The House Page 9

  He glanced up and down the alley before walking back through the gate and was gratified to see nothing unusual, no strange shadows, nothing out of the ordinary. He returned the shovel to the garage and went inside the house, where Margot was finishing her orange juice and yelling for Tony to hurry up and brush his teeth, they had to go. He slipped a quick hand up her skirt, but she pulled away and shot him a look of annoyance.

  "Why're you up so early today?" she asked. "You don't have an interview do you?"

  "No." He thought of telling her the truth, that he'd had a nightmare and couldn't fall back asleep, that when he'd gone out to pick up the paper he'd found a dead cat in their front yard, but he didn't want to worry her before she went off to work, and he said, "I was going to clean the house today. I thought I'd get an early start."

  She looked at him skeptically.

  "It's true!"

  He was trapped now, he'd painted himself in a corner, so after Margot and Tony left, he swept and mopped, dusted and vacuumed, and it was past lunchtime before he finally finished. He slept most of the afternoon, dozing off during the hottest part of the day, and only a chance call from a phone solicitor woke him before it was time to pick up Tony.

  Waiting in the parking lot of Tony's school, the need to move struck him once again. School was not even out yet and there was a group of tough-looking boys smoking openly on the sidewalk in front of the administration building, all of them wearing white T-shirts and identically baggy pants. They were joined by two slutty -looking young girls dressed far too provocatively for their age.

  Then the bell rang and the floodgates were turned loose. Hordes of students streamed out from doorways and hallways, walking, running, talking, screaming. Individuals separated from the crowd, moving toward their parents' cars. A large contingent headed over to the two waiting school buses. Others started walking home in pairs or small groups.

  He looked for Tony, tried to spot his son's face amid the sea of similar-looking students, and finally saw him walking alone toward the car. One skinhead near the administration building halfheartedly threw a Coke can, yelling, "Pussy! Going to ride home with your daddy and your mommy?" but Daniel pretended he didn't hear it for Tony's sake and smiled as his son got into the car.

  "How was school?" he asked.

  "Great," Tony said sarcastically.

  Daniel laughed at the boy's tone of voice. "Well, at least it's Friday."

  "Yeah," he said. "At least it's Friday."

  They did not talk on the way home. Daniel got into an old Joe Jackson song on the radio, listening to the lyrics, singing along in his head, remembering when that album had first come out, and it wasn't until they were pulling into the driveway that he realized he and Tony had not spoken since leaving the school. He glanced over at his son. "Is everything all right?"

  Tony nodded.

  "You sure? Nothing you want to talk about?"

  "No." Tony grabbed his books, got out of the car.

  Daniel followed the boy into the house. Margot wasn't home yet, but she'd be back from work within the next hour, and he decided to start making dinner. She had a series of stressful meetings today and though she'd told him she'd fix something when she got home, he thought it would be a nice surprise if he made dinner tonight, gave her a little treat.

  He looked through Margot's cookbooks, looked through the refrigerator and cupboards to see what they had, and finally decided on a hamburger casserole from Julia Child. The instructions classified it as a "quick and easy"

  dish, estimated preparation time fifteen minutes, but he knew himself and he figured he'd be lucky if he finished within the hour.

  Tony plopped his books down on the kitchen counter and grabbed a can of Dr Pepper from the refrigerator before heading off toward his bedroom.

  "Homework!" Daniel called out.

  "It's Friday!"

  "Do it today and your weekend will be free."

  "I'll do it Sunday."

  Daniel thought of arguing with him, but decided to let the boy go. He picked up the books from the counter and carried them into the living room, where he placed them on the coffee table on top of the pile of today's newspapers.

  It took over an hour to prepare the meal, and Margot came home before he was finished, but she was touched by his thoughtfulness and she gave him a big hug as he slid the casserole dish into the oven. "I love you, Mr. Mom."

  He turned around, gave her a quick kiss. "I love you, too."

  Dinner wasn't great, but it was better than he'd expected, and Margot praised the meal to high heaven, exaggerating its quality to such an embarrassing extent that Tony rolled his eyes and said, "Give it a rest, Mom."

  Daniel laughed, looked over at his wife. "Is this your subtle way of telling me you want me to cook dinner more often?"

  "No--" she began.

  "No!" Tony repeated.

  "--I'm just touched by your thoughtfulness and I

  wanted to let you know."

  Tony pushed back his chair, stood. "This is getting too pukey for me. I'm out of here."

  They watched him go, smiling.

  "It really is pretty good," she said. "I'm proud of you."

  "Thanks."

  As always, he offered to do the dishes and, as always, she turned him down. So he went out to the living room and watched the last part of the local news, then the national news. There was nothing on after that except reruns, game shows, and syndicated entertainment news, so he shut off the television and walked back into the kitchen, where Margot was eating an orange over the sink.

  "Where's Tony?" she asked.

  He shrugged. "I don't know. His room, I guess."

  "Hiding in there?" She looked at him significantly.

  "Why don't you go see what he's doing."

  "He's all right.

  "Why don't you check?"

  He understood her concern, thought of his son walking alone through the crowds of students at school, thought of him sitting silently in the car, and nodded.

  "Okay."

  The door to the boy's bedroom was closed, and Daniel walked quietly down the hallway and stood outside it for a moment, listening. He heard nothing, and he reached for the knob, turned it, pushed open the door.

  Tony moved quickly, trying to hide something beneath the unmade covers of his bed.

  A bolt of primal parental terror shot through Daniel.

  Drugs, was his first thought.

  He walked toward the bed, desperately trying not to think the worst. Let it be a Playboy, he prayed. Let it be a Penthouse.

  He forced himself to smile at his son. "What you got there, sport?" He reached for the covers, pulled them up.

  It was not drugs. It was not porno magazines.

  It was a figure, a doll, the body made from an old 7Eleven Big Gulp cup, the arms straws, the hands and fingers toothpicks, the legs and feet bent toilet-paper tubes. The face was paper, topped by whisk-broom bristle hair, and it was the face that stopped him cold. A

  seemingly haphazard composite of eyes, nose, and mouth culled from disparate newspaper photos, the face nonetheless possessed a strange unity, an off-center cohesion that seemed natural in an unnatural way and awakened within him a dread deja vu.

  He had seen the face before.

  In the House When he was a child.

  In the House But he couldn't quite remember where.

  "What is that?" he demanded.

  Tony shrank back, shaking his head. "Nothing."

  "What do you mean, 'nothing'?" He was aware that he was yelling, but he couldn't help it, and though he was addressing his son, his gaze remained fixed on the figure. It repulsed and frightened him at the same time.

  There was something abhorrent in its makeup, something repugnant about its form and shape and the way ordinary objects had been used in its construction. But it was the doll's familiarity that frightened him, the sense that he had seen it before and could not quite place it.

  "What is it?" Margot ran up behind him, a
n edge of panic in her voice. "What's happening? What's wrong?"

  Tony was still cowering on the bed before him. "Nothing!"

  he told his mom. "I was working on an art project and Dad went crazy!"

  "Art project?" Daniel said. "For school?"

  "No, I'm doing it on my own."

  "Then why were you trying to hide it?"

  "I didn't want you to see it!"

  "What's going on?" Margot pushed past him, stood before the bed. She looked down at the doll. "Is this what all the commotion was about?"

  "Yeah," Tony admitted.

  Margot turned on Daniel. "Why are you screaming at him? Because of this? I thought you'd caught him using drugs or something."

  "Mom!"

  Daniel stood there, not sure what to say, not sure how to defend himself. Margot was acting as though there was nothing unusual here, nothing out of the ordinary, and it threw him. Couldn't she tell that there was something the matter with the doll? Couldn't she see?

  Obviously not.

  Maybe it was him. Maybe there really was nothing wrong. Maybe he was just overreacting.

  Daniel looked once more at the doll, again felt repulsed, scared.

  He tried to tell himself that he was having some sort of breakdown, that the stress from being out of work for so long had finally gotten to him, but he did not believe it.

  Wasn't that the definition of mental illness, though?

  If you had it, you didn't know it?

  He didn't believe that either.

  What did he believe?

  He believed that Tony's doll was evil. He believed that his son was doing something wrong in making it and that he knew it was wrong and that's why he had tried to hide it. He believed that, for whatever reason, Margot couldn't tell what was happening and didn't understand.

  "It's not for school?" Daniel asked again.

  Tony shook his head.

  "Then throw it away. If you want art supplies, we'll get you art supplies."

  "We can't afford--" Margot started to say.

  "I don't want art supplies!" Tony said. "I just want you to leave me alone!"

  Margot pulled at Daniel's sleeve, pulled him toward the door. "Come on."

  Daniel stood his ground. "I don't want that thing in the house."

  "What's the matter with you?" Margot frowned at him.

  "I'll do it in the garage," Tony said.

  Daniel didn't know what to say, didn't know what to do. He knew his attitude appeared irrational, but he could not seem to articulate his aversion to the figure, could not seem to explain and communicate his feelings toward the horrid object. The threads were there but he could not pull them together. He glanced from Tony to Margot. He did not want to get into a fight with them over this. He knew the truth, felt it in his gut, but he was aware that he was in the intellectually weaker position here and that in a fair fight he would lose.

  It was best to back off, throw the thing away later, when they were both out of the house.

  He allowed himself to be led by Margot out of the room, and she waited until Tony's door was closed and they were safely in the kitchen before confronting him.

  "What was that back there? What did you think you were doing?"

  He didn't even try to explain. Out of the room, away from the figure, it almost seemed silly even to him, and he could think of no way to defend himself that would sound even remotely plausible.

  "If that's all he's doing by himself in there, making 'art projects,' then we should consider ourselves lucky."

  "Yeah," Daniel said. "You're right."

  But he didn't think that at all.

  He walked back into the living room, nipped on the television, found a movie.

  The thing was, Tony didn't seem to really understand what the doll was either. He obviously knew enough to try to keep it hidden from his parents, obviously felt as though it was something he should not be doing, but there'd been no deception or dishonesty in his defense of his "art project." He'd seemed as naive as Margot in that way, sincere in his straightforward appeal. It was as if, on one level, he recognized the abnormal and abhorrent nature of the object, and on another level he saw it as merely an ordinary product of an ordinary hobby.

  He didn't seem to understand what he was doing or why.

  He was like . . . like a baby playing with fire.

  What made him think of that analogy?

  Daniel didn't know, but it was accurate nevertheless.

  There was a danger here. He sensed it. And he would not feel comfortable until that thing was out of his son's room and out of his house.

  Margot finished the dishes and came out in the living room with him. She sat next to him on the couch, read the newspaper, snuggled into the crook of his arm, but there was tension between them, and though they tried, they could not regain the relaxed and happy atmosphere of dinner.

  The doll.

  The shadow in the alley.

  `Something was going on here that he couldn't quite grasp. It was like a word on the tip of his tongue that he knew but could not immediately articulate. He had the strong feeling that on some level he did understand what was happening, that somewhere inside him was the key that would unlock this puzzle, but he could not seem to find it.

  They went to bed at eleven, made love quietly, perfunctorily, then rolled over, automatically moving to opposite sides of the mattress.

  He lay awake long after Margot fell asleep, long after the timer shut off the TV, staring up at the ceiling through the silent darkness.

  Silent?

  No, not quite.

  There was a rustling whisper of movement from down the hall.

  From Tony's room.

  Ordinarily, he would not have been able to hear the noise, so subtle was its intonation, but in this quiet the faint sibilance was clearly audible, its changing location pinpointed by slight increases and decreases in volume.

  He listened carefully. It was a sound he had heard before, a long time ago In the House --and, soft as it was, it sent a powerful chill through him. He could not quite place it, but its origin was in his past and there was something about it that frightened him. Daniel closed his eyes, concentrated on listening.

  The noise faded, moving away from their bedroom door, then grew louder, returning.

  It was the sound of ... a doll patrolling the halls, hunting little boys who dared to leave their rooms.

  What in God's name had made him think of that?

  He didn't know, but it was the image that came to his mind, and it stayed there, refusing to budge. His first instinct was to get Tony and Margot out of the house.

  They might be in danger. But he could not act on that impulse. As concerned as he was for their safety, he was paralyzed, afraid to get out of bed, afraid to wake up Margot, afraid even to move.

  It would not harm Tony, he told himself. Tony had made it.

  And it wasn't after Margot.

  It was after him.

  Just as it had been in the House.

  He heard it outside, shuffling by on toilet-paper-tube feet.

  He held his breath, praying that it would not stop in front of their bedroom, praying that Margot had locked their door.

  He waited until both Margot and Tony left.

  Then he searched through Tony's room.

  Daniel wasn't sure what he thought he'd find. Some clue, he supposed. Something that would jog his memory, something that would let him know what was going on.

  Something.

  But there was only the doll itself, at the bottom of his son's closet, in a plastic grocery sack sitting atop a jumbled pile of old worn-out sneakers. There were no notes, no diary, no hints as to why Tony was working on the disturbing figure, no reference of any kind to anything remotely connected to the object. There were only Tony's books and toys and tapes and clothes. His rock collection and bug collection and a pile of old homework.

  And the doll.

  Daniel carried the sack out of the closet and put it o
n the bed, taking out the nearly finished figure. He picked the doll up gingerly.

  It was as repugnant as it had been before, and once again it seemed familiar to him. He thought of the noises in the night, in the hall, his certainty that the doll was on the prowl, looking for him, and though it was daytime and he could hear the sounds of the street outside, the television in the family room, he was acutely aware of the fact that he was alone in the house with this horrible figure.

  Its expression was fixed, formed from the newspaper photos, but it seemed different from yesterday, more purposely hostile, its eyes narrowed, its teeth bared.

  Maybe he remembered it incorrectly, but he could have sworn the eyes had been more open, the mouth closed.

  Maybe Tony had altered the face after their confrontation.

  There was no indication that the doll could ever be mobile, much less animate, and its taped and stapled limbs hung limply down as he gripped the midsection, but Daniel had the impression that it was playing possum, pretending to be dead when it wasn't.

  That was ridiculous.

  Of course it was. This whole thing was ridiculous. It was ridiculous for him to be secretly searching through his son's room in the first place. But he felt no embarrassment, and no matter how much he tried to intellectually discount his feelings, they were still there.

  He looked down at the doll and was suddenly afraid.

  What would happen when Tony finished his "project,"

  when the doll was complete?

  He didn't know and he didn't want to find out.

  He knew what he had to do.

  Daniel shoved the doll back in the bag and carried it outside. He dropped it on the grass next to the back porch and walked into the garage, wheeling out the barbecue.

  Opening the lid, he picked the sack up off the ground and unceremoniously dumped the doll into the ashes.