I glide across the hardwood with purpose and light a fire in the stone fireplace using a box of matches I find atop the mantel before heading into the open-concept kitchen to put on some tea. I spend too much time picking out a mug as a mode of distraction.
When the kettle starts to whistle, I pour scalding water on an Earl Grey tea bag, watching it twirl around the mug and blow up like blistered skin. I almost feel bad for it.
“Imogen?” Amelia asks softly.
Her voice sounds distant at first, like I’ve fallen into my cup and my hearing is muffled from the water clogging my ears. Soon enough, I snap back to reality, my unblinking eyes stinging. I meet her gaze.
“Did you hear me?” she asks, taking a brief beat. “What’s our plan?”
I lick my dry lips and think. “I guess we just keep whatever we want to keep. Whatever’s sentimental,” I manage to say. “And the rest…” I trail off.
Thinking about getting rid of anything in this house makes me numb. I don’t even want to sell the place. But neither of us wants to live out here on the lake, and although many happy, wonderful memories crowd this house, I can’t imagine residing here without Mom.
Part of me wants to sit on it a little longer and think about what we’re doing. Mom’s been gone for two weeks, and it feels like we’re already putting her in the past. Leaving her behind. Maybe I’ll have kids someday. Raise them on this lake like Mom did us. Spend weekend nights snuggled up with them on the island that sits in the middle of the lake, watching old movies on the projector with neighbors while snacking on hot popcorn. Springing off the rope swing into the water and teaching them how to swim in the same place I was taught. Watching them run around the supposedlyhaunted community center with friends from next door, hoping to spot a spirit in the windows like we did, scaring each other in the process.
As these memories occupy my mind, dark clouds appear over them. Because something about this community also brings fear, uncertainty, bitterness. I can’t put my finger on why I feel this way, but I always have. There’s an eeriness in the air, a weight. A dark presence.
Aside from the looming negativity, I know that if we keep this house with all her things in it and leave for the city like we did years ago, we’ll be abandoning her again. As much as I don’t want to go through the compulsory ceremony that is losing someone I love so profoundly, I know I can’t do that properly until I deal with the house.
I grab my cup of tea and glance up at Amelia, who is still in the living room. She turns on the TV to liven up the place, and I sit at the kitchen counter swirling honey into my mug, too sickened to actually take a sip.
“It’s supposed to rain again tonight,” Amelia says, fussing at her ginger locks. “Want to help me bring in the cardboard boxes?”
I slip my boots back on and trudge outside with her to pull flattened stacks of boxes in four sizes from her back seat.
“Thanks for getting all this,” I blurt.
“We’ll probably end up needing more, but this should get us through the first few days,” Amelia says. “Sorry you have to start packing without me. I know it’ll be hard being here alone.”
I almost forgot she’ll be back at work in the morning, putting most of the packing on me. A lump forms in my esophagus at the thought.
“It’s okay. I know your job is more important than mine,” I say, balancing a stack of boxes on my head and jogging to the porch. And I meant it. But it didn’t come out that way.
Miscalculating how close the boxes are to the wall, I smack into the front of the house and lose my balance, dropping the boxes and knocking over a floor lantern next to the entry mat. Luckily, it doesn’t shatter.
“Are you okay?” Amelia asks, sounding almost frustrated.
I wave her off.
Under the lantern is a spare house key, painted to look like a single rose. It’s the same key my mom had customized for the house long ago, to match the one on her own set, and mine and Amelia’s. I put the large lantern back on top of it, grab the dropped boxes, and head inside.
After suffering through a silent dinner of frozen pizza with Amelia, we retire to our old bedrooms. I drag my bloated overnight bag into mine and choke down any sense of nostalgia that rises in me. My Alfred Hitchcock posters still caress the walls, sans the layers of dust I’d expect on account of the room’s vacancy. It’s just like Mom to continue to clean it after I’ve gone, yearning for the day I’d come back and need a bedroom again.
I let myself look at old photos pinned on my bulletin board: a Polaroid of Amelia sitting on the hood of my first car, a few of me and my high school friends, a photo booth set of my old boyfriend Aiden and me after seeing a horror movie in the city, and one where I look very young. Maybe first grade. Sporting a white T-shirt, denim shorts, and pigtails, I showed off my crooked front tooth with a bigthumbs-up at what looks like a lake party. I see my mom in the background laughing, and some neighbor kids I grew up with. My first best friend, Laura; my first crush, Rory Holloway; and another boy with dark hair, who I don’t recognize, probably since I can’t see his face under his sweeping mop of hair.
I switch on my bedside lamp and close the curtains before changing into sweats and a T-shirt and collapsing onto the full-sized bed. The springs squeak below my back, the mattress almost as old as the TV that sits upon my desk. Holding the lake party photo in hand, I stare hard at Mom, hoping to commit this version of her to memory. Nineties blonde bob. Always smiling. Constant attention from friends, her daughters. When everything was bliss.
I miss her so much.
I pull my knees and duvet against my chest, hugging it like a makeshift body pillow. Trembling as I choke back sobs, I struggle to keep Amelia from hearing me in the other room. Taking the blanket in my mouth, I bite hard and let the tears flow, down feathers masking any pathetic sounds that escape from my throat. I stay like this for minutes until my eyes run dry. For a while, the crying continues anyway, with mousy whimpers being the only proof of a breakdown. Until finally, exhaustion takes over and numbness fills me.
Everything will be okay,I lie.
2
At last, Imogen Bly has returned to Lake Blair.
He knew she must have come back to find him, homesick for him. Why else would she return? Others might say grief brought her back here. But he knew better. Imogen wasn’t here for her dead mother. She was here for him.
