Rory gets up and walks to the fireplace. He reaches into the hole, pulling out the papers. He gags slightly, turning his face away from the sickening images. From the look on his face I have to assume this might be more than he can handle, but then he shakes his head. "This isn't your fault."
I hate that he is seeing this side of me. "It is. I never told anyone what he was doing until he caught me doing it, touching myself in the living room. I was just about ten. He beat me, so I told the teacher everything he had done to Michelle and Leona, but I made it sound like he did it to me. I told them every tiny detail, but it wasn't ever done to me."
I hate myself.
I hate this house.
I hate Derek because I know he knows this and has used it all to play with my head.
Rory sits with the knowledge inside himself. I can see him processing and contemplating it all. "I have to burn this house to the ground. We have to leave now."
I shake my head. "There's one place I need to go first." I turn and walk out the front door to the hatch at the side of the house. The basement was built when my father got out of prison. I lift up the doors, letting them fall away to the sides. Rory is next to me when I take the stairs into the darkness. He pulls out his cell phone, making it a flashlight. The cellar is so creepy, but there is one place I have to see. I turn to the right, walking to the front where I used to be able to see under the stairs. I look up, seeing the notch hole in the floor like it always was. But there in the dusty darkness I see something that was never there before-a VHS taped to the underside of the wood.
It's the only secret I have ever kept with myself. The only secret I have kept from Derek.
I pry the tape loose, dragging it from the wood. Dust and particles drop from it, but I finally get it free, handing it to Rory as I close my eyes and try to step away from the dust.
Something hits me in the back of the head, making everything black.
13. THE VIEW FROM BELOW
Smoke wakes me. My head is throbbing, and as far as I can see in the dark, the air is filled with dust. I squint, trying to see where I am. It takes several seconds of replaying the last few images I have in my head before I realize where I am.
I am on the dirty floor of the cellar, and the house above is on fire. Looking up I see light in the notch hole. Something moves up there in the smoke, making the light vanish and then come again. My head is pounding and my heart is racing but I get up, dragging myself to the notch. I sway from the trauma done to my head, grabbing quickly onto a joist to stabilize myself. I lean forward, peeking through the notch hole like I did all the time as a child, and once again I see something I don't expect-a gray eye looking back at me.
I jump, still staring at it. It moves like he has narrowed his gaze. "I missed you all day, baby."
I shake my head as tears start to trickle down my cheeks. "Why are you doing this to me? Where's Rory?"
He laughs. "You still believe he's on your side? He hits you in the head and he's still the good guy? Jesus, Jane. What do I have to do to prove I love you?"
My eyes narrow, matching the look on his face, I'm sure. "Give me back my video."
He chuckles. "Jane, I never wanted the video. You were always the prize for me. That was their big obsession. Now come out from under there before the house falls on you." His gray eye is gone, and the light is back.
I turn, still squinting to see better. Suddenly, a light flashes at the entrance to the cellar. It moves like it's in a hand, swaying it back and forth at a concert.
I have two options-die in this fire or go to the man I believe is responsible for it all. It's a no-brainer, but it's also like selling my soul to the devil. I stumble through the smoke to the entrance, taking his hand and letting him pull me to safety. He lifts me into his arms and runs away. All my hate and anger are burning up with the house behind us. Everything becomes less painful, seeing the billowing smoke coming from the haunted house that Derek has left burning in our wake. I blink, but the view still continues to shrink away as if my body ignores my fears, and again I lose consciousness.
When I wake there is a sound, a song or humming. I recognize the tune.
"Once in a while, send me a smile. Make me see who you want me to be. If you'd only listen to the sounds of my heart beating for you." Derek's voice singing the tune to the taunting song picks at me. I've heard it before, in his voice. "Listen, listen to the wind and stone. Listen, listen to the sounds of old. Listen, listen as my hopes are drowned. Listen, listen to the sounds that bullets make of blood and bones. Where will you run today? How will you ever get away? Our love is meant to stay."
I shudder as a memory floods my mind, taking all of me into it.
The song wakes me. I stumble from the bed into the dark hallway in search of its source. His voice is new to me for only a second as memories flit about my head and recognition occurs halfway through the darkness. He is the man I love and trust-my father.
The song is odd. I don't recognize it. He repeats it using the same taunting melody. When I get around the corner there's a door with a sliver of silver light shining from it. The song is coming from the crack, echoing inside the light within the room that becomes bluer as I get closer. The color makes my bare feet on the marble floor feel as if it's colder than it actually is. I shudder as the creepy chorus plays again off the pale-blue walls.
"Listen, listen to the wind and stone. Listen, listen to the sounds of old. Listen, listen as my hopes are drowned. Listen, listen to the sounds that bullets make of blood and bones. Where will you run today? How will you ever get away? Our love is meant to stay."
When I peek through the slit, the cool blue paint on the walls and ivory floors contrast remarkably with the spatters of red all over. My father, a man who has never shown me a moment of love or kindness, is cutting up something bloody. A hand lies on the floor, pointing at the wall on the other side of the room. There is no arm attached. It takes several seconds for the images to compute, but he hums and sings the chorus again.
"Listen, listen to the wind and stone. Listen, listen to the sounds of old. Listen, listen as my hopes are drowned. Listen, listen to the sounds that bullets make of blood and bones. Where will you run today? How will you ever get away? Our love is meant to stay."
I gasp, backing away. When I turn I trip, making the music stop. The warm singing in the cold room ceases, and hollow footsteps take its place.
"Jane?"
I scramble to my feet, spinning around.
My eyes pop open, as I come back from my memories. The song was his. The weirdness was never mine. The shit wrong with me-the cherry and the creepy song and the memory loss-are not mine. They are my father's, and God help me, but I have fallen in love with a man just like him.
It takes a second to come out of the weird dream. The room I'm in reminds me of a place I've been. It has a soft bed with a fluffy pillow and pretty paint color, but I know it's fake, like our sanity.
The door opens, with his smiling face poking through the opening. "You're awake? I figured you would need a bit more sleep. You haven't been sleeping or eating enough. You need that. You need to stay calm."
"I need answers, all of them. I need to know now, right now, what this is. Why did you burn the house and attack Rory? Did you leave him at the house?"
He pushes the door open as if he's freeing me, making me more comfortable, which I think is his intention. "You volunteered for this."
"What? Where's Rory?" He offers me his hand. I don't hesitate-I climb from the bed and storm past him. "Stop coddling me, Derek. I'm not your fucking toy."
He chuckles and follows me down the hall. We're in a hotel. It's a suite with a large living room. I sit down on the couch, holding my hands wide. "What the hell is going on?"
He strolls calmly to the TV, hooking up a VCR.
"Is that from my father's house?"
He nods, dropping to his knees and turning the TV and VCR on. The wide flat-screen TV, which couldn't be more opposite from the VCR connected to it, turns on. My face, my face from before, appears on the screen, frozen. Derek comes and sits next to me, patting my leg.
I shove his hand off me, looking at him with a glare. "What is this?"
"Your VHS. I stole it first a while ago. When you were sleepwalking once you told me where it was. I let that asshole Rory take the fake one I made from this one, missing all the good stuff, of course. Do you know how hard it was to make it dusty like that?"
I pause, completely stunned. "You are insane."
He shrugs. "I know." He presses "play" with the remote he stole from my father's house with his ancient VCR, left over from when I was a kid. The picture runs clearer as he hits the button.