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I do as I’m told, only dimly registering the splinters that puncture my fingers as I toss the wood into the garden. My leg itches from where the cacti got me, but I fancy I can still taste the graveyard in my mouth, and that’s all I can think about.
My pajamas are covered in sweat and sawdust by the time I’m done, but I empty the box. At the rear is another door – I realize this must open inside the house, so the family can stoke an indoor fireplace using the same wood supply. Clever thinking, Antony.
I push on the door, but it’s stuck fast.
“Step aside.” Antony strides across the garden toward me, carrying a sledgehammer over his shoulder. I tug off my pajama pants and sit on the edge of the swimming pool, dangling my legs into the cool water while he swings at the inner door. I think about the newspaper article he showed me in the car on the way here – about the family who used to live here, about the girl who looks just like me who disappeared without a trace – and his plan to use that to our advantage. Any other day I’d have punched Antony for being a crazy mofo. But he has grave dirt under his nails. My grave dirt. Crazy has gone out the fucking window.
I was buried alive along with my daddy, who didn’t survive. My mother was sliced up in our home, her head nearly severed from her body.
Nothing seems crazy after that.
Antony calls me over. I peer into the dark void of the hole he’s made in the wood. Antony steps back. “Ladies first.”
It can’t be this easy. “How come no alarms have gone off?”
“The family has been missing for at least six weeks. I’m guessing they stopped paying their bills. There’s only one way to find out.”
I step through the hole. This room isn’t lit like some of the others. I can’t see a thing except for the shaft of pale moonlight across the floor, but the place has a feeling of oppressive gloom. I turn to help Antony through the gap. He fishes his phone from his pocket and turns on the flashlight, handing it to me so I can shine it around the space.
We stand in a grand living room. Dust dances in the beam of the flashlight as we move through the space. Everything seems eerie without the presence of people – the weird hip furniture takes on the shape of sinister, half-human forms.
A home without occupants is like a husk – a body without a soul. Although it’s hard to imagine this house feeling like a home to anyone. It looks more like a modern art museum.
The living room leads into a bar area and a formal dining room that seats twenty. The table looks like the kind you see in medieval artworks where everyone’s gnawing on wild-boar legs and someone’s getting their head chopped off because they slurped their soup the wrong way.
The thought sends up images of my mother’s body, and I swallow down bile.
“This place is unreal,” I breathe. I can’t resist the urge to run my hands over the table, imagining the meals that had taken place here, the intellectual discussions, the titillating parties for famous movie stars and worldly business-people. Did the same elite guests who attended my parents’ dinner parties come here, too – only in different outfits, with a different agenda? Had my father ever set foot within these walls? Had he been responsible for the acquisition of the strange art adorning the cavernous rooms?
Did he come here, too? The man who lives in a dark box in my mind? Did he sneak away from one of those parties and make his way upstairs…
Or were these a better class of people – the kind with superior morals? If so, what would they think of this cat creeping through their secrets, ready to sink her claws into their life?
“I can’t believe no one else has broken in here.” I point to a cabinet on the wall holding a collection of ancient coins. I recognize several designs from my father’s books, including a golden solidus of Emperor Theodosius I, which Daddy told me is worth around twenty grand. “This place is filled with expensive shit.”
“This isn’t like our neighborhood, where you need to keep your treasures hidden away.” There’s a darkness in Antony’s voice. We both know he’s not talking about Roman coins. “The cops have been swarming all over the place since the family disappeared. Plus there are stories about the family, about what happened to them. Any smart crook is too superstitious to touch it. But we’re not here to steal shit. We’re here to find you a hiding place.”
We move from room to room, taking in the scope of the place – the office lined with mahogany bookshelves stuffed with history books and more ancient artifacts, the bright kitchen with gleaming appliances that looks as though its never been used, the media room with its movie-theatre seats and huge curved screen, the girl’s room on the second floor with the shelves of creepy porcelain dolls, the gym and sauna and motherfucking bowling alley in the basement. The more I see, the more overwhelmed I feel by the sheer size and opulence and volume of stuff. Malloy Manor is not a gift but instead the weight of six feet of earth that will bury me alive.
Yeah, I’m not getting over tonight any time soon.
Finally, overcome by the scale of the house and the exhaustion dragging our limbs, we sink down into the impossibly soft sofas in a living room that’s larger than every house I’d ever lived in jammed together. And Daddy was no pauper, so that’s saying something.
“Here’s how this is going to work,” Antony says. “You are going to live here. If anyone comes to the house, you have two choices – hide or pretend you’re the ghost of the dead daughter.”
I snort. “You’re cracked. Are you sure you weren’t the one inhaling all that graveyard air? No criminal is going to pass up the chance to loot this Tutankhamun’s Tomb because I jump out with a sheet over my head and yell boo.”
“I wouldn’t be so quick to doubt, cousin. You read that article – the Emerald Beach gossip queens are filling in the blanks in the official disappearance story with wild theories. Adding a ghost to the mix will only build on their narrative. If we can make people frightened enough to stay away, and it becomes too much of a focal point for thieves to bother with, you’ll be able to live here unmolested for five years.”
“Why five years?” How can I possibly stay hidden here for that long?
“The State of California recognizes squatters’ rights. After five years, when you’re over eighteen, you’re able to take legal ownership of the property.”
“What?” I can’t even contemplate it. “This house would be mine?”
“Yup. There are a few stipulations, but I think we can find a way to make it work. Namely, we have to continue to pay the property taxes. And obviously, we’ll need to keep services like water and power running so the place doesn’t turn into a cesspit of filth. I can get someone I know to hack into the family’s accounts and get all the details. You’ll need to get a job, and I’ll contribute what I can. We might be able to quietly sell off some of these antiques. Once this place is officially ours, we sell it off and pocket the money.”
“What about you? If Brutus did this for control of the family, then he’s going to clear house. You have to stay here with me. If you go back, you’re dead.”
