Part of her wanted her dad to follow her, tell her she was being silly. She wanted him to crack a dumb joke andcoax her downstairs to dinner. But only silence chased her up the stairs to her room.
Ollie didn’t slam the door. No, she’d already had her tantrum. To slam the door would be too obvious. Make her an angry kid (which you are, dummy) instead of an angry almost-teenager who Had the Right to Be Mad.
So Ollie gritted her teeth and closed her door very softly. Then, where no one could see, she threw herself onto her comforter and buried her face in her pillow. She didn’t cry. She squeezed her eyes shut but she didn’t cry. It wasn’t something she had tears for, anyway. Tears were for things like skinning your knee, not for...
Whatever. Ollie just got mad sometimes, and people talking to her made it worse. It was easier to be by herself, up here where it was quiet. Even though shewashungry. She could still smell garlic. But her dad would want to talk more and Ollie didn’t have any words for him.
Or maybe he’d let her be quiet. Sometimes he did. But in its way, silence between them was worse. Better to stay up here.
Ollie dug a russet apple out of her bag. Evansburg had the best apples. It was harvest time and the market was full of fresh cider and every type of apple in the world. Red and purple and yellow and green apples.Crunch.Ollie bit down. Apples were good. She would think about apples. Ollie practically lived on apples in October. She tried toconvince herself that an apple was as good as pasta. Fail. But it was something. She’d sneak down later for a proper snack. Snacks. She thought about snacks.
Not enough. She needed a better distraction. Distractions were good. Then she wouldn’t have to think of her dad, pale under his beard. She wouldn’t have to think of Mr. Easton and his too-sympathetic face. She wouldn’t have to think about fire in a torn-up field beneath the rain. She wouldn’t have to think at all.
Ollie had dropped her backpack on the rug and tossed the old book onto the desk when she first came in. Now she got off her bed and wandered over to examine it. The book had a worn-out cloth cover with its title stamped in faded gold letters. It was very thin, less than a hundred pages. Ollie picked it up.
Small Spaces. No author. Just the title.
Ollie opened the book, scanned the copyright page.
1895.Wow,Ollie thought.Super old.Printed in Boston.
Ollie turned the page.
It started with a letter.
My Dearest Margaret,
I wish I could have told you this story in person. More than anything, I wish I had one more hour, one more day, a little more time.
Ollie bit her lip. She too had wished for more time. She sank down on her bed, reading, chewing her apple without really noticing.
But I don’t. This—these words are all I have.
I know you have often wondered why I do not speak of your father. I am going to tell you why. I do not know if you will believe me. Set down in black and white, I barely believe these words myself.
But I promise you that everything I say in here is true.
Once you have read, I hope you will forget. The farm is yours now. Sell it, if you can. Above all, I beg you to leave the past alone. Think of the future. Think of your family.
Do not go back to Smoke Hollow. The twilights when the mist rises—the dangerous nights—get more frequent as the year draws to a close. Jonathan told me that. Before he... well. I will come to that.
I can’t tell you how I have thought of leaving this place. I meant to, you know. Your father and I even talked of it. But he said the curse was his alone, and he could not escape it. I would not leave him.
Now he is gone.
There—the candle is guttering. Lights flicker, you know, when they are near. Sometimes I hope desperately that Jonathan is with them. That he has never left me at all. But mostly I hope he is safely dead, and that I will see him in the next world.
Because the alternative is so much worse.
God bless you, my dear. Even if this story seems strange, I beg you will read it. For my sake.
With all my love,
Beth Webster, née Bouvier
Smoke Hollow, 1895
Ollie turned the page, fascinated. The next page only had an epigraph:
