Chapter 6

The weekend trip to the city was exactly what we needed. A reset after what felt like several long weeks in the new house.

No strange voices followed us there. No mysterious movements of Harlow’s new doll. Just the laughter of our children as they experienced things for the first time.

Like the fountains around the city and authentic KC barbeque. And how the whole city comes alive on game day—from the overcrowded tailgate parking to the thunderous roar of the crowd when we won the game. Charlie was ecstatic to be a part of it and even more so to leave with a brand-new jersey for his favorite player.

We’re all happy, but exhausted, as Bryce pulls the Highlander into the circle drive. I half expect to find the lights still flickering, but the house stands silent and dark, the way it appeared when we first arrived.

Looking up at it now, I feel none of the ease I felt when we first arrived. Whatever false sense of calm I’d felt then has long since elapsed, leaving in its wake an unshakable suspicion that something beyond its walls is not right.

I follow closely behind the kids as Bryce leads us all up the front walk, turning the key in the lock.

“What is that?” I ask, squinting through the darkness at a small puddle, glinting in the moonlight. “It looks like it’s seeping out the bottom of the door.”

Bryce follows my gaze to the dripping water and sighs. He doesn’t answer as he shoves the door open, lifting his suitcase off the ground to keep it out of the water that covers the foyer.

I usher the kids quickly onto the stairs before they soak their shoes and hand them each their bags one by one, passing mine to Bethany when they are all safely in the dry stairwell.

The water isn’t deep, no more than an inch, but it spreads the entire length of the front hallway, straight down to the kitchen.

“A burst pipe maybe?” Bryce says, more a question than an answer. He heads off down the hallway.

“But where is it coming from? Wouldn’t we hear it rushing out of a burst pipe still?” I call after him. I slosh through the water, stepping closer to the wall to inspect it. Beads pool on its surface, some still streaking their way down it. “Wha—” I start, but the sound of the front door slamming closed behind me stops me mid-thought—a shriek erupts from my throat before I can stop it.

I spin around expectantly to see which child came back down and slammed it, but they are all still standing on the stairs in varying levels of shock as they stare at the door themselves. Harlow clutches her stuffed cow and Mabel tightly to her chest, burying her face in them.

“Molly?” Bryce calls my name from the kitchen, but there is no time to respond as I lunge for the brass knob of the heavy wooden door.

Just as my fingers wrap around the smooth metal, the deadbolt above it twists into place with an eerie hiss. I try to turn it but it doesn’t budge. I reach for the knob again but the effort is futile. It turns in my hand but the door doesn’t even jiggle as I pull on it with all my might.

“Bryce!” I call.

“Mom, what’s going on?” Charlie asks from the stairs, his face twisted with fear.

“Nothing, Buddy. Just umm. . .an old door,” I try to say it convincingly, but I know I fall short as my heart pounds against my ribcage. “Bryce!” I call again.

“Molly?”

The air turns stagnant. I turn towards the hallway as if moving in slow motion. Bryce is still in the kitchen examining the pipes beneath the sink. The kids stand frozen in fear on the stairs as I lock eyes with Bethany.

We all just heard it, every one of us.

My name, in Bryce’s voice, from somewhere upstairs.

“Mommy!” Harlow cries out.

“It’s okay, we’re alright,” Bryce says assuredly, as he makes his way back down the hall. He looks at me like he wants to say something, but not in front of the kids.

“Echoes,” I say. I am met by looks of confusion. “It’s, umm. It’s an old house,” I stammer. “Dad’s voice sounded like it was coming from upstairs because of the echoes.”

“Yeah,” Bryce agrees, finally catching on. “The high ceilings can make it sound like a voice is coming from somewhere it’s not.”

Judging by their looks, I can tell we haven’t convinced Bethany and Charlie but Harlow pulls her face out of her dolls and nods along.

“That’s why it sounds like Mommy is next to me when she talks to me through the wall,” she says matter-of-factly.

Bryce and I lock eyes and even though I know it isn’t the time for this conversation, I can’t help myself.

“What do you mean, Baby?” I ask. “Mommy doesn’t talk to you through the walls.”

“Yes you do. At night sometimes.” I stride towards the stairs, settling onto my knees on the step in front of her, the weight of my own body too much to keep upright.

“What kinds of things does Mommy tell you?” I ask gently. She shrugs, glancing around.

“You said we shouldn’t talk about it outside my room, ‘member?” she asks sweetly. I laugh once, but there is no humor in it.

“Mommy was just being silly. Of course we can talk about it anytime.” She is still looking at me like she’s unsure when the walls begin to rumble again. A light buzzing runs beneath our feet. We all grab onto railings or walls, whatever we can manage to keep from falling. One of the suitcases vibrates off the stairs, landing with a splash in the pooled water below.

Then from somewhere deep inside the house, or maybe from everywhere inside the house all at once, a new voice. Not a mimic of one of us, but a voice I’ve never heard before, shrill and unsettling.

“You came back,” it says, followed by a laugh so sinister my blood runs cold.

Harlow drops her dolls and throws her arms around my neck with a screech. I grab her stuffed cow before it bounces into the water but Mabel slips too far out of reach and I hear her hit the water just as the walls finally stop shaking.

“Pick her up!” the voice all but yells. Bryce jogs the remaining couple of feet to the stairs, scooping up the doll and drying her plastic face off on the sleeve of his shirt.

“We’re sorry,” he calls into the darkness. He looks down at Mabel in his hands. “We didn’t mean to drop your doll.”

The voice doesn’t answer. We remain glued to the stairwell in silence, the only sound my own pulse thrumming in my ears.

“Mom?” Bethany whispers after several minutes have passed. “What do we do?”

I look to Bryce, coming up short on answers of my own but he looks just as lost for words as I am.

“Don’t be afraid,” rings out from somewhere downstairs, startling me enough to get me moving.

Don’t be afraid. How can we not be?

I scoop Harlow up in my arms and usher Bethany and Charlie up the stairs. The hallway is empty, but still, I step around the kids to lead the way. It is still dark and when I reach for the switch at the end of the hall it does nothing.

“Wait,” Bryce says, passing Mabel back to Harlow. He grabs my face and kisses me before he adds, “stay here.”

He leaves us standing in the hallway as he disappears into the master bedroom. Each second that passes with him out of sight feels like an eternity but, finally, he reappears in the doorway and motions for us to follow him inside.

He closes the door behind us and locks it. I don’t have the heart to mention that I don’t think that lock will stop whatever is haunting us.

The minutes stretch on in silence. Harlow and Charlie have both managed to fall asleep in our bed despite the chaos. Bethany sits by the window, too afraid—or maybe entertained—to even text her friends about it.

“The kitchen was dry,” Bryce whispers, for only me to hear.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“The water in the foyer and hallway. It was only there. Nowhere else.”

“The walls were wet,” I add. “Not like the water was running down them from something leaking above them but like. . .” I take a deep breath unsure how to make any sense of any of it. “Like the water was coming out of them.”

He stares at me, unblinking.

“I’m scared,” I finally add. I’ve been scared since we moved in but it’s the first time I’ve said it out loud and despite everything that’s happened since we got home tonight, I feel as if a weight is lifted off of me no longer having to carry this all alone.

“I know,” he says softly, pulling me towards him and wrapping his arms around me.

“Mom?” Bethany says from her perch by the window.

I turn to look at her and she’s staring out the window into the moonlight.

“Are we going to die here?” she asks, her voice catching on the end of her question.

“No, of course not.” My answer is immediate, though I have no idea if I’m lying to her or not.

“I’m going downstairs,” Bryce announces.

“What? No. Why would you do that?” I ask, clutching at his arm to keep him here with us.

“We have to find a way out of here, Molls,” he says, so quietly I can barely hear him.

“I’m going with you,” I declare.

This all started with me. Maybe I’m the one who’ll have to finish it.

Bethany looks at us with wide eyes for only a moment before she glances back towards her sleeping siblings on the bed, just feet away.

“I’ll stay with them. I won’t let anything happen to them,” she promises.

I stride across the room and wrap her in a hug before she can protest.

“Thank you for being brave,” I say earnestly. Her lips tug up into a small smirk and she looks so much like her father my heart flutters.

“Still the coolest thing that’s ever happened to us,” she says mischievously. I narrow my eyes at her as I back towards the door.

“Wait here until Dad or I get back, okay? Lock this behind us.”

She follows us to the door and as soon as it closes behind us, I hear her lock it. Bryce squeezes my hand as he leads me down the hallway to the stairwell. When we reach the foyer, the water is all but dried, leaving behind white watermarks on the cherry wood. I tilt my head to examine them but Bryce keeps moving.

In the family room he walks to the row of picture windows. I opened them our first weekend here to let the cool fall breeze blow through the hallways. He twists the lock and shoves one open and I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding.

He reaches into his pocket, pulling out his keys. He lifts a key, pressing its teeth into the screen to cut the mesh, but before he can form a tear, the open pane slams down on his wrist.

“Fuck,” he calls out. I rush to the window, lifting it just enough for him to slide his arm out and then a force far stronger than I am slams it closed again.

We stare on in horror as the locks on each window twist shut one by one. Without a word to each other we sprint to the kitchen, but the lock is already twisting on that window too, then the back door.

From the hallway we can hear every lock, on every door and window in the house, turning on their own.

Sealing us inside.

“Bethany!” We call out in unison, but before we can reach the stairs she is already coming down them. Harlow is still sleeping in her arms, her head resting on Bethany’s shoulder. Charlie follows behind her, wiping the sleep from his eyes.

“The windows just locked on their own,” she says, confirming what we already knew. “The bedroom door unlocked and I–I got scared.” She drops her eyes to the floor as if ashamed to admit this.

“We know about the windows,” I say, reaching to take Harlow from her.

“Are we locked in here?” Charlie asks.

I exchange a glance with Bryce. We are past the point of lying to the kids any longer.

“Yes,” he says.

“At least the water is gone,” he says, trying to force a smile. I appreciate him trying to put on a brave face, even if Harlow is still sleeping.

“Wait, why are their salt lines?” Bethany asks.

“What do you mean?” I say, bending to look at the watermarks left behind on the baseboards. “Those are just watermarks from when the water receded.”

“No,” she says flatly. “They’re salt lines, look.” She stands and I follow her to the wall, where small white streaks are left all over the wood from where I’d seen water beading there before. She runs her finger over one of the marks, smudging it. When she pulls her hand away, tiny grains of salt cling to her fingertip. “It’s salt.”

“Why would the walls be leaking salt water?” Bryce asks. Bethany looks thoughtful for a moment.

“You came back,” she breathes a moment later. Her voice is so soft I have to lean closer to hear her as she repeats the words again, only slightly louder. “You came back.”

“Wha—what are you talking about?” I stammer.

“That’s what the voice said. It said you came back. It wasn’t threatening us. It was relieved.”

“Bethany, what are you suggesting?” Bryce asks wearily.

“It’s not water,” she declares. “The house isn’t leaking.”

“Then what were we all standing in?” he presses, but the pieces are already clicking into place as I turn to watch her as she gently places her palm against the wall.

“It was crying.”