Haunt

Morning. You come awake to dust motes dancing in spots of sun. Your bedroom is exactly as it was the day before- and the day before that, and before that. Your record player by the vanity where you do your makeup, sitting gathering dust, your flower pressings pinned to the wall above the neatly made bed you no longer sleep in. This room is hidden now, walled off, a mystery to the rest of the house, a time capsule in which your life is preserved just as you left it.

It is only when you go to the window that you see how much has truly changed, how long it has been. You twitch the curtain, look outside at the driveway snaking over the hill. It used to be white stone, but now it's dark, like a chasm you imagine you might sink into if you tried to step on it. They've uprooted the fountain and put some strange sculpture in its place, a twisted wire man with two heads. It confuses you what passes for art these days. Downstairs, you hear a door slam and footsteps, a chair pulling out, grunting over the floor.

They're up.

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Noon. You don't mind having them around much of the time- they keep you company with their chatter and the warmth from their bodies- and their thermostats- helps to fill the house with a kind of comfort, and to take the edge off the anxiety that starts to build in your stomach. You're used to their patterns, and they're used to yours, the way you pace around upstairs when you're trying to figure out what to wear, what to say.

Nathan is coming tonight. After your betrayal, you didn't think he'd be back, didn't think you deserved a second chance, though you begged for one, crying on the phone. Finally, he's agreed. I'll come over. We can talk about it. You couldn't get the vibe on how he was feeling; he was short and a little cold, but that was to be expected from anyone who'd been cheated on. All there is to do is wait, so you do, just as you do every day.

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Afternoon. You couldn't break the pattern if you tried. Even though you know how it ends, even though you understand it ended, *you* ended, years ago, you can't stop yourself from tracing over your old patterns like scars that you think might vanish if you just press hard enough.

Maxine and Elle are in the library, reading in the oversized plush armchair they favor. It must be a day off for both of them. You favor their days off, days when you don't have to ramble around this vast place alone. You watch as Maxine, intent on her book, fiddles lovingly with a piece of Elle's golden hair. In your time, relationships between two women were frowned upon, but now it would seem they are not. You're glad for them, that they don't have to creep around and hide in shame. Looking at them makes you both happy and sad. Sad because it's been so long since you have felt that same intimacy, that touch. The longing grows inside you until it is too intense to contain. A book topples from the shelf you're leaning on, reacting not to your body but your emotion. It falls to the floor and the women jump, looking up. A moment later, they relax again. Elle laughs.

"Ghost lady’s getting rowdy," she says.

Maxine gives her a look. "How do you know it's a lady?”

Elle shrugs. "I can just tell. For one, she smells nice, like roses."

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Evening. You spray on your rose perfume, picking out your best dress. As the day wears on, you feel things start to adjust to your solidifying reality. The house remembers its old loyalties and shifts to show you the familiar, the comforting. The grandfather clock in the hall, the four-poster bed and floral wallpaper in your parents’ old room, even the little writing desk in the study you spent so much time at, penning letters. You sit there now, humming some half-remembered tune, watching the driveway outside- it has become pale white once more, glowing in the setting sun.

Any moment now, he will arrive.

A creaking sounds at the door, and you turn to see it half-ajar. Maxine or Elle, you can't tell which one, probably drawn by your humming. As your reality heightens, your perception of theirs dims. You wonder sometimes if the reverse is true for them- if maybe as dark nears, they can see you more clearly. How unfortunate, you think, that the edges of your worlds can never neatly align, that you can never speak with these people you've come to think of as a sort of friends, face to face.

The invisible presence at the door leaves, and you switch to staring at the rotary phone on the desk, waiting for a call you know won't come.

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Night. The call doesn't come, but Nathan does. Two short, sharp bleats of a car horn outside, piercing in the rural night. Heart in your throat, you head down the stairs and to the door. The phantom sound of a television- something that didn't exist in your time- murmurs in the entrance hall. You know they're there. Maybe they even see you, in your white dress, headed for the door, the scent of roses trailing behind you. Stop me, you beg them, for though your world is clearer, your control over your own impulses lessens, your power to not repeat your worn steps from the past crumbling.

They don't stop you; they never do. Possibly no one can. Outside, the twin headlamps on Nathan’s car flicker like angry eyes. He cranks down the driver's side window and calls for you, and despite knowing what will happen, despite everything, you feel your feet move to him, stepping out into the glare of those twin beams.

You hear the engine rev when in the middle of the drive, too late to turn around. No matter how many times you live it, you never get used to it, the solid force of the impact, the way your vision blurs and goes mercifully black as the wheels churn over your limbs and the pain goes from unbearable to nothing at all as you come apart, disperse into the chill air.

It will take a while for you to assemble again, but when you do, when you come to, it will already be

.

Morning. You come awake to dust motes dancing in spots of sun. Your bedroom is exactly as it was the day before- and the day before that, and before that. Your record player by the vanity where you do your makeup, sitting gathering dust, your flower pressings pinned to the wall above the neatly made bed you no longer sleep in. This room is hidden now, walled off, a mystery to the rest of the house, a time capsule in which your life is preserved just as you left it.