The Meridians(101)

Amy-Lynn heard a creak and looked over.

The porch swing.

It was swaying gently in the evening breeze. And again the usually-charming view was one that seemed less a reminder of a pleasant afternoon sipping lemonade and more as though the ghosts of past residents were still present, still swinging in eternity, still searching for rest.

The remains of the day's lemonade still sat in glasses on the porch rail, condensation dripping from them like nervous sweat.

"Mommy!" came a youthful, high-pitched voice from inside the house, and Amy-Lynn shuddered then turned gratefully away from the view of the town, and returned her attention to her treasure, her all: her reason for life and continued reason for living.

Sean Rand was a tow-headed child of eight, bright eyes gleefully alight as he shot a marble across the kitchen floor. It rolled across the linoleum tile with a dry, brittle noise, then hit another marble with pinpoint accuracy. Crack! went the two glass orbs, and one suddenly halted as if by magic, its momentum stolen by the second marble, which rolled away rapidly.

Amy-Lynn watched the second marble roll away, and rolled her eyes. "You got me again, Sean," she said.

Sean grinned, his perfect smile leaning a bit to one side, marred by an accident that had happened less than a year before. He had been learning to ride on a two-wheel bike, leaving behind the training wheels in favor of a much cooler dirt bike that Ron had given their son for Christmas. But though he had been a quick learner, overconfidence had come with practice, and Amy-Lynn still shuddered every time she remembered the crash: her son smashing through their oh-so-perfect white picket fence, and one of the resulting splinters leaping up as if by dark magic to spear through her son's cheek. She could still see the blood in her dreams, the dripping red that splashed - so much, too much - on the white of the fence, staining it forever.

It had turned out to be almost nothing. Just a head wound, and everyone knew - or so the old ladies on the block said with mellow sagacity - how much head wounds bled, even little ones. Still, the blood that had come out before she had managed to staunch the bleeding and get stitches - only two, head wounds really did bleed, even the little ones - had been so bright and so frightening that it still made feature appearances in her dreams, and she couldn't help but shudder whenever Sean's little cheek, still slightly scarred from the mishap, pulled to one side due to a muscle that had been torn in the accident.

The grin, even pulled to one side, however, was highly infectious, and Amy-Lynn couldn't help but smile herself as Sean clasped his hands over his head in victory and shouted, "I...am..."

And then Amy-Lynn joined in with him to finish: "...The Greatest!"

And then, as she always did when she and Sean did this victory shout, she attacked him with a flurry of hugs and tickles, stopping only when Sean started to say, "Stop it...stop it! Can't breathe!"

So she paused, just long enough for him to get his breath back, then said, "Better?" Sean nodded as he always did, and then Amy-Lynn redoubled her attack as she always did.

It was happiness. A moment of bliss that was almost - almost - enough to chase away the fearful thoughts from her mind.

Until Sean kicked out. His foot hit his marble, still sitting in a red glow on the ground. The marble rolled...

..."Oh no!" shouted Sean...

...and then it disappeared through a large, dark gap below the door that led from the kitchen down into the basement.

"Oops, there goes your marble," said Amy-Lynn, still smiling.

Sean was still smiling, too. Until he saw where the marble had gone to hide.

He stopped laughing.

Stopped smiling.

Almost, she thought, he stopped breathing.

Amy-Lynn's brow softened, and she touched Sean gently on the shoulder. "It's okay, kiddo," she said. "It's just the basement."

She moved to the door. Swung it open.

Darkness beyond. Death-black. Funeral-black. To an eight-year-old, she supposed, this may as well have been the doorway to Hell.

Sean wasn't moving. Still and silent, like a deer that knew it was only inches away from a predator; from death. He stared, terrified, into the darkness that lay beyond the basement door.

"Go on, Sean," coaxed Amy-Lynn. "There's nothing to worry about. Nothing to fear."

Sean whispered something.

"What?" said Amy-Lynn.

The boy turned to her, and she was shocked to see that his face was now streaked with tears, mere seconds after he had been laughing his bell-tone little boy's laugh.

"The monster," whispered Sean.

Amy-Lynn pursed her lips. This obsession with a monster in the basement was a new thing, almost as new as her own sudden fear of the mountains that until today had always provided peace and serenity to her. She and Ron had both tried to coax their son on numerous occasions into the basement, but in the last week or so the child had utterly refused to go, no matter what the provocation or the possible reward.

Amy-Lynn was, she thought, a patient and loving mother. But she also knew that patience and love had to be tempered with firmness and encouragement in the face of fear.

No time like the present, she thought, and gestured to her son. "Here," she said. She reached into the basement, and was almost disturbed herself to see how completely her hand disappeared into the murky blackness that began only inches beyond the doorjamb.

Has it always been this dark in the basement? she thought. And on the heels of that thought came another, unbidden and strange: What if something does pull me in?