David Nickle - The 'Geisters

“Guys?” she called as she stuck her head in one bedroom, then the other. “Guys?”

Nothing. The beds were made.

“Insect?” she whispered as she touched the freezing cold doorknob to the bathroom, and as she thought of that other door, she pulled this one open.

The bathroom in the beach house was nice but nothing fancy. There was a biggish bathtub with jets, next to a fibreglass-formed shower stall opposite the toilet, whose tank was high on the wall. You flushed it by pulling on a chain at the bottom.

Ann flicked on the light. Everything was as it should be at first glance. Towels were hung neatly by the sink. The mirror was clean, and uncracked—and while it was true, her arms and legs were gooseflesh, there was no frost or even mist on the mirror. The water in the toilet bowl was clean and blue. There was nothing amiss.

Other than the fact my husband is missing.

Ann shut the bathroom light off and crossed the hall to their bedroom.

The French doors there opened onto a miniscule balcony; they were cracked open. Had Ann left them that way this morning? Had Michael? Wouldn’t Thea have shut them while they were out?

Yes. She would have. She most certainly would have.

Ann closed her eyes—tried to visualize the safe place. That, she knew, was the one sure way to deal with the thing that was happening. But she couldn’t get far—the memory of the shambles that she’d found there, just moments earlier, was too strong. She might be able to reconstruct it, but it would be well-nigh impossible to do it herself. And she couldn’t face that door—not without Eva. And Eva was far away.

“Fuck,” she whispered, and opened her eyes. “Fuck.”

It was darker now; the door to the hall was shut. The French doors were wide open. Her mouth tasted copper-salty; she had bitten her lip hard enough to draw some blood.

Outside, the palm trees swayed; the leaves sounded like knives on a sharpening stone as they rubbed against one another. And underneath that—

A humming sound.

It sounded like a man—humming a tune to himself while he worked. What tune, Ann couldn’t say. It was coming from outside the room though. She made her way around the bed, and peered out the window.

The bedroom was badly placed for any view; it looked out on the small cleared garden behind the beach house, which ended not twenty-five feet off, in thick foliage. There was a moon tonight, but also some cloud. So while Ann could hear that the humming was coming from the edge of that foliage—she couldn’t see much, at first. Just something moving, swaying back and forth. She went to the edge of the railing, and leaned over to look.

It was a man. Who, she couldn’t say. But she could see arms outstretched on either side—a head that seemed to loll back, far enough that the neck might have snapped. He was turning like a dancer. She wanted to call out—but her throat felt full of sand. She couldn’t even open her mouth.

She also couldn’t look away.

Because she began to realize that he wasn’t turning like a dancer at all—he was spinning, as though he were dangling on the end of a string, or a wound up elastic band; there was no contact with the ground. And as he turned, he seemed to rise up: a half-dozen revolutions, and the tips of his toes soon hovered at Ann’s eye-level—not more than a few metres out.

His rotation had slowed—he might have been making one revolution every two seconds. His close-cropped beard caught the faint moonlight in a stippling of silver, as he spun to face her for an instant. Then the moon struck silver hair—bare, suntanned shoulders—the flank of pale naked buttock.

He corkscrewed higher still, and when he turned, Ann found herself face to face with Ian Rickhardt. His eyes were shut—his jaw clenched.

Ann stumbled back into the room. She fell against the bed and righted herself with her hands. When she turned back to look, the French doors were shut again. The room was like ice now.

Ann pushed herself up and tried to open the doors. They were stuck—of course. She drew the curtain aside and peered out through the glass. There was nothing there but the trees. She put her hand on her racing heart and drew a deep breath, and shivered. When she exhaled, her breath condensed on the glass, and made a lattice.

“Get back in your room,” she said. “Back into the tower.”

But she didn’t have the stamina to do what she had to do—go back to her safe place, visualize the necessary repairs… toss those things out the windows on her way to the door, which she might then secure with… something… something that would keep the Insect in its place.

“Get back!” She hoped to sound strong. But she was all too aware how her voice broke over the words—how the terror manifested, in her quaver.

The room hummed back at her—mocking.

Ann stepped away from the window as a crack started to grow along the frozen pane.

“Get back!” She tried to turn on the lamp, bring real light to drive away the dark, but it was dead.

She rounded the foot of the bed and found the door to the hallway. She twisted the doorknob and pulled hard, and the door opened. She stepped out of the bedroom, and into the tropical warmth of the beach house again.

The hall light was out too—but it wasn’t dark.

A warm yellow glow was coming from one of the closed doors—not the bedroom or the bathroom. But the utility closet.

Was there a light fixture in there? Ann didn’t think there was; when Thea had given them the grand tour, she’d shown it to them: the place to get towels and clean sheets, and light bulbs in case one blew.

“Shit.” Ann swallowed. The light bulbs.

She had to be careful if that’s what it was.

The light bulbs had sent her mother to the emergency ward one time; she’d have lost an eye if the glass had flown just an inch higher. Ann approached the closet carefully, one hand shielding her eyes. She pulled open the door, standing behind it as light spilled out, accompanied by the crackling whiff of ozone.

Ann stepped around the door, and looked in. That’s what it was, all right.

The dozen sixty-watt bulbs were yin-yanged in their little corrugated cardboard sleeves, next to the stack of towels. They were all glowing bright and hot.

The packaging was starting to smoulder.

She could see how this would end—how it had almost ended, the last time.

Ann opened the washroom door and turned on the tap in the sink. The pipes moaned, but no water came out.

Fuck you , she thought, and found a small bucket by the toilet. She dipped it into the toilet bowl and pulled out a half-bucket of water. The first bulb popped, then, and as Ann turned she saw the fire had started, flames licking around the edge of the cardboard.

Ann flung the water into the closet. But she was too far away, and the water that got there just hissed, just threw up steam. Another bulb exploded, and then two more, in fast succession. The fire grew, as though someone were standing close fanning it. Ann dipped the bucket back into the toilet and stepped closer this time.

“Fuck you!” she shouted, tossing the bucket directly into the flames, which had now spread to the doorframe, making of it a gateway of fire. Steam and smoke billowed from the middle, forcing Ann back.

She dropped the bucket and coughed. There was a sparking and a hiss over her head, as the ceiling light fixture shorted beneath the inverted dome of the cover, sending a scar of black across the frosted glass. Fine white smoke poured out around the edge and cascaded down like the foam from an overflowing draught.

Ann bent low and her hand flailed behind her and caught hold of the bannister. She pulled herself to the stairs and, on hands and knees, backed down them to the dark main floor as her injured knee protested. The smoke followed her in grasping tendrils but she was faster, and soon she was on the main floor. Only then did she let herself draw air. She struggled not to let it turn into a sob.