Cold Summer Nights (3 page)

The deluge of fat raindrops pelting the worn out shingles was his only response. He left the door open and crept across the threadbare carpet, past the darkened fireplace, the old upright piano with yellowed sheet music, and her favorite hunter green recliner. Over the years, her rear end had left its imprint in the dry vinyl, causing cracks to run through it like a burned out wasteland. The house’s smell grew stronger the further he went, making his nose wrinkle. Slowly, he lumbered into the spacious formal dining room that he could never recall eating a single meal in. Not even a lone Thanksgiving dinner. Lightning flickered across the room’s long wooden table and chairs, briefly revealing a thin layer of dust covering all of the old books, owl figurines, and other junk littering its surface.

He stared into the empty kitchen and turned to the darkened hallway leading to the bedrooms. “Hello?”

A boom of thunder rattled the windows, making him jump. He glanced back to the open front door. It called to him.
Leave now before it’s too late.

When he and Matt were younger, their mom dragged them over here every Sunday after church to take their grandma grocery shopping. Sometimes there would be no sign of her like this and their mom would make them stand by the front door while she went and made sure her boys weren’t going to stumble upon a three day old corpse. He wanted to go stand by that door now, but his mom was gone and this was his responsibility now.

In the hall, he looked to the right, barely able to make anything out until the lightning pulsed again, revealing an empty bathroom and spare bedroom buried in junk. He turned to the left, towards the master bedroom at other the end of the long hallway, plastered with peeling wallpaper. A sudden clap of thunder shook the pictures hanging on the walls. When the lightning flashed again, a black and white photo of his deceased grandpa was staring right at him. Nick looked away and noticed his grandma lying on top of the bed covers in her favorite red dress with white polka dots, her arms folded across her chest in a pose much more fitting for a funeral than a good night's sleep.

He stepped closer and wished he hadn’t. Her eyelids flipped open. She stared at the ceiling without moving. He swallowed, feeling like he had just ingested a piece of gum. His mouth opened to speak but nothing came out. Quietly, he took a step backwards and the floorboard creaked. A burst of lightning punctured the windows, highlighting his grandma’s perfectly styled white hair. Slowly, she sat up and rotated her head in his direction. Her eyes pierced him like he was an intruder. He inhaled sharply and tried to retreat but his body had turned Jell-o. Her face twisted in anger as she rose from the perfectly made bed and began drifting towards him, her pantyhose covered toes lightly scraping along the floor. Another explosion of thunder shuddered across the worn out floorboards, jolting Nick from his foggy daze.

He dashed across the dining room into the living room. The front door was still wide open. Halfway to it, the thin carpet peeled into folds under his wet sneakers. He ran harder but the carpeting had come free from the wood flooring beneath. He glanced over his shoulder. Lightning lit up his grandma, leisurely floating into the dining room behind him. Her saggy arms reached for him like he was still a little boy. Like he had just gotten off a merry-go-round at Lion’s Park and was still dizzy from all the spinning.

Lazily, she gravitated towards him, her mouth hanging open. It looked like she was moaning but other than the thunderstorm pounding the night outside, there was no sound. He turned back around and a jarring clap of thunder made him wince. His eyes found the front door again. He sprinted for it, but only ran in place. Just a little further, he begged his legs. But it was too late. Prune-like, clammy fingers found the back of his neck and squeezed. Nick threw his head back and screamed.

His eyes snapped open in the murky darkness. He gasped for breath but it took a few seconds to come. The outline of the ceiling fan slowly came into focus, his chest rising and falling. The quiet hummed inside his ears as he tried to recall if he had screamed out loud or not. He took another deep breath and slowly released it, turning to see
Summer
lying sound asleep next to him. He dropped his head back into the pillow and rubbed his eyes. He hated that dream, which was more than likely the result of a guilty conscience after stealing quarters from a change dish on his grandma’s desk. As a kid, he had a nasty little video game habit he supported anyway he could.

He exhaled another long breath and considered peeking at the alarm clock, but dropped his eyelids shut again instead. Summer mumbled something and rolled over against him, causing his eyes to pop back open. He listened for anything intelligible but she grew silent. The alarm
clock’s
blue glow called to him. He fought the urge to look, guessing it had to be close to five-thirty in the morning.
Maybe even six.
The suspense of it all was too much to take. He frowned when he saw it was only a quarter after three. His head returned to the pillow and he inhaled sharply when his eyes landed on someone sitting in the armchair across from him.
Someone watching him.
He squinted, his heart increasing its rhythm.

“Madison?”

The orange glow from the streetlight outside washed across her blank expression.

He peeled the sheets back and got out of bed. “What’s wrong?”

She stared straight ahead, looking past him. Nick didn’t recall Matt saying anything about her sleepwalking, a subject they had just broached.

“Come on, let’s get you back into bed, sweetie,” he said, gently ushering her from the chair. An image of her suddenly lunging for him and sinking her teeth deep into his jugular shot through his cloudy mind. Instead, she quietly slipped out of the chair and let him lead her down the hallway to the spare bedroom. She shuffled her bare feet across the wood floor like a slow moving Romero zombie and climbed into bed without uttering a single word. Nick shook his head, watching her begin breathing deeply with her eyes closed.

Back in his bed, Nick’s eyes combed the room. His grandma floated through his racing thoughts, just like she had done in his nightmare. The one he dreaded almost as much as the crusty nursing home she lived in today. She deserved better and he felt guilty for not stopping by to visit nearly as much as he should. Madison’s glassy eyes suddenly pushed those thoughts down, triggering a cold shiver to wiggle its way through his entire body.

Summer stumbled out of the bedroom in another one of Nick’s favorite t-shirts, this time a black one that read
WW(
picture of a hockey mask)D?
in
white letters. Amy had given it to him for his birthday last year and anytime someone would ask him a question while he was wearing it, he would point to the shirt and say,
“What would Jason do?”

 
“What time did you wake up?” she asked, scratching her nappy head and glancing at Headline News on the TV.

“Couple hours ago,” he said, even though it had been over three.

“Why? Couldn’t sleep?” she yawned.

He shook his head, dark circles encompassing his puffy eyes.

She dropped onto the couch next to him. “Was it because of me?”

He smiled. “No, I had this crazy nightmare about my grandma.” His eyes dropped to the steaming Columbian brew in his mug and then rose to glance down the hall. “So I wake up, already completely freaked out from this dream, and Madison is sitting in the chair across from the bed,” he whispered.

She studied him with thin eyes and let out a surprised laugh. “What?”

“Yeah, just sitting there staring right at me,” he said, shaking his head. “Sound familiar?”

Her brow wrinkled. “Well aren’t you just the object of affection lately?” she said, reaching out and smoothing his ruffled bed-head.

“Lucky me,” he said flatly, taking a careful sip of the hot coffee.

Hurt flickered across her face. “Well, I’m sorry I
creeped
you out the other night.”

Nick chuckled lightly. “Hey, at least you were in your underwear.”

She tried not to laugh and failed as Madison lumbered out of the spare bedroom with sleepy eyes.

“Hey pumpkin, how’d you sleep?” Nick asked.

“Don’t call me
pumpkin
,” she grumbled, rubbing her eyes. “I’m not a baby, Uncle Nick.”

“Okay, how about peanut?”

She frowned further. “No.”

“Honey bee?”

“No.”

“Freckles?”