The Lovely Shadow (19 page)

I left the bedroom without investigating
further. I’d seen enough to settle in my own mind that it was
June’s room, and after all she’d done for me already, she deserved
a modicum of privacy in her own home.

I went to explore the final bedroom fully
expecting to poke my head into it and find it similar to my own
room; sparsely decorated with a simple elegance, and an inviting
nature. I was sorely mistaken in that assumption.

The outline of the room was the same as mine,
and the other three bedrooms, with the same woodwork, closet,
dormer window, and red carpeting, but the interior decorator of
this particular room seemed to be as crazy as my own mother.

Shelves, dressers and tables lined the walls.
All of the available flat surfaces on those pieces of furniture
were covered with a vast array of different items, some creepy—some
innocuous.

A bookshelf near the bed was overflowing with
at least a hundred hard cover books, many of which appeared to be
bound in leather. I could not escape the idea that some of the
leather may have been made from human skin, and a chill shivered
down my spine as I peered at the books from the safety of the
doorway.

A small table sat beside the bookshelf and
was covered with dozens of glass vase candles, all depicting
various images of the Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ, or the
crucifixion. In the center of the table was a black and white
photograph of a middle aged Negro man. The picture was framed in an
ornate brass frame, and had a set of Rosary beads draped on it.

There were numerous crosses and crucifixes
scattered in between the candles and leaning up against the framed
picture, as well as a couple dozen brightly colored stones and a
few scraps of tattered cloth scattered about. The whole scene
looked like some kind of ominous shrine.

The impression the table gave was very busy
and disturbing, but at least none of the candles were lit, which
was a great relief to me as it implied that whoever had erected
this creepy tribute had not been here in the very recent past.

Next to the table was a medium sized hutch
with glass doors on the four cupboards upon it. There were two
large cupboards on the top portion of the hutch, and two smaller
cupboards at the bottom. The top and bottom cupboards were
separated by a large tabletop, or shelf. Between the two bottom
cupboards, running down the center of the hutch were three drawers.
All the wood surfaces of the hutch had been painted black.

I could see, through the glass doors, that
each cupboard held an assortment of strange, twisted figurines.
Some appeared to be ceramic, some wood, and some were made of
cloth. All were undoubtedly disturbing to look at.

Some of the dolls were made in the likeness
of humans, mostly black humans, though some were white. Some dolls
seemed to be a representation of some strange mostly shapeless
beast I’d never seen before, with large black button eyes and only
a slightly humanoid shape. The majority of the dolls seemed to be
images of corpses or skeletons.

Almost all the dolls were exquisitely dressed
with bright colored silky fabrics and plenty of shimmering metallic
accents. Wild hair and oversized dark eyes were another dominant
trait that most of the dolls shared.

Scattered intermittently between all of the
dolls were small pouches of varying size, colors, and fabrics. Most
of the pouches were tied off with black strings, concealing their
contents from my prying eyes.

The tabletop shelf of the hutch was like a
tractor beam to my wide-eyed snooping. Sitting on the tabletop were
copious numbers of various bones, mummified animal feet, and
brightly colored paper and cardboard coffins.

Most of the bones were small and it was not
possible to discern the originating animal they came from, but I
silently prayed that they were not of human origin, even though
many resembled fingers.

There were a dozen or so mummified animal
feet mixed in with all the bones. Some looked to be monkey paws;
some resembled rabbits feet, some bird feet, and one large, clawed
foot that looked like it came from an alligator.

Scattered among the hodgepodge of bones and
feet were many small skulls. Some were undoubtedly from large
birds, though many appeared to be rodent skulls. But the one skull
that served as a centerpiece to this macabre display was the large
human skull that sat in the center of the tabletop, like a gruesome
sentinel, watching over all the other bones to make sure they did
not take a fanciful idea into their minds to go off wandering.

I stared at the skull for several seconds,
unable to move from the spot where I’d been rooted in abject
horror, before I saw that it was plainly not real. It was made from
plaster and all the details had been grossly over defined, giving
it an almost cartoonish appearance.

I let out a small sigh of relief and let my
eyes wander upwards to the ceiling where there were many more
oddities to entertain my curiosity.

Scattered about in a seemingly random
pattern, various items hung lazily from the ceiling on black
strings. Many feathers were strung about. Some were single
feathers, others were grouped into clusters. Most of the feathers
were black, but some had been dyed bright, vivid colors such as
red, yellow, and blue.

There were many dried plants hanging about in
various locations as well, but their species was incomprehensible
to me as I’d never cared much for botany.

I diverted my eyes from the ceiling and
looked toward the bed. The bed looked just like mine, with the
exception that the bed spread was black instead of red, and had an
intricate pattern of skulls, and humanoid figures with big dark
eyes, embroidered into it in bright colors.

The nightstand beside the bed was different
from mine and was nothing fancy. It was just a plain table, about
two feet square, and painted black. Upon the table there was a
small lamp, with nothing sinister in its appearance, a large open
Bible, and a pair of reading glasses sitting on the exposed pages
of the open book.

Continuing my swift visual exploration of the
room, I ascertained that the rest of the room held no more bizarre
treasures with the exception of the shelf beneath the dormer
window, which had nothing on it except a small mortar and
pestle.

The room had a dark, musky smell to it. Like
damp earth and dry weeds, and brought images to my mind’s eye of
muddy rivers, flanked with cattails and tall yellow grasses. The
smells coming from the room seemed almost alive and filled me with
a strange inexplicable excitement and fever for adventure.

Deciding that I had probably been cursed by
some kind of black magic that was trying to draw me deeper into the
strange, chapel like room, I decided to back out of there as
quietly as I could, fearful that too much noise in that place would
not be appreciated.

I had backed almost completely out into the
hallway when I thought I saw a shadow pass in front of the dormer
window. The louvers on the blinds had been only partially opened.
Just far enough to allow a dim light to effuse into the room,
offering just enough luminescence to see by, but not so much that
anything looked bright.

My eyes had been pointing towards the window
on my way out of the room, though I was not actually looking at it.
I saw a small dark shape dart past the window, from the right (near
the bed) to the left (towards the closet). By the time my brain
registered what my eyes thought they had seen and my muscles
responded to the order to whip my head to the left and focus my
eyes in that direction, the shadow was gone.

I stood there for several seconds, looking
all around the window and closet area, trying to spot more
movement. I saw nothing, but the damp earthy smell that had been
dominating my nostrils was joined by a third smell…roses.

I backed the rest of the way out of the room
and closed the door quietly. I was still filled with an exuberant
energy that I could not explain, but was now also filled with a
sense of queer awe; a sense that I’d just witnessed something out
of the ordinary realm of explanation, and something that was
special and meant for me alone.

I stood in the hallway and shook my head
powerfully, trying to shake away the faint traces of earth, rose,
and weird that were still filling my head. After a nice, violent
shaking, my head seemed to be as empty as it normally was, and I
was able convince myself that there was nothing weird going on
behind that door.

Turning back towards the stairs I took a deep
breath of the fresh air in the hallway and smelled the unmistakable
perfume of bacon wafting up from the downstairs. My stomach rumbled
rudely at me and I realized that I was starving. I couldn’t
remember the last time I’d eaten anything that actually required a
pan to cook it properly.

I made the snap decision that exploration
could wait until after breakfast and jogged down the hall to the
stairs. I descended the stairs two at a time, gripping the
handrails on both sides of the stairs as if my life depended on it,
and at the speed I was travelling it probably did.

A quick glance around at the bottom of the
stairs revealed a large living room that was decorated sparingly,
yet invitingly, with a western theme dominating the tone of the
room. There were two tan leather couches with matching overstuffed
chairs flanking them. The two couches sat facing each other with a
large dark wood (possibly cherry wood) coffee table between
them.

Several pictures adorned the walls, but at
the speed I was traveling in search of bacon I could not discern
what images were displayed in those pictures. Hell, I couldn’t even
tell if they were photographs or paintings.

I blew through the living room like a small
tornado ripping through a trailer park, and woe be to anything that
dared to get in my path, and headed for the double swinging,
louvered half doors that were set in an entryway in the wall
furthest from the stairs.

I slowed down only slightly when I reached
the doors, with common sense telling me that exploding through the
swinging doors could have disastrous consequences if anybody
happened to walk past those doors on the other side at that moment,
but with ravenous hunger telling me to damn the consequences.

I came bursting into the kitchen, slobbering
like a rabid dog, with bacon dominating every thinking part of my
brain. I had fully expected to burst in there and see June hovering
over the stove, looking as lovely as a spring day, but as often
happens in life, what we expect is not exclusively what we get.

Standing at the stove was a short, plump
black woman who appeared to be in her mid fifties. She was wearing
a full length black dress adorned with bright floral patterns, a
white apron, and a bright yellow and red head-wrap that was open at
the top, allowing her tight black braids to spill out of it like a
bucket full of snakes.

She was turned towards me as I entered,
holding a spatula up in the air as if she was getting ready to swat
a troublesome fly with it, and smiling broadly, showing many large
brilliantly white teeth and a couple of gold ones. She must have
heard me thundering through the house like a rhinoceros, because
she looked as though she were expecting me.

Shocked by the sudden sight of something so
many miles away from what I had expected, I tried in vain to stop
moving forward. Unfortunately for me the combination of forward
momentum, stockinged feet, and vinyl flooring served up a malicious
cocktail of sliding feet, flailing arms and experiments designed to
test all of Newton’s theories of gravity. I landed flat on my butt
and slid right up next to the big black woman.

I looked up at her from my position on the
floor and saw that she was staring down at me, her dark eyes
twinkling joyfully and her broad smile growing even broader. She
burst out laughing. She had the loudest most raucous laugh I’d ever
heard. Her laughter was rough, and coarse, like sandpaper grinding
against sandpaper, but was at the same time the purest, most honest
laughter I’d ever heard.

She laughed so hard that tears sprang up in
her eyes as she reached her hand down to help me up. She continued
to laugh as I took her hand and stared at her with wide eyes and an
open mouth. She tried to make words as I was standing up, but she
couldn’t manage any type of enunciation and instead broke out into
fresh bursts of laughter.

When I was standing fully erect and my shock
had begun to wear off I couldn’t help but join her in her laughter.
We stood together in the tidy kitchen, laughing uncontrollably
together for several minutes, until my sides ached with the revelry
and my eyes were watering profusely.

Finally we both managed to calm down to a
point where we could make words. The black woman set her spatula
down on the stove and used both hands to wipe the tears off from
her big round cheeks, and said “Boy, you done slide into ‘dis room
like a big ol’ swamp rat squirmin’ into him’s mud-hole.”

I’m not sure how describe her voice. It was
as brown as her skin (if we could hear in color, she would sound
brown) and it flowed from her like liquid chocolate. She spoke with
a thick French Cajun accent and her soothing tone immediately
removed any doubts that her warm smile and infectious laughter may
have left about her intentions and made you trust her.

“You alrigh’, Child?” she asked, (she
pronounced child as chy-uhl). “You din’ break you’s self now
didja?”

I rubbed my bottom with my sore right hand
and replied, “Well, Ma’am, I might have broke my butt a little bit,
but I’ll be ok.”

The woman broke out in a fresh burst of
laughter and slapped her robust thighs as she cackled.

“Ha ha ha ha! Da Child done bust him butt!
Fo’ sho’ dat’s what him done did! Ha ha ha!”