Bank Owned (5 page)

10.

It took her twice as long as usual to get ready for work that day. In the spare bedroom where she kept her clothes, she got dressed in her best power skirt suit and studied the dark spots under her eyes, considering going back to bed one more time. Then she heard laughter. High and fast and melodic. Like a song.

A child’s laughter.

A flutter in her heart. She dropped the hairbrush and her feet moved without even thinking about where she was going. She just followed the sound of that musical, joyous giggling. She pictured a girl. She didn’t know why. It just sounded like a girl. And she was somewhere downstairs.

In the kitchen, the laughter got louder, but she found no baby. More giggling pointed her to the basement, and down she went. The lone light bulb was harsh in her eyes and showed the basement for what it was—an empty, cold, damp place. No babies. Yet she heard one, babbling and cooing. It took only another second or two until she was standing before the cinderblock shelves, certain the baby was behind the concealed door.

She had the blocks moved in no time. Worry for the baby’s wellbeing drove her, giving her almost supernatural speed and strength. Must have been supernatural, because, once the shelves were disassembled and moved aside, she got the secret door open with no troubles. The very same door Brian couldn’t dislodge. Her breath abandoned her at the sight of the blackness beyond. But the baby’s laughter became even louder, perfectly distinct. It was in there, and that knowledge urged her forward, into the darkness. A step down took her by surprise, and she stumbled the next three. Then she caught her balance, thankfully, since there were at least twenty more steps down, further into the underground abyss.

When she reached bottom, what she beheld stunned her into silent awe. The room, not small, yet not large, either, had every inch crammed with children’s things. A mobile hung from the ceiling. All sorts of birds, different colors and sizes, spinning and dancing on strings. A lamp with lions and tigers and bears on the shade provided enough light to see a chest of toys, dollhouses and dump trucks and building blocks and bouncing balls. A shelf packed with books and stuffed animals and a table adorned with even more—elephants and giraffes and silly monkeys with cymbals in their hands. She found herself touching a monkey, just to make sure it was real. She handled it all, the toys and the lamp and a small tabletop with washcloths and bibs and diapers and little outfits with adorable flower prints.

She realized the laughing that had brought her down there had ceased. The twinkling sound of a music box took its place, bringing her to a state of calm. All those terrible thoughts of losing her child were replaced by optimism, a genuine feeling of compassion and, most of all, of love.

The crib had blended in with the satiny, soft wall coverings, which is why she must not have seen it right away. When she did, though, she rushed to its side, wasting not a second. She didn’t know why she was disappointed to discover only a bundle of cotton blankets, clean and neat. To find a baby in such a state of abandonment would have meant some horrible evil was afoot. So it came as a relief nothing was in the bassinet. Still, the laughter she’d heard seemed authentic, so genuinely joyous. Joyous. That’s what she felt as she took another mental inventory of what only could be described as a nursery. A wonderfully and thoughtfully arraigned and stocked child’s room, designed with love in mind. Pure. Unconditional.

After the original shock of finding such a meticulously outfitted space, the reality of the situation began to wear down her euphoria. How could such a room exist, deep below their house? And why would someone build this place, in such a subterranean dungeon, with such a thorough eye for detail and obvious care? Though it didn’t look like a dungeon. It looked like any other room. Finished walls, soft carpet, whimsical paint with a rainbow and bunnies and a sunny spring scene. The only things missing were windows, a view of the outside world.

She wondered if, in all of his sneaking around when she was asleep, Brian had built this room. It was just the sort of thing he would do. Maybe that was why he was acting so distant lately. Maybe he was doing that on purpose, just to throw her off. However, she began to see signs of age. Tattered and yellowed paper in the Doctor Seuss books, and heavy dust on the stuffed animals. This place had been here a long time. Way before she and Brian had moved in. She decided to cast aside questions and motives. Far be it for her to question, or even criticize. One truth demanded to be heard above all others, and that was whoever built this room, they loved a child very, very much.

That residual compassion moved her to tears for the second time that day. Suddenly she wasn’t so depressed about the negative pregnancy test. They’d make another baby. And another, and another. These were her thoughts as she hurried up the rickety staircase again. So excited was she that the absence of handrails, and light for that matter, phased her not even a little.

“Brian! BRIAN!” she ran up to the real basement, or what she’d thought was the real basement. She kept running and shouting for her husband, desperate for him to come see.

He grumbled when she found him, lumped in bed, a face sticking out of the sheets. He was cold, even in the Indian summer they were having, and didn’t want to get out of bed. Angie’s persistence, though, along with her mention of the room beneath the cellar, got him up.

“What do you mean you went down there? You moved the shelves and opened that door? The hidden door?”

“Yes, yes!” she took his hand and had to drag him. It didn’t take much more cajoling after that, though. After that, he dominated the conversation.

“So you saw what was in there?” he kept asking her. “You know what’s down there?”

“I saw it, Brian!” she was in the lead as they rushed down to the basement “I saw it all…it’s so wonderful!”

“Wonderful?” his head began to spin. “You really think so? You think it’s wonderful?”

She stopped before they reached the hidden door. “Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”

He felt dirty all of the sudden, like he needed to scrub himself with Comet. “You…something’s wrong with you…you’re sick.”

“Sick? What do you mean?” she couldn’t understand what he was talking about. She waited for a response, which Brian didn’t want to contribute, so she gave him a confused shrug and descended, quickly and decisively, into the darkness.

“Angie! Wait!” he went after her. The staircase shimmied and shook. They both thought it would come down and bring them with it. Neither cared particularly. Angie wanted to show Brian he had nothing to be afraid of, and Brian just wanted to get his wife the hell out of there. At the bottom of the steps, both of them out of breath, they each got the surprise of a lifetime. Nothing. Bare wood walls, dirt floor, open rafters, a breeding ground for bugs. Nothing else.

Angie stumbled in the dimness, searching for the table of diapers and washcloths, rooting for the cabinet of stuffed animals, probing for the bassinet which was no longer there. Brian, in a similar state of confusion, turned a full circle, his eyes used to the dark by now, and not spotting a thing from earlier. No medieval instruments. No wheel of torment. No hanging razor wire or kinky sex toys. Nothing.

“Where is it?” she felt the exposed two by fours. “Where did it all go?”

Despite the absence of provocative items, Brian still harbored suspicion. “Where did all
what
go, Angie?”

“Everything that was in here?”

“So you’re admitting you knew what was in here. Did you have anything to do with it? Was it yours?”

She looked at him. “At first I thought
you
did it. To surprise me.”

“What!” his face felt hot. “Don’t be disgusting!”

“Disgusting?” she’d had enough of his attitude. “How can you say that?” she studied him closer. He was shaking, with anger or fear, she couldn’t tell. “What did you see in here?”

“What did
you
see?”

“It was a…” she scanned the empty space once more. “A nursery.”

“Nursery?”

“Yeah. A baby’s room,” she filled with warmth at the thought. “It was magnificent. Everything a baby would need. Blankets, a crib, a changing table, stuffed animals,” she gave him a pleading look. “Oh, Brian, it was beautiful,” she returned to her confused search. “I just don’t understand where it all went.”

“A nursery,” he repeated, trying to understand. “Impossible.”

“Why? Brian, what did you see down here?”

He turned away. No way could he, or would he, talk about it.

“Brian?” she refused to back down. “Tell me what you saw.”

He found it unbearable to look at her, and just as unbearable to speak a word. Confusion turned to fear, then fear to anger. He backed away from her, feeling for the staircase behind him. When he found it, he went up, slowly, carefully.

“Brian? What is it?” she followed, aware of the dark, suddenly. “What are you thinking?”

“Something’s going on around here,” he said. “Something really fucked up.”

11.

“So, you want your usual?” Betty flashed her best sunrise smile, despite wanting to do the exact opposite. She remembered the girl in the Lexus, the one who’d bought the Castle. How could she forget? That poor girl and her husband were all Betty thought about since the second they’d met.

“Huh?” Angie heard the woman. She just wasn’t listening. Too much on her mind.

“Small, nonfat half caf vanilla hazelnut cappuccino?”

“Oh,” she shook away the haze in her head, appreciative to see a friendly face. “You know what? No. Gimme a large…full fat…and load it with caffeine this time,” she spied the baked goods lined up in a transparent plastic bin. “And one of those bagels, too. Smear it with cream cheese, would ya?”

“With pleasure,” Betty giggled. “Treating yourself this morning, are you?” she got to work on Angie’s order. “Good. Indulge yourself once in a while. Nothin’ wrong with that, I always say.”

Angie peered into the little Coffee Hutch. It seemed empty except for Betty. No omnipresent and foreboding husband around to squelch any free talk.

“Betty?” she read from the nametag. “You seemed a little…disturbed by something the last time I was here. Do you remember?”

Betty felt her pulse quicken. Her palms became moist instantly. “I-I don’t think so,” she was a terrible liar, and everyone knew it. Angie wasn’t fooled.

“I told you where I lived, remember? The Castle? I just…I wanted to know. Why were you so, well, disturbed? It was like you wanted to say something.”

Betty inhaled sharply. She thought if she was quick, and if she talked quiet enough…but there was no way. The young woman’s car was running, and she had to speak louder than she wanted. She had to break the silence, though, so she leaned out the drive-up window.

“There
is
something—” Betty knew she’d been caught the second Earl stepped around the shack. His stern breath and clenched jaw told her all she needed to know.

“My wife’s got nothin’ to say about no Castle,” Earl put himself between the Lexus and the Coffee Hutch. “This is a quiet community. Respectable, hardworkin’ folks. We don’t need no city folk comin’ in here causin’ problems.”

Normally, Angie would have told the old geezer to shove it where the sun don’t shine and peel off without her coffee. But something in Betty’s look. “Mister, I don’t want any trouble. It’s just that…it’s my house. Strange things have been going on, and I thought maybe your wife knew something about—”

“We don’t know nothin’ about nothin’!” he banged his hammer on the shack’s aluminum siding. That made Angie put the car into gear and do exactly what her first instinct had told her to do. Get the hell out of there. Before she could step on the gas, Betty stopped her with a holler.

“Miss! Miss!” she held out a paper cup and little white bag containing the bagel and cream cheese. She gave Angie an expectant expression, impossible to ignore. Angie glared at old Earl and he glared at her as she claimed her order. She placed the coffee in the dash holder and let the sack drop on the seat. “I put the receipt in the bag,” Betty emphasized the word, ‘receipt,’ and held her breath, hoping the young lady would find the note she’d scribbled.

Have urgent info on your house. Must speak to you in private
, she’d written, and then left her cellphone number with an additional message:
Call me. Tonight. URGENT!

She caught Earl’s disapproving stare.

“Why do you have to meddle, woman? You should know by now what kinda trouble’d come our way if we get in the middle of this.”

She said nothing, and had no way to mask her feelings from this man after fifty years, so she didn’t even try.

“I don’t know what kinda ideas you have in your head,” he continued his admonition. “But you just wipe ‘em clean, ya’ hear? You wipe ‘em clean.”

Betty watched the taillights disappear into the early morning haze and sent her will to the young woman.
Please find that note,
she thought over and over, crossing her fingers.
Find the note.

Angie let the bagel sit on her passenger seat the whole forty-five miles to work, and only took a sip or two of the cappuccino. She’d lost her appetite, and didn’t have much need for the caffeine. Consequently, the bagel remained untouched, and the receipt with the crucial note on the back never saw the light of day.