“Gavin?” she called, jumping in surprise when the television flickered to life only feet from where she stood. How had she not seen it before? Had it slid into view so quietly?
“Gavin?” her own voice echoed from the dark box, a crackly, hollow copy of herself. “Gavin, your house is going to kill me and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“No,” Delilah said, stumbling forward and pressing her body flat to the hallway wall to shimmy past the television. The ax clanged loudly against the plaster, startling her more. “Tell me where he is.”
Her own voice laughed back at her, sickly sweet and mocking. “You can dream, Delilah.”
As the television spoke, Delilah felt tiny, hysterical sobs form in her chest and begin to push up her throat and out into the air in front of her. The voice coming from the television warped from something recognizable to a high-pitched, terrifying squeal: “Don’t cry, don’t cry, crybaby, don’t cry, don’t cry, crybaby, cry, baby, cry.”
She could get stuck here, terrified by the television come to life and inching toward her. She could be swallowed by this moment, heart beating so hard she worried she could die from it, the fear of what she would find upstairs making her sweat, making her throat tight, making tears stream wet down her cheeks.
Or, she thought with a deep breath, she could get her ass upstairs and put the ax to use.
Shaking herself into motion, Delilah pushed past, swinging her foot as hard as she could and cracking it against the side of the television, sending it sliding into the opposite wall. A crunch of glass sounded and filled the hall. Tendrils of wallpaper rolled down from above her, crinkling at her ears, tickling at her collar and growing sharper and more savage until they pierced at the flesh of her neck.
She shoved them away, ripping at them with her hands and kicking the television hard again, as she lunged for the banister, propelling herself up the stairs.
The house will try to swallow you, she told herself. It will try, but you are faster. You are smarter. Find him.
Beneath the wind and the creaking, the mad little cackles and the freezing chill in the hall, Delilah could start to make out a faint, hollow noise. Something repeatedly hitting a wall, a
thunk, thunk,
thunk,
thunk. . . thunk, thunk.
The sound wasn’t immediately threatening like everything else all around her. It had real weight, real effort. Delilah flushed, struck with understanding.
“Gavin!” she screamed, taking the slick stairs two at a time, tripping over the runner rug and the edges of wood that appeared beneath her shoes. She fell, cracking her kneecap on the table at the top of the stairs and shoving it violently away. “Gavin! Gavin!”
The sound stopped and then picked up again, rapid now, louder and more urgent. Rubber hit plaster over and over again, and then two sounds reverberated in tandem. His feet kicking a wall? Was he unable to speak? Terror clawed up her throat, cutting off her breath until she felt like she was choking, running down the hall. But what was once a short length with five rooms coming off it now stretched and loomed, growing and turning in front of her, as Delilah doubled back, lost in an unending maze of turns and dead ends. The carpet slid beneath her feet, pulling her back, and she kicked at it, running along the edge of the wood floor, ducking the paintings that fell, the doors that opened in her path.
She cracked her shoulder on the bathroom door and shoved it so hard it slammed closed and cracked. Dark, thick blood poured from the gash and slid down into the hall, lapping at her heels.
No matter how far Delilah ran, how many times she circled back in the hall and opened doors and ran deeper into the maze the house built all around her, the sound of Gavin kicking the wall never diminished. It always stayed just to her left. Delilah pulled up short, catching her breath and wiping the sweat from her face.
She closed her eyes, ignoring the rising tide of blood at her heels, the cackle so close to her ear she feared whatever made the sound could touch her.