Page 2 of His to Haunt

“San Bruno mountains,” rasps Mom, startling me with her sudden wakefulness. I glance over. She’s squinting at the map with her light on, her black eyeliner smudged along the corner of her eye.

She’s been wearing it thicker since she began randomly time-shifting—even with a degree in clinical psychology, I had to look that one up. Sometimes, people with dementia revert to an earlier time when things make more sense. Mom’s go-to is the early ‘90s—her college years when she was into Goth culture. Never mind the fact that I wouldn’t have been born yet. Time is conflated as she fluidly moves between then and now.

We pass the apartments, where a tall, black-haired man, ghostly pale in dark clothes, stands in the small parking lot. He turns toward my car, and the cloud-filtered sunset glints off hiseyes. I lift my hand at him, neighborly. His sunset eyes burn into mine. He doesn’t smile or wave back. He turns, looking up beyond the apartments toward a sloping yard.

I follow his line of vision, my gut fluttering at the sight of the big, grey structure streaked in purple sunlight.

“That the place, Leena?”

“I…think so.” It is the only building on this road that seems worthy of the name Moonvine Manor, and it resembles the picture I have, though a different color. Besides, there are no other houses on this dead-end road unless they are buried in the adjoining woods, which is hard to believe. So, this must be it.

The house grows exponentially as we approach.

Stacy, the estate handler, referred to it as a Gothic Queen Anne. Which I guess means a Victorian on steroids, multi-dimensional and ornate, with a spire spiking from a tower, imposing over the anachronism of modern, flat-roofed apartments downslope.

“Wow. Pretty rad,” says Mom—her new favorite word. I smile at her. Every day is a new glimpse into Anne Sperling prior to her conception of me. Even though it’s weird, I’m glad she’s having a good time with it. It’s her way of coping with what life has thrown at her.

“It’s huge,” I mutter, shaking my head.

“Almost too big,” she adds, spinning positive by adding a qualifier. I know what she’s thinking. It will be impossible to keep clean. Unless we hire an army of maids, it will have to be tackled in stages, not all at once.

But really, a lot of that will fall to me. Her stage-three dementia can sometimes make it hard for her to focus to the point of completion.

When she was diagnosed, she threatened that if I put her in an old folk’s home, her ghost would haunt me posthumously. She has no husband, siblings, or other children to help her. Isaid I wouldn’t abandon her, that she cared for me when I was little, and I’ll care for her when she’s old. Adding that, mostly, it’s cheaper than outsourcing. We both laughed.

But it hasn’t been easy. At least in this oversized house, there will be plenty of much-needed space apart, which makes dating or having a boyfriend a better prospect. But I can’t think about guys right now, not with this sinking realization hitting me hard that my first time coming here is…after Rachel’s gone.

Suspicious death.

The phrase stalks me, jumping out at random intervals, nipping at my nerve endings, my extremities tingling with quietly controlled panic as my thoughts twist into a pit of unanswerable questions.

My own sister, an unsolved murder.Alleged.I hate that word. It’s nothing more than a giant, noncommittal What the fuck?

Her body is missing, but there is enough proof surrounding her disappearance—mostly in the form of blood—that she is assumed dead. Her phone pinged once at a location not far from here, and at that very spot, more blood was found.

Too much blood loss for a five-foot-six female weighing one hundred forty pounds.

It’s the most horrible thing I have ever known, will ever know. A true horror befallen us. But no matter how traumatized we may feel, it’s nothing compared to what Rachel went through. She is the real victim here.

I press my lips between my teeth, holding back tears. I wish it could be different. I wish for a lot of things.

“That woman’s meeting us, right?” asks Mom, sifting through her fringed, black leather purse.

“Stacy, yeah.”

After stumbling with the security code box and feeling surprised that the rusty iron gate actually opens, I slowly pull through, heading up the sloping drive.

The Goliath house looms like a primordial God, and as I pull to a stop, there is this still moment of pause like we’ve come to meet our master.

I turn off the engine.

Curvy trim wraps the base of each level, and shingles cover the upper half, but not the brightly colored mermaid kind of cute storybook Victorians. This hulking giant is painted in shades of grey, the scales mimicking reptilian. A weathervane with a turquoise sphinx oscillates in the breeze atop a high-peaked gable, the clouds forming a dark halo above.

A few more seconds of God-fearing observation pass before Mom clears her throat.

“Alright then,” she sighs with finality.

“Yep,” I agree, sucking in air then roughly exhaling. Hand on the door handle, I pause in fear of the unknown. Alleged.

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