Mothman's Curse (9 page)

“How can a miner be claustrophobic, moron?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. But what you need is dark, open space for this piece. Under those conditions, the statue is guaranteed to move at least once, if not every night.”

Marcus sneered. “It only moves at night? So what—I gotta stay up all night to see if it does anything?”

“How many ghosts come out in the middle of the day?” Fox said.

“Well, none—”

“Okay, then. Take the statue home, give it two more weeks under the conditions I specified, and you're sure to see results.”

“Look, Fletcher, I think you're full of it. Now, maybe if you'd let me trade this for something from the Goodrich estate…”

There it was.

“My family is auctioning the Goodrich estate, not me.” Fox's smooth tone gained a brittle edge.

“What was in that old house of theirs, anyway?” Marcus said. “I heard that old geezer was a hoarder, that the place was crawling with roaches.”

I could tell Fox wanted to take on this idiot. On a normal day he would probably have used jokes and flattery to tame the guy's nasty temperament, but today Fox's green eyes were stormy, like he was itching for something to hit, and Marcus was the perfect target. But Marcus was also a foot taller than Fox and twice as wide.

“I'm so sorry, Marcus, but I've just remembered something I have to do. Would you excuse us?” He tried to push past the bigger boy, but Marcus put out a pudgy hand to stop him.

“No. I came here to get my money back, or at the very least get some good dirt on the Goodrich place, and I've just decided I'm not leaving without both.”

The mood in the tiny room shifted. It felt closer, darker, like storm clouds closing in. The air grew cold.

I'd never seen Fox in a situation he couldn't talk his way out of. But Marcus wasn't backing down. I was glancing around for something I could use as a weapon if the need arose when:

BANG!

The door blew open with a sound like a gunshot. It closed again with the same violence. Over and over the door flew open and shut, open and shut.

Our breath clouded the air around us. The table in the center of the room began to rattle and tremble.

“What's going on?” Marcus said. He advanced again on Fox, statue raised threateningly. “You think your little tricks will help—”

The window shattered inward. Glass flew everywhere. We threw ourselves flat on the ground, covering our heads. Fox and I tried to take refuge under the table, but it shook so much we couldn't get near it. Something ripped the statue out of Marcus's hand. It flew across the room and crashed into one wall, then the opposite wall. The head shattered. Now jagged and deadly, it hovered in the air above Marcus, as if someone stood poised to take a swing at him.

Marcus ran. Out the door, through the trees, and out of sight.

We stood and edged toward the door, watchful for any new threats, but the statue fell harmlessly to the floor. The table stilled. The door snicked shut.

Fox and I stared at the statue, then at each other. I reached over and brushed bits of glass from his hair.

“I'm guessing that was Goodrich,” I said, my voice not quite steady. “Did he just … save us?”

He scratched his head. “Looks like.”

“How can this be happening?” I squeezed my eyes shut as I counted to ten in my head. “If that
was
Goodrich, he obviously doesn't need the cameras to get through to us. What does he want?”

Fox sat down at the table, drumming his fingers on the scarred surface. “In the storeroom, he kept saying ‘save them.' It was written on that paper from the safe, too. Maybe he's hung up on the fact that he and his wife couldn't stop the landslide. Maybe he still thinks it's 1975. I mean, he died an old man, but in the Polaroids, he looks like he did back then. I wonder…” He jumped up and headed for the door.

“Where are you going?”

“I'll be right back. I just want to try something.”

“Wait, don't—” I started, but he was already off and running toward the house. “Leave me here alone,” I finished, wrinkling my nose at the glass scattered across the floor.

I was scraping the glass into the corner with my shoe when Fox returned with a Polaroid camera hanging around his neck.

“You're kidding,” I said. “You're the one who said you wanted to be done with this, remember? Where did you get that?”

“Coat closet. There was a whole box of old cameras in there, just like Dad said. I'm surprised Mason hasn't gotten to them yet.”

“What's it for?”

“So far we've only seen Goodrich through items that he owned—his TVs, his cameras. I wanted to see what happened if we used our own camera.”

Why not?
I thought, slumping down in the nearest chair to watch.

Fox checked for film, and when he didn't find any, he pointed the camera at the wall and pressed the button.

A photo slid out and fell to the floor.

“How is he doing that?” I yelled, nudging the picture with my toe. The same familiar image of Goodrich appeared soon after.

At least his lips weren't moving.

“Guess he's got a thing for cameras,” Fox said. “Old ones, anyway.”

A burst of laughter escaped me before I knew it was coming.

Fox looked at me like I'd lost my mind. “What?”

“I was just thinking about the look on Marcus's face.”

Fox snickered. “Think he'll be back?”

“Nope.”

A breath of wind gusted through the broken window, stealing away the lighter mood.

“So … what now?” I said. “This has to stop. Goodrich could have killed Marcus with that statue.”

“Seems like he could hurt any of us if he really wanted to, but he hasn't.”

“Not yet. What about all this glass? We're lucky we didn't get cut. And what about Mason? He was so scared, Fox.”

“I know.” Fox jammed his hands into his pockets. “If we could just figure out what the guy wants. ‘Save them' isn't enough to go on.”

I sat up a little taller. “Eva.”

“Who?”

“Aunt Barb's hairdresser. She worked right there in the Goodrich house for years. Maybe she knows something.”

He fussed with the camera around his neck. “Isn't that the lady who says she saw Mothman?”

I nodded. “Is that a problem?”

“It just sounds so … out there.”

“People would probably say that about us if we told them what we've seen.”

He snorted. “That's true.”

“Let's just go talk to her, hear her out. What could it hurt?”

“Okay,” Fox said. “I'm in. What time is it?”

I checked my phone. “Almost five.”

“Too late to go see her today. How about tomorrow after school?”

“Oh, wait. Dad might come home tomorrow.”

“We'll have to find a good excuse to sneak away.”

My heart sank. “But I want to see Dad.”

“I do, too, Josie. We'll do both. Are you in?”

I thought of Mason's screams and Dad's bruised, tired face. I remembered my resolve at the hospital that I wouldn't let anything else harm my family.

I stood to face him. “I'm in.”

 

7

At school the next day, several kids told me they were sorry about my dad; twice as many asked about the Goodrich house. One kid even wanted to know if a ghost had been responsible for Dad's accident. I told him off, loudly, right there in the hall, partly because he was an insensitive jerk, and partly because the reason for Dad's fall was a topic Fox and I had been avoiding.

On the bus ride home, I bounced in my seat, knowing I would beat the boys by thirty minutes and glad for the extra time with Dad, if he was home. I willed the bus to go faster, smiling when I saw Uncle Bill's car parked in front of the house.

I ran inside and flung my book bag and coat on the floor. I found Aunt Barb and Uncle Bill perched on the couch, their faces pinched, hands fidgeting.

My steps faltered. “Where's Dad?”

“Hey, Josie,” Aunt Barb said with a forced smile. “How was your day?”

“Fine. Where's Dad?” I checked the kitchen and the bathroom on the unlikely chance he was waiting to jump out and surprise me.

“Why don't you sit down for a minute, honey?”

My insides froze, squeezed, shattered. “Where's Dad?” I shouted.

Aunt Barb stood quickly, hands splayed in a calming gesture. “It's not what you think, honey, okay? He's all right. He's still at the hospital. They just want to keep him a little longer.”

I sank into Dad's leather chair and let the tears fall, torn between relief and fear.

Aunt Barb scooted the ottoman beside me and sat down. “There's an infection, Josie. They're fighting it with strong antibiotics, okay? He just has to stay for a few more days. I didn't mean to scare you. I got it all wrong, didn't I?”

I sniffed and wiped the tears from my cheeks. “Kind of.”

“I'm sorry, pudding.” She squeezed my shoulders in apology.

“So will he be home for the auction?”

“They're not sure. They hope so. But you know your daddy. He would try to get up out of his wheelchair and run the darn thing all by himself. He doesn't need that kind of stress.”

“But he'll be okay? Are we going back today to see him?”

“Uncle Bill and I were there all morning. He's very tired. Maybe tomorrow?”

I tried to smile to hide my disappointment. From his spot on the couch, Uncle Bill gave a slow nod—his own special way of offering reassurance. I knew they both tried so hard, did so much for us, and I loved them for it. But I wouldn't feel settled until we got Dad back.

I drifted into the kitchen and helped myself to a couple of peanut butter cookies. I had plenty of homework, but I couldn't bring myself to start it yet. I remembered that Mitch's car had been parked beside Uncle Bill's, so I went out to the auction building to see what he was up to. I found him hauling the large furniture pieces from the storeroom out to the auction floor, arranging them around the perimeter of the room for shoppers to preview. He parked the dolly when he saw me and mopped his forehead with one sleeve.

“Hey there, Josie. Nice to see you again.”

“You too.”

“How's your dad?”

“He has to stay at the hospital a few more days.”

“Aw, that's a shame.”

I nodded. “They've already put you to work, I see.”

“Yes, ma'am. It beats sitting out at that house all alone, watching for trespassers.”

“Did you ever catch any?”

“Two or three. Sent them on their way pretty quick.”

I could imagine. Mitch was built like a bodyguard.

“So how did you end up working for my dad?”

He smiled. “Good story, actually. I'm taking a semester off from the university because—well, because I'm trying to earn some tuition money. The Goodrich lawyer, Mr. Latimer, is a friend of my dad's. He hired me to do some landscaping on the property, get it cleaned up some, but John Goodrich died just a few weeks after I started. I thought that was the end of it, but I happened to be up there working when your dad first came to inventory the estate. He saw my OU sweatshirt, we got to talking about basketball, and the next thing I knew he was offering me a job working security.”

“That sounds like Dad.”

“It's good money, and I don't have to break my back hauling brush and chopping up dead trees anymore.”

“Wow. Now you're hauling furniture instead of trees. Not so sure that's a step up.”

He laughed. “At least I get to talk to you and your family. You're all so nice. Grab that door for me, would you?”

I did, then followed him out to the auction floor. As he walked on ahead I noticed he was wearing two different socks—one yellow, one green.

“Hey, Mitch. What's with the socks?”

“These,” he said, holding up one ankle, “are my lucky socks. My old high school basketball team is playing in a tournament tonight. If they win, they'll play for the state championship here in Athens next week.”

“Do the socks work?”

“Sometimes. But if the team loses and I wasn't wearing my socks, I would feel like it was kind of my fault, you know? I have to do my part.”

“Sure.”

I bit my lip, wondering if I could be doing more to fix the weirdness plaguing our family the past several days. Suddenly I felt the urge to ask him what I couldn't bring myself to ask Dad. “Mitch? Did you ever see anything strange out at the Goodrich place?”

He shifted a rolltop desk into position and headed back to the storeroom for another piece. “Strange … you mean ghosts? Have the kids at school been bothering you about that? Because the answer is no. I never saw any ghosts up there.”

I plowed ahead with my next question before I could change my mind. “What about Mothman?”

He stopped midstep and turned back to stare at me. “Now there's an odd question. I thought that guy was connected with Point Pleasant.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.”

A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. “Sorry, Josie. Not a single ghost, Mothman, zombie, or unicorn. Just the occasional deer or raccoon.”

I felt my face grow hot. I wanted to sink into the floor.

He must have noticed, because he put a hand on my shoulder and said, “I'm sorry. I didn't mean to give you a hard time. I just don't believe in that stuff. I gotta get back to work now, okay?”

Between Mitch's teasing and my disappointment at not seeing Dad, my mood was in freefall. I just wanted to be alone.

I stomped to my room and slammed the door, not bothering to say hello to Fox and Mason or wait around for their reaction to the news about Dad. I took out the lockbox. I found the moth stickpin and set it on my dressing table. Then I sat down and met my own eyes in the mirror, daring myself to put on the pin to see if anything would happen.