“There,” Esther said after Gretchen had taken her picture. She sounded calm and relieved. “There. Now we can get on with it.”
She walked over to the cabinet that held jugs full of Dektol and D-76 and Fix, took out more black plastic bottles, uncapping them. Gretchen turned away to study the enlarger. But when she turned back around Esther was not filling the trays with chemicals, as she had thought she would. She was gulping down the entire bottle of D-76 as if she were drinking cool, sweet water.
“No!” Gretchen screamed, rushing forward and trying to knock the bottle out of her hands. She wrenched it, but Esther somehow was stronger, and by the time Gretchen had gotten hold of it, it was too late; the jug was empty. Will of steel indeed. “No no no!” Gretchen shrieked, and pulled out her phone. She tried an emergency call to 911 but there was no reception. How could this be possible?
“We have to get you to a hospital,” she said to Esther, who was now sitting on the floor, her knees pulled up to her chest, and breathing shallowly, her weathered combat boots solidly planted on the tile. She tried to pull her aunt to her feet but the woman was much heavier than she looked. An odd smile was spreading across Esther’s face. She looked up at Gretchen. They both knew even a hospital wouldn’t matter now.
Gretchen started to cry. The woman’s face was turning blue and her breathing was labored as she stared at Gretchen. Her black eyes shone in agony.
“Why why why?” Gretchen whimpered, holding her aunt’s face. For a brief moment Esther looked happy, like she had when Gretchen had first arrived, and she realized this was what Esther had planned all along. Gretchen’s blood was beating in her veins and she felt she might pass out. For a moment she felt like she was watching it all from very far away. She squeezed Esther’s hand. As the life drained from her eyes, Gretchen was flooded with love and remorse. How could she have met and lost this amazing, triumphant disaster of a woman all in one day?
“It’s up to you, sweets,” Esther gasped. “At least now I can help you.”
“No!” Gretchen wailed.
But her protests couldn’t prevent Esther from choking, convulsing, and succumbing to what could never be described as a painless death.
Filled with horror, Gretchen ran out into the brightly lit hall. The floorboards bounced and shook beneath her feet as she ran. She pounded down the stairs, family portraits staring at her from both sides, then ran down the long hallway toward her room, the only room that had reception.
Across from it, in front of the mirror, stood the two little girls. They were holding a rope. Dressed in their dingy white dresses. No, she said to herself. This is not real. When the girls saw her they hunched their shoulders and whispered to each other. One of them—the one who had bitten her in the dream she’d had at the piano—smiled brightly, her teeth gleaming and pointed as a cat’s.
Gretchen stifled a scream, then forced herself to look more closely at them. “I am hallucinating,” she whispered to herself. “I am asleep. I am dreaming or Esther must have drugged me. This is a nightmare. I won’t be controlled by a nightmare.”
Then she looked up, put the Nikon to her eye, and shot the picture. The girls seemed to take a step back. She needed protection from whatever was going on and the only protection she’d ever known was a camera. Tomorrow she would look at the photo and no one would be there. It would be proof that she’d imagined it, that there was nothing to be afraid of. The other girl reached out her little fingers toward Gretchen. They were filthy, covered in dirt and grime. She shot another picture and then another, then ran into the room, turned on the light, and slammed the door.
The force of the door slamming knocked an avalanche of papers from the tall bookcases onto the floor. She dialed 911. Nothing. She tried again. Nothing. She called Simon. Nothing. The reception was too spotty. She walked around the room, looking out the windows at the pitch-black night, and trembled. She tried again, pacing and clutching at the phone. It rang a few times and then disconnected. She pulled out the car service’s card, dialed, and was flooded with relief to hear the heavy New York accent of the dispatcher when he picked up and said, “Paragon Limo, how can I help you?”
“I need a car to pick me up in Mayville, New York, immediately.”
“Mayville?” the dispatcher said with distaste, and then the line went dead.