In the dark I reach for the string I remember dangling off the ceiling. It magically ends up in the palm of my hand. I loop it around my finger, pull on it, and the light comes on. Passing underneath the bare bulb forces me to hunch over as I count my steps. It strikes me as silly—it’s not as if Edward has added any—but all the while it seems appropriate and when I land on the last one, I know why.
My foot slips as if on a patch of ice. I catch myself. How could I forget? I had made it a habit to hold on to the railing and caught myself every single time. Like now. Muscle memory. The concrete step had begun to crumble years ago, a big chunk had broken off. The slightest contact will deteriorate the jagged rectangle until there’s nothing left but cement turning into dust. Eventually the sudden drop-off will feel like drifting off to sleep and catching yourself jerking awake, all the while you are tumbling into the dark.
The first door on my right swings open with ease. Mildew blasts at me. A few wooden boards are haphazardly cast onto the floor. I’m about to turn when I spot chairs in the back corner. One propped up upside down on the other, six altogether. They are covered in brown stains and I can’t help but think of blood but then I catch myself. It terrifies me to know that’s where my mind goes.
The room on the left is a wine cellar intended to shelve vintage wines but I lost interest—between the cost of vaults and temperature control units and logs one should keep—and Edward didn’t want to spend more money and so I gave up on it altogether. Behind the next door is nothing but an old bike leaning against the wall, rolls of wrapping paper in a bucket, bent at the top as if they have been down here for decades. The last room contains nothing but cobwebs, spider nests, and rat droppings. Close to the ceiling are elongated windows, slit like cuts into the walls and even during sunny days they didn’t provide enough natural light to see every nook and cranny. One window has been left ajar.
Back upstairs, in the kitchen, I listen to the house. The refrigerator hums, ice cubes drop into the tray. My movements are cautious, I pass from room to room, timidly, afraid I’ll knock over a vase, bump into a chair, and send it screeching across the floor, or a rug will trip me up.
The dining room. I remember it as a long and narrow room with the original hardwood floors, the perfect size for a table that would seat a dozen people. In the best of days we’d had dinner parties and anniversary gatherings here, held charity functions, and even the mayor came for a brunch once. When Edward opened his practice, guests gathered in the foyer and upon my direction the staff pushed the doors open and the grand space revealed itself. I watched the faces, how their jaws dropped. Over the past year at Shadow Garden, I have imagined this room often: the mahogany table taking up most of the room, impeccably set with heavy silver cutlery; etched wineglasses luminous in the early evening light; candelabras on each end of the table; ornate place cards.
The starburst pendant hangs above. It’s a work of art and a genius move to place it here, that one modern accent completing a room of antiques. Such a powerful statement, the perfect piece for the space. I wish I could see the room the way it used to look, the way the light danced off the walls and reflected in the windowpanes like a lustrous crown manifesting our place in the world, but I don’t dare turn on the light.
I move on into the foyer and the double flight of stairs invitingly wind upward in front of me, but I hesitate, I’m fearful I’ll give myself away if the stairs creak. I needn’t worry, though; the construction is sturdy and up I go, ignoring the second floor with guest bedrooms and a library and make my way to the third floor. I want to rush rush rush but I stop myself from getting carried away. If I get careless, it’ll only be a matter of time until I run into a chair, knock something over; eventually a mistake will be made.
At the top landing, the hallways to the left and right lie abandoned and I’m disoriented; furniture is missing, the hallways lack accent tables, the silk curtains are not there either and it strikes me—the entire house is furnished sparsely. I look left, then right, left again. The hallways are long square chutes, like shipping containers, leading into gradual darkness.
Above me, though shrouded in darkness, is a masterpiece. Just knowing it’s there is consolation enough, even though I can’t see it. The hours I spent on picking it out are incalculable, and the designer had advised against it but I told her if something works, you keep it around. From Versailles to Buckingham Palace, its appeal was time tested and if it was good enough for them, it was perfect for us: an early nineteenth-century French crystal chandelier draped with bead roping, heavy pear-shaped drops, an iron structure with fluted arms. I had purchased the chandelier behind Edward’s back and had it electrified. I have no qualms with saying I would have spent double the money if I had to. How do you put a price on something so perfect? Every time I turned it on, it was like plugging in a Christmas tree.
Taking in a deep breath, I feel a tickle in my nose. Those dirty drapes and windows. Is it neglect or my presence sending a vortex of dust into the previously stagnant air? A house this size requires dusting twice a week or it turns into a dust trap, and judging by the state of it all, Edward hasn’t hired a housekeeper. There’s an expression physicians use: circling the drain. Talk for a patient whose death is unavoidable, a medical term for someone in rapid decline: this house is circling the drain. It’s fixing to die. This isn’t a house neglected, not a house in flux, in a state of unrest, but a house about to perish.
A ghost house is what this is. One moment there was a landing I used to navigate from but now there are so many rambling hallways, half stories, offset stairs, it’s no longer simple and easy to get around, and everything is complicated and overthought. The transition between floors makes my head spin. I’m tangled within these walls. Maybe it’s just the dark inducing some sort of bewilderment? That’s what I tell myself: the darkness is playing tricks on me.
The hallway unfolds and there’s panic. Has the house morphed into a labyrinth? There’s this sinking feeling of despair, a lack of confidence in finding my way around, and is this warped house no longer willing to accommodate me? I might as well admit it to myself: I am lost. How does one get lost in one’s own home?
Making my way back down the stairs, I end up in a passageway with a round table and a hideous horse statue. A glimmer of a memory in this otherwise unaccustomed space—Penelope in pajamas, a Christmas morning, her calling out to me, mere seconds and she was down the stairs tearing wrapping paper, Edward saying from above, “Would you look at that, Santa’s been here!”—but then my heart sinks right through my body onto the floor. Is that where we used to put up the Christmas tree? I don’t remember the area being so spacious. Why would I not remember the very house where I raised my daughter and where I lived for almost twenty years?
If I were in court, if someone made me rest one hand on a bible and raise the other, I’d say this isn’t my house. But that is just silly. Silly.
20
DONNA