Crazy Love You (29 page)

Though indeed withering, her expression, I'm certain, didn't properly capture the depth of her disdain.

“You think I want your money?” she said. “That I'm a carny or a con?”

I couldn't take another woman being angry with me. Didn't it seem like they were always so mad about what you'd done or hadn't done? How is it that they are always right and you are always wrong? I bowed my head so I didn't have to look at her.

“I don't know what you want or what you are, Ms. Montgomery.”

She stood and walked again around the living room, made a slow circle, and then came to a stop near the window. The room felt wobbly and warped. I wondered briefly what I had taken . . . those pills. Where had they even come from? I sat back down onto the couch. It was the only semicomfortable piece of furniture in the whole dump. I sank in, wishing it would swallow me. I read about that guy in Florida who was just lying in his bed one night when a sinkhole opened up. He fell into a fathomless cavern in the earth, never to be heard from again. I wished that would happen to me.

“Do you remember what I told you about energy?” she asked.

“Vaguely.” I did remember, of course, had just spent some time reflecting on that long-ago conversation. I don't know why I just didn't tell her so. Maybe it was embarrassing that it was just now making sense to me.

“Negative energy doesn't just adhere to people. It adheres to places, too. People call it a haunting. I guess it's a haunting in a way, just not in the way of movies—no banging doors and demons pulling you out of bed. A haunting is personal, like a relationship.”

“A bad relationship.”

“Well, yes,” she said. She blinked her eyes at me like a Vulcan, as if trying to process why I would waste energy stating the obvious. “Love lets go, Ian. Only fear holds on and drags you under.”

“She's holding on to me?” I felt like an idiot having this conversation. She was a nut, wasn't she?

Eloise came to a stop before the mantel, picked up a photo of me, my father, and my mother. It was one of those department-store shots, Sears or something, in the cheapest possible frame. We all looked so stiff and unnatural. I remember that I got an ice cream after and how my mother was pleased.
I always wanted to do that
, she said. And suddenly this struck me as so goddamn sad. It was probably one of the best things she ever did. Man, did she ever fuck up her life and mine. Then there it was, that rumble of anger that follows sadness. But it was dull and distant—whatever I was on was keeping all my emotions behind glass.

“She's holding on to this place,” Eloise said. “She has unfinished business here, or thinks she does. But
you're
holding on to her.”

“I'm not holding on to her,” I said. It sounded more like a bark, like the yip of a stupid little dog. I didn't like how defensive I felt, tried to soften my tone. “I'm
trying
to get away from her.”

“You're trying to get rid of her like people try to kick a heroin habit. You want to give her up; she's killing you, destroying your life. But you're hooked on her. You want her, need her, feel lost without her. You're addicted to her.”

I thought about Fatboy on the tracks with the train bearing down, Priss pulling him to safety. He wanted to give her up, but without her he was a victim, weak and powerless. I wanted to argue with Eloise, but I couldn't. She was right and I knew it.

She kept moving in the circle around the room; it was like she couldn't stop. A nervous energy kept her in motion. Maybe she was afraid, I thought. Now she was looking up at the ceiling.

“There's so much anger and fear here. Can't you feel it?”

I
could
feel it. It was like a noxious gas in the air, every breath I took in this house made me sicker.

I started talking then—I don't even know why. I just couldn't keep it all in anymore. I told this strange woman everything, even though I wasn't totally convinced of her sanity. Everything that had happened then, now, and how I had no place left to go and why. She listened carefully, never commenting or making affirming noises. When I was done, she stayed quiet.

“Who is she?” I asked. “What happened to her?”

Eloise Montgomery shook her head. “I don't know,” she said. “I can only see so much, only what she wants me to see.”

Okay, that sounded a little crazy. But I didn't have any choice but to stay with her. Even if I wasn't convinced of her sanity, I was less convinced of my own.

“What has she wanted you to see?”

“A long time ago, she showed me the night she died. She was just a child. Someone she loved, someone she trusted, did unspeakable things to her. She died in terrible pain and horror.”

She paused here and closed her eyes as if out of respect, or as though she could feel the pain herself. “That suffering and fear has turned to rage. It lives here on this property, where she died, where her ashes are.”

“Her ashes.”

“There was a fire in the end.”

Of course there was. Priss
was
fire, burning out of control.

“But
what
happened to her? You must know.”

She pressed her lips into a line and looked out the window. In the harsh light that washed in, I saw how much her work cost her. She looked like a crone, ancient and desiccated. If she closed her eyes and lay down, she'd have looked like a corpse laid out. Maybe that was why she never stopped moving. Afraid someone would carry her off to the morgue.

“I don't know,” she said. “I can just see her running, barefoot and cold, afraid.”

Was she telling me everything? Why would she come here and keep things from me? But I could tell she wasn't going to say more. Maybe she couldn't. I didn't know what the rules were.

“How do I find out what happened?” I asked.

“The Hollows Historical Society has an old library—they have birth and death records, old newspapers. They have a cache of primary sources, too—letters, journals, some school files. There's a woman there, Joy Martin. She's a historian, an expert on The Hollows and some of the nearby towns. She might be able to help you.”

She stood as if to leave, and I felt a kind of panic set in. She was the only person who had understood what I was dealing with. I really didn't want her to go. I moved after her.

“Why can't
you
help me?”

I put my hand on her arm. It was as spindly as a tree branch. She didn't pull away. She put her hand on mine, turned her storm-cloud-gray eyes up to me. It was the very gaze of compassion, caring but somehow distant. She would help me if she could, but she wouldn't let me pull her down into the quicksand.

“I
am
helping you,” she said. She moved her hand from mine to place it gently on my cheek. “This is what I can do for you right now. If I can do more, I will.”

She walked toward the door and pulled it open. Warm air and sunshine washed in, and she moved into it. I followed her onto the porch. I didn't want to beg, but I was about to.

“They don't let you go easy,” she said. “You've wasted too much time, given her too much energy and power. She's strong. And she'll do what she must to keep you here with her. Forever.”

“What does that mean?” I was as pleading and desperate as a whiny toddler.

“I'll tell Joy you'll be coming by. She'll help you. She's very knowledgeable about this town. More than most.”

Then she walked down the drive toward her car. The sun moved behind clouds and I shivered in the chill that seemed to fall.

I looked after her. What had she just told me about Priss? She'd never said it outright, not really. We'd talked about negative energy. Did she just tell me that Priss was a
ghost
?

I went to see my mother. It was pretty risky considering that the police were likely looking for me, but there were things we needed to discuss. Things I hadn't wanted to talk about until now, when addressing them was a five-alarm emergency. My mother knew about Priss; she'd told me as much. But I had filed away the information like one files away all the things crazy people say, in my mental trash bin. Now I found myself sifting through the things she'd told me about Priss. But my memories were foggy and disjointed.

The nurse at the front desk greeted me with a knowing smile even though I didn't quite recognize her. I found myself staring at her, the doughy quality of her skin, the hazel eyes, her thick lashes. There was something unsettling about her gaze.

“Ian,” she said. “It's good to see you. Your mom will be so happy.”

I had no idea what her name was, so I just smiled and said how nice it was to see her, then quickly moved on to the elevator bank and pressed the call button. The space was big and airy—flowers everywhere and soothing watercolors hanging on pale blue walls. With skylights letting in the sun and soft music playing, the place was trying to look like a cross between a hospital and a hotel lobby. It wasn't a bad place, all things considered. They'd taken good care of my mother. But I hated it.

I went to my mother's room and found it empty. Her space was plain, with just a narrow bed and a table by the window with two chairs. On her windowsill, she had a framed picture of Ella and me. In the photo, I was sitting in the rocker that still stood in my mother's bedroom and Ella was in my lap, wrapped in a pink blanket. Her blankie had these soft bunnies on it, and I had secretly wished it were mine even though I was too old to like bunnies. In the photo I looked down at her and she looked up at me, the two of us gazing with fascination at each other. I remember wondering that day how long she was going to stay.

On my mother's hospital bed, there was a blue-and-white crocheted blanket that she'd made herself. I knew there were a few cheap items of clothing hanging in the closet. It made me sad that she had so little. If I ever figured out what happened to my money I was going to buy her more things. Even though she needed nothing, wanted nothing, made me take back everything I bought her, I was going to get her some stuff. You know, the junk we all have—journals and iPads, jewelry, tchotchkes, books, magazines, hair accessories. All the little pieces of our personal mosaic—she needed some of those things. Didn't she?

The floor nurse told me to go up to the eighth floor, where I might find her. And I did. My mother was standing in the art room behind a canvas. There were two other patients as well: a bald and terribly thin older man, and a young girl with white-blond hair who looked pretty and sad and totally vacant as she stared at her blank canvas without even a brush in her hand.

My mother looked at me and smiled. She was wearing street clothes—a pair of jeans and a white button-down shirt. She looked almost normal. She'd put on some weight since I'd last seen her. She didn't seem as drugged out.

“Mom,” I said, leaning in to kiss her. “I need to talk to you.”

“Of course,” she said.

It seemed as if she'd been waiting for me. Once she told me that she was always waiting for me, always expecting me to walk through the door. And that's how I always thought of her at Shady Knoll, patiently waiting for me even though I didn't come to see her often enough. Talk about guilt.

I followed her out to the library, which was empty of others and washed with sunlight. Spare metal shelves held a scant supply of worn and wrinkled books. We found two chairs near the window and sat. I leaned in close to her. Outside there was the sprawling green of the grounds, and tall oak trees standing sentry. It was a peaceful view, and there was something about it that calmed me.

“Mom,” I said. I put my hand on her arm, drew her closer to me. “I need you to tell me what you know about Priss.”

Her smile faded and a frown moved over her features like cloud cover. “Why? What's happened?”

“I just need to know who she is. When did you first see her? What did she tell you about herself?”

My mother shook her head. She was losing her hair, a side effect, her doctor told me, of the many years she'd been on medication. What remained was a brittle black-and-gray tangle. “It doesn't matter, Ian. No one ever believed me about her.”

“I know,” I said. “They don't believe me either. But she's real and I need to be free of her. I can't do that until I know who she is.”

“I told you,” she said. She grabbed my hands and pulled me in even closer. “You have to ignore her, don't give her your attention.”

“But I didn't do that,” I said. “I wish I had but I didn't take your advice.”

It was too late for ignoring Priss. Maybe at first I could have just walked away from her and she would have attached herself to the next lonely and desperate person who crossed her path. But we were wrapped around each other, each of us giving and each of us taking something from the other in a psychic symbiosis. You can be addicted to all kinds of things.

My mother pulled her hands away and did that anxious rubbing of her crown. I imagined her rubbing away all her hair, it falling to the ground like leaves. Suddenly I felt bad for upsetting her. What was I doing here? This was a mistake; I should have gone to The Hollows Historical Society and not brought all this up to my mother.

“I'm sorry, Mom,” I said. I stood and tried to gently pull her to rise with me. “Forget it. Let's go downstairs and get some lunch.”

I wanted to be with her a little longer, even though I didn't have much time. If the shit hit the fan, I could be going to prison. I might never see my mother again. The thought was a stone I'd swallowed, sitting cold and heavy in my craw. She didn't get up; instead she pulled me back into my seat.

“I had three miscarriages after you,” she said. “Did you know that?”

I sat back down beside her.

“Dad told me,” I said. “I'm sorry.”