Tap. Tap. Tap.
The intermittent pressure on my forehead causes me to snort awake.
Caitlyn is standing next to the couch, hunched over me, her finger poised from tapping me on the forehead.
Sunlight is pouring through the windows.
“Why are you sleeping down here?” she asks.
I stretch my aching, cramped muscles. “I fell asleep watching TV,” I reply.
Caitlyn turns to look at the television.
The menu screen for Sleeping Beauty has to have been repeating the same fifteen-second clip for hours, waiting for a response.
She turns back to me, very confused.
“I … I couldn’t remember how it ended,” I say.
She shrugs. “Whatever.” She walks to the kitchen. “Can I have breakfast?”
*
I still haven’t been to the store to do a proper grocery shop, so the options for breakfast are limited to cereal and Pop Tarts, which we’re fine with. It’s only the responsible parenting part of my brain that is uncomfortable, and it can wait.
“Okay,” I say, sitting across from Caitlyn in the alcove. “The objective for today is to finish unpacking. We’re going to try to get everything done.”
“Everything?”
“Well, at least all the big stuff. Between the two of us, it shouldn’t take too long.”
“I wanted to play outside.”
“You can, after you help me.”
She pouts, apparently less eager to help than yesterday.
“Hey. That’s what you get for waking me up by poking my forehead,” I say with a wink.
She tries not to laugh.
*
And she does help.
We take care of the last two boxes in her room that need to be unpacked and put them away. Then, we head to the guestroom.
It’s almost laughable that we’re trying to fill this house with the stuff from a two-bedroom apartment. We don’t even have a bed for the spare bedroom.
I can’t help but think of the plans Nicole had for this place.
In the weeks before the accident, she had been looking at furniture and asking my opinion on whole sets. I told her all I wanted was a big, comfy monstrosity of a recliner. She had webpages of furniture sets bookmarked but we didn’t pull the trigger, deciding that we would pull the trigger once we were in the house. After all, we would have so much time, right? The pages are still bookmarked on the computer, but I can’t bring myself to look at them. Maybe one day.
Once we finish, I break down the cardboard boxes, and we carry them down to the basement.
“Watch your step,” I warn Caitlyn as we navigate the stairs down into almost total darkness.
I make my way to the center of the room and pull the chain, snapping on the old lightbulb. It illuminates the immediate area but can’t reach into the corners of the basement. We walk over to the heavy wooden shelves. I take my armful of collapsed boxes and set them down on one of the shelves. I reach out and Caitlyn hands me the two collapsed boxes that she was struggling to carry.
“Thank you.”
I put her boxes on top of mine and start to walk back towards the stairs.
“Since we’re coming back down, I’ll leave the light on,” I say, mounting the stairs.
“Hi …”
I stop and look back.
Caitlyn isn’t following me.
She’s standing in the middle of the room, under the hanging lightbulb, staring into the shadows in the far corner.
“Caitlyn?”
She turns to me, smiling.
“Pumpkin, what are you d—?”
Pop.
The bulb flashes, illuminating Caitlyn and the thing that’s standing in the corner, before plunging the basement into darkness.
“Caitlyn?” I frantically try to get my phone out and turn on the flashlight app.
“I’m okay,” she calmly replies.
I’m finally able to get the app up and find Caitlyn with the beam of light. She’s still there, looking into the corner. I shine the light in the direction she’s looking, but it’s empty.
“You sure you’re okay?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says, not turning around.
I point the beam at the lightbulb, half of which is now gone.
“You didn’t get any glass on you?”
“No.”
I swing the light around the room. It’s just us.
“Come on, pumpkin. Let’s go upstairs. I’ll get another bulb.”
She doesn’t move. She’s still fixated on that corner.
“Caitlyn, come on.”
Reluctantly, she turns and I light her way back to the stairs.
She climbs the stairs up to the kitchen.
I swing the light back to the corner.
It has to be lack of sleep, but when that bulb flashed, I thought I saw someone in that corner where Caitlyn was looking—someone Caitlyn said ‘hi’ to.
*
Caitlyn’s waiting for me at the top of the stairs in the kitchen.
The spare bulbs are in the kitchen. I grab one and return to the stairs where Caitlyn is staring down into the darkness.
I hand her the phone with the flashlight app still on. “Here. Light the stairs for me, okay?”
We head back down. I’m holding the bulb. She’s holding the phone.
We reach the bottom and I walk across the floorboards to the hanging, spent, ancient lightbulb. Caitlyn stays by the bottom of the stairs.
As I reach up to change the bulb, the light drifts over to the corner.
“Caitlyn, keep the light here, please.”
She moves it to illuminate the bulb.
I carefully remove the old lightbulb, careful not to break any more of the brittle glass. I screw in the new bulb. As soon as it’s in, the bulb blinks on. It fills the room with a much more powerful glow than the old one. I can’t help but sneak a glance at the far corner, but it’s empty.
I pull the chain, turning off the light, and walk towards Caitlyn.
“Let’s go,” I say, shepherding her up the stairs.
“Why did you turn it off?” she asks. “Aren’t we coming back down?”
“Nah. Not today.”
By the time we reach the top of the stairs and emerge back into the sun-flooded kitchen, I already feel slightly stupid. It was a shadow, nothing more. I had an atrocious night of sleep and an exhausting day of unpacking. Yes, Caitlyn is helping, but I am literally doing the heavy lifting.
And this house.
I love it. I do, but it’s going to take a while to get used to it. It would be different if Nicole were here and my subconscious knows that too. Why else would I be seeing visions of her? I’ll get used to this but I’m starting to worry about how long this adjustment will take, and not only for my own sanity, but for Caitlyn’s sake, too. I have to stay strong for her, because I’m worried that soon, she’ll start going through that same adjustment, if she hasn’t started already. I have to accept that I’m a grieving widower, who is all of a sudden raising a daughter on his own, and we’ve just moved into a big, old house. This is going to mess with my head a little bit, and if we’re being completely honest, the basement’s creepy. All basements inherently are. There’s something about them that suggests isolation, or even a grave.
“What’s next?” Caitlyn says, clapping her hands like she’s all business.
“Living room?” I suggest.
She turns on her heels and points commandingly to the entranceway.
“Living room!” she calls out and stomps away.
Okay. She might be adjusting much better than I am.