Chapter Three

Crazy Mary

 

THE NEXT MORNING I lay in bed waiting for my cousins to wake up. They slept in the bunk beds across from me. The sun ripped through the curtains, creating broken shadows in the room.

It reminded me of the dream I had last night. I dreamt of running with the wind at my back. I swayed with the wind, dancing with the invisible breeze. Then it turned dark and the grass was no longer green but brown and dying. I felt its invisible strength as huge rushing shadows appeared across the field and began chasing me. I was running and running but I was staying in one place. I couldn’t get away from the unseen thing chasing me.

I shuddered. Even though it was summer, I was cold. I wasn’t usually cold. But it wasn’t just the weather; it was the weather on top of everything else. On top of me being here.

I listened as my aunt drifted out of her bedroom and into the kitchen, where she started breakfast. A pan scraped against the burner and then I heard the clicking of the gas stove lighting. A few minutes later, the smell of bacon filled the cottage.

Aunt Lori served me breakfast while Uncle Butch was just finishing up. He was eating with his fingers, picking up his bacon and dipping it into the yolk of his egg with one hand while holding the newspaper with the other. He picked up his “World’s Best Dad” mug and slurped his coffee, making the liquid gurgle between his lips.

“Are you going to work today, Daddy?” Paige asked. She was still small enough to climb into his lap and get a hug.

“It’s not summer vacation for me, sweetie.” He lowered the newspaper from his face and unfolded Paige from his lap. He rose from the table and kissed her on the top of her head.

After he left, Wendy flopped on the couch next to me. “What do you want to do now?”

“Let’s watch TV.”

Wendy laughed. “We don’t have a TV here because we can’t get any reception. We don’t have any phone lines either.”

My aunt came into the room with folded laundry in her hands.

“How am I supposed to call my mom every Saturday?” I asked, panicking.

“We have a phone at the house in Mount Adams, sweetie. I’ll make sure you can call your mom on Saturdays,” Aunt Lori said.

I felt a little better but there was still nothing to do. Wendy sensed my boredom.

“Let’s go to the playground,” Wendy said.

“Wendy, take your sister with you.”

“Oh, Mom.”

“You hardly have to watch her. Just let her tag along.”

I didn’t mind her hanging around, but it sure did bother Wendy.

We walked to the playground with Paige straggling behind us.

“Wait up, guys, wait for me,” Paige said, trying to catch up.

Wendy snickered and started walking faster.

“No fair! I can’t walk that fast,” Paige said.

Wendy giggled, continuing her sprint to the playground.

When we got there, Paige went to the sand box while we took charge of the swings.

Next to the swings was a large pool surrounded by a chain link fence and next to that were two tennis courts, also fenced in. A large grassy field separated the two. We could see the pavilion on the other side of the field. A lawnmower roared in the distance and I smelled fresh cut grass. I loved that smell. It reminded me of home, of my dad cutting our own grass. After he was done, I would help him rake up the clippings and put them into bags. The smell made me realize how much I missed him. How much I missed my mom, too.

“Hey, look, it’s New Girl and Wendy.” Julie walked to the side of the swings and stopped just short of me hitting her upside her face with my feet, startling me.

“Hey, Julie. What’s up?” I said.

“Going to the river. Want to come?”

“No, can’t. Got to watch my sister,” Wendy said.

“Where’s your entourage?” I asked with more sarcasm than I intended.

“New Girl, you’re trying to be cool, but it’s not working. My entourage is already at the river, waiting for me. So, do you want to come or not?”

“We have to watch Paige.”

“No, she has to watch Paige. You could come to the river with me if you wanted.” Julie crossed her arms over her chest and stared at me.

I thought about it. About when Julie looked at me after my swim, it made me feel excited and scared at the same time. But I couldn’t leave Wendy and Paige behind. I’m sure she put me in this tight spot on purpose. “Well, if Wendy has to watch Paige, then I have to watch Paige too. I’m her company.”

“No you don’t, New Girl. Wendy has it covered, don’t you Wendy?”

“Well, yeah,” Wendy said.

Julie moved closer to me. I could smell her citrus shampoo as her hair fell forward around her face. “See, Wendy has it covered, so get off the swing and follow me to the river.”

“No,” I said louder than I intended.

Julie looked at me wide-eyed. I could tell this was not a word she heard often. “What?”

When she looked at me she made me want to sing and yell at the same time. I was conflicted. Wendy looked at me with the biggest smile so I knew what I had to do. I had to stick up for Wendy, so I corralled all my courage. “Well, it’s like this. Blood is thicker than water and I want to stay here with my cousins.”

“Okay, suit yourself. But you don’t know what you’re missing.” She turned on her heels and was off toward the river, her long hair glowing in the sun.

“What was that about?” Wendy asked.

“That was another challenge I think.”

“Did you pass?” Wendy asked.

“I don’t think so. I think I just made her mad.”

“Well, thanks for staying with us,” Wendy said, swaying on the swing with her feet on the ground.

“No problem. Like I said, blood is thicker than water.”

“Come on, I’ll show you a haunted house,” Wendy said.

Paige jumped out of the sandbox and ran up to us. “Wait up, guys, wait for me. I want to come.”

We followed the road to the entrance of the camp, passing through tall pine trees. Paige tried to keep up but mostly fumbled behind.

On the edge of the neighborhood, an old house stood tall on a hill, an aging queen overlooking her domain.

As we reached the house, Wendy pointed and whispered, “That’s Crazy Mary’s place.”

We were standing on the dirt road in front the house just yards away, scared to go near it.

I was sure the house had a view of the river and the entire camp from the third story window. It reminded me of a haunted house in a horror movie. All that was missing was the spooky music. The white paint was peeling and the steps led to a decaying wrap-around porch. In front of the porch were wild bushes laced with spider webs. In the front yard was a huge weeping willow with its branches touching the ground. Cement containers made for flowers were overflowing with weeds. The screen door was cracked open, squeaking when the wind blew it back and forth. Black shutters were on either side of the windows, some a little off kilter. Cats sunned themselves around the house and bowls of cat food and water littered the porch.

“She’s the only one who lives here year round anymore and owns all that land over there.” Wendy pointed to an open field.

Tall grass danced in the breeze. It seemed to me that the grass could be the hair on a giant’s head peeking up from below the earth.

“I heard she killed her husband and inherited this place. No one ever sees her and there’s a rumor that she only comes out at night.”

Mystery hung in the air.

“There are so many cats,” I said.

“Keep your eyes open for Crazy Mary,” Wendy warned.

“Why?” I kept my attention on the cats.

“She hates kids, and she doesn’t like visitors, either.”

I walked to the steps and reached out to pet an orange cat. Wendy stayed on the road, watching me closely, while Paige followed me. “Well, we’re not visiting her; we’re visiting the cats, right, Paige?”

“Yep,” Paige said.

“That’s just a technicality,” Wendy said. “I’m not visiting the cats, you guys are. I don’t want to have anything to do with it, especially with Crazy Mary.”

“What’s her story anyway? Do you think she really killed her husband?”

“I don’t know. That’s what people say. Why else would she be such a loner?”

“She can’t be all bad, if she’s feeding all these cats,” I said. “I don’t trust people who don’t like animals. You can tell a lot about people by the way they treat animals.”

“I didn’t say she murdered her cats.”

A cat brushed up against my leg and I jumped. I could tell it was a kitten as a tiny flash of black disappeared under the porch. A minute later another cat jumped up on the railing of the porch and meowed at us.

“Look at that pretty black-and-white one,” I said. I walked slowly up the steps toward it. As soon as I got close enough to touch it, the cat jumped back down and disappeared under the porch.

“Looks like it doesn’t like you,” Wendy said.

“Here kitty, kitty.” I looked as hard as I could under the porch, but it was too dark and all I could see were two pairs of gleaming eyes. A tiny meow came from deep beneath the house.

“Here kitty, kitty,” Paige said, following me around.

“Come on. Let’s go,” Wendy said nervously.

“It’s okay. I want to see the cats.”

“That’s not a good idea.”

“I’m just going to . . .” I heard a ping against a window, scaring me silly, and we ran back to where Wendy was standing on the dirt road in front of the house. Then we heard another ping and looked at each other in disbelief.

“What was that?” I asked.

“I don’t know. We’d better get back, though,” Wendy said.

I looked in the direction of the noise. My eyes widened when an older woman peeked from behind the curtain of an upstairs window, then disappeared quickly.

“I saw her!” I said, tugging on Wendy’s sleeve.

“What?” Wendy asked.

“She was right there in the window,” I said, pointing up to the second story.

We heard a girl laugh. We turned around and saw Julie hiding behind the weeping willow tree with a handful of little rocks. She stepped out from the tree.

“Scared you, didn’t I? You should have seen your faces,” she said, laughing at us.

“That wasn’t funny, Julie,” I said, turning to leave.

“Not so brave today, are you, New Girl?”

I walked to the end of the dirt road and could barely make out the name on the weathered mailbox. It read, “Weaver.”

That night in bed, I reviewed everything in my head and the three things that kept coming back to me were—the woman behind the curtain, Julie, and my mother.

I wondered about the woman behind the curtain and what secrets, what horrors kept her locked inside her house.

I thought about Julie and how much I wanted to be like her.

And, I thought about my mother. I finally realized how alone she must feel, because now I was in the same boat.