Page 27 of The Premonition at Withers Farm
Molly strained to see clearer, the window being far enough away from the coop to make it difficult to see anything else. She leaned into the attic window, her nose almost pressed against the dirty glass. Her heart thudded in her chest and reverberated in her ears. Her breaths came shorter.
Placing her palm against the window, Molly tried to steady herself as she made out the form of an indistinguishable person staring back at her from her bedroom window.
“Molly!”
Sid made quick work of climbing the ladder after Molly’s uncontrolled garbled scream.
Molly hated herself. She sat against the attic wall, hunched below the windowsill, her knees pulled up against her chest.
Sid scurried to her side and crouched in front of her. Concernetched into every crevice of her face. “What is going on with you?” Her tone wasn’t one of condemnation but of real worry. Sid rested her hand on Molly’s knee.
Molly shook her head. “I’m fine.” At least she thought so. Who knew who was in her bedroom? She’d blinked a few times, and the vision had disappeared. The curtain was still. Once again, there was nothing to tell Sid—nothing shewantedto tell Sid. “I saw a mouse.” She excused herself, but noted her hands were shaking. She tucked them under her rear so Sid wouldn’t notice.
“A mouse?” Sid gave her a look of disbelief. “You haven’t been afraid of mice a day in your life. You’re pale as a ghost.”
The words drained more color from Molly’s face, she could feel it.
Sid pulled her phone from the back pocket of her shorts. “I’m calling Trent.”
“No!” Molly’s hand shot out and landed on Sid’s, halting the trajectory of the phone to Sid’s ear. “Please. Don’t. There’s no reason to.”
Sid’s mouth scrunched back and forth as she considered. Her eyes glowed with consternation. “Molly, you’re acting really strange. You’re worrying me.”
“I’m fine.” Molly had to give Sid something to appease her. “I just—the mouse ran across my foot. I need some time.” Time to get her story straight before she cornered herself in her lie. Time to erase the voices and sightings of spirits wallowing in dark corners. Leave it to Trent to move her into a haunted farmhouse. To disrupt an already-disrupted life.
Sid readjusted so she was sitting in front of Molly, cross-legged, her phone resting on her knee. “This seems like more than a mouse.” She was picking her words carefully. “You seem ... troubled.”
“I haven’t been sleeping well.” Another lie. Her medication knocked her out most nights, but it would pass as a goodreason to be on edge. “There’s a lot of change with a move,” Molly justified.
Sid tipped her head to the side. “You moved five miles out of town to a farm. You didn’t move to Papua New Guinea, or something.”
“Papua New Guinea?” Molly’s mouth quirked in a slight smile.
Sid waved her off. “It’s the first place I thought of that sounded shocking. The point is, I know a move can be stressful, but isn’t this your and Trent’s dream? I mean, maybe I’m overreacting, but the last time we were here, you almost passed out on me, and now—heck, girl, you canscream!”
Molly managed a wobbly laugh. She hated lying to Sid. Hated being dishonest. But what was she supposed to say?Hi! I see dead people!She’d heard that line before. It’d been popularized, and it wasn’t a sign of mental stability. They’d commit her. Or worse, arrange for some modern-day exorcism. Okay, she was being extreme. Trent and Sid wouldn’t do that.
“Molly?”
She snapped out of her mental spiraling. “What?”
“Are you and Trent ... you know, okay?”
Molly leaned her head back against the attic wall. She sucked in a deep breath, filled with the pungent mustiness of the old building. She couldn’t answer. There was too much—so much—that was twisting her mind into an uninterpretable mess.
Sid took Molly’s silence and seemed to accept it, yet Molly didn’t miss her friend’s suppressed sigh.
“I know that since the miscarriages...” Sid paused. Hesitant. “But getting this new farm and starting fresh...” Her words then drained away as if she had a point but was afraid to say it.
Molly stifled a laugh. “It’s more Trent’s farm than mine.”
“But—”
“Sid.” Molly opened her eyes and leaned forward, earnest, catching her friend’s gaze and holding it. “Seriously. I know I’m not as fun as I used to be.”
“I never said that—”
“But it’s true.” Molly struggled to her feet, wiping dust from her bare legs. She ignored Sid’s beseeching look from her position on the floor. “We lost the babies, Sid. Four of them. You have your children. Breathing,alive. Mine are dead. There’s no more of them, and there won’t be, and I have to live with that. So, no. Trent and I aren’t okay. He wants to move on.”
