Episode 12: Open House

Open House

by Janet Crum

The woman in the Nike jacket was staring at Kim Idlewood’s husband. Oh, she was trying to be discreet about it—they usually tried to be discreet, unless they were young, hot, and drunk—but it was still obvious. She stood a few feet in front of them in line for an open house, strategically positioned so she could scope out Ed in her peripheral vision. Without intending to, Kim leaned closer to Ed. 

“Are you cold, love?” Ed wrapped an arm around her shoulders. 

“A little.” Kim hadn’t been cold since the end of her first trimester, but better to be thought cold than jealous. And on a drizzly December morning in Portland, cold was plausible.

The woman in the Nike jacket twitched an eye in their direction. Kim leaned into Ed and rubbed his back. Ed radiated heat. He always had. A hottie in more ways than one, she’d told her girlfriends after their first date. 

Kim massaged his muscled back, then glanced backward over his shoulder. There was no one behind them, so she let her hand slide down to his firm, tight ass, currently encased in a form-fitting pair of Levis. 

He chuckled deep in his throat and tightened his arm around her. “Planning to try out the bedroom, are you?” He spoke into her ear so the couple in front of them wouldn’t hear.

Her hand contracted in a suggestive squeeze, then returned to his back. “That would give the real estate agent a story to tell.”

“Which would be great, right up until we had to register as sex offenders.”

Kim gave a theatrical sigh. “I guess I’ll have to wait then.” 

Kim ran a hand over her shoulder-length brown hair in a futile attempt to smooth the drizzle-induced frizz. She touched her cheek. At least her makeup seemed intact. That was all she had for now, hair and makeup. The rest of her was swollen and puffy, from her face to her feet, which were currently encased in pink and black slip-on Reeboks two sizes larger than she normally wore. “You better get your body back in three months if you want to keep that man of yours,” her mother had told her more than once. “Wait much longer, and he’ll look elsewhere, just like your father did. Men like ‘em young and hot.” Needless to say, her mother hadn’t remarried after the divorce. 

Kim shook her head to clear away the ugly memories and looked up at Ed, who was studying his phone as though it held all the secrets of the universe. “What time is it, honey?”

He squinted at the screen. “Eight fifty-six.”

That gave the woman in the Nike jacket an excuse to turn all the way around and get an eyeful of Ed. “Looks like they’re going to be sticklers for the opening time,” she said.

At sight of the fine lines around the woman’s eyes, Kim relaxed. She had to be at least forty-five. She was lean and fit and what Kim thought of as country club chic—expensive makeup, casual clothes that cost more than the fanciest dress Kim owned, and perfectly styled hair. In this case, a bleached blonde pixie cut that made her look like a menopausal Tinker Bell. 

“Of course. They want to make sure everything is perfectly fair.” This comment came from the man standing beside the woman, who looked late for his tee time. He too wore designer-casual clothes. His hair was styled as perfectly as his wife’s, slicked back on the top and sides, revealing a receding hairline and advancing tan line that added an air of suburban aristocracy to his blandly handsome face.

Kim deflated as much as a woman nearly eight months pregnant can deflate. If they had to bid against this couple for the house, they stood no chance. They had already been outbid for two other properties. Affordable housing in Portland was rarer than a clean-shaven hipster. 

Ed, a clean-shaven former hipster, tucked his phone into his jeans pocket. “It’s odd,” he said to the country club couple. “Sellers usually don’t have open houses as soon as a property goes on the market. Especially not the Saturday before Christmas.”

“Very true,” Mr. Country Club said. “But this is an odd property.” He leaned back on his heels, surveying the pale blue suburban ranch house in front of them, shrouded in mist and tangled in overgrown vegetation.

“So what’s the story on this place?” Ed asked. “The asking price seems below market for this area.”

That was an understatement. The asking price was over a hundred thousand less than comparable properties.  

Mr. Country Club shrugged. “I suspect the place needs a lot of work. What did the ad say? ‘Bring your decorating ideas?’”

“That’s usually code for, the place is a total dump,” Kim said.

“Exactly,” Mr. Country Club said. “This was Hattie Herrin’s property. She and her husband died sometime in the late Eighties. Their bedroom caught fire while they were sleeping. It was all over the news. The police suspected arson, but they never arrested anyone. I think her niece owns the house now, and based on the pictures in the online listing, she hasn’t done any modernizing.” 

“Not any landscaping either,” Kim said, jerking her chin at the overgrown conifers, hazelnuts, and rhododendrons that crowded against the house on all visible sides. Low fingers of fog hung suspended in the tangled branches, giving the place all the warmth and coziness of a Gothic graveyard.

“Damn, how could they even paint the place with all that crap right up against the house?” This question came from a male voice behind Kim. She checked the current position of her hand—resting chastely in the middle of Ed’s back—then turned to see a man in paint-spattered carpenter jeans and a Rolling Stones sweatshirt standing behind her. His arm looped around a willowy blonde who wore her jeans and hoodie like a Versace-clad supermodel. Behind the mismatched couple, several groups of people spilled out of SUVs and streamed up the concrete walk to join the line. 

Kim leaned into Ed and whispered, “Let’s get out of here. There’s no way we can outbid all of these people, and my back hurts.”

Ed kissed the top of her head. “You never know. If the place really hasn’t been updated since the Eighties, maybe it will scare off everyone else.” 

“It’s already scared me off.” She gave him a suggestive smile. “Are you sure we can’t bail and go home?”

Before Ed could respond, Mrs. Country Club spoke. “The niece’s husband died a year or so ago. From what I hear, she’s selling because she needs the money.”

“You’d think they would ask more for it, then,” Stones Sweatshirt said. An unlit cigarette now dangled from the corner of his mouth, and he was flipping his thumb on the wheel of a green plastic lighter that produced no more than sparks.

The cigarette made Kim’s chest ache with longing. She’d quit when she’d found out she was pregnant, hadn’t had a cig since April, but the mere sight of one had her licking her lips. Still, she did the gracious thing and reached into her purse. “Need a light?” She held out a silver Zippo etched with a Chinese dragon, its stylized mouth shooting a strip of stylized flame toward the wick.

Before Stones Sweatshirt could answer, the front door opened, and a middle-aged woman in a gold Century 21 jacket greeted them.

“Good morning, everyone. Please come in. Brochures and business cards are on the kitchen counter. Please let me know if you have any questions about this home.” 

The line eased forward. Kim slid the lighter into the pocket of her maternity jeans and stepped inside.

The house wasn’t a dump, but it was what real estate agents politely refer to as, “dated.” More like a 1980s time capsule, Kim thought as she took in the ruffly mauve and teal curtains, softer mauve walls, and cream-colored carpet in the living room, all as bright and unblemished as they would have been when Miami Vice was still on TV. An entertainment center occupied one wall, complete with an old-fashioned projection TV and a stereo system with a turntable playing a vinyl record at low volume. Kim paused, listened, and recognized the song, Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up.” 

“For God’s sake, Ed, we’re being Rickrolled at an open house.”

Instead of responding to her snark, Ed took her hand and towed her into the middle of the living room. “The house looks so much bigger on the inside.” 

Kim gave him a noncommittal grunt and tried to ignore the cloying scent of too much potpourri. What sort of stench was the owner trying to hide? 

“Is this carpet original?” Mrs. Country Club’s voice carried from across the room, where she and her husband stood flanking the Century 21 agent. 

The agent’s response was inaudible, but someone behind Kim chimed in. 

“Not possible. No one could keep cream carpeting this clean for thirty years.”

Kim let go of Ed’s hand and turned. It was the guy in the Rolling Stones sweatshirt. 

“I bet she made everyone take off their shoes at the door,” the wannabe supermodel on his arm said. 

“I don’t think that would do it, sweetie,” he said. “Maybe she made them tiptoe.”

Kim giggled. “Or maybe old Mrs. Herrin could hover.” That comment earned her several laughs from the surrounding house hunters, a smile from Rolling Stones, and an eye roll from the wannabe. 

Mrs. Country Club strolled over with her husband after her chat with the agent. “I thought Century 21 agents stopped wearing those hideous jackets twenty years ago.” 

“Maybe she’s old school,” Rolling Stones said. 

“That would explain the hair,” Mrs. Country Club said with a sniff. “She’s a good match for the house.”

“She looks just like the rich guy’s wife on one of those nighttime soap operas my sister watched in high school,” Mr. Country Club said.

“Dynasty,” Mrs. Country Club said. “She looks like Blake Carrington’s wife on Dynasty. You know, Linda Evans played her.”

Kim took Ed’s hand and towed him into the kitchen. “Let’s get out of here. This place needs way too much work. New carpet, new paint—”

“What’s wrong with the paint? It’s in great shape. There aren’t even any grease stains. Maybe Mrs. Herrin didn’t cook much.”

“It’s mauve, Ed, that’s what’s wrong. And the light in here makes you look like you have jaundice.”

“Okay, we could paint the walls a nice eggshell, replace the fluorescents with some full-spectrum bulbs, and—”

“Full spectrum bulbs are not the same as natural light.”

“There’s a window above the kitchen sink.”

“And those damn trees are covering it up. It looks like twilight out there, and it’s nine a.m.” Kim shifted her weight from her left foot to her right and tried to ignore the growing pressure inside her sneakers.

“We could put in a bigger window.”

“With what money? The down payment will take every cent of our savings. And in case you haven’t noticed—”Kim smoothed her maternity top over her baby bulge, “—we have a baby on the way. Are you seriously going to paint and cut drywall with a newborn in the house?”

Ed responded in a calm, reasonable tone that added to Kim’s irritation. “I just got a raise. We could save for a couple of years and then do the work.”

Kim jerked her chin toward the country club couple, who were inspecting the pink tile countertops and whispering about remodeling. “We’ll have to bid way more than the asking price to have even the slightest chance of getting this place.”

Ed dropped his voice to a whisper. “The asking price is way below market, and the house has great bones. Look at these cabinets. These are real wood. Walnut, by the look of them.” He stroked his finger down the door of one of the upper cabinets like it was the inside of her thigh, right before he—

“Let’s go check out the bedrooms,” Ed said, and he turned his back on Kim and strode out of the kitchen.

###

“Oh, dear God. More mauve.” Kim spoke through clenched teeth, unsure why she was so angry about 1980s home decor that could be erased with a few cans of paint. 

She stood just inside the doorway to the master bedroom, fighting the urge to turn around and walk back out. Light mauve walls, the same as the living room and kitchen. Poofy green and mauve curtains, also the same as the living room. Green and mauve bedspread on the ruffled canopy bed, its ugliness doubled by its perfect reflection in a set of mirrored closet doors. A pair of reading glasses, a paperback copy of Women Who Love Too Much, and a glass bowl of potpourri on the cream-colored faux-bamboo nightstand. 

The potpourri bowl was small enough to fit in Kim’s hand, but its contents permeated the room with the heavy sweetness of cheap rose perfume. Kim hadn’t been nauseated since the end of her first trimester, but the smell nearly made her gag.

Naturally it didn’t seem to bother Ed. He stood in the center of the room, turning in a slow circle, looking smitten. 

Kim sighed and approached him. “I thought the guy in line said the Herrins died when the bedroom caught fire. But this room looks just as…” Hideous. “…dated as the rest of the house.” She flapped a hand at the curtains, then the spotless cream-colored carpet.

“Oh, come on,” Ed said lightly. “It’s not that bad. Look at all the windows. You should like those.”

He was right about the windows. One rectangular window stretched across two thirds of the wall opposite the bed, and half of another wall consisted of a sliding glass door to a deck that wrapped around the back of the house. Both expanses of glass framed the same view: a grey and green wall of mist and overgrown vegetation. 

“They’re nice, but the trees—”

“Yeah, I know. They block the light.” For an instant, Ed’s upper lip contorted into a Billy Idol sneer. He turned to inspect a lingerie chest opposite the bed. When he spoke, it was in his usual tone of relaxed cheerfulness. “I wonder if she’d sell the bedroom suite with the house. It’s Thomasville, and it’s in perfect condition.” 

Ed caressed the chest, stroking a finger along the frame like he’d done to the kitchen cabinet. Kim stifled a snarl, then shook her head. What the hell was wrong with her? Was she seriously jealous of… furniture? Damn pregnancy hormones.  

She took a few steps into the bedroom and looked at the piece Ed was so taken with. 

It looked back.

Kim blinked and shook her head again, and the image dissolved. It was just the drawer pulls. Round knobs on the top drawer, upturned handles on the rest, gave the illusion of eyes atop a column of smiling mouths. Her own mouth turned up, whether in response to the grinning furniture or her own foolishness, she wasn’t sure.

She moved beside Ed. He snaked an arm around her waist and gave her a half hug, and she rested her head on his shoulder, letting herself relax into him. So, he liked the place, and she didn’t. They wouldn’t be able to afford it anyway, so who cared? She would humor him, and they would leave, and that would be that.

“They really got into staging this place.” Ed gestured toward the top of the lingerie chest, on which lay a carefully arranged collection of brushes, combs, and hair products, as though Mrs. Herrin would rise at any moment, fire up the blow dryer, and create her own Linda Evans hairdo. At the back of the little grouping stood a purple and white can of Aqua Net. 

Kim picked it up and examined the label. “Do they still make this stuff?”

Ed glanced down at the can in her hand. “I have no idea. I remember my mother using it when I was little.”

A low chuckle came from behind Kim, making her jump. “We used to spray it into our lighters. It was like a fucking flame thrower.” 

Kim turned too quickly, eliciting an ache of protest from her back. The guy in the Rolling Stones sweatshirt stood just a few feet behind her. The wannabe supermodel was strolling out of the master bath behind him, her feet silent on the thick carpet.

“I’m surprised you didn’t singe your eyebrows off,” Wannabe said as she reached his side.

“I did.” He paused for a beat. “Twice.” 

Ed grinned. Kim snickered. “Testosterone poisoning,” Kim said. 

Rolling Stones gave another low chuckle. “Guilty as charged, babe.” He sauntered out the door into the hallway. 

“Whoever buys this house is going to need a decorator,” Wannabe said to no one in particular as she followed him out, leaving Kim and Ed alone in the room. 

Kim watched her for a moment, remembering when her own body moved with such grace. She stretched to ease the ache in her lower back, replaced the can of Aqua Net on the lingerie chest, and waddled over to Ed, who now stood in front of the closet. 

“The mirrored doors add light,” Ed said, resuming his earlier sales pitch. 

Kim studied the reflection of the bed in the perfectly polished doors and forced some light lewdness into her tone. “The mirrors do add some interesting visual possibilities.” 

“Finally you find something to appreciate about this place.” His tone was gentler than his words, and he drew her against his warm body.

Kim cast a glance over her shoulder toward the door, then slid a hand down his ass and between his legs. “Lots of visual possibilities,” she murmured into his ear. “Wanna see if we can make the sex offender registry?”

He stepped out of reach of her questing hand. “In a few minutes. I want to see the rest of the place.”

###

“When is your baby due?”

Kim had been too lost in blank-eyed contemplation of the view from the living room window—the same grey and green muddle as the view from the bedroom—to notice Mrs. Country Club materializing next to her. Or maybe the music had muted her footsteps. The Rickrolling was over—thank God—though Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love” was only a modest improvement. The agent must have brought some Eighties compilation record. 

Kim turned away from the window and dredged up a smile for Mrs. Country Club. “Five weeks. Not that I’m counting.”

Mrs. Country Club chuckled. “My sister said the last month was the worst. By the last week, she was doing jumping jacks to jar the baby loose.”

The mere thought of jumping jacks sent a deep ache through Kim’s pelvis. She rubbed her hip with her right hand and made a face. “No jumping jacks for me. I’m doing well to be upright and walking.”

Mrs. Country Club gave Kim the kind of half smile childless-by-choice women offer their breeding sisters, then changed the subject. “Where’s your husband? You two are so cute together. Would this be your first house?”

Kim tried not to wrinkle her nose. “Yeah.” If we bought it. “He was in the master bedroom last time I saw him. He likes the place.”

“Mine does too. He says it has a lot of potential.” She rolled her eyes. 

“Same with mine. ‘It just needs a coat of paint, it has good bones…’”

“That’s almost exactly what mine said. I left him in the master bedroom too. I got tired of him cooing over every little detail.” 

Ed, caressing the cabinet door like a lover.

“Huh. I didn’t see him in there.”

“Oh, that was a while ago. I’ve been out here for at least a half hour.”

“Really?” Kim pulled her iPhone from her purse and checked the time. “Whoa, it’s ten-thirty already. How did that happen?”

“Ten-thirty? I’d better go retrieve Stephen before he signs anything. Besides, we’re supposed to have lunch with the Jessups at noon. It was nice to meet you. I hope you and your husband find a wonderful house.”

Mrs. Country Club had taken about ten steps when a waft of strong, heavy perfume heralded the arrival of the real estate agent. Kim covered her mouth with one hand and tried to pass her gag off as a burp. Her mother was always buying her perfume—“you need to smell good for that man of yours”—but Kim rarely wore it. She’d opened her mother’s most recent present, a bottle of Calvin Klein’s Obsession, during her second month of pregnancy. Ed had helped her clean the puke off the bathroom floor. 

“Do you have any questions about this home?” The agent sounded bored, like someone going through the motions of an interaction that had no meaning to either of its participants. 

Kim paused to rein in both a gag and an unfiltered opinion. Damn pregnancy hormones. And the woman’s perfume smelled just like Obsession. “It’s very… well-preserved,” Kim said, and covered her mouth again.

“Yes, it is. Mrs. Herrin was always very particular about who she allowed in her home.” And you wouldn’t have been welcome, the woman’s tone suggested.

Kim’s temper rose, along with the remains of her breakfast. She swallowed both down but was spared further efforts at control by the reappearance of Mrs. Country Club. 

Kim turned away from the agent. “Your husband wasn’t back there?”

Mrs. Country Club slowed but didn’t break stride. She answered tonelessly. “No.”

“Did you see Ed back there?”

“No.” 

Kim recognized the carefully blank face and faux-indifferent tone of a woman who had just had a nasty argument with her husband and said nothing more. Instead, she stomped down the hall to look for Ed. 

###

Kim encountered no one, not in the hall and not in either of the two smaller bedrooms. She peeked into each room briefly, determined that each was as dark and uninviting as every other room in the house, and continued down the hall to the master suite. Either the crowd of house-hunters had all dashed back to their respective real estate offices to draw up offers, or they were just as disenchanted with the place as she was. 

The door to the master suite was closed. Kim placed her hand on the knob and started to turn it, then stopped and retracted her hand. Why would a bedroom door be closed at an open house? Was some other couple auditioning for the sex offender registry? And where was Ed?

Men want ‘em young and hot. 

She listened for a moment. No sex sounds emanating from the bedroom. No sound at all, in fact, not even the clichéd Eighties music from the living room stereo. She returned her hand to the doorknob, only to have it jerked out of her hand. 

“Come on, Kevin. We need to leave. Now.” The supermodel wannabe barreled through the door, shoulder-checking Kim and dragging Stones Sweatshirt behind her by the hand. Kim stepped back and reached an arm behind her to steady herself against the hallway wall.

As he passed through the door, Stones Sweatshirt reached for the door frame. “I want—”

The woman yanked his hand, and he stumbled forward through the doorway. “I don’t care what you want. We’re getting out of here.”

Kim caught a moment’s glimpse of the man’s face. It was… blank.

The hairs on Kim’s neck prickled, and the baby squirmed. Her arm wrapped instinctively over her abdomen as the couple disappeared around the corner at the end of the hall.

“Ma’am, are you all right? You don’t look well.” The real estate agent strode toward Kim, her anachronistic gold jacket glowing in the dim hallway. She gave no sign of having noticed the couple’s quick exit. 

Kim nodded. “Yeah, I’m okay. You haven’t seen my husband anywhere, have you?”

The agent smiled, dimpling her cheeks but leaving her eyes untouched. “Oh, you know men. They get engrossed in the darndest things when they look at houses.” The agent dropped her gaze to Kim’s bloated feet and ankles. “Why don’t you wait for him in your car, so you can get off your feet and be comfortable? That’s what most of the wives do when their husbands lollygag.”

“I just might do that.”

The woman turned and retreated to the living room without another word. Kim ached to follow her but resolved to check the bedroom first. 

She turned back to the bedroom door. It was closed again. When had that happened? 

She twisted the knob, shoved the door open, and entered the bedroom. 

It was empty. 

No monster dripping saliva from its fangs. No spectral Mrs. Herrin hovering above the spotless cream carpet. And no Ed banging some hottie on the canopy bed. 

“Ed? Ed, are you still in here? We need to get going.”

No answer. 

Kim checked the master bathroom. Empty.

She opened the shower door. What did she expect to find in there? Norman Bates wielding a butcher knife? Ed banging a hottie?

She found exactly what she expected to find: nothing. 

She strode back into the bedroom, eyes roving over each wall, each corner, finding nowhere that a guy Ed’s size could hide. And why the hell would he be hiding, anyway? He was a grown man looking at a house, not a six-year-old playing hide and seek. He must have wandered into the backyard. 

She turned to the sliding glass doors. They were closed. She checked the latch. Locked. 

A breath of heat tickled her neck and radiated between her shoulder blades. She whirled, sure someone—or something—was behind her. 

But there was nothing. The room was empty and silent. Nothing amiss. 

Well, almost nothing. A two-inch rectangle gaped to the right of the mirrored closet doors. Someone checked out the closet and didn’t slide the door all the way shut. People looking at houses had a license to be nosy.

She started toward the closet, then noticed the bedroom door. It was closed. 

She had left that door open. She knew she had. 

The prickle of fear she’d felt earlier hardened into a ball of ice in her chest. She sucked in a raspy breath and yelled, “Ed!”

She clapped a hand to her mouth. What the hell was wrong with her? She’d just yelled loudly enough for anyone in the house to hear, like some Wal-Mart mom screeching at her kids. 

But apparently no one had heard. No footsteps in the hallway. No, “Are you okay in there?” Nothing. 

How odd. Even if everyone else had left, the real estate agent was still here. Kim had just seen her, and the open house was scheduled to run till noon. 

Kim flicked her eyes to the digital clock radio on the nightstand. The numbers glowed red in the dim light of the bedroom.

12:30.

The ball of ice in her chest settled lower. It had been 10:30 just before she’d walked to the bedroom, just before Wannabe dragged her blank-faced husband or boyfriend or whoever the hell he was down the hall. Kim blinked several times and focused on the clock again.

12:32. 

The radio clicked on. “Love Shack” blared from its tinny speaker. 

This time she shrieked. “Ed! Ed! Where are you?” 

No answer. Just the repetitive chirping of the B-52s.

The baby kicked. Not a squirm like last time. A kick worthy of a judo master, hard into her ribcage. Mom, get us out of here.

Her head whipped toward the closed bedroom door. She reached for the doorknob and stopped. She was being an idiot. Ed must have gone outside a different way. He might even be waiting for her in the car. And someone—probably the guy in the Rolling Stones sweatshirt, he seemed like the type—must have set the alarm on the clock radio as a prank. 

She walked to the nightstand, clicked the radio off, and tried to think. Maybe Rolling Stones and Wannabe set up the scene at the door just to spook her. That blank face, though…

Maybe Ed had been in on the joke. Maybe Ed was hiding in the closet right now, watching her and stifling his laughter. Kim turned to the partly-open closet door and pushed. It slid a few inches and caught on its tracks. She stuck her head in the gap. “Ed?”

She got a face full of Obsession, thick and cloying, overpowering the scent of the potpourri that permeated the house. And under the perfume smell, something else. Something Kim had smelled once when a mouse died inside the kitchen wall of their rented loft. She jerked her head out of the closet, retching, and this time part of her breakfast did come up. She fumbled in her purse for a tissue and spat out a mouthful of partially digested oatmeal. 

“Dammit, Ed! If you’re in there laughing at me, so help me, I’ll—

A muffled groan, so faint it could have been the house settling.

Kim slammed her hand into the edge of the closet door to force it open. It shuddered but didn’t move. 

She drove her heel into it, kicking it with all the force she could muster. It gave way and slid all the way open, crashing into the end of its track hard enough to crack the mirrored surface. 

Pain speared through Kim’s side. 

Oh, God, the baby. Did I hurt the baby?

Kim stood before the open closet door, gasping and clutching her side. At first the closet appeared to hold only clothes. That made sense. Most closets with sliding doors were barely deep enough to accommodate a coat hanger. 

Kim held her breath against the stench and shoved the clothes aside, expecting to see a white sheetrock wall and maybe a pile of dead mice. But where the wall should have been, there was… nothing. Only blackness. 

“Ed!” Kim shrieked into the void. 

Another groan, this one a little clearer. 

Kim let out her breath, sucked in another, and plunged into the darkness.

###

“Ed!”

Kim screamed one final time before the void closed around her. And then she was weightless, all sense of time and space left behind with the Members Only jackets and acid-washed jeans that hung just behind her. 

How did she get here? 

Why? 

Who knew, and who cared? 

So much easier to drift along with the flow of whatever unseen current carried her. The ache in her pelvis and hips from the growing baby disappeared as it did when she slid into the rec center pool for deep water aerobics. No gravity, no pain, just floating in the warm, damp, silent darkness. She could almost ignore the faint stench of decaying flesh, like the mouse in the wall…

Another hard kick to her ribs yanked her from her trance. The baby. Ed’s baby.

Kim screamed. 

She screamed and screamed and screamed. And as she screamed, her feet found purchase, and the ache returned to her pelvis and hips.

“’im.”

A faint syllable, somewhere to her right. 

“Kim.” Louder now, more distinct.

“Ed!”

Kim flailed her arms toward the sound, and the back of her right hand connected with something solid. Fleshy. Her fingers dug into it. 

An icy hand closed over hers, and she nearly jerked away until the cold metal of Ed’s wedding band grazed her knuckle. She laced her fingers through Ed’s and yanked with all her strength. Ed’s feet scraped as they landed next to hers on the unseen surface beneath them.

Ed was a mere shadow in the darkness—and there could be no shadows without light. Kim blinked and turned. A faint light rose from what had been behind her, like dawn at the end of a pitch-black night. 

She squeezed Ed’s hand till her knuckles protested, dug her feet into whatever was beneath them, and heaved her husband toward the light. 

###

Ed didn’t resist Kim’s efforts. He didn’t do anything at all, just hung there like a bug cocooned in a web.

She yanked him forward, trying to build momentum. Objects in motion tend to stay in motion. But this object—Ed, she corrected—gained no momentum, and her own feet weighed her down. 

Bugs in a sticky trap. That’s what they were. Roaches check in, but they don’t check out. A high-pitched cackle bubbled out of her mouth. She clamped her other hand around Ed’s arm and yanked with all her strength.

His feet seemed to slip free of whatever had been holding them, and he fell into her. Kim stumbled, Ed’s weight and her own skewed center of gravity driving her forward. 

If I fall, I won’t get up. 

Buyers check in, but they don’t check out. 

Her head slammed against something that clattered around her ears as she fell face-first on the carpeted floor. Ed’s weight landed hard on her back, knocking the wind out of her. 

Pinpricks of light like stars filled Kim’s vision.

Don’t check out

Don’t check out

Don’t check out

Kim sucked in a shallow breath full of carpet fibers, furry nylon caterpillars that scratched the back of her throat. She coughed and would have screamed from the pain in her side if she’d had the air. She tried to roll sideways and managed to get her nose and mouth clear of the carpet. She sucked in another breath, a gag-inducing blend of new carpet, perfume, and rotting meat, and the burning in her lungs eased. She gasped and panted, her expanding lungs fighting against the dead weight of her husband. 

She threw out an arm, and her hand collided with something that rattled. 

Closet door.

Closed. Of course, though her foot still ached from when she’d kicked it open… how long ago? 

She slammed the heel of her hand into it, over and over. She heard the staccato pop of cracking glass, but the door held firm. 

She dropped her hand to the floor and felt along the carpet.

Ed moaned in her ear, and the weight on her back lessened.

The baby shifted.

And her fingers found the edge of the door. 

###

Kim dug her nails into the space between the door and the wall. The space widened enough to fit her fingers, and she squeezed them in. She raised herself onto an elbow for more leverage and slammed her shoulder against the edge of the door. It gave about a foot, and she lunged forward, blocking it open with her chest. 

She twisted onto her back, sat up, and reached for Ed. He stood just inside the closet, drifting slowly backward, deeper into the darkness. The side of his face she could see was as expressionless as an unpainted doll. 

The closet door pressed against her side, pinning her between its edge and the door frame, and the hanging clothes she’d shoved aside earlier slid back into place like drawn drapes, hiding all but Ed’s feet and ankles from view.

“Ed!”

She kicked out, hooked her heel around his ankle, and swept his leg out from under him. Ed dropped onto his butt, and Kim shoved at the edge of the door. It moved just enough to allow her to wriggle her belly and hips through. 

She jerked her head toward Ed, now seeing his hands and knees beneath the wall of clothing. As she watched, he turned away from her and crawled toward the back of the closet. 

“Ed!” Kim screamed and aimed a kick at the edge of the closet door. This time it retreated almost a foot, and another jagged crack split the mirrored surface.

Ed stopped.

Kim aimed another kick at the door. When her foot connected this time, a chunk of mirror glass sheared loose and sheeted to the floor. 

Ed turned toward the sound. His voice sounded faint and far away, but the single syllable he spoke rang like a gong in Kim’s ears. 

“Kim.”

“Ed! Over here!”

Did she dare risk going back in the closet for Ed? 

In the moment that she hesitated, weighing options, Ed turned away from her again. 

She turned, grabbed the door frame, and hauled herself upright. Her quads protested—she hadn’t been able to do a squat since her six-month checkup—but she made it to her feet. She took two steps through the door to the bedroom, turned, and kicked the door again from the outside, aiming her heel at another crack in the glass. Another sheet of glass slid to the floor. 

Ed stopped. 

Kim kicked again. 

Ed turned. 

And Kim understood.

###

Kim fumbled in her jeans pocket and pulled out the Zippo. She flicked it open, flicked it on, and held the tiny column of flame to the door frame. 

The floor beneath her shifted, knocking her off balance. She tripped forward and just managed to jerk the lighter away before her shoulder hit the doorframe, and her knees hammered to the carpet. 

Ed planted his hands on the shifting floor and gazed at her, his face no longer blank.

She held the flame against the inside of the closet wall. A breath of warm, fetid air rose from inside the closet, stinking of rotten eggs, rotting flesh, and… Calvin Klein’s Obsession. Kim’s gorge rose, and she urped up another mouthful of half-digested oatmeal, spat it on the carpet inside the closet, and swallowed the bitter bile rising in the back of her throat.

The floor beneath them shifted again. Ed slid backward, away from her, toward whatever was back—

The metal edge of the closet door slammed into the side of Kim’s belly with a solid thud, and a ripping pain tore through her abdomen. The lighter dropped to the floor, still lit. The door pinned her in place, its metal edge grinding into her belly. Another sharp pain knifed through her, and she felt warm wetness between her legs. 

Panic wrapped around her belly and squeezed like a contraction. Had her water broken when the door hit her? 

Can’t think about that now.

Heat seared her ankle, and she jerked her foot back. The lighter lay next to the bottom of the door frame, a thin column of yellow-white flame licking up the drywall. 

The pressure from the closet door slackened, and Kim fell backward onto her butt. She snatched up the lighter and held it to the door frame. The floor shifted, and Ed slid further away from her. Another gust of fetid air, and the Zippo’s flame flickered and grew smaller. 

Shit. When was the last time she’d filled its tank? Probably around the last time you had a cigarette, dumbass.

Shit. 

What she needed was a flamethrower. Blast the crap out of the bedroom wall and make the bitch let go of—

Rolling Stones sweatshirt standing behind her, his mouth turned up in a smirk. Like a fucking flamethrower.

Kim turned on her side, sending another spear of agony through her abdomen, and looked up at the lingerie chest. The brass knobs on the top drawers flickered with—was that afternoon sun? How long had they been in here? She blinked and refocused on her target: the purple and white can of Aqua Net on top of the chest, no more than six feet away. 

Six feet that might as well have been six miles. 

She would have to leave the doorway. The door would close, and Ed would disappear into the closet. Into the darkness. Into the hot, breathing, stinking thing. 

She turned her head and checked his location. Only the tips of his fingers peeked out from under the wall of outdated clothing. 

Kim clutched the lighter in one hand and rose to her knees. She braced her other hand against the door frame and tried to push herself upright. Her thighs trembled, and she dropped back to her knees. If she dropped the lighter, she could use both hands, but she couldn’t risk letting go of her only weapon. 

She raised her eyes to the can of Aqua Net. Six feet. Just six feet.

Weak winter sunlight slanted in through the sliding glass doors across the room, throwing a pale spotlight on the lingerie chest. Its knob eyes glowed, and its handles grinned down at her, each metal rictus a challenge. Come on, cupcake. Come and get it.

Another glance inside the closet. Only clothes. No fingers. 

No Ed.

The lighter in her hand, the flame barely half an inch high. 

Just six feet.

Kim crawled toward the lingerie chest, the lighter raised in her right hand like an Olympic torch. 

The closet door slammed behind her with a metallic clatter.

Another fist of fear tightened in Kim’s swollen, throbbing belly. 

Ed!

But she didn’t stop. 

When she reached the chest, she grasped one of the metal handles with her left hand and tried to haul herself to her feet. Her quads quivered, and she cursed herself for not working out harder. Who knew her life—and her baby’s life—might depend on fucking squats? 

But they don’t.

Kim dropped back to her haunches as the truth, the blissful truth, coursed through her like a cool stream on a hot day. Her life, her baby’s life, didn’t depend on her quads or the lighter or that stupid can of Aqua Net, because she could leave. 

She could leave right now. 

Crawl across the floor to the sliding glass door, pull it open, and crawl out. Call 911. Get to a hospital. Save her baby. Save herself. 

She raised her eyes to the chest. The drawer handles grinned their agreement.

The house could have Ed, like it wanted. Like he wanted. 

In her mind she saw Ed’s finger stroking down the edge of the kitchen cabinet, and rage boiled in her chest and bubbled into her brain, searing away all traces of reason. Ed wanted the house more than her? Fine. He could fucking stay in it. Forever. He could slide into that gaping, stinking maw and—

A kick from the baby. Two more in staccato succession. 

Get out. Save her baby.  

Kim shook her head from side to side like a senile dog. 

Ed’s baby. 

Ed, whose warmth comforted her. Ed, whose smile had turned her knees to Jell-O the first time she’d seen him. Ed, whose baby twisted and kicked in her womb. 

The house wanted Ed. It—she—wanted him. 

And she wasn’t going to get him. 

A feral snarl tore up Kim’s throat. She clenched her hand around one of those grinning handles, clenched her quads and glutes tight, and heaved herself to her feet. 

A drop of fluid rolled down the inside of her thigh. Without looking, Kim stuffed a hand between her legs. Warm, sticky wetness.  

Her eyes dropped to her crotch, where a dark stain had soaked through her jeans. Panic clawed up her spine, coiled around her heart, and choked away her courage. She swayed where she stood, though the floor had not shifted. 

Get out of here. Get out. Save the baby. Get out!

No. 

Her courage had retreated. Her rage had not. 

She grasped the top of the chest to hold herself upright, dropped the lighter on top of the chest, and seized the can of Aqua Net. She forced the white plastic cap off the can with one hand, picked up the lighter, and staggered toward the ruffled canopy bed. She braced her hip against the foot post, held the lighter in front of her, and sprayed the Aqua Net straight into its flame. 

A jet of fire hit the comforter. It singed and caught fire. The floor shifted again, but Kim was ready for that. She lunged forward and grabbed one of the head posts, then shot another jet of fire at the wall above the bed. Flames licked up the curtains surrounding the headboard. 

The flame from the Zippo flickered and died, but it didn’t matter now. Kim dropped the lighter back into her pocket and aimed another spray at the already-flaming bed. A streak of fire hit the wall. 

This time the floor didn’t shift. 

###

Kim stumbled backward from the rising heat and turned toward the closet. She threw the door open, meeting no resistance. She yanked the hanging clothes aside to reveal Ed, sitting up and struggling to rise. She reached down and helped him to his feet. 

At first, she had to drag him by the arm, like a mother with a tired toddler at the end of her weekly grocery run. The soles of her Reeboks crunched over the shards of shattered mirror glass, glowing with reflected fire light against the cream carpet, but she barely noticed. The entirety of her focus was the sliding glass door leading to the deck. To the outside. To safety.

Ten feet to go. 

Ed stopped.

“Kim, what the hell—”

“Come on! We—”

But he didn’t move. He stood amid the shattered glass and rising flames and turned his head toward the closet door. A look of longing, of bone-deep ache, flickered in his eyes. 

Heat flashed through Kim that had nothing to do with the flames rising only feet behind her. She drew her arm back and slapped him across the face. His head rocked sideways, and he turned back to her. The look of longing contorted into hatred. 

Kim grabbed his hand and jammed it between her legs. “You feel that? That’s blood, Ed.” She yanked his hand away and forced it to his face. “Do you know why I’m bleeding you weak, miserable bastard? Do you?”

His nose twitched, and awareness flickered into life behind his eyes. 

“Kim, you’re bleed—”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“The baby, is he—”

She dragged him by the hand to the sliding door, seized the handle, and yanked. The door shifted on its track but didn’t open. 

Her hand scrabbled for the latch, then dropped to her belly as it clenched. The contraction locked her in place, curved like a comma over the door latch. 

An unseen force shoved her sideways, and her shoulder slammed into the door frame. She flailed a hand toward the latch, but another hand slapped it away. 

In the next moment, the door flew open, and Ed shoved her through it. The toe of her Reebok caught on the threshold, and she fell forward. 

Ed’s arm wrapped around her chest before she could face-plant on the deck, and then he was beside her, dragging her away from the rising flames. 

###

A soft rustle emanated from the bassinet beside Kim’s hospital bed. She started to turn on her side and winced, one hand dropping to cradle the thick bandage covering the incision from her C-section. 

“I’ll get him.” Ed brought the visitor’s recliner to a sitting position, rose, and took two long strides to the bassinet. He scooped Phoenix out in one graceful motion, cradling the tiny body in his two hands. Phoenix weighed seven pounds, six ounces, an excellent weight for a baby born five weeks early. 

“Good thing he was early,” the obstetrician had said after Kim woke from surgery. “He’d probably have been at least nine pounds at term.” 

Kim had laughed dutifully, but her joy had become genuine the moment she laid eyes on her son. Phoenix was perfect. Ten fingers, ten toes, pink skin, a shock of dark brown hair. Just before the anesthesiologist put Kim under—there’d been no time for a spinal, not with the growing puddle of blood pooling on the gurney as they wheeled her into the ER—she’d pictured the final scene from Rosemary’s Baby. 

He has his father’s eyes. 

Would she wake to a baby with vertical slits for pupils? Or three sixes seared into its backside?

But no, Phoenix was perfect. So perfect. 

Ed placed him into the crook of Kim’s arm, and she unsnapped the hospital gown on her left side, letting the green and white cotton fall away to bare her breast. She guided her nipple to the baby’s mouth and gazed down at him through eyes hooded with exhaustion and softened with a mother’s pure, soul-searing love. 

She’d done it. She’d saved her child and Ed. They were all here, safe and together. She raised her eyes from her child and took in the room around her. Walls painted a soft yellow, framed prints featuring generic pastoral scenes. It could have been a room at the local Holiday Inn if it weren’t for the hospital equipment and sharp scent of antiseptic. 

Kim yawned and returned her gaze to her baby. Antiseptic was better than Obsession and rotting—

A soft tap on the door broke Kim’s reverie. She raised her eyes from her nursing child as the door opened. 

The visitor was an elderly woman with powdered cheeks and a grandmotherly smile, pushing a cart stacked with folded newspapers. Her pink smock marked her as a volunteer. 

“Would you like a copy of today’s Oregonian?” the woman asked. 

“Sure,” Ed said. 

The volunteer—her name tag read, Sharon Mitchell—held out one of the newspapers to Ed. He took it and returned to the visitor chair, while the volunteer wheeled the cart out the door. 

“Want to know what’s going on in the world?” Ed asked.

Kim yawned again and relaxed against the nest of pillows behind her while Phoenix nursed peacefully. “Sure.”

Ed unfolded the paper and ran through the headlines. “Terrorist bombing in Afghanistan… that serial killer, what’s his name…” Ed focused on the paper for a moment, then resumed. “Jacob Ramsey, he was sentenced to death. Not like this state will actually execute him…” 

The paper rustled as Ed flipped the page.

“Unemployment is down for the third quarter in a row… the housing market is expected to heat up even more after the holidays…” 

Ed’s voice faded in Kim’s consciousness to a soft drone, rising and falling in time with the alternating pressure of the baby’s mouth, lulling her into a half doze. The squeak of a rubber sole on the floor outside their room, the faint murmur of a television down the hall…

“That guy in front of us at the open house—”

Kim’s eyes flicked open, and her arms tensed around the baby.

“You know, the one who told us about Mrs. Her—”

“What about him?”

Phoenix squirmed, and Kim forced her arms to unclench. 

“He’s disappeared.” 

This time Kim’s whole body tensed, all but her arms, which she willed to stay relaxed. Phoenix squirmed anyway, and his mouth disconnected from Kim’s nipple with a wet pop. 

Ed chuckled. “Sounds like he had a tight grip.”

“What else does the article say?”

Ed pursed his lips and seemed about to comment, then returned his attention to the article.

“This is fishy. His wife, you know, the blonde with the short hair—”

“I remember.” Kim snapped the left shoulder of the gown back into place and unsnapped the right. She shifted the baby to her other breast, and he latched on. 

“Yeah, well, get this. The article says she was, quote, unable to provide any information about her husband’s recent whereabouts and, quote, couldn’t be reached for comment.”

Couldn’t be reached for comment. The emotionless face, the hollow, empty tone as she left without her husband. Kim shivered, but Ed didn’t notice.

“It says his employer—he worked for Bank of America—reported him missing two days ago when he didn’t show up for work. The article says they found no evidence of financial wrongdoing.” He refolded the paper and set it on Kim’s hospital tray. “That’s strange, isn’t it? They reported him missing on Monday. We saw him and his wife on Saturday, but she can’t tell them anything about her husband’s recent whereabouts?”

Kim’s previous chill coalesced into a slithering snake of ice that settled just under the breast where her baby lay, slurping enthusiastically. Behind her eyes, tongues of fire leaped from the bedroom window as Ed half-dragged, half-carried her to the car. She had done that. She had burned that cursed place, hopefully to the ground. Had she burned Mr. Country Club with it? 

She rested her eyes on the baby at her breast, felt the hard palate moving rhythmically against her flesh, then raised her eyes to Ed. It could have been him. Local software engineer reported missing. Would she have been, “unable to provide any information,” about Ed’s, “recent whereabouts?” More likely, she would have been, “unable to be reached for comment,” because she would have bled out on that spotless cream carpet.

Phoenix’s mouth sagged open, and Kim’s now-bare nipple puckered in the chilly air of the hospital room. She dabbed away a drop of milk with the corner of her hospital blanket. 

Ed rose as if by unspoken command and held his arms out for the baby. She raised the baby to him, then snapped the hospital gown back into place over her shoulder. 

Kim picked up the paper, separated the first two sections, and refolded them, keeping her eyes unfocused to avoid seeing the headline about the missing man. She dropped those sections on the floor beside her bed, opened the real estate section across her still-mostly-nonexistent lap, and skimmed to the Beaverton section. As much as she didn’t want to think about it, they still needed to buy a house. Their one-bedroom loft wouldn’t accommodate the three of them once Phoenix graduated from a bassinet.

There were only six ads. Some agents and sellers didn’t bother with the newspaper classifieds anymore, relying on Craigslist or Zillow instead. And, of course, it was holiday time. Christmas Eve, in fact, according to the dateline at the top of the page. No, there wouldn’t be many ads today. 

Still, out of habit she scanned down the column, focusing on the prices. An efficient approach, since about ninety percent of the listed homes were out of their range. 

$479,000. Same price as—

A wet, resonant burp issued from the vicinity of her husband and child. 

And Kim screamed.

Ed leaped from his chair with the baby still on his shoulder. 

“Kim, oh, God, Kim, what’s wrong?” Ed reached for the call button, half-buried under Kim’s thigh. 

A hot hand against her flesh. 

Ed. 

She clamped her hand around his wrist with the grip of the damned. With her other hand, she jabbed a finger at the paper. 

11666 Filbert Ln., Beaverton

3 BR 2 Ba, 1750 sq. ft., $479,000

Open house Sat. Dec. 30, 9-12.

Bring your decorating ideas.

END