The Vanishing Game (5 page)

My eyes slowly opened. After all these years I finally formed an answer and murmured it out loud. “No, Jack. We died and went to hell.”

The light was fading fast. I reminded myself that the only thing worse than going in Seale House would be going inside when it was dark. No amount of desperation could make me enter it after the sun went down, so I started across the street. Mentally routing the quickest path, I told myself, “Just get in, see if you can find something, and get out.” It wasn't like I had to stick around.

There were only two times that any of the foster kids ever used the double doors fronting Seale House: when they came there to live and when they left for good. Veering to
the right, along the side of the house that wasn't charred, I passed oleander bushes and prickly holly plants guaranteed to discourage kids from climbing out the windows. I looked up at the panes of old glass that blindly reflected my image. My racing imagination made it seem as if they were eyes watching me through cataracts. I glanced away and noticed the grass was longer than I'd ever seen it. There were also weeds in the flower beds, something that had never been allowed during my time here. I slipped through the space between the worn wooden fence and the house—a tight squeeze since I was no longer twelve.

Near the back corner of the house was the small side door that we kids had used so many times. I put my hand on the knob, half expecting some sort of electric jolt but there was nothing except the feel of cold metal. It was locked, of course. I closed my eyes for a couple of seconds, remembering how Jack had done it:
twist the knob to the far left, lift it up, and jiggle it a few times
. The hinges were loose, which allowed just enough movement to slide the lock out of its slot. It popped free and the door slid open without a sound. This was worse on my nerves than if it had made a loud creak. Jack and Noah had kept the insides of those hinges well oiled so we could sneak out and Hazel Frey wouldn't hear us. But who had kept it smoothly working in the years since the foster home had been closed?

I entered the small coat room and then crept up two steps and through an open archway into the kitchen. It was dim in the house but not dark, so I could still see. There
was a long worktable in the center of the room, different from the one Hazel Frey had owned. Shards of crockery and glass were strewn across the floor as if someone had gone on a dish-hating rampage. Chairs were upended; one lay in splinters, and the ancient gray linoleum was warped and water stained.

The smell of greasy smoke covered everything. I asked myself how Seale House had allowed this, remembering the few times some of the little boys had tried to light the curtains on fire. The flames would immediately go out, as if the house was extinguishing the fire. Little Dixon had called it a magic trick. Just thinking about it gave me the creeps.

I hurried across the kitchen, ignoring the crunch of broken glass beneath my shoes. The dining room still had the same sideboard, table, and benches from years ago, but the mirror now had a large spiderweb crack in its center. The smell of smoke grew stronger, and it tickled my throat in an unpleasant way. Turning, I was startled by shadows.

For just a second it seemed I saw my old roommate, Angry Beth. She was crouching down, holding one of the knives she'd stolen from the cutlery drawer. Her close-set eyes shimmered in the dark as her wavy red hair seemed to fade into the wallpaper. My heart raced at the memory, even though I knew that's all it was. Angry Beth became a shadow again, but I could still feel her malice. She was so full of hate. Not really for me, unless I got in the way, but for everyone.

My body was so tense by then that I could hardly force
myself to keep moving. My ears strained for the sound of her harsh whisper, even as I reminded myself that Beth couldn't be here now. Certainly she'd grown up and moved on, the same way I had. My heart thudded like crazy anyway. Not far to go.

A few steps more and I faltered, frozen by the sound of a voice speaking low. It came from another room. Unlike Beth's ghost from the past, this person was real.

One voice became two, the pitch and drop of garbled conversation entwining with the sigh of the wind. I turned in the direction of the sound and saw a flickering light. Flashlights? Then I realized nothing cast that kind of yellow glow except open flames. Had someone come to Seale House planning on finishing its destruction? My first instinct was to volunteer my help until I remembered that people who were up to no good, as Hazel Frey would have said, were seldom friendly. So I stayed in the darkest part of the shadows and moved quietly, just the way I'd learned to do during my months spent here.

“Like a mouse,” Jack cautioned
.

“Right … a six-foot mouse,” I whispered in reply
.

He grinned. “You're not six feet tall.”

“Not yet.”

The memory of my brother's playful voice made my heart hurt, but I told myself to focus. I moved forward and peeked around the corner. The large front room was opposite the entryway's double doors and had been the nicest place in the house. Reserved for visiting guests and social workers, the only time children were allowed in was when we dusted the furniture or politely brought lemonade or tea to Hazel Frey's visitors. Now, though, the once-lovely room had a blackened east wall, ruined furniture, and some strange visitors.

There were five kids a little bit younger than I was. They were dressed in black tees that advertised bands or had slogans I couldn't quite read. They wore tight, low-crotched jeans, chains, and piercings galore. Their hair was either dyed black or bleached white, and they wore eyeliner a mummified Egyptian would be proud of. At first glance I thought they were all boys, but watching them from the shadows it looked like a couple might be girls. Luckily for me, they were mesmerized by a small fire. Its light distorted their features and seemed to make tribal images leap across the walls.

The windows were covered with a heavy coating of soot, making it dark inside, and lace curtains hung in melted clumps. A soft wind drifted through the burned section of roof and stirred the flames, causing cinders to spiral upward. What would Hazel Frey think, seeing this? Five years ago, she wouldn't have even let these kids through her front
door. And yet here they were, making a campfire in the living room. I guessed they were from the neighborhood, content to sit in a burned-out house and have their anarchist ritual. A couple of them joked with each other in slangy murmurs, while the others stared at the flames with fascination and sipped from dark bottles. I quietly stepped back. Instinct said to take off and come again tomorrow after they were gone, but I was afraid that once I left Seale House I might not find the nerve to return. I turned away. Next stop, the cellar.

I went back to the kitchen and tried not to think too much about where I was going. Across from the staircase that led to the second floor and next to the bathroom was a closed door. I reached for the knob and felt my adrenaline spike, since what lay below was scarier to me than the fire starters in the other room. Going down in the cellar was the most unnerving task I could take on, but my desire for the truth forced me to keep going. Opening the door slowly so it didn't squeak, I slipped into the dark. My heart started doing an unpleasant little tap dance.

As much as I didn't want to go down the steps, it was the only option left. I knew that if Jack had left me a message somewhere inside Seale House, the cellar was where he would put it. At first I had assumed the newspaper clipping about the fire was just my brother's way of letting me know what happened. And that he was telling me to find Noah. Now, though, I figured the clue was more direct than that. He'd probably meant for me to come here all along, and instead I'd been overthinking it, the way I usually did.

I left the door open a crack, too scared to close it all the way, and stared down into the inky black well. Snatching the keys to my missing car from my pocket, I fumbled until I found the tiny LED on the chain. I pressed the button and a small, circular blue light relieved the darkness, showing the rough board steps just below me but nothing else. Still, it was surprising how that tiny bit of light helped ease my dread as I moved forward.

Halfway down a new idea came to me. Could Jack possibly be so frightened that he was hiding in this cellar? I couldn't image such a thing, but anxiety spurred me on.

“Jack?” I called in a loud whisper. “You down here?”

There was no answer.

“Jack?” I tried again.

“Why do you have to hide it here?”

“I hate it when you whine,” my brother said, though there was nothing hateful in his tone. If anything, he sounded cheerful
.

“Stop acting so tough. I know you're as scared of the cellar as I am.”

“You're wrong, sis. I love this place. So many good memories of our first days here, you know? Besides, this is the perfect hidey-hole. Who's gonna come down here and snoop around? Even Beth is spooked by the cellar.”

Jack didn't answer, and I felt really dumb. Of course my brother wasn't hiding down here! Was I crazy? Cold, dank
air rose up to greet me. I would have shivered if I hadn't already been sweating. It wasn't until I reached the final step that I noticed I'd been clenching my teeth and breathing through my nose. The tiny LED didn't dispel the deep gloom as it glanced off stacked boxes and old furniture. A sheet-wrapped Christmas tree made me gasp when the light first hit it. Beyond those things, I knew, was the massive oil furnace that glowed hot during winter but lay like a hibernating ogre in the warmer months. Around the corner and farther back was the darkest spot the children were most afraid of, a wall of moist black dirt next to the cement foundation. That's what gave the cellar its earthy smell of decay. I grimaced. It had been years, and yet the odor was both familiar and sickening.

Seven-year-old Dixon had been more terrified of the cellar than anyone, screaming us all awake because he had nightmares about it. According to Noah, Dixon was sure the dead bodies of disobedient kids were buried in that moldy earth. Outwardly we all scoffed at such an idea; secretly, we half believed it.