“Claw marks,” I whisper.
On the next page, a skeletal wolf with eyes that are strangely human stares up at me. After that, a pair of fastidiously drawn masculine hands with shackled wrists. And finally, on the very last page, a second picture of the faceless man.
I sit cross-legged on the cold, concrete floor with the sketchpad in my lap.
I don’t understand.
These drawings shouldn’t be possible.
But then, neither was the portrait—Ezra’sObsession, a painting of me centuries before I existed. I live in a world of curses and fallen angels and magical amulets, and in this world, these drawings aren’t impossible.
I set the sketchbook aside and examine one of the blank cassette tapes carelessly tossed into the bottom of the crate. I slot it into the boombox, rewind to the beginning, and push play.
It takes me a moment to process what I’m hearing.
Not music, but a girl’s voice speaking into the silence.
“Today is Saturday, December thirty-first, and my head feels like it’s going to crack in two. I drank way too much last night…”
A thrill of excitement shoots through my body.
This is Lily.
She recorded herself talking.
“Dad is furious, of course. Grounded for life, per usual. Gotta love it when that vein in his forehead starts bulging.” The words are followed by a huff of indignation and the squeaking of bed springs, like she has just plopped onto a mattress. “Sometimes, I hate him so much I want to scream. Does he really think my golden boy brother doesn’t drink, too?”
I come to my knees and pull out the other cassettes while Lily Vandenberg tells her story.
41
CASSETTE TAPES
There are four tapes in all. Each one is ninety minutes in length. The first three are filled front to back. The fourth is blank on one side. So for five hours and fifteen minutes, I shut myself in my bedroom and hang on every word. A piece of Lily Vandenberg’s life, told by Lily herself, starting in November of 1994.
The first three tapes tell the story of a very lonely girl from a very wealthy family who doesn’t like her parents. At times, she seems to loathe her parents. She has a volatile relationship with her father and a strained, passive-aggressive relationship with her mother. She certainly doesn’t want to be anything like her when she is older, trapped in what Lily calls a loveless marriage to a controlling,narcissistic, unfaithful man who cares only about his image. And possibly, Simon—the one person Lily doesn’t hate.
From what I can glean, Lily is high-spirited, capricious, and perpetually bored. She presents herself as invulnerable and rebellious and impervious to her father’s constant disapproval. She tries to maintain the facade, even when it’s just her and her boombox. But the tough exterior slips enough to reveal a sensitive soul, a girl who feels things more deeply than others, and uses drugs and alcohol to dull that intensity.
She drinks like a fish.
Smokes like a chimney.
And Simon disapproves. Not of the behavior—he drinks and smokes, too—but of the way she goes about engaging in such behavior, like she’s trying to get caught.
Despite this particular source of contention, the two seem to share a strong bond. There are definite notes of jealousy and the occasional chord of bitterness, but overall, Lily carries an affection for her brother that is endearing. It is them against the world. Until my mother comes along and changes the dynamic. According to Lily, Simon is obsessed with Clara and Clara is obsessed with Simon.
Lily doesn’t resent them for it, though.
She seems as fond of my mother as she is of her brother.
Not until the fourth tape, which runs from mid March of 1995 to Lily’s last recording two days before she and her family would vanish, do things go from fascinating to paranormal.
On an unusually warm Sunday in early spring, Lily convinces Simon and my mom to go with her to Talenwah Run, where they might catch a glimpse of the mountain witch who lives in the woods with her grown daughter, Coraline.
“Wait a minute,” Harper interrupts. “Isn’t Coraline…?”
“Mistress Bramble,” I say, hitting the stop button.
