She shakes her head.
“Why can’t you sleep, Monkey?” It’s such a pointless thing to ask. Obviously it’s because of what’s going on with Bailey, or because we traumatized her in the barn. She pulls the sleeves of her pajama shirt down over her nails, which she’s bitten ragged and bloody. I pull her sideways into a hug.
Lauren looks up at me from under her dark lashes. “Chloe said she saw something.”
Chloe Strauss lives on the farm at the end of the road, on the other side of Sparrow Hill. She’s a year older than Lauren; Ashley told me the two of them played when they were little—play dates that always ended with Lauren in tears.
Once Emma and Lauren’s other friends stopped coming over, Chloe began popping up like a rash. The first time she came over while I was home, Ashley made the girls grilled cheeses for lunch; Chloe sat on the stool, pumping her legs back and forth while she watched Ashley cook, interrogating every step of the process. Is that Muenster? My mom uses regular cheese.
Chloe is a know-it-all and a brat, but worse, she’s a liar. The type of kid who will shamelessly make shit up so people will give her a moment of attention. I feel my body curl up defensively at the thought of Chloe saying something about my friend.
“What did Chloe say she saw?”
“She saw the Red Woman,” Lauren says. “Sunday morning.”
A jolt of panic. “Did you tell Chloe we went to the barn?”
Lauren shakes her head. “I didn’t. I swear. That’s just what she said.”
“What exactly did she say?”
Lauren gnaws her bottom lip. “She got up at three a.m. to feed Snowflake, and when she was going out to the stables she saw someone running from the barn on Sparrow Hill. She was covered in blood.”
It’s no different from every other alleged Red Woman sighting. And it smells like shit from Chloe’s stupid horse. “Why was she up at three a.m.?”
“She and her dad had to drive all the way to Minnesota to meet the man who bought Snowflake. You can ask her. She’s not lying.”
Lauren had mentioned that the Strausses had decided to sell Chloe’s beloved horse. Chloe very well could have been in the stables early Sunday morning like she said.
“If Chloe saw a bloody woman running around Sparrow Hill, why didn’t she call the police?”
Lauren frowns, her bottom lip jutting out in protest. “You’re not supposed to tell anyone if you see the Red Woman.”
“Well, then it wasn’t very smart for her to tell you.” I feel my patience thinning. There is something else nagging me—the way the creepy-ass woman at the spiritualist shop had looked at me.
“Hey. If Chloe really saw something, she should tell the police,” I say. “It could help find Bailey.”
Lauren gnaws the inside of her bottom lip. “Everyone is saying she’s dead.”
I remind myself that my sister is thirteen, and not completely a child. “She might be.”
Lauren tucks herself into me. “Do you think—do you think it has something to do with the footsteps outside the barn?”
I swallow. “Laur, Jade and I checked. There were no footprints. I think the wind was playing a trick on us and made us hear things.”
Lauren looks unconvinced. “Can I stay in here tonight?”
“Your mom might think it’s weird if she finds out,” I say. “She’ll get really worried, and might figure out what we did.”
“She won’t find out. Please.” Lauren blinks; there are tears gathering at the corners of her eyes. “I can see the barn from my room. I’m scared.”
“Okay.” I give in. I can’t stand to see her so upset. “But only tonight.”
Lauren plops her head on my shoulder, relieved. I feel hollowed out—it takes all the energy I have left to pull her closer to me, to comfort her.
I don’t have the words she needs to hear—that whoever took Bailey can’t hurt us. Because I’m not so sure I believe it anymore.
—
Go back to the barn.
I sit up, my back rattling the headboard. Hand to my chest; my heart’s beating like a lab rat’s. Lauren is gone. She must have gone back to her room before Ashley woke up.
Upstairs, I hear the dull roar of Ashley’s hair dryer. The cable box says it’s 5:45 a.m. Through the slits in my blinds, I see that the sky has lightened to a pearly gray, which means snow is threatening.
I creep out of bed. Leave my light off in case Ashley comes downstairs for breakfast. I root around in the dark for my running shoes, realize the snow is too deep, and opt for my clunky boots instead. I zip myself into a fleece and pull my clava over my face. I used to joke to Andrew that his made him look like Bane from Batman, so of course he got me one for Christmas. Now, I can’t imagine going out in the cold without it.
I move the fleece from my ear and open my door, slowly, listening for the hair dryer upstairs. When I hear it, I slip down the hallway and out the front door.
The trek up Sparrow Road is unforgiving, and I’m still half a mile from the hill itself. I feel the incline in my thighs. I start to warm under the layers I’m wearing. I peel my clava off and stuff it in my jacket pocket.
The sun is coming up over the hill. There’s rustling in the larch trees above me, followed by clacking. I look up in time to see a gray-and-white owl take off, wings stretched wide.
I’m sweating by the time I reach the top. I unzip my coat and give it a flap, desperate to get some ventilation. My cheeks sting from the cold. I pick my way over pine needles and cones, veering as far right as possible to avoid the clearing several hundred feet from the barn.
They razed what was left of the Leeds House and planted spruce trees—seven, one for each member of the family—that form a macabre circle.
The barn rests behind the trees, where the house once stood. Gold light streams through. For a moment I can’t believe that this is what we’re all so afraid of; right now, with the sunlight spilling onto the snow, washing the walls in amber, the Leeds Barn looks stunning.
A shiver cuts through me. I don’t know what I came here looking for. Maybe I just needed to see it in the unthreatening light of the morning.
Go. The snow comes up to my ankles, seeping through the tops of my boots. I wince, but I don’t stop. I step through the entrance of the barn.
The boards creak under my feet. It feels as if the barn is one heavy snowfall away from collapsing completely. I shield my eyes from the sun streaming in through the gaping hole in the ceiling.
The circle of tea lights from our séance is still in the middle of the room. The sight of them makes my stomach fall to my toes. We left so many traces of ourselves here.
There’s a flash of something by the window at the back of the barn. Probably the light playing tricks with my vision. I swallow and step forward, my boots rustling the hay scattered on the floor.
My heartbeat picks up. Closer, closer. I blink, hard, trying to wipe the sight from my mind. It can’t be real—I must have spooked myself into seeing it.