in the lounger. “And if that ain’t enough, Isabelle’s about to make me crazier than a sprayed roach. I ain’t even had a chance to tell you her latest nonsense.” Pink hadn’t thought about Isabelle in the last couple hours, but now it seemed she was living rent-free in his head. What would make a woman say the crazy shit she’d told him? he wondered. How could she even conjure up such a notion? It was beyond him.

  “Pink, I want you to do me a favor,” his mother said.

  “Sure, Mama, but I may need to stay here tonight. Isabelle’s lost her mind. You know what she told me? I can’t even believe I’m telling you this. She’s been calling me all damn night to tell me—”

  “Pink. I need your attention.”

  Pink crooked his arm over his other shoulder and scratched an itch at the center of his back. “Yeah, Mama, I’m listening.”

  “Don’t repeat what I’m about to tell you.”

  Pink looked at her.

  “Mrs. Stage . . .” his mother said. “Mrs. Stage is a very disturbed woman. I’m worried about her, Pink. I called Loudon’s office and left a message while you were eating supper. I told him to come by in the morning to fetch her. She needs professional help. She shouldn’t be in that cabin alone. I’m afraid she’ll end up like her husband.”

  “She’s got her own people, Mama, back in Atlanta. Let them handle her. We got our own nut logs to deal with . . . like Isabelle.”

  “Pink, listen to what I’m telling you. Mrs. Stage believes she followed a light in the woods and somehow ended up in some other dimension or something.”

  “Whew!” Pink said. “I should get her and Clarence together. He’s in some other dimension too. They’d be happier than a three-legged dog in a ball-licking contest.”

  “Pink! Why do you say such things?”

  “Sorry, Mama.”

  “Mrs. Stage experienced a terrible trauma with the death of her daughter . . . and now her husband. She’s delusional. I’m not sure why they released her from the hospital.”

  “What’s this got to do with us?”

  “She came to us for answers. She came to us for help. We need to help her, Pink.”

  Pink shook his head. He didn’t share his mama’s altruism, and he didn’t believe he was put here to save anybody. He saw folks out there trying to help other folks when they couldn’t even help themselves. “Blind leading the blind,” his daddy used to say. Pink felt he’d be lucky to save himself, much less anyone else.

  “After you drive her back up to her cabin, I want you to go with her. Into the woods. Tonight. And I want you—”

  “Tonight? In the damn snow? Mama, I can barely keep my brain working as it is, I’m so damn tired. I ain’t going down no damn mountain in the middle of the damn night in no damn snowstorm!”

  “Pink, go with her. Make sure she’s doesn’t hurt herself and bring her back here. Once she sees there is no strange light, no mysterious cabins—just a hill and my house down here—she’ll have to accept reality.”

  “Then what?” Pink asked.

  “Then she can sleep here, on the couch, till Loudon comes to fetch her in the morning.”

  Pink shot up from the chair, pulling his fingers into fists. “Where the hell will I sleep? I can’t go home. You have no idea the shit I been through the past few days. I got Mrs. Stage telling me I killed my wife. I got crazy rednecks shooting holes in my upholstery, making me jump off bridges. I got Clarence spraying his damn toes with jock itch powder, and I got Isabelle calling me every damn three minutes to tell me I’m her damn blood brother! Now I know it was a full moon the other night, but right now my life’s got more nuts in it than a squirrel’s nest!”

  Mattie sat back in the couch, her hands folded in her lap. “I need you to do this, Pink. I want you to go with her. Bring her back here safe.”

  Pink shot away from his mother and went to the window. He looked out at his Suburban in the driveway, wondering how much it was going to cost to fix his window. He’d never had to replace an electric one before.

  “I don’t know why I can’t just take her back to her cabin and leave her,” he said. “She’s none of my business. Yours neither.”

  “Because I asked, Pink.” His mother wrapped her arms around him at the window and hugged him. “I love you, Pink.”

  He scratched behind his ear. “Aw, hell, Mama, why do you have to get involved in other folks’ business?” He turned in her arms and returned the hug, pulling her to his chest, planting a kiss on the top of her head. For a second he thought she was crying. “You okay, Mama?”

  “Yes, baby. Maybe tomorrow, Pink, you can help me take down the circle, and I’ll cook you a nice, big lunch.”

  Chapter 38

  The drive to the cabin took longer than normal, the road hidden under more than a foot of snow. Michelle gripped the armrest when the Suburban’s tires slipped, then caught, slipped again, then caught, the rear end shifting before the tread found traction, jerking the vehicle forward. A few times, the front end slid and Michelle thought they might crash into the trees lining the edge of the road. Pink kept the wheel steady as he crawled the big truck up the mountain, eyes straight ahead, not saying a word. Snow cut past the windshield. Pink’s silence made her nervous. She didn’t know him well, but she knew he liked to talk.

  When they arrived at the cabin, Michelle was shocked to see Darcy’s Explorer in the driveway. She felt a moment’s relief that her sister hadn’t abandoned her, followed by the dismay of knowing Darcy wouldn’t approve of what Michelle was about to do.

  When they got out, Pink knocked his fist on the hood of Darcy’s vehicle as he walked past. “Looks like you have company,” he said.

  Michelle walked up on the deck. The cabin was dark, and Michelle wondered if Darcy was asleep, if she should wake her. Why? she thought. What would be the point? Michelle padded through the snow to the far railing. Pink followed.

  “Mama says you got some business down there,” he said, walking up beside her, brushing snow off the rail to rest his hands on the wood. “Wants me to go with you.”

  Michelle had no idea what Mrs. Souder had told him and didn’t know quite what to do. She could tell by the flat tone of his voice that he was making fun of her, that he probably thought she was insane. She searched the blizzard for a light, tried to force her eyes past the fusion of snow and darkness—nothing. It was like trying to read a newspaper through a sweater. She heard the sliding door open behind her and turned to find Darcy in the doorway.

  “What are you doing, Michelle? Who’s that with you?”

  Pink turned to look at Darcy then looked back at Michelle shaking his head, muttering something about squirrels. How could she explain who Pink was? “It’s nobody,” Michelle said. “Go back to bed.”

 
“That’s right, ma’am,” Pink said, speaking to Darcy. “I’m nobody. Just one of those figments of your imagination. Like the tooth fairy.”

  “Darcy . . . this is Pink Souder,” Michelle said. “Everything’s going to be all right. Can you just go back to bed? Please? Just trust me.”

  Darcy started to protest. “Michelle, what the hell is going on . . . ?”

  “That’s a good idea,” Pink said, turning to leave. “Let’s all sleep on it tonight, and we’ll all go to Shoney’s in the morning for a big biscuits-and-gravy breakfast. My treat.”

  “Pink, no. Please don’t leave,” Michelle said, grabbing his arm.

  “This is Pink?” Darcy said. “The real estate agent?”

  “I see my reputation precedes me,” Pink said. “Do you need a card?”

  “Darcy,” Michelle said. “Please, just go back inside.”

  “Michelle, what’s going on?” Darcy said. “Can you just come in and tell me what’s happening here? Alone, please?”

  “Okay. I just need to speak with Pink for a minute then I’ll be in. Why don’t you put on some coffee? Maybe decaf? I’ll tell you everything.”

  After sliding the door shut, Darcy disappeared into the darkness of the cabin. Michelle could tell her sister was disgusted with her, but none of that would matter. Not if this worked. If it worked? Michelle examined the words her mind had used, the little battles waged on a regular basis between fantasy and logic, denial, and acceptance. Then a new thought came, a tricky one. What would Darcy do in the morning when Michelle was gone? Michelle recalled the photos of missing children on boards in Post Offices and grocery stores, remembered stories she’d read about people who disappeared and were never heard from again. To Darcy, Michelle would be just that, a person gone missing. The notion distressed her.

  “Let’s go,” Michelle said, trying to push away her discomfort.

  “Where?” Pink asked, stopping at the head of the steps.