The Witch House of Persimmon Point (15 page)

“You seem to have stumbled right onto your welcome wagon. I've been sent to fetch you, Mr. Masters. Would you like to come home with me?” she said.

She wasn't shy. Once Lavinia and that boy of hers were set up, Lucy took him into her bed. He knew there was something not right about her, not right about the house and the land it was built on. But he didn't care. It was good. Until it wasn't. Nan didn't like him. Dominic, Lucy's son, couldn't stand him. Lucy started to get distant.

He wanted to take her and Lavinia and the kids back down south but she wouldn't hear of it.… She mumbled something about waiting for signs. His drinking increased as his patience decreased.

And then Lucy dropped the news that she was pregnant. And she refused to marry him … she just wanted him in her bed.

He started going on more and more fishing expeditions. The next few years were spotty for Gavin, hazy with sea spray and bourbon. He recalled trips back to the Witch House. His daughter was a beautiful little birdlike thing. She was quiet, though, and it seemed everyone liked her just about as much as they liked him. He felt sorry for her … but in the end, he felt Lucy would be a good mother to the girl. He could still see Lucy on the dock where he first met her, playing with Dominic: that mothering part of her was half the attraction. Each time he came back, Lucy was a little crazier, a little drunker, and an ocean grew between them.

When it was clear she didn't want him anymore, he left. When he asked her one final time to come, she sent him word that he was no longer a part of her story. He was washed from her memory.

He should have tried harder. Because he left his little bird daughter in terrible danger.

This danger had a name, and it was Jude. Gavin's bastard nephew and half brother. Evil was in the lineage. A toxic mix afoot.

 

15

Maj in the Backseat with the “What If” Game

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2015

12:00 P.M.

“This seems as good a place as any to take a break,” said Byrd. “Anne's story comes next, and hers is the longest,” said Byrd.

“I finally get to learn more about Crazy Anne?” asked Eleanor, putting down her notes.

“Yep, Crazy Anne. My great-grandmother.”

“It's astounding to think how much hate and loss was suffered here. I've always thought that houses were like sponges, soaking up everything. But I don't feel the sorrow here. This house still feels like a hug.”

“I agree with you there,” said Byrd. “But maybe it isn't the house at all. Later, if we take Maj to see them ponies she keeps yammering on about, we could take some time feelin' out that old foundation.”

“Good idea, but for now, let's go grocery shopping. We cannot live off coffee grounds and whiskey.”

“You just lack imagination, but FINE. I'll get Maj. Do you see her? I don't see her.”

“She's right there—see the hair bouncing over the topiary?”

“I love that hair.” said Byrd. “I love that kid. She's just my kind of weird.”

Elly smiled. Someone else was noticing the amazing parts of Maj. Someone else was loving Maj for who she really was. It was lovely to no longer be alone in the adoration of her child.

12:30 P.M.

Driving away from the house, Eleanor looked at the gatehouse, overgrown with weeds and boarded up. Like a bruised face. She wondered if she should clean it out and try to rent it, as Nan had. Or maybe use it as a painting studio. Then she shivered. It was as if two parts of her were arguing. One pragmatic, one visceral. She put all of it on hold. Too much was happening already.

Once on the main road they played the “What If” game in the car. Byrd fit right in.

“If you were an ice cream flavor, what would you be?” asked Maj.

“Vanilla,” said Byrd.

“Me too,” said Eleanor.

“I'm cherry,” said Maj.

“Cherry ice cream or cherry ice, baby girl?”

“JUST CHERRY.”

“Fine,” said Eleanor.

“If you were a punctuation mark, what punctuation mark would you be, Mama? I'm an exclamation point,” said Maj.

“That's a good one. You stumped me. And I think you're an exclamation point, too,” Eleanor smiled.

“I'm a question mark,” said Byrd.

“Yes you are!” laughed Eleanor.

“Mama, you have to answer. What would you be?”

“Baby, I don't know.”

“You'd be an exclamation point, too. It's … what was that word Dr. B used, Mama?” asked Maj.

Eleanor thought back to their last psychotherapy appointment. Then she remembered. “
Genetic
, is that the word you're thinking of?”

“Yes! See, if I'm an exclamation point, so are you.”

Eleanor parked the car in the half-empty lot.

“I wish I were. But … I'm a.…” Eleanor felt the tears come before she could fight them back. The sorrow came on so quickly when she stopped focusing on the Witch House and its mysteries. She missed Mimi. And she missed Anthony and hated him and loved him and now she was trapped in the car with her baby girl and her odd young question mark of a distant cousin, about to lose her mind because of a game.

“What's the matter?” asked Byrd. “Question mark?”

“I'm just sad. Sometimes people just get sad, and there's nothing much they can do. I don't like to be sad. Don't people in Alabama get sad? How about you take Maj in the store, and I'll get my act together.”

“Maj is right here,” said Maj.

“Sad means regret, did you know that? Seems to me you're angry, not sad. And there are plenty of angry folks in Alabama, believe you me. There's an emergency cigarette in the glove compartment. You know, for times like these,” said Byrd.

“It's my car. My glove compartment, and my emergency … oh, can it, kid. Go inside. Leave this almost-middle-aged woman with her crisis.”

Eleanor watched them walk inside and defiantly lit her cigarette. She thought about all the things Anthony used to say to her. And it didn't really matter that she knew he was only lashing out because he'd been hurt.

“I hate it when you smoke. I don't understand you. You seem so much smarter.”

Yes, she thought, because this is the real truth:

I am not an exclamation point.

He is a long story. I am an ellipsis.…

Or maybe, on a rainy day, a comma,

A fucking pause,

Yes. I'm a pause.

Onward to the groceries.

2:30 P.M.

After the groceries were unloaded, Byrd wanted to resume the stories. But Eleanor needed a break.

“I'd like to rummage around a bit myself. I know you've found all there is to find, but two sets of Amore eyes can't hurt. Can you watch Maj?”

“Sure. But yell if you find something. The clock is ticking, you know.…”

Eleanor knew.
Tic tock tic tock tic tock. Tic.

She wandered the house alone, listening to the two girls running and shrieking as they played outside. Then she focused on the library. The door was stuck. Typical. She turned the knob and forced it open with her shoulder. Then she tumbled forward and fell sideways into the room, knocking over a humidor cabinet, which broke, splintering in front of her.

“Nice one. Graceful,” Eleanor grunted.

A thick white envelope had fallen out of the cabinet. It had a proper label on it, addressed to Byrd at “The Witch House,” but in the corner, where there would have been a postmark with a date, it simply said,
“There is no such thing as time.”

“Byrd! I think I found something!” Eleanor called. She got up, placed the envelope on the desk, and looked around while she waited.

There were boxes of books next to half full bookcases. They seemed to be organized by name.

Nan, Lucy, Anne, Opal, and Stella.

Nan's were lives of the saints. Lucy had plays. Anne had all the dark magic books. Opal's box was full of romances and adventures. And Stella's books were about families.

“What is taking you so long, Byrd!?”

“I'm right here! What happened?” asked Byrd, looking at the broken cabinet.

“I'll never be a dancer is what happened. I'll clean that up. This is for you, honey.”

Byrd hesitated, then carefully took the envelope and left the room.

And even though she was curious, Eleanor let her open her letter alone.

And past the juniper, on the edge of a cliff, Maj began to sing.

3:00 P.M.

One, two, three, four, five,

Once I caught a soul alive,

Six, seven, eight, nine, ten,

Then I let it go again.

Why did you let it go?

Because its sorrow hurt me so.

Which soul did cause this fright?

This little one who likes to bite.

Maj sat on the cliff watching the ponies with Ava and Crazy Anne.

“So, Byrd will tell your mother my story next, love,” said Anne.

“Yes.” Maj tried not to be shy around spirits—they could walk all over you. But Anne was different—stronger, angrier. Maj automatically became a polite, well-mannered child in her presence.

“I don't want you to listen. I've shown you all the important parts, but there are some things you cannot unhear or unsee. There are things that will be told that could follow you, haunt you. And I do not want that for you.”

“Aren't
you
already haunting her?” asked Ava, giggling. Maj braced herself. Anne exploded into a swarm of blackbirds and flew away.

“Why did you do that? I don't like when she's angry.”

“Because I want to watch the ponies. I don't care about the stories. I always think those ponies will lead me home to my mama.”

“You're brave, Ava.”

“I'm not really. Anne says all I have to do is call for mama and she'll come. But I don't do it. I don't know why. Oh, and I have news. Anne said she'd tell you the secret!”

“When?”

“Tomorrow. But right now, I think you might be in very big trouble.”

Maj turned around to see her Mama and Byrd running toward the cliff.

4:00 P.M.

“
Dear God, Maj!
What were you thinking!” yelled Eleanor, shaking her daughter.

“LET GO OF ME!”

“Are Anne and Ava still here, Maj? Because I can't see them. Why won't you let me see you?” cried Byrd.

“You never took me to see the ponies and you promised and
I wanted to
!” Maj started crying.

Eleanor shook with anger and fear. She looked to the bottom of the cliff, and thought,
It would be easier to jump.

Then, she took a breath and pulled both girls into a tight embrace safely away from the edge.

“Wait, this is what it does. This house … it hits a panic button. We need to calm down and think things through.”

All three stood still in a sort of shock, and then … calmed.

4:15 P.M.

“That was intense.” said Elly, walking back from seeing the ponies.

“It just wants us safe.” said Maj.

“What does?”

“The house. The land. It loves us, and I got too close to the edge, and it lost its temper inside you. Because it doesn't have a body.”

“Of course,” said Byrd.

Eleanor, Maj, and Byrd continued to talk, as stars twinkled in the darker half of the sky and the house stood up straighter, with a sly smile, its angles, spires, and shadows reaching inward to embrace its new darlings.

9:00 P.M.

“She's asleep,” said Eleanor to Byrd, who was sitting in the library under a glowing green stained-glass reading lamp. “Good. I don't care what Maj think she knows, this isn't a story for her. This is horror. The real kind. You ready?”

“Byrd?”

“No time to waste here. Is this question you're about to ask me pertinent?”

“Everything is pertinent. I'm hearing all this for the first time. But you aren't. And it's all much closer to you, honey. We are talking about things … genetics … I don't know. I hope you're okay with all this.”

“The way I figure it, everyone's family has hidden shame. I'd be a piss poor witch if mine weren't downright horrible. And as bad as you think it is, it gets worse. The sooner I tell you about Anne, the sooner we find out the secrets this place hides. And about that … well, uh, see … we're going to have a guest tomorrow.”

“And who would that be?” Eleanor raised an eyebrow.

“Well…”

“Spit it out, Byrd!”

“I may have called a psychic. You know, like a medium.”

“You called a psychic? Byrd … technically speaking,
we
are psychics! That's the last thing we need. What if this person…”

“Amazing Andy.”

“Oh, God. What if
Amazing Andy
hooks up with Johnny Colder and they—never mind. What's done is done.” Eleanor sighed. “Tell me about Anne.”

“Well, Anne's story is my favorite, even if it's the worst of the bunch. She was the one woman who loved the Witch House the way it wanted to be loved.”

 

The Book of Anne

1940–1999

 

16

Intermezzo

Look at them, the women of this house. It is night and they are sleeping soundly. The moon is full, so we can get a good look. It is midsummer and the windows are open and the ocean breeze is making for perfect sleeping weather. Salty air floats through this house with the moonlight. The women … their hair fades gray to black and black to gray. They are old and young, and young and old.… They are crazy and sane. They belong to each other, and they belong to no one.