The Messenger

6

She screamed before her cousin Brad finished saying, “-are you doing?”

“Brad! You scared me to death!”

“Apparently not,” he said.

Lights came on in the upper hallway. Rebecca came out of her room and peered over the railing. Rebecca, even suddenly roused from sleep, looked perfect-as always. Rebecca and Brad were both tall, slender, blond, and blue eyed. Both favored their late mother. The look worked a little better on Rebecca than Brad, Amanda thought, but that might have been because Brad tended to sulk.

“Amanda? What is it?” Rebecca said. “Are you all right?” She saw Brad standing next to Amanda and frowned at him.

“Not my fault, I swear,” Brad said, holding up his hands in mock surrender.

“That’s a first,” Rebecca said dryly.

“I heard someone prowling around outside,” Amanda said. “It scared me. I had just come out of my room when Brad said something and I’m afraid I-I overreacted. Sorry.”

“Someone prowling around outside?” Brad said, looking nervous.

“Yes. I left my window open, and just now I thought I heard someone moving around out there.” She paused. “It might have been an animal, but I don’t think so.”

“Brad,” Rebecca ordered, “go outside and look around.”

“Me? Oh no. If it’s her imagination, I might catch a chill, and if it’s not, I don’t want to think about it.” He shuddered dramatically.

“Is it your imagination?” Rebecca asked, starting down the stairs.

Amanda blushed. “Don’t trouble yourself.”

“Come on,” Rebecca said, “I’ll look with you.”

Amanda turned on the outside lights, grabbed a baseball bat from the hall closet, and, looking down at her bare feet, hurriedly stepped into a pair of rain boots she found in the same hall closet.

“Charming outfit, as usual,” Rebecca said, and opened the front door.

The galoshes were loose on Amanda’s feet, and it took a bit of effort to keep from tripping or stepping out of them, but she followed Rebecca as quickly as she could.

“I’m sure whoever it was is long gone by now,” Amanda said. “My scream probably scared him off. If not, then the sounds of everyone getting up out of bed and my turning the lights on-”

“Probably. But let’s look around outside your window to see what we can see.”

Amanda followed, thinking that these were the moments when she could actually be fond of Rebecca. She might grow tired of Rebecca’s bitchiness, her self-absorption, her moodiness-but Rebecca never sat still when action was needed. Rebecca, she had to admit, was bolder than she was.

The scent of pine trees soothed Amanda’s own edgy nerves a bit. The house was situated in a canyon in the foothills above Los Angeles. The area was not wilderness, but many of the lots were large; the homes nearby were expensive. Most of the owners chose them for the seclusion the area afforded them.

Amanda’s great-grandfather had been involved in the early movie industry and built the oldest part of the house as a private retreat, reputedly his love nest, where he’d sneak away to be with his mistress. No wonder, Amanda thought, he had concealed it by planting trees.

Right at this moment, Amanda wished the house was not surrounded by quite so many of them. Only one other house had even a partial view of her home. Standing on the front porch, she looked up the hill and saw that no lights were on at Derek and Ron’s place-no, she had to stop thinking of it in that way. Tyler Hawthorne’s house.

“So,” Rebecca said, following her gaze. “He’s gone.”

“What?”

“Tyler. When we saw him the other day, he said he was driving to St. Louis.”

“Driving? Not flying?”

“Yes.” She moved fearlessly down the front steps.

Amanda followed her, Tyler forgotten. She tried not to think of all the things baseball bats wouldn’t stop.

“He seemed very interested in knowing if you’d be at the party,” Rebecca added, and Amanda heard the underlying message.

“I’m not interested in him.” Liar, an inner voice said. But she knew that once Rebecca came into a man’s orbit, he never thought twice about Rebecca’s klutzy cousin.

“Oh, that doesn’t worry me,” Rebecca said, causing the last of Amanda’s fear to be chased away by anger.

“I’m sure it doesn’t,” she bit out.

“I just wondered why he’d be interested in you at all.”

“He’s not interested. I met him briefly at the hospice. He and Ron are friends.”

“Oh.” Rebecca frowned, working this out. Undoubtedly, as far as Rebecca was concerned, friendship with Ron put some kind of black mark against Tyler.

“Doesn’t seem to be anyone out here now,” Rebecca said as they reached the area outside Amanda’s bedroom.

“It wasn’t my imagination-”

“Right. Whatever. I’m going back in. I’m freezing my ass off out here-I don’t carry as much weight as you do, you know, so I get cold faster.”

Amanda let her go. She needed a few minutes alone to prevent herself from booting Rebecca’s skinny frozen ass from here to Laguna.

Amanda decided she was going to walk back inside and tell them to leave tomorrow, and not to come back without an invitation. How would they like it if she just showed up out at their place in the desert? Not at all!

She stood in the darkness, silently composing a lecture. She envisioned delivering it, and…her shoulders sank.

She’d never do it. They were close to being the only family members she had left.

A light went on in one of the rooms of Derek’s-no, Tyler’s-house, then a moment later the house was dark again. Rebecca must have been wrong about Tyler being out of town.

She had better things to do than think about Tyler Hawthorne. She studied the ground near the window. She saw fresh tracks in the moist earth.

“A dog,” she whispered to herself, swallowing hard. “A big dog.”

She heard a rustling sound in the woods and whirled, bat at the ready. But the galoshes didn’t easily follow the motion, and she fell flat on her face in the dirt. She scrambled up in panic, bat held ready to swing, and tried to see beyond the area illuminated by the outdoor lights of her own house.

She could hear something moving through the trees. Running.

She braced herself for an attack, then realized the sounds were retreating.

The dog-if it was a dog-was racing uphill-away from her.

Suddenly, at the edge of the darkness, four figures appeared-two men, two women. Dressed in evening clothes.

Fear and anger caused her to stiffen every muscle.

She knew exactly who they were.

And knew they were long dead.

“Go away!” she shouted.

They disappeared just as she heard the front door open. Brad and Rebecca peered cautiously around the corner of the house.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she answered shakily. “Just a stray dog.”

They heard the roar of an engine, the squealing brakes and tires as a vehicle took the curve in the road just downhill from the house.

“Someone’s in a hurry,” Brad said.

Together, they walked back inside the house. She put up with their merciless teasing about her fear of dogs.

She closed the window and got back into bed. Tomorrow, she decided, she was moving up to the third floor.

She had nearly drifted off to sleep when she recalled the fright Brad had given her, and a question occurred to her. What had Brad been doing downstairs, creeping around in the dark, well after midnight?

Just before dawn, she awakened. The room was still dark, the blinds drawn, but she clearly saw four figures standing around her bed. Dressed, as they always were, the way they had been when she had last seen them alive. “Go away,” she whispered to her parents and aunt and uncle. She shut her eyes tightly and pulled the covers over her head. “It wasn’t my fault.”

When the air grew stuffy beneath the bedding, she peered out over the edge of the comforter.

They were gone.

It took a long time to fall asleep again.