Chapter 30. Tessa
Tessa
Bodies form out of the ether, slowly filling in the details with limbs and long-fingered hands all belonging to the dead and forgotten.
“This way.” I beckon from the doorway, waving them forward.
“Step right up.” If it’s an invitation they need, then it’s an invitation they’ll get.
The first creatures hover toward the door, with twenty or so more gathering behind, rising out of vapor, one after the other.
The smoke darkens, dips, and swirls around their bodies to transform into shadowy memories of suits, gowns, hospital robes, their last living imprints on earth.
Like me, I think, looking down at my repurposed lace dress.
But their faces remain a void, as if over time they’ve forgotten what they look like and let decay take over.
For the first time I see them for what they are.
Hungry, but not for blood—for meaning, for a chance to remember, for a chance to feel whole again.
The first creatures press together, angling to get through the narrow doorway. I step back, leading my quarry farther into the house. I walk backward down a long wood-paneled hallway, through a yellow kitchen with cracked linoleum floors, chipped-paint cupboards, and empty beer cans on the counter.
The fades push closer, as if the pull from the door below and its promise of escape draws them near. I gasp when I recognize one. With her black-bustled dress and long satin gloves, it’s the woman from the mansion gate. A brooch on her neck glints in the overhead light with the initials BvdB.
Is that why she wanted inside the mansion so badly? Could this be Brielle van der Born herself? Was it her home?
But there’s no time to wonder as I round the corner to the basement stairs, pausing only briefly to let them catch up.
Though the fades may not need me anymore.
There’s an agitation, a rattling energy, as clawed hands with ancient fingernails reach forward, yearning, moaning, each of them struggling to arrive first. I take the stairs two at a time, landing on the floor only long enough to hear Carl jerk back in surprise and say, “What is this?”
But I don’t answer; I don’t want to call attention to myself. I grab hold of the banister and swing under the stairwell, tucking inside the small empty section below the lowest steps.
Not that the smoke creatures care; the door is in their sights now.
They surge forward, arms outstretched, a frothing undulating mass.
Before Carl can do more than throw his hands up in protest and scream, they’re carrying him forward, an overflowing river of bodies, a current too strong to break.
Carl searches me out by the stairwell as he’s shoved along, the door looming closer.
Fear flashes behind his eyes. He waves in a panic, shouting for my help, “Tessa!”
Just like Reed’s final words. So much hope carried on my name, but this time it echoes hollow in the room. He’s begging me to stop the madness.
But I don’t. As if I even could. Instead, I step out of my cubby, raise my hand in the air, spin it around, and flip him off. It’s the last thing he’ll ever see.
I win, asshole. You’ll never hurt Tilly or anyone else again.
The gateway opens, larger than I’ve ever seen it, expanding to take up the entire basement wall. The fades rush the gap, bodies tumbling inside, dragging Carl with them, pulling him forever out of this world.
The door snaps shut, the golden outline vanishing.
I lean back with a deep sigh.
He’s gone.
It’s finally over.
Without the presence of the door, the several fades that couldn’t pass the threshold in time dissolve into mist. I’m alone. At least, it seems, Brielle made it through. Good for her.
I can’t bring myself to check the phone.
Hal said any time we betray our presence to the living we lose time off the clock.
The lights flickering and objects flying around Tilly’s house must have docked more days.
I’m sure my time is almost up. And if it isn’t, what’s the point?
This day has taken such a toll, I’m at a complete loss for what to do.
I sink to the floor, staring in wonder at the wall, which moments ago had cracked open to suck Carl and those creatures through.
Now, it’s lined with shelves of aging paint cans, tattered towels, and faded linens.
If Reed had any chance to escape, Carl’s departure was probably his moment.
But he didn’t return. The pain of that admission cleaves me in two. He’s well and truly gone now.
I bury my head in my hands, ready to go to pieces, then snap forward when someone knocks at the basement door.
“Hey, Carl, it’s Alvin. Your neighbor. I saw your car down the road and wanted to check on you. You down here?”
I turn as a middle-aged man, hair graying at his temples, plants a foot on the first creaky stair.
“Your door was open, I hope it’s okay that—” He gasps and almost loses his footing when his eyes land on Carl’s broken body, spread across the floor.
“Oh my God.” He runs down the remaining stairs while dialing 911.
So, there it is. The police will come. They’ll find Carl.
They’ll see his wall of stalker photos—those disturbing images of Tilly, me, and even Santiago.
A hit list, perhaps. If they poke around and start asking questions, they’ll discover Carl was at the party and learn what he’s been studying.
This might be just what’s needed to connect the cases.
But I don’t wait to find out. I can’t take any more death—any reminders of all that happened here and all I’ve lost because of it.
But I can’t face the van der Born estate without Reed, either.
So I close my eyes and go to the only place I can think of.
The place I’ve missed most in the entire world.
I imagine the green shag carpet my parents never ripped out, the sagging couch with Grandma’s quilt we’d tuck over us for movie nights, the family portraits hung over the mantel of Jillian and me at every awkward age, and in an instant … I’m home.
Home.
A deep sigh escapes my lips as a warmth spreads through my limbs.
The word has such a different meaning now.
Home used to be a place to sleep, do homework around the kitchen table, breeze in and out of with my busy schedule, but now I see it for what it actually was—a treasure.
I never realized how much I cherished this little corner of the world until it was ripped from me.
It’s quiet, save the ticking of the grandfather clock in the hallway and the laughter of the neighborhood kids at the end of the cul-de-sac.
I couldn’t go inside before, face all that I’d lost and my father’s grief, but I guess once you conquer an actual monster, confronting your inner demons doesn’t feel as impossible.
The temptation is high to sink into my dad’s recliner and drink in the memories of our life here. But for now, I keep moving.
I wander past the kitchen, where I spied my father through the window breaking down as he washed dishes. His plates are laid neatly in the rack now. Somehow there’s comfort in the small fact that he’s taking care of himself. I need to know he’ll be all right, or I don’t know if I can leave.
The pull of my room is strong. I want nothing more than to curl up on my bed and miss them, the people who made up my too-short life.
But rather than project myself there, I amble down the hallway, letting my eyes land on every framed photo and family memento.
There’s seven-year-old me, mouth stuffed with cake, lips ringed in chocolate, eyes sparkling.
There’s the crocheted owl I made my dad when I was twelve, which he first thought was a shoe.
We laughed so hard at that, he said he had to keep it forever.
There’s the photo of Jillian and her date before prom with me photobombing.
And the last one with my mom holding me as a newborn, my tiny hand wrapped around her finger.
As I make my way down the hall, something occurs to me that I never realized before.
There’s no report card tacked to the wall.
No A+ essay, framed college admission letter, or certificate of achievement.
All those things I thought made up my worth weren’t what made me loved by my family.
It was me they loved, not my accomplishments.
Where I saw success or failure, they saw me.
This is who I’m leaving behind for them.
Not the scholarship winner or the salutatorian.
But all the versions of myself—especially the deep and private ones only the people closest to us ever witness.
At last, standing outside my bedroom door, I take a shaky breath and pass through. I’m greeted by my sewing machine and dress form, my bolts of fabric in the bin by the window, and my wall collage with images of Kathmandu and the Himalayas.
It’s evening now. The room is cast in a rosy hue, the sun’s rays streaming in through gauzy curtains.
A sadness falls over me as I realize this is a space my dad has left untouched.
Even the trash by my desk hasn’t been emptied.
I still spy my crumpled graduation speech notes tossed in the bin.
Though it wasn’t that long ago, the room seems like a time capsule now, a museum piece.
See here, folks, this is how people used to live.
It’s as if it belongs to another girl, in another life.