Later, when I go and look, hoping to use a stick to pull the flower back to me, it’s no longer among the trees. [THE CREEPER MAN TOOK IT.] I swallow my guilt, and the shock I feel at myself— His face.
Oh, God. Why do I even care? He’s nothing. And yet, I can’t stand the hurt I saw there.
—and I vomit into the earth.
I should have told him. I should have told him the horrifying thing that might be happening.
When I walked to him today—it was uphill. Slightly. Ever so slightly.
But when we arrived at La Baume, the house was at the top of a hill, not in the dip of a valley.
God help us.
I think the house is sinking.
8
food infiltration
Rotting in your skin
rotting in your mind
you are rotting in this house
in this house you’ll die.
I frown down at my dress. The pale material is spotted with green. It puts me in mind of a rash, or an infection. A spreading bacteria in a petri dish.
I peer closer.
It can’t be…
Impossible…
It’s… fungus. Or mold. Suddenly repelled, I brush it off. Try to. I want it as far away from me as possible. It does nothing but smudge, turning my white dress into a blotchy green mess.
I rip it off and fling it away across the floor. It lands and sits like a curled snake. I’m shaking as I pull on the yellow dress instead. The clean cloth soothes me, even if it is a little damp, and I loose a half-hysterical giggle into the silent room.
“Enough of this,” I tell myself, my voice grounding out the unreality of the moment. “Get Nori up. Now.”
Her room is closest to the stairs, so I head for them, resisting the urge to look down at the ground floor, imagining I will see something or someone looking up at me. Nope. “Getting Nori up,” I sing in a half whisper, “so we can start this crappy day.”
I pause at her door, force a smile, and breeze in. “Wake up, lazy bug,” I say, but then I stop beside her bed. A horrible, chilly feeling dances along my spine in unpleasant tingles.
Little patches of green—like tiny verdant freckles—are scattered upon her unblemished little cheek.
With a rising sense of horror, I raise my hand and wipe my own cheek, then look down. My fingertips are green.
Mold. Or moss. Or fungus.
It’s growing on us.
Cath paces.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
Apple is masticated.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
The wind is agitated.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
My heart’s full of hatred.
Creak. Creak. Creak.
The whole house is rotting. I can smell it. Rising damp, maybe. Mildew and wood rot everywhere. Even on us, now. Even the damn air looks a little green.
I watch Nori eat, seeing how the apple falls apart piece by piece, how Nori chews—squish, squish, squish—and swallows—slosh!—I am r e v o l t e d.
“All right?” Gowan asks.
I nod, though I’m queasy. “Why are you here?”
Gowan blinks. “You… you asked me to watch Nori so you could take a look at the walls inside, remember? Find the rising damp?” Trying to cozy up and be my friend.
I did? I… maybe I did. I can’t remember.
“Right,” I say. Here to look after Nori. But he’s wrong if he thought I was trying to make him a friend. I swallow any pinch of embarrassment I might feel, get up, and walk away.
I feel half in a dream. I wander without thought. Anything to be away from Nori’s apple mastication. The creeeeaking of her little rotten teeth and the slurping of her saliva. I’ll feel better when I’m alone. When it’s quiet.
Only, when I am alone, I feel far from okay.
Hunger
so intense
it’s like
there’s a fence
between my urge
my need
my desperation
and the body that
seeks
food infiltration.
Can’t swallow.
So hollow.
Could I borrow
your tomorrow?
I can’t eat.
Can’t swallow.
Why am I so hollow?
9
daddy
Where are you going?
won’t you play here?
storm winds are blowing,
bringing me near.
I’ve waited so long,
for you to see.
if you must go on,
then go on with me.
LEAVE THIS HOUSE
AND YOU WILL DIE.
I wake up with his sylvan, rootlike voice rattling my skull.
LEAVE THIS HOUSE
AND YOU WILL DIE
AND SHE’LL BE MINE.
I shut my eyes, and then open them again, straining my ears so that the silence hurts. A dream. Just a dream. Branches moving, clawing—roots twisting around my legs. The Creeper Man grinning, his mouth opening, Nori screaming— Just a dream.
I lie back down, letting my heart settle, trying to ignore the incessant creaking, which seems to have crawled beneath my very skin. Even with this smallest sleep tonight, I heard the creaking. I have just closed my eyes once more, when— Silla.
A voice. An impossible voice.
Presilla, daughter. Come to me.