Help for the Haunted(23)

My sister may not have been good at school, but she was a master at the art of moping. That’s exactly what she started doing as the years went on and she grew into her teens. One Halloween night, we made the pilgrimage to the old neighborhood and found ourselves once again in Mrs. Gertrude’s kitchen, where the air was thicker than usual with the smell of spices, though there was still nothing but money and mail on her stove. I was dressed as a scarecrow, stuffed with real hay my father picked up from Watt’s Farm before leaving for his trip. Never mind that the straw poked and scratched my skin, never mind that I smelled like the livestock section at a state fair, I was thrilled to be wearing a genuine costume.

My sister, however, refused to wear any costume at all. “Not including her mope,” my mother joked when Mrs. Gertrude asked about it. Everyone but Rose laughed. And the more she moped, the more the old woman made an effort to cheer her up. “I don’t understand,” Mrs. Gertrude said when all her attempts, from cookies and milk to free rein of the TV, failed. “No costume. No appetite for sweets. Something has changed about you, Rose. Why the long face?”

My sister looked up from where she was sitting at the table with the rest of us. I thought she was about to participate in the evening at last. Then she said, “Because I’d rather be at a party with friends my own age instead of being forced to spend the night in a stinky, disgusting apartment with a dumb old fatty bat like you.”

My mother’s mouth dropped open. Her hand shot up and slapped Rose so hard across the face my sister slipped off the chair and crumpled on the floor.

“Rose!” Mrs. Gertrude shrieked, but she was not talking to my sister.

My mother jerked her hand back and brought it to her mouth, horrified by what she’d done. Neither of our parents had ever taken a hand to us, never mind with such force. The next thing I knew, my mother was ripping us out of the apartment, spewing trembled apologies to Mrs. Gertrude, Rose, me, and most of all, God.



Now, on the first Halloween without my mother or father, I looked away from the sight of Rose and Cora kissing and walked into our house, twisting the locks behind me. In some ways, my sister’s behavior was no different from all the other surprises she delivered over the years, from that night with Almaline to the morning last year when she came downstairs with a shaved head, still nicked and bloody from the razor. But hadn’t she done those things to antagonize my parents? What could be her reason now?

With the Hulk standing guard, I figured I’d seen the last trick-or-treaters. I helped myself to dinner—a handful of Mr. Goodbars—clicked off the lamps, and made my way upstairs. My sister didn’t make a habit of telling me where she was going and when she’d be back, so I felt a sense of freedom as I pushed open her door. Squashed soda cans, scratched off scratch-off tickets, her old globe—those things and more littered the floor. A humidifier puffed away, mold gathered at its mouth. The tub of witch makeup sat on her dresser, the epicenter of a green fingerprint storm that moved from the window to the walls to the tissues scattered everywhere but the wastebasket.

It had been eleven weeks exactly since we heard from my uncle. After the courts rejected his request to be made my guardian, he promised to return to Florida, “tidy up his affairs,” then move closer and be part of our lives anyway. Instead, all spring we had received late-night calls with rambling explanations about leases, debts, and so many other reasons why things were taking longer than he hoped. When the calls stopped, letters arrived, claiming he had devised a plan to help us all if only we’d be patient. After that: no word at all. Good riddance, my sister said, though I’d taken it upon myself to finally write him without telling her, if only to make sure our sole living relative was okay. It would have been much easier if I could’ve checked our mailbox for a return letter, but when a car came by and kids batted it off the post, Rose set up a P.O. box in town. Carrying mail home from that box put her in an even worse mood than usual, so it didn’t help to ask if anything was for me.

“Not unless you count these love letters from the electric and gas companies,” she told me last time. “What could you be waiting for anyway? An invitation from Harvard? Don’t get ahead of yourself, squirt.”

I moved slowly around the room, unearthing a laminated prayer card from Saint Julia’s that I was surprised she had not thrown away, and a newspaper where she’d circled an ad: PARTY PLANNER WANTED: MUST BE DETAIL-ORIENTED & ORGANIZED. Even though Rose talked about going back for her GED, so far she had done nothing about it, instead taking random office jobs only to get fired because she lacked the exact skills listed in that ad. I gave her old globe a spin and thought of the way she used to do the same, planting her finger on random locations and bringing it to a stop, announcing Armenia or Lithuania or Guam.

I was about to check out her closet when the Hulk’s chain rattled on the lawn.

I went to the window. Outside, the dog’s bone must have thawed, because she gnawed frantically on it, causing her chain to make that clanging sound. Except for Rose’s truck, the driveway remained empty. Relieved, I stepped through the minefield on her floor and opened the closet. Since so few of Rose’s belongings were ever put away, the space was mostly vacant. Nothing from Howie, but I located a plastic bag labeled Baltimore County Police Department. Flashlight, road map, repair bills, oil change receipts—its contents included everything the police had removed from the Datsun before returning the car to us. I stared at my father’s signature on a receipt, imagining his hand moving a pen across the bottom. Finally, I pulled out the only remaining item: Help for the Haunted: The Unusual Work of Sylvester and Rose Mason by Samuel Heekin.