I can\u2019t remember the last time I heard the house, not really. I used to know; in fact I used to know right down to the very second, but they\u2019ve been giving me drugs. I can\u2019t hear it any more. I can\u2019t feel it, but I can remember it.<\/p>\n
Once, I felt it call to me. I felt it pull me. I<\/em> felt it.<\/em><\/p>\n No longer, although I haven\u2019t actually swallowed the pills for several days, and I bet by bedtime tonight I\u2019ll feel it. Perhaps I miss it. Perhaps I long to be in that other place. Perhaps it\u2019s all illusion brought to life by my tired and frequently twisted mind. Oh I know I\u2019m sick, don\u2019t think I believe I\u2019m sane. I know better.<\/p>\n Even though it\u2019s been so long I can\u2019t remember the when<\/em>, I can remember it<\/em>. The stairway from first to second floors. The wainscoting just around the corner from the last step; I\u2019d run my hand along the white-painted strip until it reached a snag in the immaculate wood.<\/p>\n The snag wasn\u2019t<\/em>, not really. It was a button. If I pushed it at the right time, the lower part of that panel would swing inwards, so I could crawl through into the space between the walls.<\/p>\n Crawl slow and silent, so they<\/em> didn\u2019t hear me. <\/p>\n I don\u2019t think I ever knew who they were. They were just muttered voices between the walls, causing terror to dance across my spine. I could cross from the house, through it, to someplace else. Even to my child-mind, I knew where I was going wasn\u2019t possible, that it wasn\u2019t part of the house. It wasn\u2019t that big. <\/p>\n They lived between the walls, the voices that terrified me at twelve and continue to terrify me, even now. If they knew I was crossing, crawling so slowly that it seemed a day between the rooms, they\u2019d do horrible things to me.<\/p>\n I saw the remains of more than one child there, between the studs and plaster and lathe walls; if I looked down, I could see them just a foot or so below my scraped knees. No matter how long they\u2019d rested there, the look of complete and utter horror was frozen to their tiny features. They didn\u2019t rot, they didn\u2019t fall apart. They were just there<\/em>. Dolls, broken and abandoned.<\/p>\n And I was as scared of them as I was of the voices. <\/p>\n Carefully, I would put a hand out, set it down. Wait<\/em>. Bring my knee forward, put it down. Wait<\/em>. Opposite hand, repeat the motions.<\/p>\n The other children moved sometimes. Just their eyes, sometimes their little brows would knit together and it seemed to me that I could hear their silent screams. <\/p>\n One hand out, down, wait. Knee forward, down, wait.<\/p>\n So it went, every night, for so long\u2026 I don\u2019t know why I went through the little door, I don\u2019t know why I crawled between the walls, I don\u2019t know why I opened the door to the other side. I know I was scared; scared of myself, scared of what was behind me and scared of what lay in front of me. All the time, scared. And night after night, I did it over and over.<\/p>\n I<\/em> waited on the other side of that door, only it wasn\u2019t really me. It was, but not. She looked like me and talked like me, but she could do horrible things. She knew I was scared of her. Her name was Maya. <\/p>\n I once watched as Maya took slivers of wood and slid them into the eyes of a bird she\u2019d trapped. The bird didn\u2019t make a noise as the wood pierced its eyes; I hoped it was dead. She asked me if I wanted her to come through the wall and do that to Mother.<\/p>\n It was shameful, but I hesitated before I shook my head. I left her standing at a doorway where the beyond was nothing but blackness. I turned back only once, just as she turned to leave the room we shared; the blackness sucked her in with a noise not unlike that of a straw at the bottom of an empty milkshake glass. The bird was left on the floor, twitching. Not dead. Silent<\/em>.<\/p>\n I hated and loved Maya at the same time. <\/p>\n Together we explored other rooms in the house that stood between. I know you\u2019re thinking\u2014Between what?<\/em>. I can\u2019t tell you that, you\u2019d never understand. The house I went to, the house she<\/em> went to\u2014it<\/em>\u2014it was between<\/em>. <\/p>\n And forever whispering, forever nattering\u2026 the voices<\/em>.<\/p>\n The house seemed to breathe around us; light cast crazy shadows on walls that rippled and heaved. In that place, the sun moved differently, faster than it should. Sometimes the house was old\u2026 old-fashioned wallpaper hung on walls in rooms with very high ceilings, area rugs covered floors set with period furniture. It was in the old house that we met Joseph.<\/p>\n Joseph looked like Maya and I, sounded like Maya and I\u2014but he was a boy. A frightened boy. Maya pinched him, hard and often. He would scream each time, but he looked at her with such love and admiration. He never walked in front of us or beside us as we explored\u2026 he stayed behind. Always behind.<\/p>\n I remember we played Chinese checkers and jacks. I remember we played hopscotch on a grid Maya carved into the wood floor beside the rug in the old house. Joseph was terrified the \u201cnanny lady\u201d would find out, and punish us. Mostly, he worried about the \u201cnanny lady\u201d punishing him. For two years, he had me convinced the \u201cnanny lady\u201d was going to get all of us, and maybe do to us what Maya did to the little creatures she captured.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t know why I stopped playing with Maya and Joseph, except that suddenly I couldn\u2019t stand being with Maya any more. Maybe it was the way she began touching Joseph. Rubbing her hands across his chest before she pinched him. The look had changed in his eyes too\u2026 there was something else there now, something visceral and bloody and hungry<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n Rather than turning right the next time I went through the wall, I turned left. The children on this side could move much more than just their eyes or their brows, they could reach up and pull at my nightgown, or grab at my wrists and ankles. I shudder thinking about their cold, dead hands on me. I can still feel them, you know. The drugs never did take that away from me.<\/p>\n Still I went on, and with each slow, cautious movement\u2026 the voices grew louder. It took twice as long to get to the next hidden door.<\/p>\n The house was the same, but new. Can something be the same, but different at the same time? I walked from room to room, looking for another one like me. I was alone\u2026 alone except for the voices.<\/p>\n Alone<\/em>\u2026<\/p>\n Continued →<\/u><\/a><\/p>\n This short story is one of many in my collection, Into a Long Ago Future<\/a><\/em><\/strong>. <\/p>\n
<\/center><\/p>\n