“If I have to listen to any more Styx, I’m throwing myself from the car.”

“Remember to tuck and roll when you land.”

“Very funny,” Lucy grumbled, crossing her arms. “Don't know why we can't listen to my music for once.”

“As I've told you--”

“‘My car, my rules’, I know.”

“You can listen to whatever you want to once you're in your own room.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“Would it kill you to be pleasant?”

“This is pleasant.”

“Then just be quiet, okay?”

“Fine. How long before we get there?”

“About five hours,” Amelia said. “Depending on traffic.”

“Great.”

“Would you hurt me if I asked ‘are we there yet’?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then I won’t. So how long is it going to take to fix up this house?”

Amelia smiled at the thought of her new home. It was as far from the extravagant house in New York as she could get . . . and it was actually hers. Not her mother’s, not hers and Alex’s, but hers. “A couple of months, at least. It’s a little run down, but wait until you see it. And the land is just gorgeous. You could almost go camping on the front lawn. A river goes through the property, too--”

“Cue the dueling banjos.”

“Deliverance was not set in Vermont.”

“So? Psychos can’t move?”

“It’s not even a real-- never mind. Didn’t I tell you to bring a book?”

“I can’t read in the car, remember? I start feeling sick. Though if you want me to puke on you, go ahead and hand me a magazine.” Then she looked at the small clock and groaned. “I can’t believe you’re moving this far away.”

“And I can’t believe I didn’t do it sooner. You’ll understand once you see the place.”

“Mom said it was a ‘fixer-upper’. I know what that means. It means ‘decrepit wreck with 49 million spiders’.”

“I brought bug spray; don’t worry.”

“If I find even one bug in my bed, I’m catching the next bus home.”

“There aren’t any buses that stop near the house.”

“What?”

“This is the nearest town, and it's about fifteen minutes away. Nearest bus stop is--”

“Whoa, wait a minute. That was the ‘town’?”

“Yeah.”

“No no no. That wasn’t a town. That was ‘grocery store, library, post office, three houses’.”

“It’s charming.”

“Oh my god, you’ve gone insane. Let me out.”

“Quit being melodramatic.”

“I’m not. I’m serious. If that’s your ‘charming’ town, I don't want to see the house.”

“It’s really nice, Lucy.”

“Your definition of ‘really nice’ and mine are different. Will I like it?”

“I don’t know. I want you to. I love the place.”

“Well, you loved Alex, too, and we know how that turned out.”

Amelia didn’t respond to that, and Lucy looked out the window for a few moments, staring at the trees. Amelia hadn’t rolled the windows down now that they were off the highway, choosing instead to keep the car closed up and the air conditioner on. The cold air seemed to drape over her bare lower legs, making her shiver. Finally, she spoke again. “Sorry.”

“Yeah.”

Lucy sat in the car, watching as her sister got out and nearly ran to the wreck as one might normally go to a long-lost lover. She continued to watch as the movers transported the boxes from the trucks to the house. Watched as they drove away, leaving them alone.

She reluctantly opened the door as Amelia emerged from the house again. Her sister already knew that something was wrong. She’d been putting up a front for the movers, but now she was frowning as she walked toward the car.

Here comes another lecture, Lucy thought.

How could Amelia find something likable about this thing? she wondered, staring at the house. It was two stories tall, and drab, with broken windows and peeling paint. Rats probably held weekly poker games in the basement.

“So,” Amelia asked, stopping beside her and also turning to look at the house. “What do you think?”

“Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”

“Oh, shut up!”

Her sister turned and stalked toward her new home, and Lucy grinned. “What?”

Then she considered the fact that it wasn’t just ‘her’ new home, but their new home, and the grin faded.

Amelia stopped in the doorway. “How about you at least come in and look around before you start with the comments?”

Lucy followed her sister inside, and for a moment could only stare. She was amazed that the boxes of their possessions hadn’t turned gray and dingy simply to fit in. A layer of dust seemed to coat everything in sight; out of the first three steps she took into the house, two of them creaked; and the fading sunlight was the only light in the room.

She focused on the latter fact first. “Don’t tell me we’re gonna have to rewire this place.”

“I called in an electrician already. We should have power.” She went to the nearest light switch and flipped it. A light came on, illuminating the dust and grime further. “Yes! In business.”

She's definitely gone insane, Lucy thought. “Don’t get too excited. This is still a house the Addams family would’ve turned down.”

“Can’t you just say something nice? For once?”

“Sure. Hi, house! You provide a very comfortable home for mice, I’m sure. Especially in the basement. Which I am not going into, by the way,” she said, casting a derisive look at the stairs at the other end of the room.

“Fine. Here’s what we’re going to do. We’ll clean the living room, and then we’ll go to bed. In the morning we can start on the rest of the house. Depending on when we get that done, we can relocate some furniture.”

“When we get that done? We’re still going to be cleaning when fall gets here.”

“It’s not going to be that bad,” Amelia said. “Come on, I want you to see the upstairs.”

Lucy followed her, looking warily at her feet as the steps groaned underneath her weight. “Are you sure this is safe?”

“Yes.” She didn’t say anything else until they reached a room at the end of a long hallway. Amelia stepped into it and turned on the light, smiling. “See? This is one of the things that just sold me on the house.” She walked over to the bay window and looked outside, smiling.

“Sis, you’d sit down there and fall through to the basement.”

“Well, it’s a little weak in places, but it’ll be fine after we repair it.”

“This from the person who hated arts and crafts because she was afraid she’d burn herself with the hot glue gun?”

“I bought a bunch of home repair manuals and some tools; we’ll do fine. But we don’t have to worry about that for a little while yet. Come on, let’s go back downstairs and start dusting.”

“Exactly what I want to be doing on a Friday night.”

Amelia ignored that, and just hurried down the steps. “Okay, I marked all the boxes-- help me find the one that says ‘cleaning supplies’.”

“Fine. Where are we going to sleep, by the way? The beds are in 59 different pieces.”

“They won’t take that long to set up.”

“Right. Here’s the box.”

“Good. Bring it back here,” Amelia said, walking through one of the two doors at the back of the front room. “We can use this as a bedroom until we get the whole house clean. Wait’ll you see the rest of the rooms. And you can have your choice of bedrooms; there are five more to pick from.”

“You’re talking like this’ll be the first time I’ve had my own room.”

Amelia was silent for a moment, and then she went out to the front room and got her CD player. A moment later Styx’s “Babe” started playing, and Lucy held back a scream of frustration as she started sweeping the floor.

All in all, she would’ve preferred the sitcom-sister chatting.

“Have I mentioned that mom was really, really, really smart to hire a maid?”

“I’m not hiring a maid,” Amelia said, as she flopped down onto her newly set up bed.

“I’ll help pay for one. Seriously. Just so long as I never have to touch another dustrag.” Or smell any more of that nasty air freshener that Amelia had insisted on spritzing around. She had no idea why most people thought that ‘clean’ meant, ‘imitating the scent of twenty dozen bouquets all crushed together’.

She decided it was best not to say anything else about that, though. Amelia hadn’t thought that her pantomimed gagging was amusing earlier.

“Cleaning’s not my favorite thing either,” Amelia answered. “But it’s not going to take forever.”

“Yeah,” Lucy said, yawning as she sat down on her bed and took off her shoes. Then she changed into her nightgown and crawled under the covers, pulling them almost completely over her head. “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Amelia said, reaching up and turning off the light.

“Amelia?” Lucy asked a moment later.

“What?”

“Are you sure there aren’t mutant spiders in here?”

Amelia laughed wearily. “Go to sleep.”

“Okay. But if something carries us off to its lair, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Lucy opened up the freezer. “Hey. We don’t have any ice cream?”

“Of course we don’t have any ice cream. I only brought the basics, remember?”

“Ice cream is a basic. I'm going to the store.”

“You are not wasting gas money going to get ice cream.”

“I’ll get more than that,” Lucy said, going through the cupboards. “Because you brought a bunch of non-perishables, but no chocolate. That's just wrong.”

“Fine,” Amelia said, getting a piece of paper. “I’ll make out a list and you can do the shopping.”

“No problem. It’ll keep me out of Hell House for a while.”

“And it’ll keep me from having to hear your nasty comments for a while,” Amelia said, continuing to write, “so I guess we’re even.” After a few moments, she handed her the list. “I'll see you when you get back.” Then she watched her sister start towards the door and bit her lip, wondering if the question she was thinking about really needed to be voiced. Surely it was something that Lucy already knew, but-- “And, Lucy?” she said, as her sister’s hand touched the doorknob.

“What?”

“Don’t . . . don’t buy any alcohol, all right?”

The glare her younger sister gave her made Amelia wonder if maybe she should’ve stayed silent after all. But since the question was already asked, she reluctantly pressed on. “All right?”

“I wasn’t planning on it. I’ll see you later.”

The door slammed, and Amelia winced.

Lucy stared at the horn for a few seconds as she started the car, wondering if her sister would understand some choice words tapped out in Morse code.

Finally, she just drove off, cursing under her breath.

One mistake, she thought bitterly. She made one mistake and all of a sudden her mother and sister thought her future was to end up begging for whiskey money in a gutter.

She hadn’t even been that drunk. She’d only swerved around a little. Just her luck that some cop was out looking to fill his ticket quota that night.

And she’d tried to explain that. But no. Her mom had thought immediately of her ex-husband, and decided that she was cut from the same cloth-- she hadn’t even come to bail her out of jail that night, to ‘teach her a lesson’.

There’d been a time, right after the DUI sentence had been handed down and her mother had been threatening to cut her off, when she’d been certain that Nicole hated her. Now she knew that wasn’t the case. Her mother liked her; she just didn’t like her enough to want to be around her. Which left the boondocks.

I hate my life, Lucy thought again, and reached for her CD case.

She nearly screamed in frustration when she realized that all her CDs were back at the house. Well, she certainly wasn’t going back to get them. That place gave her the creeps.

For one thing, it was way too big for just two people. Their mother’s house had been enormous, too, but that had been for her, Amelia-- when she’d still lived there-- their father-- when he’d still lived there-- the maid, and any friends who happened to be in town.

There’d been so many friends to invite. Now? Now there wasn’t even a coffee shop nearby. When a new movie came out she was going to have to drive an hour to go see it, instead of walking two blocks. So much for meeting people for coffee, or going out on a date.

She sighed. When she’d been in New York, she’d flirted with several men and gone home with a few, but she’d never really thought about anything serious. Now, certain that there was nobody near her anymore, serious was the only thing on her mind.

She’d intended on getting married someday, settling down-- after she’d sown about a field and a half of wild oats-- but how was she supposed to follow through on any of her intentions here? Just because her sister had chosen to live in Purgatory, USA didn’t mean that she should have to.

She walked into the grocery store, and all thoughts about finding a cute clerk around her own age disappeared when she sight of the man behind the counter. Balding, stoop-shouldered, and the grin he gave her displayed at least three missing teeth.

Perfect, she thought. I cannot get a break.

She grabbed a basket and filled it with the items on the list-- as well as plenty of chips and ice cream-- and then walked up to the counter.

“Hello there,” the clerk said cheerfully. “My name’s Francis Dean, but people call me Frankie. You can call me that, or Mr. Dean, I don’t really mind. You the new girl around here? Amanda?”

“My sister’s name is Amelia. She’s the one who bought the house. I’m Lucy,” she said, remembering at the last second to smile.

“Well, very pleased to meet you, Lucy. You know, I was really surprised to hear that someone had bought that old thing. It’s gonna take a lot of work. But I suppose you already know that, don’t you?” He laughed at his own joke, and then continued. “Your sister might regret buying it, though.”

“Yeah? Why?”

“Well . . .” He glanced around as if checking for eavesdroppers, the annoying grin still on his face. “It’s haunted.”

Of course it is, Lucy thought, wondering how she could politely tell him to please stop babbling and just give her the total.

She knew she should feel bad for the thought-- the guy looked thrilled at the chance to tell his obviously well-worn stories to someone new-- but she didn't want to stand around here while he rattled on about Vermont urban legends.

Then she realized that she might be able to freak Amelia out if she got something juicy enough from this coot. “By what?”

“Not entirely sure. But there’ve been murders there.”

“Plural?” Oh, this was getting better and better.

“Yeah. They say--” He peered at her. “I better stop there,” he said, his voice full of teasing. “I wouldn’t want to frighten you.”

“Trust me, I don’t scare easily.”

“Well, they say that several years back, the man and woman who were living there butchered each other.”

“Were their names Jack and Wendy, by any chance?”

The grocer rolled his eyes. “If you think I’m making it up, go talk to Sophia. She knows a lot more about it. She housekeeps there.”

“That place had a housekeeper?” Lucy asked, wondering where in the world the woman had learned to dust. Obviously her idea of ‘cleaning’ had been, ‘just kill the cockroaches before they reach pony-size’.

“Well, she went up about once a month or so. Place’d been abandoned for years, but since it was still on the market it needed some upkeep. She made sure the cobwebs didn’t get too thick, and if there was a problem with the floors she called her cousin.”

“Why?” Lucy asked. “Goodness of her heart?”

“She knew the couple who killed each other there. They were friends.” He smiled. “See? If I was just telling stories, would I send you to someone who could verify everything?”

“You haven’t sent me anywhere yet,” Lucy said, putting a teasing note into her own voice now. “You just gave me a first name.”

“Sophia Kinman. She lives two doors down from this place, gray house with blue trim. Tell her Frankie sent you; she’ll let you in.”

“Thank you,” Lucy said. Like she was going to waste her time trying to talk to some friend of his who also got her jollies babbling about nonsense. She’d gotten more than enough to make Amelia freak out, and that was all that mattered.

“You're welcome,” he said, giving her the total. “And tell your sister to come in next time, too! I'd like to get to know both of you, since we're practically neighbors now.”

Neighbors, Lucy thought. Back home, she had no idea who lived on either side of her mom’s house, and she preferred it that way. But, she couldn’t exactly say that to him. “I will,” she said instead, picking up her bags.

“Good. Oh, speaking of neighbors, you'll probably be meeting Elizabeth soon.”

“Elizabeth?” Lucy asked, her interest perking slightly.

“Yeah. She doesn’t live too far from you. She’s a funny one.” That grin again. “Her real name’s not Elizabeth. Can’t remember what it actually was anymore, been so long since she used it, but she renamed herself after some Queen after her mom passed on. She doesn’t come to town too often anymore, but I’m sure she’ll stop by your house.”

Great. “Well, I’ll say hi to her for you.”

“I’m home!” Lucy called. “And wow, what do you know-- I’m not plastered!”

Amelia turned down her music. “I didn’t think you were going to be.”

“Well, you sure have a funny way of saying it. ‘Don’t buy any alcohol’ means ‘I don’t think you’ll be drinking’? Cool. I’ll remember that.” She took the bags into the kitchen, and continued as she and Amelia started to load the perishables into the fridge. “Oh, and sis? Just because we’re not in NYC doesn’t mean you should be blaring music when you’re alone in the house.”

“I’m fine.”

“You had the music turned up so loud I had to shout to be heard over it. The front door was unlocked. And somehow, I don’t think the 911 service here is too great.”

“We should’ve gotten you out of the city sooner,” Amelia joked. “You’re completely paranoid.”

“Me? One would think you’d be lecturing me about crap like this; you were the one who got mugged.”

Amelia shrugged as she finished putting the empty bags into one of the cupboards. “And I’m not going to let that control my life.”

“Lock the door next time, at least. I have a key. Or actually, maybe you should just come with me. That way I wouldn't have had to deal with the Grocer Fossil alone.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t that bad.”

“True,” she said. “He did tell me a few things about the house.”

“Like what?”

“Like, it’s haunted.”

Amelia laughed. “Right.”

“No, seriously. He says that some couple murdered themselves here a few years back.”

“Mmmm-hm. And now they walk up and down the halls, moaning and rattling their chains?”

“You don’t believe me? Fine. Ask Sophia Kinman. She lives in town; she was a friend of theirs. She did housekeeping here once in a while.”

Amelia glanced over at her, new seriousness in her eyes. “The lady who sold me the house said that one of the locals helped tidy it up sometimes.”

“Never mentioned why, though, did she?”

“You’re not lying?”

“Would I lie about something like this?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’m not. So you want to go talk to her?”

“Not really.”

“Afraid of what she'll say?”

“You know, I knew you read a lot of ghost stories, but I never thought you were stupid enough to believe them.”

“I don’t--” Then she sighed as Amelia raised her eyebrows at her.

“Exactly. You don’t. So you can stop trying to scare me.”

“Okay, fine. But seriously, what do you suppose happened?”

“I have no idea and I don’t want to know. You’ll find out nasty history about just any place, I imagine.”

“No, I distinctly recall our old house being murder-free.”

“Enough. Now come on; let’s go upstairs, and you can pick a room. I’ve gotten mine mostly clean, so we should be able to stay in our own rooms tomorrow night.”

About twenty minutes after Lucy had chosen a room, the phone rang.

Amelia smiled and quickly went to answer it. Their mother had insisted on calling them every other day, and had told them to call her immediately if anything went wrong. Hopefully, once she realized how well everything was going, she’d stop worrying so much.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Amelia. How’s everything going? Nothing got broken in the move, did it? And you’re sure the house is safe? If you want, I’ll send you some money so you can stay in a hotel while it’s being repaired--”

“Mom, we’re fine. We’re toughing it out,” she said lightly. “Right, Lucy?”

Lucy rolled her eyes.

“Lucy says right,” Amelia said. “Anyway, how’re you doing?”

“Honestly? Wishing you were home. I hope this’ll be the best thing for Lucy, but I don’t understand why you wanted to leave in the first place. It’s so beautiful here--”

“It’s beautiful here, too.”

“But there are so many things you’re not going to be able to do now. Honey, you haven’t missed the opening of a Broadway musical in ten years. You can’t tell me you want to give that up.”

“Of course I don’t want to. But I have my soundtracks, and we’ll be coming to visit. We can all catch a show then.”

“Oh god no,” Lucy muttered.

“What was that?” Nicole asked.

“Umm . . . she said she’d love to go.”

“You don’t need to lie to me. I’ll believe that you’re happy there, but how’s Lucy?”

“She’s-- well, why don’t you go ahead and talk to her?” Amelia asked.

“All right.”

“Okay. Talk to you soon, mom. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

Amelia handed Lucy the phone, and then started to walk out of the room. She paused when her younger sister began to speak. The sarcastically chipper tone was familiar-- and so, unfortunately, were the biting words.

“Hi, mom! So, how’s your life now that I’m finally out of it? Better?”

“Stop that,” Nicole said. “I wish you were still here, but--”

“Come on. You complained about Amelia leaving. You wanted me gone.”

“Why are you like this?”

“Don’t ask me. You’re the one who raised me.”

“Goodbye, Lucy.”

“See ya!”

Lucy hung up the phone, and started to go into the kitchen to get a snack. As she walked by her, Amelia spoke.

“Why do you give her such a hard time?”

“Why not?”

“You think it’s easy raising a kid?”

“I wouldn’t know. And why would you? Oooh, wait a minute! You gearing up for some sordid confession? Have an illicit child somewhere I don’t know about?”

“Stop being silly.”

“You’re right. You’re not interesting enough for an illicit child. And if Alex wants anyone to pop out a baby for him, it’s definitely not you.”

“You are such a hateful little brat!”

“There you go,” Lucy said. “Let it out. Releasing anger is healthy; didn’t your therapist ever tell you that?”

Trying to convince herself that she hadn’t brought Lucy here so there wouldn’t be any witnesses around to see her bury the body, Amelia took a few deep breaths. “I’m not going to respond to this behavior. Goodnight.”

With that, she stalked into the temporary bedroom. Instead of going into the kitchen as she’d first planned, Lucy went upstairs, to the room she’d chosen as her own.

It was a bit smaller than the room she’d had at home, but she supposed it wasn’t that bad, really. The view was okay. She could see a bit of a path through the trees, and the river that Amelia had mentioned yesterday.

She glanced back towards the door, her eyes narrowing at the thought of her sister. It wasn’t fair that she’d dragged her here. She liked meeting people, going places, doing things, and having fun-- even if it wasn’t completely appropriate fun.

That little trait had nearly driven her teachers insane. At first, her mother had thought it was a phase. When it became plain that it wasn’t, she’d made a few jokes about how her daughter was destined to be a stand-up comic. But once she’d gotten enough phone calls, the jokes had stopped and the groundings had begun.

Lucy shrugged. None of that really mattered now. Her mother couldn’t ground her anymore, and--

Oh, who was she kidding? What was this but some massive, out-of-state grounding?

She looked back to the window, disturbed by how many stars she could see. If she was seeing lights in the sky, they should be artificial ones. Streetlamps and billboards and. . .

She wanted out of here.

“Somebody help,” she whispered, entirely unsure who she was addressing. After all, it wasn’t as if she attended church regularly-- or, for that matter, at all-- and she wasn’t about to go and try to have some heart-to-heart with Amelia about all this. “I don’t know what to do anymore and I . . . just, help.”

“Lucy. . .”

“Go. Away.”

“Come on, get up. The house isn’t going to clean itself.”

“You never know,” Lucy muttered, turning away from her sister as she pulled the blankets over her head. “Give it a chance.”

“Up,” Amelia laughed, grabbing the blankets and yanking them off the bed.

“I can sleep without blankets, genius,” Lucy said, closing her eyes again. She heard her sister walking away, and smiled. Then she realized something. “You’d better not be--”

Then she heard the freezer door being opened, and the telltale rattle of ice cubes being taken from the tray.

“Okay, okay, I’m up!” she said, vaulting out of bed.

“You sure?” Amelia called from the kitchen. “If you want to sleep longer, that’s no problem.” More rattling of ice cubes.

Lucy grumbled a curse and then walked into the kitchen. “That is blackmail.”

“True. You want some cereal?”

“Nah, I’ll just have some milk.”

“You don’t eat enough to keep a flea alive.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Junk food doesn’t count.”

“It does so. Hence the term ‘food’ in its name.”

“You’re hopeless.”

“Yep. So where are we starting today?”

“There’s still a bit of work left to do with my room, and then we have to clean yours.”

“I’m not doing windows this time. That was traumatic.”

“I’ll do windows if you clean the ceiling fan.”

Remembering the pile of dust-- and who knew what else-- that had been on the fan in the living room, Lucy winced. “You drive a hard bargain.”

“There’s another kind?”

Nothing dead was found on top of the fan, though by the time they were done cleaning out the rooms, Lucy had begun to wish that she’d found some bird’s corpse, simply for the excuse it would’ve given her to quit working early. She wondered if Amelia would let her get away with heading to the grocery store again, and then decided that twice in two days would be pushing it.

“Okay,” she muttered, stepping into the hallway and leaning against the wall. “Now it’s definitely time to go back to sleep.”

“No,” Amelia said. “Now it’s time to move your bed and some other furniture up here.”

Lucy shook her head. “No way do you have that much energy.”

“It comes from eating actual meals.”

“Admit it. You’re on crack.”

Amelia laughed, and Lucy watched her sister hurry-- not walk, not plod, but hurry-- down the stairs, and she sighed. “I’ll be down in a few minutes. Unlike some crack addicts, I have to rest.”

“Five minutes!”

“Yeah,” Lucy muttered, going into a different room, one she hadn’t been in before.

Her sister obviously hadn’t gotten hold of it; it was still dirty.

She paced around, then looked back at the footprints she’d left in the dust. If she never swept or mopped another floor, it’d be too soon. But at the same time, she wanted everything to be done. Hopefully she’d find this place more tolerable once it was cleaned out and ready to live in.

No, she thought. Then there wouldn’t be anything to fill up her days, and she would die of Extreme Boredom Syndrome.

“Hey, Lucy! This bed is not going to move itself.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she called back. “I know.”

Instead of going downstairs, however, she turned to look outside.

She wrinkled her nose at the sight in front of her. She couldn’t even make out any trees through the window. “Yuck,” she muttered. She turned back around-- and saw the man in the doorway.

She nearly screamed, and instinctively moved her hand to her hip, where her purse usually hung. She had Mace in there, but of course she wasn’t carrying her purse in the house. “Who are you?” she snapped.

“A neighbor,” he said. He looked surprised, though she couldn’t imagine why. He’d snuck up on her when he wasn’t even supposed to be in the house-- what had he done, come in yesterday while the door was unlocked?-- so he couldn’t be startled that she was angry.

“Well, neighbors usually knock.” Then she thought of an alternate explanation, one that she liked much better than some stranger-in-the-attic scenario. “Wait a minute. Did my sister send you up here to scare me?”

It was, after all, something Amelia would do. She was probably trying not to laugh herself into a coma right now.

“Excuse me,” she said, moving past the stranger into the hall. “I have to go kill her.”

He didn’t reply, just continued to stare at her. She didn’t turn away from him right away, just backed up until she reached the safety of the stairs. When she was about three steps down, Amelia came up to meet her.

“Did I hear you talking?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“To who?”

Lucy turned, started to say ‘him’, but the man wasn’t there anymore. And Amelia didn’t look like she was holding back laughter from a joke; she just looked annoyed.

“Hold on,” she said. “You mean you didn’t send our neighbor up here to give me a heart attack?”

“Look, I know you hate the house, but I’m putting almost my entire savings into fixing it up. So can you please lay off for just one minute and help me move the bed?”

Lucy shook her head. If Amelia hadn’t seen him, then that left her first explanation-- he was hiding in here. And she couldn’t think of a single benevolent explanation for that.

“Amy, I’m serious. There’s someone else in the house.”

“Don’t call me. . .” She trailed off when she saw the look on her little sister’s face. Lucy looked close to panicking. And despite her assertion yesterday that she wasn’t going to let the mugging control her life, she couldn’t help but think back to when she’d glanced behind her at the sound of someone’s voice and seen the streetlamp light reflecting off the blade of a knife. “Where was he?”

“Shouldn’t we be calling the police and then getting out of here or something?”

“Not until I find out what’s going on.”

“Amelia. Number one safety rule. When you find out that someone broke into your house, you do not investigate. You--”

“I asked, where was he?”

“Fine. He was right up here,” Lucy said, going back upstairs and pointing at the room’s doorway. “But after that I don’t know where he went.”

Amelia looked around, and then nodded once. “Nice try. But we haven’t cleaned the hallways yet.”

“What? What does that have to do with--”

“Only your footprints are there. You figure out the rest, Nancy Drew.”

“I’m not lying!”

As she headed back downstairs, Amelia nearly growled at her, nearly told her that bringing up a memory like that-- however inadvertently-- because of a joke was excessively inappropriate. But she didn’t want to argue with her sister, not again. Instead, she decided to humor her. “What did he look like?”

“Black hair,” she said. “Brown eyes. He looked like he was a few years older than you. He--” She cut off when she heard Amelia laugh quietly. “What?”

“Tall, dark, and handsome?”

She nearly cursed at her sister, and then she paused. “Well. . .”

“Hey, you haven’t been here long enough to start hallucinating about men. Wait a month; then go for it.” She winked. “Though, if they do continue-- send a few my way.”

Lucy surprised herself by actually laughing at the comment. “I’ll see what I can do.”

And Amelia was right, Lucy thought, as her sister got to the bottom of the stairs and then went into the other room. After all, hadn’t she been thinking just yesterday that she wanted to meet someone? She’d simply stared out the window-- or stared at the grime-- and started fantasizing, and she’d had some kind of waking-dream. Nothing to worry about.

She glanced back, confirming the story. Nobody there.

Exactly, brain, she thought. So while it was a nice-- very nice-- effort, no need for a repeat performance.

And then the man walked out of the room she’d been in a few moments before.

Lucy looked down. He wasn’t hovering off the floor, but neither was he leaving any footprints.

Looking up again, she saw that he was smiling at her. She didn’t wait for him to say anything. Instead, she just turned.

“Wait for me!” she cried, and then raced downstairs after her sister, for once not even thinking about the possibility of her foot going through a particularly creaky step.

Either she’d had two detailed hallucinations in less than five minutes, or her sister’s dream home honestly was haunted.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Lucy asked, as she and Amelia picked up a dresser and started to carry it upstairs.

“Do what?”

“Sleep in separate rooms. Maybe we should just stay where we are, you know? I mean, it reminds me of camp.”

“Exactly,” Amelia said. “One of these days I’m going to ask to have those memories wiped from my brain.”

Lucy laughed. “Okay, camp was kindof annoying, but--”

“Pit toilets are unnatural in this day and age, and should not exist.”

“Definitely agreed. But still.”

“I know you’re worried about bugs. If you want, I’ll leave you the can of bug spray.”

“Thanks,” she said, giving up. After all, what was she supposed to say-- ‘go ahead and keep the bug spray, but please look up the number for the Ghostbusters’?

“No problem.”

Lucy didn’t answer; simply looked around warily as they reached the second story. No one was there.

She resisted the urge to curse at herself. She wanted to think she’d been imagining things this morning, but she couldn’t. And that was driving her crazy, because she knew ghosts weren’t real. Yes, she’d loved reading stories about them, even when she was young-- at ten, she’d snuck a copy of The Shining off the father of a friend’s bookshelf and read it-- but she’d always known they were fiction.

She’d never had night terrors, never imagined that some pointy-toothed thing was hiding under the bed ready to grab her when she got up to use the bathroom. She’d laughed at the other kids when they’d tried to tell her boogeyman stories.

So what was this? Everything finally catching up to her?

Normally, the chores and cleaning seemed to take forever. But to Lucy, the rest of the day went by far too quickly. Then her sister was announcing that she was going to call it a night.

She wanted to talk her out of it, wanted to suggest that they watch a movie or talk for a while or even play a board game, but such things were far from their routine, and so she couldn’t rely on them now.

Instead, she simply said goodnight, got ready for bed, and then very reluctantly went into her new room.

She wanted to be happy when she saw no one else in there, but she held off on that emotion until she’d checked under the bed and in the closet, feeling like an absolute idiot as she did so. Small children did that, she told herself as she shut the door. Or rather, they had their parents do it for them.

Then, even though the room was searched, she found that she couldn’t make herself turn off the light.

“You are such a moron,” she muttered, trying to tell herself for the millionth time that day that she’d just had some kind of dust-allergy hallucination.

She didn’t believe it, and as she got into bed she resigned herself to sleeping with the light on tonight. And maybe for the next several nights, too.

The next time she went into town, she’d ask the grocer if there was anyone else living nearby. Maybe the black-haired man had been telling the truth; maybe he was a neighbor-- Mr. Dean was old, it was perfectly reasonable that he might’ve forgotten to mention somebody.

And was it also perfectly reasonable to walk on a thick layer of dust without leaving footprints?

“Just go to sleep,” she said, but didn’t follow her own instructions right away. She ended up pacing around the room for two hours before she finally lay back down and closed her eyes.