That night, Charlie found herself back in her bizarre dream world. The grey-white place of endless doors and archways. Again she felt herself waiting. While last time she’d been waiting for her mother, this time she felt something — or someone — was waiting for her.
“Hello?” she said, hearing her voice echo around her. In response, she heard the same giggling she’d heard by the creek. It was just as soft and tinkling as the creek had been, running over its stone bed. “Marie?” Charlie took a step forward and was suddenly standing in the grass fields of her own property. No, she thought. Slight differences made her understand it wasn’t her property right now — it still belonged to the Evans family. She heard grass move behind her and turned, expecting to see Marie. Instead she saw a large flock of sheep, moving slowly, nibbling as they went, ambivalent to her presence.
“Marie!” a voice called from her left. Charlie turned to see her house — the Evans’ house —in the field. The frame was just as it was in Charlie’s house now, as was the beautiful deck. But lace curtains hung in the window, and the paint was a slightly different colour. “Marie! Lunch!” After a moment, the woman muttered to herself, but Charlie still heard her as clear as if she stood beside her. “What will I do with that girl?”
The soft giggling started again, and as Charlie stepped towards the sound, the world shifted with her. She found herself at the front of the property near where the gate led to the road. In her dream, the road was still hard-packed dirt rather than tarmac. Along one side of the fence ran a makeshift shelter, a tin roof atop a wooden frame. Beneath that roof was a trough, and by that trough stood a gorgeous, sturdy chestnut horse with white patches on its coat and a caramel mane. A roofless, wooden wagon stood not far from the horse, its harness tossed carelessly inside.
In front of the mare, patting its nose, was Marie. She was still the small, skinny girl Charlie had seen by the creek, but older. By at least a year or two. The horse nuzzled the girl’s chest, and as she giggled in response, she wrapped her arms around its neck. The horse lifted its head, pulling the small-framed Marie off the ground. The animal then swung its head, and Marie used the momentum to swing her own leg over the horse’s back to sit on its shoulders.
Just as the horse had nuzzled Marie, she nuzzled its back. Somehow Charlie knew that Marie was aware what time of day it was and that her mother was expecting her for lunch. In the same way, Charlie knew Marie would delay as long as she could — as she always did. Whether it was by catching tadpoles at the creek, playing with the caramel-maned horse, or reading amongst the sheep. “I wish she’d let me go,” Marie sighed into the horse’s neck. “It’s so unfair she keeps Alice and me here.” Charlie wondered only for the briefest of moments what Marie meant, before Marie’s emotions hit her like a wave. Charlie felt the same way she would have if she were at the beach and the surf had struck her, grinding her into the sand.
“Jack…” Charlie breathed. The mother, Emma, kept the younger two children home to protect them, because she couldn’t protect Jack. Just as Charlie had understood what Marie was feeling, she knew the older children were at school in town, living with their grandparents during school terms. Marie looked up and peered straight into Charlie’s eyes.
“I just want to play.” Marie sighed again. The dream slowly washed itself away, everything fading into white. Charlie tried to hold on to the dream to no avail. She then attempted to wake herself, also unsuccessfully, and instead fell into a deep, mercifully dreamless slumber.
The next three weeks passed as uneventfully as Charlie could make them. She still heard odd sounds in the wind. She still woke to find things had moved in the house — though thankfully not to the same degree as after she’d first spoken with Marie. Charlie also continued to see shapes or movements from the corner of her eye. Even so, she refused to acknowledge they were there. She wanted nothing to do with these weird, spooky occurrences. Charlie even managed to convince herself that how she’d found her kitchen had somehow been her own doing. Perhaps she’d meant to dust the cupboards and simply forgotten she’d left them open. That would explain the loss of time from when she’d talked to Tess with the dowsing rods and when night had descended on her at the creek.
Tess still called or messaged for updates, but Charlie evaded or deflected them. Eventually Tess returned to “normal” conversations about Leon’s girlfriend, her current favourite books and TV shows, or planning her visit to Charlie’s cottage in November. Tess had also resumed her pattern of only calling once or twice a week. Charlie spent her time in town just at the post office and grocer — each as brief as possible. The library visits, however, were abandoned. She called her mother once a week and messaged her brother reports. Charlie also resumed walking only in the hills, filling the rest of her time with sewing clothes or packing orders.
She expected to return to the same level of contentedness as before, now that she was ignoring the odd happenings in her house. Yet the more the days dragged on, the more unhappy she felt. After throwing on a light jacket, Charlie made her second (and last) trip to the car from the house, carrying two bags of clothes she’d sold to post in town. I might need to start making two trips into Greenfields each week, she thought, buckling herself into the car. Sales were booming.
When she was nearly at the end of her driveway, a loud crunch and banging under the car made Charlie swear in shock and concern. What the fuck? After putting the car into park, she pushed open the door and ran to the front of her car, expecting disaster and mechanical bills she hadn’t budgeted for. Relief swept through her as she realised she’d just run over a particularly large branch, which had cracked in two from the pressure. Pulling the branch out from under her car, she threw it aside. As she stood upright, she remembered Marie with her horse, standing under the tin roof structure. This was exactly the spot where she’d seen Marie in her dream.
Leaving her car running for a moment, Charlie walked through the tall grass to where she’d seen the horse. She scuffed the ground with her foot, trying to break loose the stones and clumps of weed. Her foot met with slightly more resistance, and Charlie bent down and brushed the dirt aside. A large, rusted nail — as thick as her pinkie finger — was unearthed. Charlie grabbed a nearby rock and used it to continue shovelling dirt out of the way. She stopped as the rock hit something else hard and metallic.
“Oh my God…” she whispered, as she unearthed a broken, rusted piece of corrugated tin. The same shape and style as the tin on the roof she’d seen in her dream. She felt another emotion try to break through the unhappiness that had plagued her. Not fear — though she guessed many would find that a normal response. And if she were truly honest, there was a slight pang of dread. More than anything else, though, it was curiosity and a desire to keep digging that tried to break through her forlornness. “I’m not falling for this again.” She tossed the piece of tin to the ground and hurried back to her car.
Although Charlie intended to go straight to the post office, instead she found herself driving to the library. She parked (badly) and climbed the steps, neglecting her mask and gloves, and walked straight through the foyer to the front desk. Trent stood there and looked up as she approached. At first he looked puzzled — never having seen Charlie without her mask — but realisation soon dawned. “Charlie!” he said. “It’s been a while. I thought you’d given up.”
At Trent’s innocent words, Charlie burst into tears. Shame and embarrassment burnt brightly, but the harder she tried to keep the tears at bay, the more she snorted as the tears (and snot) broke through anyway. “I-I-I’m… s-s-sorry…” Charlie managed through big sobs, burying her face in her hands, foolishly trying to hide behind her fingers. Trent quickly put his arm around her, guiding her out of the lobby. Through the blur of her tears, Charlie couldn’t see where he was leading her, but she soon found herself in an office, sitting on an old, lumpy lounge. Trent was at her side, holding her hand, not saying a word.
After a good five minutes of steady sobbing, Charlie’s breath finally slowed enough for her to make a full sentence. “I’m so sorry,” she said, tears still flowing down her cheeks. “I never cry.”
“I can tell,” Trent said in a friendly manner. “Youngest kid here, three older sisters, all tough as nails. They never cry either. Until they do. And then…” He threw both hands out, palms up, in Charlie’s direction. The gesture made her laugh, more snot bursting out of her nose.
“Oh, God,” she said, covering her nose with her hands.
“Hang on, honey,” Trent said, then stood and made his way to the desk. He returned with a box of tissues. “Always prepared. Everyone thinks being a librarian is just about the Dewey Decimal code, shooshing, and chasing late fees. I tell you, we’re the philosophers and therapists of the younger generations.” Charlie gratefully took a few tissues and cleaned herself up.
“You are so nice,” Charlie said through another big sob. “I’m so sorry to come in here like this. What must you think of me?!”
“You don’t have many friends around here, do you?” Trent said, ignoring her question. “Greenfields is a small enough town. Everyone seems to know about you, with your odd deal with Emmett, the grocer, and those gloves and mask you always wear. But no one really knows you.” Charlie just nodded, taking another tissue as fresh tears rolled down her cheek. “Do you want to talk about it?”
She took a shuddering breath, and after a long pause, she actually did tell her story. How she’d been a big shot lawyer in Sydney, with her harbour-view apartment and lavish lifestyle, and how it had all started crumbling down just before the COVID pandemic. All thanks to an adult-onset peanut allergy.
“That’s pretty severe,” Trent said, having sat in silence for the duration of her story.
Charlie snorted again, this time thankfully without the snot bubbles. “That’s a word for it! I guess I hadn’t really processed it. Obviously.” She laughed, motioning to the tissues on her lap. “This is actually the first time I’ve had a good cry about it.”
“And all your research?” Trent asked. Charlie blew out another deep breath, unsure if she wanted to get into the spooky side of her meltdown. Especially not with the person who might be her first — and only — friend in her new town. “It seems like more than just passing the time.”
“My new place…it’s been…a bit weird sometimes…” Trent’s smile encouraged her to continue, which she did sheepishly. “You know, it’s an old place. Odd…noises…and things moving around sometimes. Or at least they seem to. I don’t know…”
“Oh, honey,” Trent smiled, leaning back onto the sofa. For the first time, Charlie was truly pleased Trent had called her ‘honey’. “You don’t have to be embarrassed about ghost stories around here. This library is for sure haunted.” They both laughed, Trent’s rich and full guffaws no doubt echoing through the shelves in the library beyond the door. “The last thing someone like you needs is a ghost making creepy noises and moving your things around.”
“Right!” Charlie smiled back at him. “Oh, God I needed this normality. Thank you.”
“Anytime,” Trent replied. “Anything in particular bring this on today?”
“Oh, right!” Charlie said, the curiosity of the morning breaking through her weakened defences. She told Trent about the dream and her discovery by the front gate.
Trent whistled. “Well, now you’ve piqued my interest!”