Mothman's Curse (8 page)

“What about the shadow box and the books we found?”

“They're still there. I don't want them.”

“So that's it? We're done with Goodrich?”

His jaw worked. “He went after our little brother, Josie. You don't want to be done, after everything that's happened today?”

“I want to be. But do you really think Goodrich is done with us?”

Fox was silent for too long. And that was answer enough.

 

6

After another restless night, I found Mason and Fox at the breakfast table with bowls of cold cereal in front of them. They seemed tired but less rattled than the night before, eating in their usual reckless hurry so they could have seconds and thirds. I grabbed a piece of toast from a plate on the counter. “Where's Aunt Barb?”

“Packing a few things Dad wanted,” Fox said. “We're going to the hospital as soon as she's ready.”

My heart did a tiny flip inside my chest. “We get to see him? That's great!”

“And no school,” Mason added.

I sighed in relief. “Good.”

I noticed a huge basket on the table, packed with homemade cinnamon bread, oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, raspberry jam, and several puzzle books.

“She baked,” Fox said.

“I see that.”

Aunt Barb cooked when under stress. I wondered how late she'd stayed up—or how long she'd been awake. The kitchen still smelled like brown sugar and cinnamon. My stomach rumbled. “She leave any for us?”

He gestured to a tray of cookies cooling beside the stove. I abandoned my toast and took a cookie instead.

As I ate, I watched Mason on the sly to see how he was dealing with everything. He was no longer shoveling in bites of cereal but chewed slowly staring off into space.

Aunt Barb bustled in, freshly showered and dressed. Her gardenia perfume made my eyes water as she kissed me hello.

The boys jumped up. “Time to go?”

I grabbed my coat and two more cookies before joining them at the door.

“Yes, yes, my goodness. I'm coming. Eager to see your daddy, are you?” She smiled. “I think he's eager to see you, too.”

The phone rang.

“Bother,” she said as she reached to answer it. “I'll be two minutes, tops.”

Aunt Barb hated cell phones. She refused to use one. But she did install an extralong cord on the home phone so she could talk and do pretty much anything else at the same time.

I strained my ears to listen in between bites of cookie.

“Well, no,” Aunt Barb was saying. “No, I don't know what you—how did you hear about that?”

She wandered into the next room, out of eavesdropping range. She came back a few minutes later, her face red.

“Honestly, the people in this town get hold of a piece of gossip and they gobble it up for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”

Fox and I avoided looking at each other to keep from laughing out loud. Aunt Barb was probably just sore that whatever news it was hadn't come from her. “Now, let's get these dishes cleared…”

The phone rang again.

“Now
who
…?”

She spent the next hour on the phone while we sat slumped on the couch with our coats on, waiting.

Word had gotten out, about a lot of things.

People wanted to know how Dad was, if the auction was still on for this weekend, if there was anything they could do to help. But mostly they wanted to know if it was true that we'd landed the Goodrich estate.

Aunt Barb worked herself into a righteous fury. After a dozen conversations, she ripped the phone cord right out of the wall. “Have they no shame?” she fumed as she slid her arms into her puffy coat sleeves and gathered up her basket for Dad. “Honestly, you'd think they'd have something better to do.”

Fox and I held our tongues as she marched us out the door.

*   *   *

Taking that first step through the hospital doors brought a rush of sights and sounds I'd tried hard to forget. People in scrubs or white doctor's coats hurried through the halls. The families of sick people walked slower, as if their feet were weighed down with dread. A frail old woman in a flimsy hospital gown shuffled along one wall, pushing her IV pole ahead of her on squeaky wheels.

The boys moved closer to me until we formed an awkward cluster. I counted the tile squares on the floor so I didn't have to see inside people's rooms as we passed them.

But when we got to Dad's room, he looked much better than I'd expected. He was sitting up in bed, his leg casted foot to knee and propped on a mound of pillows.

Uncle Bill looked worse, hat askew, flannel shirt rumpled from sleeping in a chair. He gave us all distracted hugs before Aunt Barb bustled him down to the cafeteria for a break while we crowded around Dad and basked in his tired smile.

“Glad to see your clumsy old dad?” He had black-and-green bruises down one side of his face and peppering his arms.

Mason tried climbing right into the bed a few times. Fox handed him the TV remote to distract him.

“When do they spring you?” Fox asked.

“Tomorrow, probably, or the next day. They just want to make sure I don't disturb all the fancy hardware they put in my leg.” He shifted in the bed with a wince.

“Are you thirsty? Can I get you anything?” I poured a cup of water from a plastic pitcher and set it in front of him.

He glanced at the TV channels flying past under Mason's quick thumb. “No good sports in this place. Food's not much to write home about, either. Don't suppose you have a
Sports Illustrated
and a bucket of chicken wings in that basket, do you?”

“Sorry. Aunt Barb brought you plenty of baked goods to tide you over, though,” I said as brightly as I could.

“And some puzzle books,” Fox added, his voice as full of phony cheer as my own.

“And I made you a card,” Mason said, eyes still glued to the TV.

“Well, now, you three are very thoughtful.”

We fell silent as we ran out of small talk. I wondered if Dad remembered what he'd seen in the Goodrich house. I wanted to ask, but I wasn't sure how to bring it up. Maybe he hadn't seen anything. Bumping his head could have caused him to say strange things.

He seemed in good spirits, but a few times I watched him when he thought no one was looking. There was something in his eyes, a haunted look that had never been there before.

“So is the business surviving without me?” he asked. “Uncle Bill will grab the truck from Clark this afternoon. He'll need to get some photos posted online, get a preview together for Saturday's auction.”

“You're not going to cancel?” I asked.

“Can't. We have other estates lined up. We can't afford to get a week behind. We're thinking of having the newspaper do a write-up about the Goodrich estate, maybe on Wednesday, get the word out without causing too much fuss.”

“Dad,” Fox said, “word's already out. People were calling the house all morning.”

His face fell. “I should have known. I suppose it's just a matter of time before…”

“Jim!” Aunt Barb burst into the room. “Look who we ran into in the hall.”

Brothers and auction regulars Carl and Joe, looking as out of place as pigs in a pool hall, stood in the doorway, one of them holding a yellow smiley face balloon even though his own expression was as dour as ever.

“Hello there, fellas!” Dad said.

The tiny room, already crowded with Fox, Mason, and me, now felt stifling. We stood squished against the far wall as the small talk began anew. It quickly turned from “So sorry about your unfortunate accident” to “Since we're such good customers, how about you let us have a preview of that Goodrich estate?”

Barb sent them on their way soon enough. “We're going, too. Kids, say your goodbyes now. Your daddy needs his rest if he's to come home to us as quick as he can.”

“You'll be seeing more of Mitch until my cast comes off,” Dad said when I hugged him. “You liked him, right, guys?” I nodded; Fox shrugged. “Nice young fellow, good to have around. Bill is arranging it all. He found someone else to keep an eye on the Goodrich home. You three help Mitch and Uncle Bill out where they need you, all right?”

Dad hugged Fox next. “You help your aunt and your sister, understand?” Fox nodded. “And keep a lid on those moneymaking schemes,” Dad added with a wink. “Josie, you'll keep him in line, won't you?”

“I'll try.”

“What about me, Dad?” Mason demanded, making one more attempt to climb up on the bed. Aunt Barb wrapped both arms across his chest to keep him still.

“Your job is to help your aunt set up a space for me in the living room. I won't be going up and down stairs for a while. Okay?”

Mason nodded and threw his arms around Dad's neck. I remembered Mason's terrified screams and my own pounding heart as we'd rushed to him the night before, not knowing what we'd find.

With my family gathered in that cramped room, I felt a pang of love and fear and loss. Momma's death had left a jagged, painful hole in our lives, but it had brought us closer together, too. I vowed that nothing was going to ruin the happiness we had left.

We left the hospital mostly in good spirits, thankful that Dad seemed okay, relieved that nothing strange had happened since the night before.

We kept so busy the rest of the day that I found myself wishing I'd gone to school instead.

Fox and I spent hours uploading photos to the computer and adding them to the Fletcher Auctions website. I was pretty comfortable with computers, so a few years back, Dad had appointed me official website administrator. It was way less glamorous than it sounded.

Uncle Bill wrote item descriptions and a paragraph about the Goodrich family, struggling for the right balance between respectful and “Don't miss this once-in-a-lifetime sale!” Fox helped him spice it up a little—just enough to draw in customers instead of lulling them into a coma.

Working in the storeroom, I kept jumping at the slightest sound. My neck and shoulders grew stiff. I found myself humming Momma's favorite song, “You Are My Sunshine,” to fill the silence.

Uncle Bill had discovered the shattered lights. He scratched his head but otherwise didn't question it. Just went and got new bulbs and the extra tall ladder and replaced them.

At one point, I spotted the shadow box and books we'd left behind the night before. I hid them in a closet to keep them from being sold. Just in case.

Late in the afternoon, we were on a snack break—Aunt Barb's homemade scones with honey—when someone knocked at the kitchen door. It was Marcus Crabtree, a regular customer at Fox's auctions who was a year older than me and who walked like a gorilla. Fox didn't open the door but motioned through the window for Marcus to meet us out at the Cave.

Aunt Barb was on the phone again. We mouthed that we were going outside, and she waved us away. We grabbed our coats and jogged out to where Marcus waited, clutching a foot-tall statue of Elvis in one huge fist.

“I want my money back, Fletcher. This thing isn't haunted and you know it. It hasn't moved once since I overpaid you for it two weeks ago.” His words reminded me that Fox was due to hold another “haunted” auction soon. Now that we were being haunted for real, it seemed pointless and childish.

Fox took the statue and examined it from head to toe. “Hmmm. Now, we do have a strict no-return policy, but it's bad business to have an unhappy customer. Would you consider trading it for another item?”

“I just want my money.”

“You did exactly what I told you, right? Kept it in a darkened room, away from direct sunlight? The owner was a coal miner when he was still alive. Couldn't stand bright light.”

“How am I supposed to see if it does anything if it's in a dark room? I carried it around with me in my backpack.”

“Ah, now, there's your second problem,” Fox said. “The owner was claustrophobic; he didn't like small, confined spaces.”