The House of Wood (14 page)

“It suits you,” he said
stepping back.

“Thank you so much. I’ll never
take it off, I promise.”

Then I kissed him, overtaken by
an impulse. I’ll never forget. It was a long sweet kiss that made
my body tingle. He obviously felt the same, as he kissed me back. I
noticed his lips were dry, but firm, as his tongue explored my
mouth. I could tell he had done this before. Our lips parted
leaving me wanting more.

He looked down, fidgeting on
his feet. “That was unexpected.”

“I’m sorry if I got-”

“No, no, I liked it.” He looked
up, placing a hand on my burning cheek. “It was a nice
surprise.”

We just giggled together before
kissing again, all inhibitions gone. The second time was even more
amazing than the first, without the nervousness acting like an
invisible barrier between us. Playful screams pulled us apart.

“Shall we go join the others?”
he asked. “We don’t want them starting without us.”

“Okay.”

Justin led me back to the rest
of the group. I had almost forgotten the incident at the
window.

Chapter
Fourteen

“Wow, a kiss. That must’ve been
a special moment for you?”

“It was my first real kiss,”
Rachel replied, the sensation of his lips lingering on her mouth
with the memory.

There was never a day went by
where she didn't think about it, or remember how wonderful she felt
at that moment. A first kiss is something a girl always remembers,
she thought, trying to hide her sadness. Everything in her life
seemed so simple back then. All she had to worry about was the
usual teenage angst that everyone goes through. Now it felt like
the world was on her shoulders. So much had changed.

“Have you and Nathan ever
kissed?”

“No, why do you ask?”

“You two seem very close. It
would be natural for two young people that close, to experiment,
especially when they’re of the opposite sex.”

“Nathan and I
are
close, but not in that way. We've been friends for
far too long to let something like that get in the way. If it
didn't work out and I lost him as a friend, I would be
devastated.”

“I see.”

The thought of Nathan made her
think about Becky. They were out on the town somewhere. Rachel had
never known two people who were more suited to each other than her
friends. She just hoped they realised it as well.

***

The sickly yellow lights
reflected off of the filth stained white tiles, making the small
men’s room look brighter than it actually was. The stench of urine
wafted around the room, permeating every nook and cranny. The walls
that weren't covered in dirt were instead covered with posters of
semi-naked women clinging to the wall. Seductive eyes stared out at
the male patrons relieving themselves after filling their bladders
with destructive liquids.

Nathan stood over one of the
urinals, leaning his weight on his left hand against the wall. So
far, so good. After his bad start to the evening, he could finally
feel the tension in his neck and shoulders stating to subside.
Thank God, he thought. He wasn't sure if he could continue much
longer. There was too much temptation around him. He could feel the
familiar gnawing at the back of his brain, urging him on.

Go on. One
more
.
One more can’t hurt
.

No, he thought. Tonight he had
to fight it. There could be no giving in.

He zipped his blue jeans up and
walked over to the sink. After washing his hands, he splashed the
harsh cold water on his face. He stared intently at himself in the
cracked bathroom mirror, one hand on the sink. The crack ran the
length of his face. His eyes, haunted and weary. He hated it, the
control it had over him, the things it made him do. All of it. Like
a relentless wolf hunting its prey, the desire to appease the
addiction never left him. There was a lot of pressure on him to
sort himself out, which didn’t help; his Pa was the sheriff, how
could he not assume he would be able to escape the weight of
expectation to hang heavy on his shoulders. It was an impossible
situation.

He continued to stare hard at
himself. People laughed at him behind his back, he knew that much.
Coward, that’s what they called him. Weak. A good for nothing
drunk, that’ll no doubt kill himself one day. Maybe he would, he
thought. But not before he’d shown them all what he was capable
of.

A clatter behind him caught his
attention.

“Evenin’, deputy,” a grizzled
old man said, as he waddled over to the urinals.

“Stanley,” Nathan replied,
heading towards the door.

“Mighty fine lady, ya got
yerself out there. Why, I reckon she’s prettier than all the
flowers in the sweet Lord’s garden.”

“You might be right there.”

“I know I am, young’un. Fine
pool hustler too,” he added with a wink.

Nathan laughed. “Damn
straight.”

“You keep a hold of that one,
Nate. Mighty fine woman.”

“I will,” he said, turning to
leave.

The old man’s words had struck
something inside him. It felt as though a torch had been shone on a
dark part of his soul and scared away the spiders. Becky was on a
date with him because she wanted to be, nobody had made her. She
didn’t know his past, or any of the things people said about him.
Not yet anyway. But none of that mattered anymore. She was his
chance for a fresh start. Redemption.

He stopped, halfway out the
door. “Thanks, Stan.”

Then he left.

Becky was still sitting by the
bar where he had left her. He sat back beside her.

“You look pleased with
yourself,” she said, raising an eyebrow.

“Do I?” Nathan replied.

“Yeah.”

“Must be the good company I’m
keepin’ these days.”

He caught the appreciative
glimmer in her eyes, as she realised he was talking about her. She
really does have pretty eyes, he thought, watching her over the top
of his beer glass. Any thoughts of Rachel had been pushed from his
mind.

“So,” Becky said, lowering her
glass. “Tell me more about you.”

He gulped at his beer. “Not
much to tell really.”

“There must be something. You
grew up here, right?”

“Yep.”

“What was it like back
then?”

Nathan put his empty glass next
to hers on the bar and cleared his throat. “Willows Peak hasn’t
really ever changed all that much. It’s always been a sleepy town
stretched out on some back road off the main route. Everybody knows
everybody else’s business. Merryville is the only other town
nearby.”

“I’ve heard of it. Wasn’t it on
the news a while back?”

“It’s always on the news. Don’t
get me wrong, we’ve got our own fair share of oddballs, but the
folks are damn crazy up there.”

Becky let out a giggle. To
Nathan it sounded nervous.

“I’m sure they’re just
rumours,” he added.

The two of them chatted a while
longer, exchanging stories of their pasts. Friendships, school,
embarrassing moments. All of it came under scrutiny. But for the
first time in over a year, Nathan was enjoying himself. For too
long he had been trapped in a cycle of guilt and self-loathing,
mixed with a garnish of regret. Not anymore. He was finally
breaking free.

“Rachel never talks about her
life here,” Becky said, turning a napkin over between her fingers.
“I mean, she’s told me what happened at the house, but only
snippets. Whatever happened, it’s terrified her right down to her
bone marrow.”

Nathan’s jaw clenched, the
Masseter muscle pulsating.

“She wakes, screaming
sometimes.”

“Sure.”

“What really happened out
there, Nate? You’re her friend, has she ever said anything to
you?”

“I don’t know what happened,”
he lied. “I wasn’t there and she was shipped off to college three
days later. I hadn’t seen, or spoken to her since then, until the
other day.”

“I just wish there was
something I could do.”

Nothing more was said on the
subject. Nathan was glad, but now he couldn’t shift the thought of
Rachel, out on a date with David, from his mind. He needed a
distraction. Or
it
would start calling
again.

“Fancy another game of pool?”
he asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

“Cool. I’m going out for a
cigarette, so rack ‘em up and I’ll be back.”

“Sure you want another butt
whipping?”

“No chance.”

As he walked away, he took a
look at the whisky bottles stacked behind the bar. He licked the
sweat from his top lip and walked out.

***

Rachel was glad the
conversation had steered clear of her past and anything connected
to the house. For a while at least. She couldn’t dodge it forever,
she knew that much. But since mentioning the kiss, David hadn’t
pushed her at all. If anything, he’d gone in the opposite
direction, she thought, taking a sip of water. He had led the
conversation, steering them around casual topics and away from talk
of the house. Maybe he had heard enough? She wondered. It suited
her just fine.

She gazed at him as he spoke.
There was still that feeling of familiarity deep inside her. Still,
she couldn't put her finger on what it was about him that she felt
she had known before. His speech, his mannerisms, even his eyes had
something that seemed so recognisable and yet, so very different.
He had a quirky charm about him. One that had made her feel at ease
from the very first moment they met. She put it down to the fact
that he was a psychiatrist; they always know how to handle people,
it's part of their job. But this was something more. In a strange
kind of way, it excited her. She liked it.

“David,” she blurted out,
cutting off his speech. “I need you to be honest with me and answer
a question for me. Are you sure we haven’t met before?”

He laughed. “No, definitely
not. You asked me that earlier.”

“I know, but there's something
about you. It all sounds crazy, but I feel like I know you
somehow.”

“What, like a past life?”

“Now you're just making fun of
me.”

He adjusted his tie. “Honest
I'm not. Don't you believe in that kind of thing? The supernatural
and all, I mean?”

Rachel sat back in her chair
and thought about it for a moment. When she was younger, her
parents used to make her go to church on a Sunday morning. The
preacher had been some greasy fat man that ended up being thrown in
jail for inappropriate relations with young boys. She hadn't any
other experiences with religion, or the supernatural. The real
world was scary enough. She knew that first-hand.

“No, I don't think I do,” she
replied.

“I didn’t think you would.
You’re not the type.”

She was intrigued. “Oh really,
and what type am I?”

“Well, you seem like a
well-grounded kind of person. I mean, you’re majoring in
Behavioural Science, correct?”

“Yes.”

“That means you probably have
an inquisitive mind, but also an empirical one. You need cold hard
facts, rather than conjecture. You also don't seem like the kind of
girl that does things on a whim.”

“I’m here, aren't I?” Rachel
said with a cheeky grin.

“Nobody said psychoanalysis is
an exact science.”

They both laughed at that. She
could feel the air around her becoming lighter without the stench
of the past clinging to them.

Despite beginning to enjoy
herself, the image of the house standing there on the desolate
hillside sat firmly in the forefront of her mind. She wished she
knew who had rebuilt the damn thing. If it wasn't there, then she
might have been able to enjoy her time being home. Despite the
circumstances of her return.

She missed her parents deeply.
The thought of never seeing them again, hearing their voices,
smelling her mother's perfume, overwhelmed her. But then she
remembered how they had been with her since that night. She could
remember their faces. They had shown no care, or concern. Only
fear. They had been afraid of what the neighbours might think, or
that their precious membership to the yachting club might be
withdrawn because they had a crazy daughter. Damaged, she’d heard
her mother call her the night before they shipped her off to
college. She had hardly spoken to them since then; a phone call, a
birthday card and a visit at Christmas was all. How could she feel
aggrieved after they had shunted her off to somewhere at the other
end of the state not wanting to be associated with her? But still,
the loss bit deep into her heart.

“Are you okay, Rachel?” David
asked.

“I was just thinking about my
parents.” She hadn't meant to tell him. It had just spurted
out.

“I never had the chance to tell
you how sorry I am for your loss. I never met them, but I've heard
they were well respected members of the community. You must miss
them a lot?”

“I guess so.”

“Have the police managed to get
any further with the investigation?”

“No. They’re pretty certain
there was no foul play involved.”

“Well, I suppose that's a good
thing. If -“

“Can we change the subject,
please?” she cut in.

“Of course, if that's what you
want.”

She regretted snapping at him
as soon as the words had left her mouth. He was being so kind and
sweet to her. She wanted to make it up to him, but she didn't know
how. Apologising had never been her strong point.

“I didn’t mean to snap at you.
I’m sorry, it's just my parents, I haven't had much to do with them
since I left town. In fact, it was them that encouraged me to
go.”

“Please, don't worry about it.
I fully understand what you must be going through. The loss of a
close family member, especially a parent, is always a hard thing.
Maybe it's time we got back to the reason we’re here?”