Chapter Four Lee #2
tape inch by inch and counted to make sure it hadn’t been printed wrong, but everything was as it should have been.
This was the answer he wanted: that he so desperately needed to think about anything but James that he was inventing problems where there weren’t any, trying to keep his mind busy.
That was probably what a psychologist would tell him, if there was anyone he could tell about the murder.
Lee already had enough problems, so that was the answer he should have accepted. He knew this. And yet...
It itched. Deep, beneath his skin. No matter how much he scratched, the answer felt just past his fingertips, waiting for
him to touch it.
Again , he thought. I will measure again, and then the noise will stop .
“Lee?”
Lee jumped back. His shoulder punched straight through one of the panels of the paper door.
His father was standing in the hallway, frowning.
“What are you doing?” his father said, grimacing at the broken panel.
Lee paused, chewed over the lie for a moment. It was hard to think past the look on his father’s face that said he’d done
it again—he’d reminded him to worry.
“Interior decorating,” he said, turning the notebook to face his father, showing him the measurements. “I wanted to have a
good blueprint to work with.”
Lee’s father hesitated, as if searching for the lie in his eyes. Then he laughed and shook his head. “I actually like living
somewhere with so much empty space for once,” he said. “It’s nice to not have a place totally crammed with junk, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Lee said, even though he didn’t think so. His brain was an attic packed to the brim. He did not know what it was like
to live any other way.
Lee could tell from his father’s eyes that he didn’t believe him.
The sedative was wearing off, and it was as if his father had peeled back his own skin, bared his raw muscles and veins—that was how easily Lee could read him.
The way his brow pinched just slightly down, gaze darting between Lee’s scrawl on the notebook and the broken paper panel, like he couldn’t decide which was more troublesome.
“Well, have fun,” his father said, turning around because he didn’t want to look at him anymore.
The measuring tape felt so heavy in his hands now, the question of the house’s measurements just a quiet simmer at the back
of his mind. He put the tape back in the hall closet, mourning the loss of a distraction.
Then a squeak echoed through the house.
At first, Lee thought it must have been hinges that needed oiling, but then the noise came again and Lee remembered there
were no hinges in this house, only sliding doors.
He followed the sound, paused and held his breath and waited for it to repeat, then followed it again. The sound led him out
to the front yard, then the backyard, then the well, where Hina had told him about Okiku.
A strange cry echoed up from the stone prison of the well. Lee drew closer and peered into the darkness. The sun blurred the
water, but he could make out a flash of fur among the shadows. Maybe it was a stray cat, or a raccoon, or an injured rabbit.
Lee couldn’t discern the type of animal from its cry alone, but pain was a universal language.
He pulled at the rope to lift the bucket but found the frayed end in one hand. It had torn a few feet into the well, and was
caught on a small hook.
The cries grew louder, more frantic. It was like a twisted piece of machinery, the sound scraping the inside of his ears.
He leaned forward, tried to reach the remaining half of the rope, but his fingers just barely grazed it.
Lee thought of Okiku at the bottom of the well, looking up at the circle of white sky overhead.
He thought of dying with his mouth full of dirty water and blood, of clawing at the wet stones until his fingernails fell out, bloody hands reaching for a sky he would never touch.
One... two... three... four.. . five .
He braced one arm against the edge of the well and leaned deeper inside its mouth.
Sounds swelled around him, his every breath echoing across the stones. The world smelled of mildew and rain, the light blocked
out by his torso. Without the sun, he could no longer see the rope. He swung his hand aimlessly through the dark, then felt
around the wet edges of the wall.
Something brushed his hand, soft and cold.
He reached out again, and this time, a hand closed around his and pulled .
His feet slipped out from the dirt and the dark water rushed toward him. For a moment, he was falling headfirst into the well.
Then his left hand caught the lip of the well, halting his fall. He panted into the wet air and realized his right hand was
closed around the rope.
He pushed himself back until his feet reached the ground, then stood up straight, a cape of sunlight warming his shoulders.
He wiped the wetness of the well on his pants, then hastily tied the rope ends together and pulled the bucket up.
It was heavy—perhaps from last night’s rainwater—and Lee wasn’t strong. It took several tries, the pulley system creaking
threateningly with each lurch. With one final tug, he lifted the bucket up over the edge of the well.
It was a raccoon, just as he’d thought. Lying on its back, tiny hands splayed out to the sides. Perhaps it was injured? Maybe
weak from hunger, or scared, at the very least.
He glanced around for a stick to poke the raccoon with, to turn it over and check for injuries without the risk of getting
bitten. Maybe he could wrap it up tight in a towel and bring it to Hina—she always knew what to do.
When the raccoon didn’t seem like it was about to jump up and rip Lee’s face off, he drew closer, the bucket swinging as he tugged the rope taut. The bucket thumped against the side of the well... and a maggot crawled out of the raccoon’s eye socket.
Lee dropped the rope and the bucket plummeted back down, splashing at the bottom. He rushed to the edge of the well, but in
the secret darkness below, he couldn’t see the dead animal at all.
“I wouldn’t drink from that if I were you.”
Lee turned. Hina stood behind him, smirking.
“There’s lots of rust in there,” Hina said. “Don’t cut yourself, or we’ll have to take you into town for a shot.”
Lee wondered if he should tell her about the raccoon—it probably wasn’t good to let dead animals rot on your property. But
then one of them would have to bring it back up and bury it or burn it. Lee’s eye twitched as he imagined a maggot popping
out from behind his own eyeball.
“Hina,” Lee said, the word delicate, so quiet he wasn’t sure if she’d heard him at all.
The smile fell off Hina’s face and she tilted her head to the side, waiting for him to continue.
Lee swallowed, looking anywhere but at Hina’s face. Then he asked a forbidden question, one he never could ask in front of
his father, or he might as well crush his heart in his fist like a grape.
“Do you think there’s anything strange about this house?” Lee said at last.
Hina watched him carefully as the words faded. She glanced back at the house, as if she would see its strangeness spray-painted
across the walls.
“It’s a samurai house,” she said. “Of course it’s strange. Why? Do you think there’s something strange about it?”
It was a dangerous question. There was no guarantee she wouldn’t tell Lee’s father exactly what he said.
Hina might cook for him and tolerate his presence and tell him ghost stories, but that didn’t mean she would protect him.
Still, Lee’s gaze dropped to the ground, where Hina’s shadow was short and dark on the dying grass.
“Yes,” Lee whispered, letting the wind carry the word away. The grass shuddered in the empty space between them as a hot breeze
sailed through, tearing at Hina’s hair.
“Hmm,” Hina said after a moment. “Like Okiku? The girl in the well? Is that why you were looking in there?”
“Something like that,” Lee said. Say yes , he thought. Tell me I’m not the only one. Say it out loud and make it real .
“The house is... loud,” Hina said at last. “It has a heartbeat.”
Lee nodded quickly. “It breathes,” he said, thinking of the air blowing through the open doors.
Hina watched him, still standing a careful distance away. “It has a pulse,” she said. “I heard that a river was diverted deep
under this land. A narrow stream that leads to the sea. Maybe what you feel is the ocean’s heartbeat.”
But the ocean doesn’t have a face , Lee wanted to say. The ocean doesn’t have eyes.
“What do you know about the people who lived in this house before us?” Lee said.
Hina stilled. The trees shivered above her, the shadows of leaves covering the left half of her face. “Nothing,” she said,
the word so soft, so frail, so completely unlike Hina that Lee wondered if it was a lie.
Lee Turner knew when people lied. Except for Hina.
Either she had never told him a lie, or she was the only person who could fool him. Lee hoped it was the former.
“But you said it was a samurai house,” Lee said. “How did you know that?”
“Because of the low ceilings,” Hina said. “The layout, the location. The house told me the story. All I know is what the walls are willing to say.”
Lee shifted from foot to foot. “Could women be samurai?” he said.
He didn’t realize how desperate he’d sounded until Hina leaned back. It was almost imperceptible, because Hina never flinched
or took a step back from him, but her face had darkened as his shadow shifted over her. Lee swallowed and carefully stood
up straight, taking a measured step away from Hina.
“Lee,” she said, “I love ghost stories as much as you, but they’re just stories. You’re safe here. You know that, right?”
“Of course,” he said quickly. “I’m not a kid anymore,” he added with a soft smile.
“Really? So you mean you’re not scared?” she teased.
“No,” Lee said honestly.
Lee Turner was scared of being caught for killing James. He was scared of jail. He was scared of himself and what he might
do. But he was not scared of this house.
He sensed, even then, that the house had been built at the edge of a cliff overlooking an abyss of darkness, that it teetered
somewhere between a beautiful lie and raw truth. And Lee wanted to fall all the way down.
“You should go home,” Lee said, half joking. Because Hina did not live here yet; it was his father’s house, and Hina didn’t
have to fall down too. “Unless you want to sleep in a haunted house.”
Hina smiled, tilting her head to the side. Her hair fell over one eye, shadows spilling across her face. “Don’t be silly,
Lee,” she said. “No one leaves this house.”