threw it and my whole apple away.
I then realized something that would come to me again and again that year, the year I found the backward glass and went inside: if the note was meant for me, then it was mine alone. Nobody else, not my parents, not the police, and not the kids at school, could be expected to care about it. The urgency of that note, the
Which is how I ended up there, on a Sunday near the end of January, after three weeks of eating my lunches alone, looking at footprints in the snow leading out of the tiny door. I was all alone in the forbidden yard. My dad was rehanging doors and my mother reading a mystery novel.
I examined the tracks. They went up to the front door, which was hanging slightly ajar.
Heart pounding, I closed it again, and looked back at the footprints.
One set.
Leading away.
I stepped back. Had the guy gone in a window? There were only two on the ground floor, boarded up tight. The hayloft window was clear, but it was fifteen feet up and there were no ladder marks in the snow, nor any easy handholds for climbing.
I called out a couple of hellos.
Nothing.
The creepiness that had made my hair stand on end began to give way to annoyance. This was my place.
I looked back toward the main house, but it couldn’t be seen through the high, unruly hedges.
I pushed the door to the carriage house open and stepped in, holding it open behind me to admit the weak January light.
“You’re crossing a police line,” I said, trying to sound bold and official.
Nothing.
I waited, letting my eyes adjust. No one.
The lower floor was bare now, the musty old couch long since left by the curb, but upstairs the jumble of disused tables and desks remained. I walked up in the dusty light and looked around. My eyes kept wanting to come back to the dark hole left by the last panels my dad had torn away.
Nobody there. An odd, low dresser with a full-length mirror stood near the back. Was there dust scuffed away from its surface? Maybe with a flashlight I could have been sure.
This was stupid, I told myself. My dad forgot to lock the door. Somebody came up and went inside, then it snowed while he was there, and then he walked away again.
But the snow had fallen yesterday, and I had seen it untrammeled last night.
I walked back downstairs and dragged my feet to the door.
Snap. Rustle.
The sound came from the hedgerow. “I hope you know you’re trespassing,” I said.
No reply. I looked into the thick hedges, snow-blind after the dim mysteries of the carriage house. But I could still tell height, and this was a kid, no taller than me.
I strode forward, shielding my eyes. “You’re not allowed to come here,” I said, maybe a little louder and harsher than I had intended, but I was trying to build up steam. “Cops closed it off.”
The figure withdrew to the other side of the hedge and took off toward the creek.
“Stop!” I hesitated for a moment, then ran to the boxwood shrubs my dad had planted, the easiest part of the hedge to slip through.
The guy was a good runner. He sprinted ahead of me, dodging trees and jumping bushes. When he reached the creek, I got a better look. A dirty white jacket, too thin for January. A foolish-looking orange woolen hat with one of those knit balls bobbing on top.
It’s funny how you can switch from feeling one way to something totally different. I had wanted to catch this kid and give him a shake, tell him he better get off our property or else.
Then, in the middle of running—I was lonely. Just like that.
“Hey, wait,” I shouted, gasping. “I just want to talk.”
The kid veered away from the creek again. We were coming up on the fences that separated us from the subdivision, and it was either climb a fence, go back to our house, or descend to the muddier ground near the trickle of water that was Manse Creek. He headed to the house.
I tried to cut him off, but he was too fast, and I was breathing hard.
Then I got it. He was doubling back to the carriage house. I’d been tricked. I put on a burst of speed, but then slowed. Why hurry? There was only one way out.
I switched to an out-of-breath jog, keeping him in sight through the winter-bare saplings that dotted the ground. He twisted sideways and slipped through the hedge, losing his hat on the way. I saw a hand flash back through and grab for it, so I put on another burst of speed.
The hand disappeared, leaving the orange hat caught in the hedge. I snatched it when I got there.
Before I had even begun to worm my way through, I heard the door slam. I rounded the front of the little house, pushed open the door, and stepped through.
The dark was almost total, cut only by the dimness making its way through the hayloft window. I was worried that the guy might be right beside me, but then I heard a scrape from the second floor.
“Who are you?” I said.
“Are you the one?” came a gruff voice from the shadows. Was he trying to disguise his voice from me, trying to sound older than he was?
“Am I what one?”
“The one the mirror chose? This time, I mean. It’s me in ten years.”
“Who are you?” I said again. “Look, it isn’t safe up there. I’m sorry I scared you before.”
The shadowed figure above made a dismissive sound. “You didn’t scare me. This is 1977, right? Are you the one who scratched that message in my drawer?”
“What message? What drawer?” I was beginning to wonder if this was my first encounter with a junkie. “I don’t know what you mean,” I added. “Look, my name’s Kenny Maxwell. I live here. Well, not here, but in the big house.”
There was a long silence. “You’re Kenny.” It was something halfway between a question and a statement. The kid rattled a piece of paper. “So you did write out those rules.”
“What rules? What are you talking about?”
“The note Melissa brought back. That she got in the mail.” He sounded impatient now, and the gruff was slipping out of his voice. “Do you know what’s going on? Have you gone back?”
I held out my hands to calm him down, but I didn’t step any closer. “Back where? I don’t know any Melissa.”
“Don’t know much, do you?” I didn’t answer. After a long pause he spoke again. “I’m going. It’s your note, so you can have it back, I guess. Jeez, I thought you’d have more answers. Help Kenny. What am I supposed to help you do? I guess we’ll figure it out, but I’ve stayed too long as it is. Bye.”
Bye? “Wait,” I said. I held out my hands, ready for him to rush me, but there was a quick rustle above me behind the furniture.
And then nothing.
“Do you need help or something?” I said after a moment. There was no reply. “What’s your name?”
But I knew I was alone. That way your voice is when it’s only you in a room. It was impossible, but I knew it was true. I walked up the stairs.
My dad hadn’t finished stripping the lath, so the dark space where the baby had been still dominated the back wall. To the right as you came up the stairs was the cluster of old furniture, much more carelessly placed than in my room. A bed had been ruined with a pile of chairs and two well-worn school desks. I picked a path between dressers, chests, and a pile of splintered remnants.
I wasn’t at all scared of the kid jumping out at me. He was gone, I was sure of that, however impossible it was.
