Sommerset House is enormous. A white rectangle, two storeys and an attic high, columns wrapping all sides, sash windows, dark shutters. Manicured lawns. Innocent-looking as if its history is nothing to do with it; the outbuildings dismantled some while ago. Nothing to see here. Rather like a man pretending he hasn’t just stepped in dog shit. But that stink just never goes away.
About a forty minute drive from anywhere useful.
A lot of the surrounding land—out past the gardens—is much wetter than it used to be. Rising water levels, climate change, no matter how much it’s denied. More swamp, more bayou, the paths that wind through the estate getting more picturesque, but also less visible, less reliable, than they once were. Mists creep in morning and night like cats slinking, not there one moment then suddenly thick and present as can be. Daylight burns them off, but only temporarily.
Sissy likes watching them from the verandahs, happy at a distance; does not wish to wander in them. Right now, staring out the kitchen window as the last tail of white shrivels in the sun, waiting for the kettle to boil and the egg in the saucepan beside it, she takes a moment to be pleased with herself.
A lot of nurses wouldn’t have taken this job—and a lot of them didn’t, she knows—but Sissy isn’t a lot of nurses. She’s not afraid of hard work, troublesome patients, remote locations, and being without any kind of backup or supervision. In fact, she works best without anyone else looking over her shoulder.
As if on cue, the door swings open to reveal Henrietta Beaulieu—Mrs B as Sissy has dubbed her. And Sissy knows this just pisses her off—she could tell by the way the woman’s shoulders went back a little further, her chin lifted a little higher when she’d introduced herself, that the housekeeper was proud of her name. That’s okay, Sissy sure to make herself helpful, which is especially handy at this very moment when Sommerset House is down a maid, and Mrs B isn’t so proud that she wants to be doing all the labour herself. So, if she has to suck on an annoying nickname like a bitter lozenge for a while, then so she will. Sissy doesn’t push it, though, no need to poke the bear. Although, in places like these, Sissy always ensures the patients like her, because in places like these the infirm rich hold sway.
“Morning, Mrs Beaulieu,”—let’s not start the day by pushing it—“I hope you slept well.”
“Good morning, Sissy.” Polite, reluctant. Sissy insists on going by her first name, insists no one call her ‘Nurse Symanski’. One of those tricks to get folk to like you; don’t rub your title in their face, makes you seem approachable. Benign. “Yes, thank you. And yourself?”
“Not too shabby. Now, can I make you something? Kettle’s almost boiled.” Up until Sissy arrived, the housekeeper had been spending her nights dozing on a chaise in the patient’s room in case anything was required. The nurse’s hiring means she’s got some of her life back—a lack of sleep will erode even the most long-term devotions, and Henrietta Beaulieu had boasted to Sissy that she’d worked for Mrs Sommerset for almost thirty years.
“That’s kind, but no thank you.” A thin twitch of the lips, passing for a smile. Then Mrs B leaves; Sissy grins. The housekeeper will return the moment Sissy’s gone. Doesn’t want to stay lest she have to endure more polite conversation. Sissy’s watched her scurry back in when she thinks the nurse has disappeared. Probably checking the number of teabags to make sure Sissy’s not stealing those. Long-term staff sometimes come to regard their employers’ possessions as an extension of their own—things no one else is going to steal except them.
Sissy can’t imagine staying in one job, in one place for so very long. Luckily, she’s patient, but that’s because she knows there’s a pot of gold at the end of this dim and dusty rainbow.
The kettle whistles and the toaster pops at the same time. Both appliances are ancient—the former goes on top of the stove, and the latter is big and heavy, one of those brands they don’t make any more because the products were just too long-lasting. While there’s a lot of money in this house, there’s also a tendency towards not wasting things; no replacements just for the sake of it and if anything can be fixed, it will be. Just about everything’s old-fashioned, from the antique furniture to the bone china teapot Sissy fills with hot water, drowning all the loose leaves. She’s careful with the three-minute egg, quickly runs it under the cold water tap, then into the eggcup. The toast goes onto a matching plate (so fine she can see the light through it); she scrapes on a little butter, then swirls a whole lot of honey. Sissy loads the polished wooden tray, adds the slender white vase with the single yellow rose to the array, and heads out.
Sissy’s movements are slow and sure, almost meditative. She tends towards the methodical, finds it calms the people around her. Calms her too, and she’s better, smarter in those calm times—and Lord knows she’s been given to panic in the past and hasn’t that cost her? So now, she likes to take her leisure, get all her ducks in a row, and all those other cliches that help her feel okay about what she’s doing.
She’s been here three weeks now and wishes she had more time.
The staircase is monumental, but she doesn’t mind because both sides are a gentle curve upwards. Sissy likes the stately walk she can affect. The chandelier hanging in the foyer tinkles. Sissy pauses, looks back: the front door’s open. Mrs B will be out on the verandah, overseeing the three gardeners whose names Sissy hasn’t bothered to learn. The dangling crystals throw prisms of light on the walls and stairs and that enchanted moment is something Sissy looks forward to every day; she thinks Stevie would like it too.
And those noises have stopped bothering her. Working in hospitals in her early days she became used to all manner of susurrations—she knows the word’s meant for ‘whispering’ but for the longest time it’s been Sissy’s hold-all for the sorts of indistinct-sounds-seemingly-with-no-source that flutter around corridors in the middle of the night. The things that seem to brush by you when nothing’s to be seen, the kiss of something that’s just passed through a doorway either real or otherwise. Things that may or may not be there.
A soft something slips past her—the first time it happened she’d thought it a very quick cat—but now she thinks of it as the something-on-the-stairs. There’s no harm in it. Just that gentle whoosh as she steps onto the landing and along to Mrs Sommerset’s master suite.
The tall doors, pristine white, creak a little as Sissy pushes her way in—the latch has been pinned back for ease of ingress and exit. Better when your hands are full; a tray, medical supplies, fresh linen, and all. The housekeeper is technically in charge of changing the beds, but Sissy always insists on dealing with her patient’s, making sure the old lady’s not jostled too much or disturbed. And she’s also been helping Mrs B with the rest of the beds in all those rooms kept for Mrs Sommerset’s five children, just in case they come to visit (which they have not done so far during Sissy’s tenure, nor any time in the recent past as far as she can tell). Sheets are changed every week, as are the flowers, and the spaces aired so they don’t get stale. Same with the guest room that little lawyer uses once a week, because he generally arrives in the afternoon and spends dinnertime with his client, then stays the night. He drives the forty minutes back to Temple Cove at dawn.
“Morning, Mrs Sommerset,” Sissy calls gently, and steps behind the silk privacy screens. The high-tech bed is at odds with the antique furniture (Louis Quatorze if she’s not very much mistaken). Carpets thick underfoot dampen the noise of footsteps, even though polished wood would be more hygienic. There’s just the hum of the refrigerator in one corner, and a little birdsong from the windows Mrs B must have opened earlier.
The figure in the bed is wrapped in sheets and shawls like a mummy. The room’s warm but the old lady’s got no meat on her; she’d be cold in full sunlight on a summer’s day in the Sahara. Mrs Sommerset is seventy but could pass for a centenarian. In her preferred white nightgowns with high button-up necks, embroidered yokes and long sleeves, she looks like she’s from another era. A cream silk scarf covers her bald head, face is furrowed and mostly immobile. Sissy’s fascinated that someone whose only nutrition comes in liquid form is so desiccated.
“Morning, you,” she says. And waits for those bright green eyes to flicker open, which they do, but more slowly than usual. “I brought your breakfast, I hope you’re hungry.”
This is the little show they do each morning. Sissy places the tray on the mahogany table beside the bed, makes sure it’s close enough for the aroma of food to waft towards Mrs Sommerset’s nose. Carefully, Sissy decapitates the soft-boiled egg, feels the old lady’s gaze on her. Pours the tea into the floral cup. Not that any of this matters: her patient can’t drink or eat. All sustenance comes via the PICC line, but the lady of the house does like the form of how life once was—the ritual—to be observed, and she’s rich enough that all her whims are obeyed.
Which is why that lawyer of hers (tiny weasel of a man Sissy can’t bear) comes out once a week, just in case the grand dame decides to change her will (scratching messages on a notepad). Which she’s done with some frequency, Sissy’d heard, this child and that removed from the inheritance, later reinstated and another banished from their mother’s affections—like a game of chess that only Mrs Sommerset knows the rules to. Just to keep everyone on their toes.
Money, thinks Sissy, tends to make folk into assholes.
“Did you sleep well?” she asks as she checks the drip on the stand, the PICC line that’s been the only thing keeping Mrs Sommerset alive for many years. A repeated question, a safe question, and one she already knows the answer to: yes, thoroughly drugged. A soft grunt in assent.
Next she goes to the refrigerator—incongruous against the antique decor, the heavy ice blue damask curtains, another chandelier suspended above—and selects a fresh bag of paternal nutrition. It’s not like it matters (the chicken or the beef?) but she makes a show of choosing anyway. While she’s hooking it up, she jokes, “A fine vintage, I think Madam will like it. Pairs nicely with fish.”
There’s a sound from the bed that Sissy recognises as a laugh, and she smiles at the woman in her care. Sissy does all the necessary things to ensure her employer is clean and comfortable. When these duties are performed, she takes a seat and picks up the book from the beside table.
“A little more Rebecca today? Or would you like to switch to Jamaica Inn?” Mrs Sommerset loves a gothic novel and Du Maurier fits the bill. A bit too grim for Sissy’s tastes but it’s not for her pleasure, is it? There’s a noise that’s recognisable even though it’s not really a word, but the shape of it, the rhythm of it, a kind of hum from the throat rather than the lips.
“Rebecca it is then.”
A lot of nurses wouldn’t do this, but Sissy isn’t a lot of nurses.
Truth be told, she’s not a nurse at all.
Sissy likes to think that all her troubles started when she met Stevie, but she knows that’s nowhere near the truth.
The only thing he made her want to do was settle down. And it had been good for a truly respectable while, almost two years—which for someone like her, who moved on a lot, was practically a lifetime. She liked Temple Cove and being by the water. She liked the little townhouse, the kindly neighbours who kept to themselves. She even like the waitressing job at the little café. She really liked that her family didn’t know where she was and that no one else had tracked her down after all these years. She’d been on, if not the straight and narrow, at least not the entirely twisted and wide spectrum of what was legal. And she hadn’t been near a betting shop, racetrack, or poker game in that time. She liked that Stevie believed she was a better person than she was, so it made her try.
She’d also liked being able to make a living as a private nurse to rich folk—and really, wasn’t ‘nurse’ such a broad term? It was a caregiver, right? And Sissy certainly had given care. She was smart, she’d picked up a lot working in hospitals after she’d first dropped out of school. Starting in the kitchens, doing cleaning jobs, helping anywhere and everywhere people would let her, and she’d listened—Sissy’s a great listener—and asked questions. Learning. She might not have a degree or formal training, but by god, she had a mind like a steel trap and knew enough to live the lie. But she really was trying to be better.
When the demons took their claws out of her, Sissy was a model citizen, or looked like one at least. But the problem with demons is that they slink back like alley cats you’ve made the mistake of feeding. One moment everything had been going along fine, then just the tiniest speedbump—a fight with Stevie, pointless and barely memorable—got Sissy Louise Symanski all het-up and her ingrained I’ll-show-you DNA kicked in. A sports bar and a bunch of bets later, a loan from a guy called Paulie the Shark (the name, in hindsight, might have been a warning sign), left her owing more than she had a chance of paying back in a month of Sundays.
She’d bought herself some time with promises and lies, taking Stevie’s savings from the lockbox beneath their bed as a downpayment—better to beg forgiveness than ask permission—but there was no way legal she was going to get out of this. And yes, she could have cut and run, but that would leave Stevie behind and Paulie the Shark somehow knew about Stevie and was happy to offer threats as incentives.
So, Sissy told Paulie she had a way to get the cash, but she needed him to be patient. It would take a couple of months, but she’d get him his money back with interest. And Paulie, observing that she seemed like a good kid, had promised to be patient.
Now, Sissy’s outside, earbuds in but there’s no music playing—it’s just an excuse to ignore anyone speaking to her: Mrs B calling from the house, the gardeners warning her about not leaving the paths. This is Sissy’s breaktime and she’s determined not to have it stolen. The old lady had a disturbed night, and therefore so did Sissy, and now she’s got one of those tired headaches, tight behind the eyes, lethargic. She needs the fresh air for a while.
When she’s out of earshot she’ll try calling Stevie again. He hasn’t picked up the last twenty-four hours, which is not unusual in itself—he’s still processing what she did, what she’s planning to do—but she wants to hear his voice. Ask him again if he’s forgiven her—just the same way she did when she’d confessed, clinging to him and weeping until he said yes. Sissy wants to tell him she’ll be home soonish. That she’s got the situation well in hand.
The thing about rich people is that they’ve got so much stuff.
Sissy’s got a system, tried and tested in her previous life, her BS era (Before Stevie, thank you very much). She starts by moving items around, just a little out of place, a few inches to the left or right, just to get a slight disruption going in what people expected to see as a matter of habit. Then after maybe a week, a statuette or trinket box or bronze bust, a Faberge Egg or ormolu clock or Ming vase is shifted across a room, from a mantlepiece to a sideboard or a dining table or another plinth. If that first phase goes without a hitch (the oldies, who really did not like change, noticed such adjustments quickly), she begins properly hiding things—behind something else in the same room, or in another room (not in her room because she’s not stupid), and if no one notices or mentions it after a month or so, then she taps a girl she knows. Annika works in an antiques store that’s not too fussy about provenance—it’s still reputable enough, but something like that only lasts so long—and sends a courier to whichever city Sissy might happen to be working in. Even though it’d been two years since they’d had any contact, Annika immediately replied to Sissy’s text. That makes her kind of proud—that Annika knew she could be relied upon for quality merchandise.
Sissy’s foot sinks and she’s up to her ankle in muddy water; she almost loses her balance. Swearing, she steps back, looks around, focuses. She’s wandered off the path; almost where the swamp begins. No almost about it—there it is, water and weeds and cypress trees with their damp skirts, things hiding beneath the surface, bubbling, bursting upwards where something breathes. She can’t be seen from the house now, but then she also can’t see the house; hyper-focusing makes her walk hyper-fast. Sissy takes her bearings and a deep breath, recognises the stone flowerpots with the last of their purple blooms; the gardeners will be replanting soon. She turns around and starts back towards the building with its columns and shutters and all those valuable and very portable treasures.
After her down payment meeting with Paulie the Shark, she’d gone somewhere to think (not drink, not again) and listen. The Salty Dog wasn’t a dive bar but in a dim light it might be mistaken for one, being just on the border where ‘the boardwalk’ turned into ‘the docks’. It was one of those places where conversations flowed over and around you, nuggets of gossip and truth that a good listener could pick out of the air. People under the influence of alcohol let their secrets slip like old pets they irrationally trusted not to wander. And that was where she’d heard the ex-Sommerset maid muttering to the bored-eyed barman dark and drunken snippets about the house, the old lady, and all the things inside those white, white walls that no one might miss. How they were hard-pressed to keep domestic staff, and couldn’t get a nurse to stay. How she was sometimes late for work because she got lost in the gardens or coming up the drive; how things moved. Sissy decided the maid probably spent too much time drinking before work, and/or not sobering up from the night before.
So Sissy’d bought the girl drinks, asked some questions, bought more drinks, enough to ensure any memories of said questions and their answers would be hazy at best, non-existent at worst. Didn’t bother asking why they have trouble keeping a nurse—she’s done the job enough that she knows how fractious old people, sick people, rich people can be. Combine those three elements? It’s a wonder anyone takes up nursing at all.
It was then just a matter of contacting the agency tasked with finding someone to look after the old lady (a name dropped by the ex-maid), dusting off her impressively forged resumé, and priming a couple of old associates to give glowing references. Sissy always makes a good first impression, and desperation to get a body out to the Sommerset estate meant that far fewer questions were asked of her than she’d asked of the ex-maid. Sissy’d resigned from the coffee shop—it would have been nice to just take leave, but who was she kidding?—and packed her bags. Stevie drove her out there because he still needed the car for work; that was okay, he’ll collect her whenever she’s ready.
Just before she steps back onto the front lawn, before she lets herself be seen again, she hits Stevie’s name in her contacts list. Listens to it dialling, dialling, dialling. Sometimes she thinks it sounds like an insistent purr; doesn’t find it so appealing as it goes through to voicemail. Her tone is terse when she leaves a message, telling him to get back to her, then starts moving ahead again.
It’s getting on for time to make a decision: which piece to take?
There are smaller things around, less likely to be missed, easier to conceal, but there’s also that huge vase in the formal dining room, smack-bang in the middle of that loooong polished walnut table. Not really a vase so much as a jar because it’s got one of those cute little lids. Sissy’s willing to bet it’s a Qing Dynasty Famille Rose piece. Usually these things come in pairs, but this seems to be an only child. And Sissy just happens to know, because she likes to stay abreast of such things, that one just like this sold in Hong Kong last year for almost ten million pounds on account of the rare glazes. To the untrained eye, it’s simply pink and blue, but the pigments for that particular object were made from ingredients no one’s been able to identify. Ever. So, they look different, if you know what you’re looking for—and rich people love to own something unique just so no one else can have it. This one here might be a twin to that Hong Kong orphan. A fraction of almost ten million pounds would pay back Paulie the Shark, and let her and Stevie take an extended vacation.
She’s moved it a couple of times, up and down the table a little, but no one’s moved it back; it and a few other small items in different parts of the house, just to get an idea if someone’s watching. Next step is to try it in a new spot—there’s another vase, similar though not the same, that she can use to replace it. Such a big piece, though, so noticeable. It’s dangerous, she knows—but then, Sissy recognises that even though this whole escapade is stressful, there’s something she likes about the risk.
She tells herself, too, that no one’s going to be hurt by this theft. Mrs Sommerset has so much; her children won’t miss that tiny bit of an inheritance when the old lady’s gone. But bad things will happen to her and Stevie if she doesn’t take it. So, really, she’s like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. She just happens to number herself among the latter.
It’s late in the day when Sissy comes down the stairs, bearing the tray of food Mrs Sommerset can’t eat. She passes by the open door of the formal dining room, that Qing vase, those rare hues of pink and blue, catching at the corner of her eye. Tomorrow, she thinks, tomorrow she’ll swap it for the other one, the one that’s not quite so valuable. See how that goes.
Through the swinging door and into the cool of the kitchen, where Mrs Henrietta Beaulieu sits at the table, partaking of a solitary meal. She never offers to make something for Sissy, even though it would be no extra trouble. Sissy’s just filed that away. Mrs B’s doing the night shift; if Sissy were planning on staying, on embedding herself in this home, she’d insist another nurse be hired. Neither she nor the housekeeper are superhuman and the rest they’re getting isn’t really enough. Maybe she’ll suggest it anyway: that sets up a good reason to leave (when she finally does) and also makes it sound like she’s planning to settle in.
“Evening, Mrs B.”
“Sissy. How’s the patient?” Mrs Beaulieu almost manages to hide her distaste by sipping at the single glass of red wine she allows herself each evening. Sissy admires the restraint.
“No change, good or bad. I guess that’s the best to be hoped for?” Sissy wonders how long Mrs B is going to hang around, then decides she’s hungry and doesn’t care. She sets the tray onto the table and sits across from Henrietta Beaulieu. There’s the medium-rare steak with baked potatoes and blanched French beans the housekeeper had prepared for Mrs Sommerset earlier, and a glass of Chateau D’Yquem Sauternes 2019 (because the old lady doesn’t care for pairing red wine with red meat). Sissy enjoys the scandalised look from Mrs B as the nurse cuts into the steak, which will teach the old bitch to be so selfish. “Waste not want not.”
She puts a sliver of tender albeit lukewarm meat into her mouth and smiles around it. “Perfection, Mrs B.”
The housekeeper’s eyes narrow into a Clint Eastwood squint, and Sissy figures she’d better make nice. “It’s such a pity Mrs Sommerset’s kids don’t visit.”
The change of topic seems to throw the woman. “What do you mean?”
“Well, she seems like a nice old lady. And don’t you think they’d be interested in their inheritance?” Sissy gestures around the kitchen by way of illustration. “All these nice things?”
The housekeeper’s gaze shifts again, focuses and seem to settle on a kind of barely repressed rage. She hisses: “I know what you’ve been doing.”
Sissy feels cold rush through her, but she’s been keeping secrets for a long while and she’s no amateur to overreact. She’s definitely regretting baiting the housekeeper though. “Mrs Beaulieu, I just don’t–”
“I know you’ve been moving things around,”—which is evidence of nothing—“trying to make me think I’m going mad.”
Huh?
“You want my job? You’ve got no idea what I’ve had to do. But this is my place and you’ll take it over my cold dead body.”
Oh.
“Oh, Mrs Beaulieu! You’ve got me wrong. I have no desire for your job! You do it so well, and Lord knows it’s demanding.” She summons an expression of embarrassment, shame. “I . . . the moving things. I . . . it’s a problem with me, a compulsion. It’s just—I had a very disrupted childhood and I’m told that this is a way of trying to exert a little influence over my environment—the sort I lacked as a kid.” She hangs her head, looks away. “It’s nothing to do with anyone else, and I’m so sorry that it upset you.” As the final touch on her performance, she mutters: “I’m so ashamed.”
There’s a long pause, and she doesn’t look up until she’s got some tears to brim. The housekeeper’s staring, stunned, as if not sure to believe her. But Sissy knows that the admission is just stupid enough and embarrassing enough to be credible. Childhood trauma has helped her weasel out of trouble more than once.
“Well,” says Mrs Beaulieu. “Well.”
“I am genuinely sorry, and I will do my level best to keep the urge under control. It’s such a silly thing, after all.”
The housekeeper rises, takes her plate and glass over to the sink, scrapes any leftover food into the bin, pours wine dregs down the drain, rinses them and stacks the dishwasher. “Just so you . . . ” Henrietta says, then: “The children . . . ”
But she doesn’t finish. Whatever kinder instinct was so briefly birthed is rapidly extinguished. Mrs B shakes her head, and her expression turns brittle again. She dries her hands on a tea towel and exits. Sissy listens as her footsteps grow fainter, then lets out a sigh of relief. That was a close one and will teach her not to get too cocky.
A little later, when Sissy’s walking up the stairs to her own little room, the mobile in her pocket vibrates. The screen flashes Stevie’s name. Sissy’s awash with equal measures of joy and irritation. She clicks to take the call, is raising the phone to her ear and still isn’t sure if she’s going to be sweet or sour, when she hears the screams coming over the line.
Sissy freezes. Even without words she can tell it’s him. Stevie. Screaming like a baby. She doesn’t need to hear much of it to know she’ll do anything she can to make it stop—but she still hears far more than she wants to.
Eventually, Paulie starts talking—but the screaming’s too loud, so then he’s shouting at whoever’s hurting Stevie to “lay off, why dontcha?”
“Sorry about that,” he says and he sounds sincere. “Now, you know why this is happening, right? You’re taking too long, Ms Symanski.”
“But you said you’d wait!”
“I did, I did. But you know about big fish-little fish?”
Sissy stammers that she doesn’t, although if her mind weren’t so jangled by Stevie’s screams she might be able to figure it out.
“So, you’re a little fish—a tiny little minnow. I’m a much bigger fish—I eat minnows for breakfast. But you gotta understand, Ms Symanski, that there are even bigger fish than me and they’re gonna eat me for breakfast if I don’t honour my debts. And me being soft and telling you I’d be patient coz you got that sweet face? Well, some of the bigger fish are less patient than I and of a far less pleasant disposition.”
“Please, don’t hurt him any more–”
“That all depends on you getting here with what you owe me plus interest for inconvenience caused.” He names a figure, which wouldn’t be a problem if she’d already passed that Qing vase onto Annika, but is an enormous problem right at this moment. And again, if Sissy was thinking straight, she wouldn’t say what she says.
“I can get it to you. But I don’t have a car. You’ll have to come to me. I’ll meet you out on the highway—don’t come to the house. But only you. You come and get me, Paulie.” Because she’s going to have to do some fast talking and doesn’t want to have to explain the value of the vase to one of Paulie’s idiot henchmen. And if she tries to tell Paulie over the phone, he’s going to hurt Stevie again. If she can only talk to Paulie face-to-face, get through to him how much money they’ll have on their hands, then she can save Stevie. Can save herself. Sissy blurts out the address.
“Ms Symanski, you sound genuine but you better not be screwing with me or it isn’t going to go well for anybody.”
Sissy swears she’s not and he hangs up.
She’s partway up the curved staircase, bending over to catch her breath and not vomit. When she’s steady enough, Sissy straightens. The chandelier’s not on, and the dusky glow filtering in from outside is the only illumination. Sissy tilts her head, listens carefully. No sound from above or below. Mrs Beaulieu will be ensconced with her employer, and the gardeners will have gone home. If she goes now, there’s just enough light to show her through the grounds, but not enough she’ll be seen.
The vase is heavier than she remembered, but then, she’s only ever slid it along the table, not actually picked it up, hefted it, taken it for a walk.
It was okay at first, sneaking across the lawns until she could connect up with the sealed drive where it went beyond sight of the house. It was okay. But then the driveway seems to be awfully long, so much longer than it should be, and she feels a fresh drop of panic in her brain, which joins the rest of the pool of panic that’s already there given the events of the evening. Makes things worse.
The dusk light is mostly gone and the trees are closing in, making the lane narrower and narrower.
It’s definitely getting heavier, this vase. The heavier it gets, the harder she finds walking and carrying. And though it takes a while, at some point she realises the vase isn’t actually empty. Something’s shifting about inside. She’s resisting the urge to try and take off the lid, just to satisfy her curiosity.
Then she starts to wonder why a vase has a lid.
Sissy thinks back to that article about the Qing vase in Hong Kong, about those almost ten million reasons why she thought this was a good idea. And she remembers that the word ‘vase’ wasn’t used at all.
It was ‘urn’.
Funerary urn. Those needs lids, don’t they? To keep things in.
It begins like butterflies, feathers. Soft laps against the skin. Pleasant.
Then less so.
More cumbersome. Like humidity clinging in high summer, sinking in until your very bones weigh a ton. And now, Sissy’s feet are wet and she’s sinking too. The driveway is no longer there, somehow she got turned around. Somehow, she left the path. Somehow she’s in the middle of the fucking swamp, those cypress trees like prison guards, and there are mists creeping through.
She notices that the water and mud around her feet aren’t so much pulling her in as the things like butterflies and feathers are pushing her down. Her steps falter, Sissy surrenders to gravity, still holding onto the urn.
The whispers start then, or perhaps they’ve been going for some while and she’s only now listening. She thinks of the something-on-the-stairs and wonders if she’s brought it out of the house with her.
Momma.
Momma.
Momma.
Momma.
Momma.
Distinct voices, she thinks. Five. Hollow. Echoing inside a porcelain funerary urn. Young. Infants? Babies? She thinks of the children who don’t visit their mother. Realises she’s never asked about them, where they are now, how long they’d lived. Why they don’t come home.
They’re already there.
The voices are bubbles in her ears.
The rushing of air from a thing trying to breathe underwater.
Maybe, maybe, maybe it’s just the sound of her own drowning.
Originally published in Darkness Beckons, edited by Mark Morris.
