‘BLOODY HELL FIRE!’ snapped Lucy. ‘You sodding idiot!’ Reclined on her elbows, legs scattered ungracefully across the steps, she glared her disapproval up at Sam’s chuckling, bewildered face. His whole head looked like it was shrouded in a halo, unruly chestnut hair backlit by the sun.
‘I’m sorry.’ He giggled, mewing the words with forced remorse. ‘I didn’t mean to scare you.’ But there was little truth in that statement.
He couldn’t help but laugh at the sight of his dishevelled friend. ‘Here,’ he said, offering an outstretched arm. ‘Sorry, Luce,’ he reiterated, allowing himself one final smirk.
Begrudgingly, Lucy took his hand, darting a disapproving look his way as he hoisted her to her feet.
She brushed the grit and leaves from the back of her dress. It was no longer pristine.
‘What were you doing?’ he asked.
‘Oh, nothing, really,’ she replied, ‘I was just…’
‘Just what?’
She loosed a sigh. ‘Oh, I dunno,’ she huffed, turning a glance down towards the pool. ‘I guess it’s these steps… I can’t remember, or recall, any of these symbols?’ she said, pointing towards the carvings flanking the pool. She turned a frown to Sam. ‘Come here, take a look.’
She walked past the base of the handrail and pointed an accusatory finger towards the unusual carvings. ‘I don’t remember any of this, do you?’
Sam was staring at her face. ‘What?’ she snapped.
‘You’ve got rust on your cheek,’ he explained, circling his finger towards a smudge. He dug out a clean handkerchief from his back pocket, and handed it to her. ‘It’s all over your arm as well.’
‘Damn it!’ she whined, rolling her wrist over to see. She turned her back to him and delicately spat into the handkerchief, and started wiping herself as clean as she could without the luxury of a mirror… She refolded the cloth to a clean side, and gave her face a few last wipes.
‘How’s that?’ she asked, turning back to face him. But Sam didn’t answer, he’d found something far more interesting to arrest his attention.
He was crouched by the base of the handrail, picking large flakes of rust off the iron bars with his thumbnail. ‘These are really decayed,’ he protested.
‘Are you going to look at this for me or not?’ she asked for the second time, pointing an impatient finger towards the carvings.
‘Oh. Yeah… Sorry,’ he said, struggling to his feet and brushing his knees clean.
Lucy handed him back his handkerchief. ‘And erm – thanks,’ she mewed, her voice tinged with mild embarrassment. ‘I’m afraid there’s some of my spit…’
He smirked at the rare display of coyness. ‘Don’t you worry about that,’ he said, with an understanding shake of the head, smiling kindly into the crystalline sheen of her turquoise eyes.
It had been a long held belief in Sam’s mind that Lucy’s eyes had to be as beautiful as eyes could ever be, and he relished any opportunity that presented itself to look deep into their serpentine vibrance.
He carefully folded the handkerchief, and covertly slipped it back into his pocket. He probably wouldn’t wash it, but he might very well frame it.
Lucy pointed again, this time calmer, and turned her head back towards the stonework. Sam’s eyes followed. ‘Look! Look at all of that, do you remember any of that?’
Sam studied the details of the carved relief with interest. ‘Mmm, well yeah. Sort of… But I’ve never really looked at it properly though.’ He stepped in to examine it closer. ‘It’s weird innit,’ he said, rolling his head from side to side, absorbing the peculiarity of what was stretched out before them. He frowned. ‘Actually, no. If I’m to be completely honest, I’ve never really taken that much notice of it. It is pretty odd though. What do you think it all means?’
‘I’ve caught a butterfly!’ boasted a voice approaching from behind. They both spun round to greet the new arrival… It was Hilly – Sam’s twelve-year-old sister.
She walked gingerly towards Lucy, shoulders hunched, hands cupped tightly together. She assumed her brother would probably have little interest in the beauty of an ornate insect, so walked straight past him.
Sam’s face complained, looking more than mildly put out, wondering why he didn’t get a look.
‘Let me see,’ smiled Lucy, hooking her hair behind her ear and leaning over the young girl’s palpable excitement.
Hilly gently uncupped her hands, revealing the butterfly. It was the first one she’d managed to catch since the arrival of summer.
Its wings beat slowly in her palm, proudly displaying its vivid, crimson iridescence within the brilliance of the midday sun.
‘I think that’s a red admiral,’ said Lucy, feeling proud of her knowledge, but disguising the pride by forcing a matter-of-fact tone into her voice. ‘Are you going to let it go?’ she asked – as a gentle nudge from an animal lover.
‘Um. Yes… okay,’ Hilly agreed, smiling up at Lucy.
She looked around for a suitable place to offload her find, then crept towards the steps, carefully extending her arms out towards the handrail.
She rolled her palm over, depositing the butterfly onto the flaking ironwork. The insect settled on its new perch, pulling the flat majesty of its wings up tightly together.
The insect suddenly began to spasm: twisting, contorting, legs curling hard into its body, like the life force was somehow being sucked from it.
Its wings began to struggle, twitching, flinching, beating erratically, then fell limp to one side. It was dead?
A gust of wind blew its paper-light carcass off the rail, and it spun to the ground like a sycamore key.
‘What the shitting-hell happened there?’ whimpered Lucy. ‘I-Is it dead?’
A thermal breeze chased the lifeless carcass over the stone carvings, bouncing it across the relief, and then carried it onto the surface of the evaporating water.
Hilly stepped in and stared despairingly down at the ornate wings wheeling on the charcoal blackness of the pool, visibly distraught. ‘Did I just kill it?’ she asked.
Sam stepped in and placed a hand flat on the handrail. ‘No. It’s cold. You didn’t kill anything?’
Lucy turned her face to Sam, they both shared a moment of confusion. The corners of Sam’s mouth buckled. He shook his head. ‘I don’t know – I’ve never seen anything like that before. Have you?’ he mouthed – she hadn’t.
Hilly edged her stooping body towards the pool, eyes fixed on the dead butterfly carcass spinning on the surface of the stagnating water… She had to squint, struggling to see through the layer of swirling fog.
Her eyes suddenly hardened. She flinched, certain she saw what looked like the end of a stick, or something similar, rising from beneath the water. It seemed to be focused on the insect, chasing it towards the side of the pool.
‘I know it’s just a butterfly, but that was really weird,’ Sam whined, while attempting to play down the undeniably freakish nature of what they’d all just witnessed to protect his sister’s anguish.
‘I know. I know. But insects don’t just die like that. At least I don’t think they do?’ Lucy responded. ‘It’s all very weird, everything. Everything about the way this place feels to me is wrong. Can you not feel it?’ she asked. ‘There’s something about this place, something not rig—’
Hilly screamed! A soul-contorting scream. Her scrunched body staggering back from the pool.
Sam turned to front the clamour, and was faced with the sight of his sister driving her fist hard between her teeth, insane eyes fixated on the water.
‘What is it?’ asked Sam – brotherly instinct rushing to the fore. ‘Hilly?’
Hilly snapped a manic, imploring glare towards him, then back to the pool. She extended a pin-straight finger towards the water.
Sam was shocked by the look he saw in his sister’s eyes, barely recognising the face glowering back at him. ‘What is it, Hilly, tell me!’
‘F-F-F-Fingers…!’ she stuttered.
‘What!?’ he exhaled.
‘F-F-F-Fingers, came out of the w-water…!’
Sam’s sickened face stared coldly back at her words, having never in his life heard her say anything so peculiar, or so sinister. He was briefly repulsed, but not by her, only by the words she spoke.
‘Th-They took the b-butterfly,’ she stammered.
Sam strode to the side of the pool, leaning in on the railings that encircled it, desperately searching for the iridescence of the wings within the layers of fog. But they weren’t there. ‘What are you talking about, “fingers”,’ Sam pleaded.
‘Fingers… A h-h-h-hand, came out of the water, and pulled the b-butterfly under.’
Lucy flashed a look across at Sam again, he shrugged.
They both walked over to the tremulous girl and wrapped themselves around her. ‘Come oooon.’ He laughed. ‘It wasn’t a hand, it can’t have been a hand… It was probably, I dunno, a fish or something.’ Hilly’s head shook frantically – part denial, part shock, part certainty of superior knowledge.
He tightened his arm firmly around her shoulder. He could feel her body quake through his hand.
Lucy looked down at the girl cocooned between them. She stroked Hilly’s face with compassion, then turned her attention back to the house…
She broke from the huddle, pulled forwards by the house’s morose facade, drawing her up the steps towards it. She sensed it watching them from atop the rise, a building somehow able to project an air of arrogance and superiority.
‘Come on. Let’s go and have a cup of tea,’ chirped Sam – one of his sister’s favourite things. She leant her head on him, a blank, doll-eyed stare gazing straight ahead at nothing. Her thumb was firmly in her mouth – something she hadn’t done in years. ‘Look, it was just a fish, that’s all,’ Sam reiterated, in an attempt to console.
Lucy stood midway up the steps, watching the house, an ominous feeling infesting her entire body. She felt decidedly nauseous.
The heavy, slab doors that guarded the hall lorded ominously over her from their vantage point at the top of the rise, beckoning, summoning, daring her to be curious…
Sam and Hilly started towards the path, his arm still enveloping his sister’s mortification.
He turned to check that Lucy was with them. He saw her standing midway up the staircase, motionless, looking up at Hobswyke. ‘Hang on here a sec,’ he said to Hilly, ‘just wait for me, I won’t be a minute.’
He unwrapped himself from his sister, and walked up behind Lucy. She was not moving, searching eyes locked on the monolithic entrance. She seemed in a trance.
‘Luce? You okay?’ he asked, softly, concerned. She didn’t react.
He laid his hand gently on her shoulder. ‘Lucy…? Lucy!’
She flinched back into their world, turned, and peered at Sam with lost eyes. ‘I want to go in,’ she proclaimed.
‘What…? In where?’
She swung a bone-straight finger up towards the derelict building. ‘There, I want to go in there!’ she spat, impatiently.
Apart from the multitude of occasions Sam had purposefully made Lucy jump for fun, he had before never actually seen her genuinely come undone. He took a step back from her unquestionable agitation.
The corners of Lucy’s mouth buckled with doubt. ‘I don’t think we moved to save money, I don’t think that’s why we moved at all!’ she said, forcefully. ‘I think there’s a whooole other reason.’
‘Like what?’ asked Sam – until now, not knowing that money was supposedly the reason for their move in the first place. ‘Why wouldn’t it be money?’
Lucy turned a look up at the oppressive morosity of the hard, granite frontage. ‘Listen. The other day, I found one of Mum’s bank statements open on the kitchen table.’ She rolled her head with mild shame. ‘And I know it was wrong, but I couldn’t help but have a look.’
‘And?’ Sam coaxed.
‘Well, of course, I can’t – or, or won’t – tell you just how much, but God-in-heaven, Sam, we’ve got a lot of money! I never actually realised just how much, until then.’
Sam would sacrificed a limb to know the figure on the bank statement, but he knew Lucy to be honourable enough to never tell, so he’d reciprocate by never asking.
‘So, you see, there has to be another reason, doesn’t there? I mean, for Christ’s sake, she’s not been up here for over five fucking years…! Why…? Why won’t she come up here?’
Sam had nothing to say, or add, or any suggestion to make. Lucy had never been this agitated in front of him before. He suddenly felt a strange awareness that Lucy was the boss’s daughter, making him feel more akin to an employee than a friend. It was a feeling new to him, and threatened to redefine their relationship. But he was her friend, so he pushed through the awkwardness. ‘Can’t you get the keys?’
‘She’s hidden the keys!’ she snapped. ‘Somewhere, Christ knows where!’ Sam took another step back.
Lucy noticed his retreat. ‘Oh, Sammy, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,’ she said, caressing her words to take the sharpness from her voice. She walked over and put her arms around him. ‘Please forgive me. I’m… I’m just getting freaked out by this fucking house.’
Sam closed his eyes. It was moments like this that he realised that he was probably in love with the girl in his arms – to some extent he couldn’t yet judge.
The healthy scent of her hair clouded around his entire face within the embrace, he breathed her in.
‘Forgive me,’ she insisted, the deeper tones of her otherwise angelic voice vibrating through his shoulder, ‘I’m just…’ She exhaled a resigned sigh. ‘I don’t know… there’s just something very wrong here, Sam, something wrong with this place. With this house.’ She turned her eyes distrustfully up to Hobswyke. ‘I can’t quite put my finger on it, and I know, it’s not really based on anything solid. But somehow, I can just sense it.’
She peered up at the stacked rows of murky window panes. ‘Thing is, the more I think about it, the more I realise there has to be another reason why we moved from here. A reason other than money.’
She release their hold. ‘Come on, let’s get away from here.’
Sam delivered a smile, and nodded, happy to distance himself from the awkwardness left by their heated exchange.
They turned to leave, making their way across the gravel, collecting Hilly along the way.
Sam’s mind was percolating all that had happened, and the things Lucy had said. There were undeniable similarities to feelings that he, himself, had had in the past regarding the house, feelings attuned with Lucy’s.
The three of them departed the derelict mansion, Sam turning a parting look back towards the staircase… He knew full well there were no fish in that water.