Chapter 51
I’ve put down the hammer, but I’m still a wreck.
My eyes are puffy from crying, and I feel mildly crazed.
When I walk through the house, I keep expecting some part of it to come alive.
The creaks sound louder. Doors seem to open, though when I walk over to close them, there’s no obvious draft.
No loose latch. Several times, I think I hear phantom footsteps in the rooms next to me.
I go up to take a second shower, to try and warm away this chilling feeling.
In The Forest of the Dead, the trees seem to tremble in my periphery, as though readying to break off from the painted walls, though when I look at them straight on, they retract back to their inanimate state.
I consider waking Topher but what’s the point. He wouldn’t see what I see.
I stand in the shower for a long while, letting scalding hot water run down my body and rubbing my skin raw with a washcloth. Get a grip. Get a grip. Get a grip. I lean my head against the shower wall.
Then, I hear my name, whispered in the steam. Elinor.
“Topher?” I pull back the curtain, hoping to see my husband.
The bathroom is empty, and the door is closed. Elinor. The whisper feels as though it’s on my neck.
I gasp and tumble out of the shower. The bathroom is full of thick, heavy steam, as blinding as fog.
Elinor. I whip around. The bathroom floor dissolves right in front of me, it falls away like sand in an hourglass.
I hear a loud thud, one that seems to shake the roof, and I suddenly realize it’s the sound of something heavy falling.
I jerk my eyes up. A woman with dark curling hair hangs from the shower curtain rod, which has been replaced by a tree branch.
Her body rotates slightly. The noose creaks.
I spin to run, slamming into the bathroom door.
I pull and pull on the knob, but it doesn’t open.
Please open, please open, please open. It’s a prayer and a beg and a cry all at once.
I look over my shoulder. I expect to see her hanging, my own witch, my damned ghost, my Lydia.
But she’s gone. The shower drips. A shampoo bottle rolls on the floor.
The steam begins to dissipate. The doorknob finally gives, and I run out.
Topher sleeps in the bedroom, an unmoving pile of blankets.
I’m soaking wet, but I pull on leggings and a large sweatshirt, shivering. I can’t be bothered with a bra and underwear. I throw on socks and hurry down the stairs, the balls of my feet pounding into the wood stairs. In the mudroom, I grab a pair of boots, and shove my feet into them.
It’s only once I’m outside that I breathe.
I don’t know when I last took a breath. Before I heard my name whispered in the shower?
I march around to the back of the house and into the toolshed.
I grab an old metal shovel, the kind with a pointed spade.
Then I take off toward the woods, and stumble and trip my way through, using the shovel for support when necessary.
I know where I have to go. She was telling me that I can’t give up.
I’m not allowed to. No matter how unhinged I might feel, she’s not going to let me stop, until I’ve done my part.
I come upon the gravestones, which rise in the fog like the hanged woman emerged in the steam.
A dark figure cut against the suffocating gray, white.
Lavinia Brown, Hester Proctor, Amias Smith.
The one too worn to read. My old friends.
I stand next to the fallen stone, the one being consumed by the earth. It’s time to see you, I think.
I shove the edge of the shovel underneath the side of the gravestone.
It takes a few tries to actually get it in there.
I press down for leverage. At first, nothing gives.
I rest, and then push again. I can smell moss and rotting leaves around me.
I see and hear a few weeds and roots begin to tear.
I keep pushing. I feel sweat start to bead at my hairline and the small of my back.
Help me, I think. Come on and fucking help me.
Suddenly, the grass and bramble that has grown around the stone, come alive, releasing the stone and then retracting into the earth.
I gasp and stagger back. There’s a sudden fluttering by my head and I can feel the beating of wings near my ear.
When I whip my head to face the black bird, it vanishes, though its caws echo through the trees.
“Lydia,” I breathe.
I grip the shovel once more and press down to lift the stone. It moves easily this time. Once it’s lifted, I drop the shovel and grip the underside with my fingers. The stone feels cold and dirty. I lift it up and over, letting it fall to the forest floor, buried side up.
Then I kneel down and wipe away the earth as best I can, scratching at the engraving with my nails. Finally, I sit back on my heels and read what’s been revealed.
ISAAC GARFIELD
APRIL 7, 1690–NOVEMBER 12, 1753
1753.
1753.
I knew it. There was a settlement here before 1771.