Part 29 (1/2)

Liz stared at her for a second, wondering what this person was doing in her apartment when she should be in Angel Hill, haunting the third floor. And that thought brought something to mind, some piece of what was wrong, but it was just out of her reach and she couldn't fully grasp it.

She moved toward the girl and a final chord was struck. The tone hung in the air, vibrating in Liz's head, then faded.

”Why are you here?” Liz asked. Sarah sat up straighter at the sound of Liz's voice. Then she turned, rotating sideways toward Liz. The face was dead, but not rotted. The hair was lifeless, the skin pale. The eyes were glazed over. The girl opened her mouth.

”WAKE UP!!!” she screamed.

Adam topped the second floor and moved into the main room. His sister sat at the piano, ethereal, vague. Since their mother's death, the Denglers had done without a number of things, and while she hadn't taken a lesson in months, their father insisted she practice, knowing their mother would never want her to quit something she showed so much promise at. So she practiced. On the bench next to her sat her doll.

A shadow that resembled his youngest brother rolled a truck over the hills and b.u.mps on the couch.

The middle brother had sat at the window for hours, rolling his plastic ball back and forth across the sill while he waited for their father.

Adam turned away from this scene, knowing it wasn't real, that the things he saw before him were just recordings the house had made, images, not even as substantial as the ghosts that roamed the house. These were just memories.

He pa.s.sed the kitchen and saw himself making lunch for the others, just as he'd done that day. More memories, more images projected by the house. But not real.

He started up the stairs again and the front door banged open. The gla.s.s shattered and fell in a shower of sparkles. Stomping footsteps came toward him, up the stairs, and his father's image flickered in and out, hung over, haggard, and murderous.

The ghost-image Adam came from the kitchen to intercept, knowing how bad their father could be when he'd been drinking.

Adam stood on the stairs and watched the scene play out with transparent people.

”I've got their lunch done,” the Adam-image said. ”You can go lie down if you want. I'll take care of them.”

His father grunted something and disappeared into his bedroom. In the past few months, he'd been trying to get the bottom floor turned into a separate apartment and renting it out for some extra money. The kids' rooms were on the third floor and Milo's was in the room off the second floor's main room, which they'd made the living room. They'd all been living only on the top two floors for a while and he'd learned to keep down the noise when their father was in bed.

The door closed, the children ate their lunch, and Adam sent them outside to play in the back yard. He stayed in to straighten up while their father slept. While he gathered a few toys scattered next to the couch, he heard something in his father's room. Creeping closer, careful to be silent, he listened closer. It sounded like crying. This was nothing new. Since their mother died, his father cried almost regularly. Whether in mourning or from stress, Adam didn't know. Since his father had started coming home drunk, Adam had learned to stay clear of his path and try to keep things at home in order.

While the Joey-Adam stood watching, the ghost-image Adam pa.s.sed by on the stairs, went into the room that used to be his, and the door closed.

He waited. His heart beat hard in Joey's chest. Within seconds, his father's door opened and he watched a shadow that resembled his father float up the stairs. In its hand was a thick wooden board.

The day all this had happened for real, Adam wondered for a second where the board had come from, just before it slammed into his skull. Now that he saw his father brought it out from his room, he wondered again, Where did it come from? Had he been planning this?

The rest he didn't need to see; he knew it. His father came into Adam's room, caught him off guard, and swung. The board knocked him out, bringing a swell of black across his vision and a thump against the floor.

His father came out then, wiped his brow, and panted, ”Everyone will suffer now.”

Jack played a rhythm pattern against Charley's blues lead, letting himself sink into the sound and motion of playing. He didn't pay much attention to his fingers or the changes; he'd let himself go and his hands went where they should automatically.

While Charley went off on another run, in the back of Jack's mind, a thought was forming.

It grew form and substance and soon moved further up.

Charley turned toward Jack and did a fret-long slide to the top of the neck, slid his fingers into the rhythm Jack had established, and Jack took over the lead.

The divorce, raising Joey, supporting the both of them and still finding someone to take care of his son while he worked--through all of it, this had been Jack's release. At first, it had been hard to deal with and he saw himself having either an anxiety attack or a heart attack by the time he was thirty. But once he picked up Lily and began learning to play her in earnest, every night after Joey went to bed, this was his tranquilizer, this was his joint, his cold beer, his cigarette, his cookie, his o.r.g.a.s.m, everything one might ever need in order to relax, Jack had found in this chunk of wood with the metal wires.

His first inspiration had been, of course, Hendrix. But after a while, Jack realized no one was ever going to emulate Hendrix. You could learn to play a Hendrix song, but that's all it would ever be, you playing a Hendrix song. So he went down a few steps, learning the original blues styles, then moving up again to the Texas Blues, Stevie Ray Vaughan in particular. SRV had been a huge Hendrix fan and his style was similar while not being as wild.

He bought as many SRV records as he could find and then got whatever videotaped concerts he saw. He bought the Stevie Ray Tribute video and watching that had led him to a number of other guitarists he would study. Within a year, he'd drowned himself in so much blues, he could play it without thinking. He let it come up from within, down in his gut, flowing out through his fingers.

It was something he didn't have to think about, just something that was, something that existed as its own thing with no other logic or thought. His fingers flew and his mind was free and his gut churned with deep things that came out and filled Charley Clark's garage with sound and feeling.

And that thought in the middle of Jack's mind came further toward the front while he played and fell away from the real world, a thought that said not everything had to have a logic behind it, because some things--like this--could just be because they were and that was all.

A part of him fought this notion, but another part felt the music rising up and felt the strings bend and slide under his fingers and this part knew that that might be right.

For one fraction of a second, he let himself listen to that thought and he found it spoke with Liz's voice.

”You want to find out what's wrong, go to the house and try the third floor. Whole bunch of stuff wrong up there.”

And once that much was in, it was easier for other bits to sneak in.

”What I'm trying to tell you through your stupid f.u.c.king logic-haze is that Joey's brown eyes are now green.”

And that was true, wasn't it? But how could that be possible?

The same way it's possible you didn't have a nervous breakdown after Joey's mother left. Feel those strings under your fingers, feel the neck against your palm, and the weight on your shoulder from the strap. Feel the sound coming from the amp, feel the way your spine tingles when you get the slide just right and it makes that sound that makes you feel like your slipping backwards out of the world. Some things just are because they are, without reason or thought. Sometimes there is a pattern, but it doesn't always fit the world you know. Like a chord pattern. Any combination of chords will fit together, but only certain progressions will make a person smile. So why can't Joey's eyes be green?

Because that means there really is something wrong.

That's right. So do something about it. Quit playing with yourself and do something about it!

His fingers broke off mid-note and the pick hit the concrete floor.

”s.h.i.+t,” he said.

Charley stopped strumming.

”What's the matter? That was gold, man.”

Jack slid out of Lily's strap, set her aside on her stand, and switched off his amp. He dug his keys from his pocket.

”I'm sorry,” he said. ”I forgot I've got to get home for a little bit. I'll get Lily later, I've got to hurry. So, uh, keep playing. With any luck, I'm a moron and I'll be back.”

With that, he was out the door. Charley stood dumbstruck, holding his guitar with his fingers positioned to strum again. Instead, he ended up standing there for at least two full minutes wondering What the h.e.l.l?

Liz sat up with a gasp, wide awake and panting.

Where was Joey? She ran into his room, found it empty, then ran down the hall again, through the living room, into the kitchen, out the back door, hoping--praying--he'd gone outside to play.

He was nowhere. At the back of the yard, Liz called for him.

Across the alley, the old naked woman peeked out from behind her s.h.i.+elding curtain.

Liz looked up at the house, dread at seeing Joey, or worse--the little girl--staring down flooded through her. The windows were empty. But the house was different. She could see that. The white exterior had darkened to a dull yellow. The windows stared back, the back door hung open, inviting her, daring her.

A shadow pa.s.sed over the house--the entire house, like a huge invisible cloud--and she took off at a full on run for the door.