Little Girls(101)

There was an eight-inch butcher’s knife in one of the kitchen drawers. Laurie gripped its handle, then retrieved the flashlight from the counter, where Ted had left it after his expedition down into the wishing well. Susan’s cries were muffled now, but she could still hear them rattling around in her head. Outside, rain pattered against the bay windows. At the edge of the patio, the black-eyed Susans bobbed and whipped about, as if puppeted by strings.

Laurie undid the bolt on the side door. She turned the knob, opened the door, and was instantly accosted by a cold, rain-speckled wind more befitting of late winter than early summer. The storm had arrived. Before stepping out, she scanned the area. Trashcans stood against the siding to her left. To her right, wildflowers had been reduced to spongy green mats by the storm. The fence that ran between the two properties was overgrown with vegetation. The trees beyond resembled dancing, shambling black smears.

“Abigail.” Her voice was flat, toneless.

She stepped outside, shut the door, then quickly locked it with the key. She followed the walkway around to the back of the house. Directly above, large mottled storm clouds pulsed with an unearthly light. When the next whip crack of thunder resounded from across the river, Laurie felt its reverberation in her back teeth.

Intermingled with the sounds of the storm was a steady banging noise.

Where are you, Abigail? Or was Sadie fully in control now?

She approached the fence and peered down beneath the whipping branches of the willow tree. The banging noise was the door in the fence; not properly latched, it slammed repeatedly against the fence post in the wind. The passageway, Laurie thought. She grabbed the door and shoved it all the way open. Rain splattered her face and soaked her shirt. On the ground, small footprints were quickly filling with brown water.

Over the storm, she thought she could hear Susan screaming for her. It took all her will to block out the sound.

A checkerboard dress passed through the trees up ahead.

I’m going to kill you.

She pursued, the knife leading the way.





The idea to call 911 didn’t come to him until he saw the massive swarm of taillights blocking all lanes of I-97 South. Even if he was overreacting—

Of course you are, Teddy-biscuit. Didn’t I tell you that a hundred times?

—he would still feel better having the police check things out.

And what will they find when they get there? A pissed-off wife who doesn’t want to talk to her cheating husband right now? I’m sure the local boys in blue will be plenty pleased about that.

“Fuck it,” he said and dialed 911.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”

“I’ve been trying to reach my wife at home but she’s not answering the phone.”

“How long have you been trying to reach her?”

“A few hours. I’m worried something’s happened.”

“Is your wife sick, sir?”

“No. She’s . . . I don’t know. . . .”

“Is she expecting a call from you?”

“No, no.” His mouth was dry. “She’s angry with me.”

“What’s your name, sir?”

“Her name is Laurie.”

“No, sir—your name,” said the woman. “What’s your name?”

“Ted Genarro. I’ve got the address, if you could send a car by—”

“Do you have any reason to believe your wife is in any type of danger, sir?”

Go on. Tell her you got a vibe, tapped into some bad juju. I’m sure cops hear that sort of thing all the time.

“Fuck,” he blurted, then killed the call.





She was freezing, her teeth knocking together in her skull by the time she reached the greenhouse. Great swirling puddles expanded along the dirt path. At one point, lightning struck a nearby tree and sent a branch roughly the width of a telephone pole plummeting to the earth. Glimpsed through the treetops, the sky itself had deepened to the color of blackboard slate.

The knife quivered in her hand as she approached the greenhouse. The canvas rippled in the strong wind while rivulets of rainwater cascaded down the creases. There was no sign of Abigail, and the canvas covering the greenhouse didn’t look as if it had been disturbed, but there were also plenty of places to hide. The tree with FUCK carved onto its trunk clawed at the gunmetal sky with barren, skeletal limbs. The branch Sadie had toppled from all those years ago still extended out over the roof of the greenhouse, its bark the color of marrow.

She approached the front side of the greenhouse. Wind whipped at the canvas covering, making it bulge and ripple in places. She peeled back one of the canvas flaps to expose the blackened glass door beneath. The rope that had held the door shut—the rope she had untied on her previous jaunt out here—was still gone, though it was no longer on the ground where she had left it. She managed to work some fingers between the door and the frame, and pulled. The door squalled open about five or six inches. Blackness seasoned with the heady aroma of rotting vegetation stood just beyond the doorway. She switched the knife to her weak hand, flicked on the flashlight, and stepped inside.

It was moist and humid, like a rainforest. Had the sheet of canvas not covered the structure, she still did not believe much light would have been able to penetrate the blackened, moss-caked windows. Jumbled shapes resolved themselves out of the gloom, vaguely plantlike. The air wasn’t fetid as much as it was merely earthy—an orchestra of organic perfumes.