The Last House on Needless Street Read online

‘That’s a good goal.’ His eyes are glazing over. They look like two blue marbles.

  For weeks I store up my most boring thoughts to tell the bug man. It’s hard work sometimes, thinking of enough things to fill an hour. But that last one just came to me spontaneously.

  ‘In my book,’ he says, ‘I talk about how dissociation can actually protect us …’

  It’s safe to tune out now, so I do. The bug man likes to talk about his book. It’s not published or anything. I don’t think it’s even finished. He has been writing it since I’ve known him. We all have something that we care about more than anything else, I guess. For me it’s Lauren and Olivia. For the bug man it’s his never-ending book.

  At the end of the hour he hands me a brown paper bag, just like a lunch bag a kid takes to school. I know there are four boxes of pills in there and it makes me feel a lot better.

  What I’m doing with the bug man is pretty smart, I have to say. I got the idea some time ago, not long after Little Girl With Popsicle.

  Lauren had been running a low-grade fever for some days. I wanted to get her antibiotics but I didn’t know how. A doctor would never understand our situation. I hoped maybe she would get better on her own, but days went by and she didn’t. In fact she got worse. I looked on the internet and I found a free clinic on the far side of town.

  ‘How do you feel?’ I asked Lauren. ‘Tell me exactly.’

  ‘I’m hot,’ she said. ‘There are bugs crawling on my skin. I can’t think. All I want to do is sleep. Even talking to you makes me tired.’ There was a little rasp in her voice. I listened very carefully to everything she said. I wrote it down and put the paper in my pocket.

  After dark I walked into the city to the free clinic.

  It took them a couple hours to see me but I didn’t mind. The waiting room was bare and smelled somewhat like urine. But it was quiet. I settled in for some time with my thoughts. As I have said, I do some of my best thinking in waiting rooms.

  When the angry lady called my name I took the note out of my pocket. I read it three times. I hoped I could remember it all. Then I went to a cubicle with a tired doctor in it. He asked me about my symptoms. I put a little rasp into my voice and spoke slowly. ‘I’m hot,’ I said. ‘There are bugs crawling on my skin. I can’t think. All I want to do is sleep. Even talking to you makes me tired.’ I repeated what Lauren had said. I was word perfect. And it worked! He prescribed me antibiotics and bed rest. I went to the little pharmacy next door and filled the prescription. I was so relieved I almost danced in the aisles. I kept my head up as I walked back – I let myself watch the world around me. I saw a pretty neon sign with a flower on it, a stall selling fruit shaped like stars. I saw a woman with a tiny black dog in a big red handbag. I kept a tight hold of the paper bag with the antibiotics in it.

  When I reached my street I was very tired. I had walked ten miles or more, to the clinic and back. I gave Lauren the antibiotics by hiding them in her food. She got better quickly after that. My plan worked!

  When things with Lauren got bad I knew I had to get some answers. Not about her body but her mind. So that’s how I got the idea to go to the bug man and pretend to talk about myself, while really asking him questions about Lauren. It’s just like when I got the antibiotics except this time the medicine is information.

  I come back. I am on my street. The house in front of me is yellow with green trim. I am in front of the Chihuahua lady’s house again, and that same feeling is in me too, like I almost know something. It’s like ants in my brain, marching with their little feet.

  I see that there is something stapled to the telephone pole. I go to look, because it is usually a missing cat. Cats can seem very capable and independent, but they do need our help.

  It is not a cat this time. One face is repeated in blurred photocopy into the distance, pole after pole. It takes me a moment before I am sure. She looks much younger, sure, and there’s no dog with her, but it’s the Chihuahua lady. In the picture she is leaning against a wall in a sunny place, smiling. She looks happy.

  The last time there were flyers on the telephone poles it was Little Girl With Popsicle.

  Lauren is waiting when I get in.

  ‘Where have you been?’ She is breathing too fast.

  ‘Calm down, kitten. You might pass out.’ It has happened before.

  ‘You are seeing a lady,’ she screams. ‘You’re going to leave me.’ She seizes my hand between her sharp teeth and bites.

  Eventually I get her to sleep. I try to watch monster trucks but I am exhausted by the day. Feelings are hard.

  I wake in the night-time, sudden and breathless. I feel the dark on my skin like a touch. The record player is supposed to be on constant repeat but it’s old now or maybe I did something wrong. In the silence, I can hear Lauren crawling across the floor. Her sharp little teeth click.

  ‘You bad man,’ she whispers. ‘Out, out, out.’

  I try to soothe her and settle her again. She cries out and bites my hand again, this time drawing blood. She fights me, crying, all night.

  I say, ‘Even if I were seeing someone, I would still love you best.’

  I know immediately that was the wrong thing to say.

  ‘You are! You are!’ Lauren scratches and fights until morning leaks grey into the room.

  I meet the day tired and bruised. Lauren sleeps late. I use the time to update the diary. This is a habit Mommy instilled in me.

  One day a week, she examined the house from top to bottom. The examination must be made twice, she was very clear about that, because of human error. She missed nothing. Each speck of dust, each spider, each cracked tile. She recorded everything in the book. Then she gave the book to my daddy so he could fix it during the week. She called it her diary of broken things. Her English was very nearly perfect; it was always a surprise when she missed the shade of a word’s meaning. Daddy and I never corrected her.

  So each Saturday morning after dawn, I take the book around the house. I do it again in the evening just before dusk. I do one circuit around the boundary of the property to make sure the fence is all good and so on, and then I come in for a tighter circle, to check the house for damage – loose nails, rat and snake holes, signs of termites, that kind of thing. It’s not complicated but, like I said, it’s important.

  The three locks on the back door open loudly. Thunk, thunk, thunk. I wait. I never know what will wake Lauren. But she sleeps on. The day is blinding, the earth baked hard underfoot, cracked as old skin. The feeders hang empty. No breeze moves in the trees, each leaf is still and silent in the rotten heat. It is as if death has put its finger on the street and pinned it down. I lock the door again behind me and go to the tool shed around the side of the house.

  In the lean-to it’s cool and dim, filled with the scent of rust and oil. It is the scent of all tool sheds, everywhere. I must be careful – scent is a highway for memory. Too late; in a shadowed corner of the lean-to Daddy stands tall and silent. He reaches for a box of screws, and the brown bottle behind it. Little Teddy tugs at his hand. He wants to get in the car and go but Daddy has to deal with Mommy first.

  I get the tools quickly and go, blinking with relief in the burning sun. I lock the tool shed. You stay in there, Daddy. You too, Little Teddy. There is no place for you out here.

  I write everything in the book very clearly. It’s not the same book, obviously. I keep my diary of broken things in an old textbook of Lauren’s. I write on top of the maps.

  Mouse in kitchen is back, I write carefully in the pale blue sea off the coast of Papua New Guinea. Bathroom sink – faucet drips. Bible fell off table again?!?!? Why? Table legs uneven?!?!?!

  And so on. The hinges on the bedroom door are squeaking; they need oil. A sheet of plywood on one of the living-room windows is loose and needs nailing down. A couple shingles have come off the roof. It’s raccoons; they’re bad for shingle. But I like their small, clever black hands.

  I do what I can now, and the rest I’ll get to
this week. I have to be both Mommy and Daddy for Lauren. I like repairing the house, fixing holes as if I’m making it watertight. Nothing gets in or out without my permission.

  The chocolate-chip pancakes are ready just as Lauren is waking. Personally I find pancakes a waste of time, like eating pieces of hot washcloth. But she loves them.

  I say, ‘Wash up first. I’ve been working outside and you’ve been pedalling that bicycle with your hands.’ She’s so smart. She lies on her tummy on the seat and her arms go a-whirring. Lauren doesn’t let anything get in her way.

  ‘It’s easier with my hands,’ she says.

  I kiss her. ‘I know. And you go so fast, these days.’

  We wash our hands at the kitchen sink, getting right under the nails with the brush.

  Lauren is quiet as she eats. Yesterday was bad; she exhausted herself with anger. She goes back tomorrow and the prospect of her absence makes us both very gloomy. ‘We can do anything you like today,’ I say without thinking.

  Her attention sharpens. ‘I want to go camping.’

  I feel the hot stroke of helplessness. We can’t go camping. Lauren knows that. Why does she always have to push me? Always tugging, nagging like one of those little dogs at the heels of a bull. No wonder I get mad.

  But sorrow tugs at me too. It is unfair. So many kids get to go to the woods and make fires and camp and so on. It’s not even special for them. Maybe all the stuff with the Murderer has made me sad, maybe it’s because I’m tired of the house, too, but I say, ‘Sure. Let’s go camping. We leave at dusk.’

  ‘Really? Truly, Dad?’

  ‘Sure,’ I say. ‘I said anything you like, right?’

  Happiness shines out of her.

  I put some supplies in a backpack. Flashlight, blanket, tarpaulin, energy bars, bottled water, toilet paper. Behind me I hear the dry sound of skirts rustling. Oh no. I squeeze my eyes closed really tight.

  Her hand is like cold clay on the back of my neck. Don’t let anyone see who you are, Mommy says.

  ‘I won’t,’ I say. ‘I just want to give Lauren a little treat. Only this once, I swear. I’ll make sure she never wants to go again.’

  You need to move them.

  The sun falls slowly into the treeline. I watch through the western peephole that faces the forest. When the light is almost gone I shoulder the backpack and turn out the lights.

  ‘Time to go,’ I say. ‘Pens and crayons, please.’

  She counts them into my hand one by one, and I put them away. They are all accounted for.

  ‘Do you need a drink of water before we go? Bathroom? Last chance.’

  She shakes her head. I can almost see the excitement coming off her like a series of little explosions.

  ‘You have to let me carry you.’ The pink bicycle will be useless on the forest floor.

  She says, ‘Whatever.’

  We go out the back door and I lock it after us. I check the street carefully before we come out from the shadow of the house. The road is empty. Midges dance around the buzzing yellow streetlight. The neighbouring house stares with its newsprint eyes. Further down the block it’s a different story. Sashes are pulled up, spilling noise and warm light. I catch the distant tone of a piano, the faint scent of pork chops cooking.

  ‘We could go knock on a door,’ Lauren says. ‘Say hi. Maybe they’d ask us to stay for supper.’

  ‘I thought you wanted to go camping?’ I say. ‘Come on, kitten.’

  We turn away to where the trees are outlined against the purple sky. We duck through the wooden gate and here we are, among them. The flashlight casts a wide bloodless beam on the trail.

  All signs of the city are soon behind us. We are enclosed by the forest. It is waking. The dark air is filled with hoots, clicks and song. Frogs, cicadas, bats. Lauren shivers and I feel her wonder. I love having her so close to me. I can’t recall the last time she let me carry her like this without a fight. She hates to be helpless.

  ‘What do you do if someone comes by?’ I ask her again.

  ‘I stay quiet and let you do the talking,’ she replies. ‘What’s that stink?’

  ‘Skunk,’ I say. The animal wanders alongside us on the path for a time, curious, perhaps. Then it ambles off into the wooded dark and the scent fades.

  We don’t go far, about a mile. A couple hundred feet off the path there’s the clearing. It’s hidden by boulders and thick scrub and you have to know how to find it. I know the way well. This is where the gods live.

  The scent of cedar and wild thyme is in the air, as strong as wine. But the trees that circle the clearing aren’t cedar or fir. They are pale slender ghosts.

  ‘Dad,’ Lauren says in a whisper. ‘Why are the trees white?’

  ‘They’re called paper birch trees,’ I say. ‘Or white birch. Look.’ I peel a sliver of bark from a trunk and show it to her. She strokes its whispering surface. I don’t tell her their true name, which is bone trees.

  I find the spot I want in the north-west corner, where I spread the groundsheet over the earth, still warm from the day. We sit. I make her drink some water, eat an energy bar. Overhead, the branches show through the stars. Lauren is quiet. I know she feels them. The gods.

  ‘This is nice,’ I say. ‘You and me together. It reminds me of when you were little. Those were wonderful times.’

  ‘I don’t remember it like that,’ she says. I feel a spurt of frustration. She is always pushing me away. But I stay calm.

  ‘I love you more than anyone else in the world,’ I tell her. And I mean it. Lauren is special. I never showed any of the others the clearing. ‘All I want is to keep you safe.’

  She says, ‘Dad, I can’t live like this any more. Sometimes I don’t want to live at all.’

  When I can breathe again I say, in as regular a tone as I can manage, ‘I’ll tell you a secret, kitten. Everyone feels like that sometimes. Sometimes things get bad, and you can’t see a future ahead. It’s all cloudy, like the sky on a rainy day. But life moves very fast. Things never stay the same for ever, even the bad things. The clouds will blow away. They always do, I promise.’

  ‘But I’m not like everyone else,’ Lauren says. Her voice is so sharp it could slice me. ‘Most people could have walked here on their own. I can’t. That’s not going to change or blow away. That’s going to stay the same for ever. Right, Ted?’

  I wince. There’s no answer to this. I hate it when she calls me Ted. ‘Let’s just watch the stars, kitten.’

  ‘You have to let me do stuff, Dad,’ she says. ‘You have to let me grow up.’

  ‘Lauren,’ I say, anger rising. ‘That’s not fair. I know you think you’re all mature. But you still need looking after. Remember what happened at the mall?’

  ‘That was years ago. It’s different now. Look, we’re outside and I’m being really good.’

  She feels the first one soon after. ‘Something bit me,’ she says. Her voice has only surprise in it. No fear yet.

  I am being stung too, on my leg, twice in quick succession. I don’t feel it, of course, but I watch the flesh rise into red lumps. They’re crawling all over us now. Lauren begins to scream. ‘What are they? Oh, God, Dad, what’s happening?’

  ‘They’re fire ants,’ I say. ‘We must be sitting on a nest.’

  ‘Get them off,’ she says. ‘It hurts, get them off me!’

  I grab the backpack and carry her through the trees at a run. The roots and brambles clutch my feet. When we reach the path I stop and brush us both down vigorously. I pour water over our exposed areas.

  ‘Did any of them get inside your clothes?’ I ask.

  ‘No,’ she says, ‘I don’t think so.’ Her voice is full of tears. ‘Can we go home, Dad?’

  ‘Of course, my kitten.’ I hold her tight all the way back. No more ‘Ted’, I notice.

  She says, ‘It was a dumb idea, camping. Thanks for getting us out of there.’

  I say, ‘That’s my job.’

  Lauren, tired out by it all, is unconscio
us before we reach the house. I put lotion on our bites, touching her sleeping skin with care. A line of vivid red pustules runs up her calf and into the crook of her knee, but that’s it. We ran before any real damage was done. The young feel pain intensely, I think, because they don’t know yet how deep it can go.

  Morning, and it’s time to say goodbye. Lauren clings. ‘I love you, Dad.’ Her breath is wet in my beard. ‘I don’t want to go.’

  ‘I know.’ I can taste her tears on my lips. Feeling rises like an ocean swell. It’s so strong I have to close my eyes. ‘I’ll see you next week,’ I say. ‘Don’t worry, kitten. You be good now. That will make the time go quickly and you’ll be back before you know it.’

  Each one of her sobs feels like I’m being hit with a wrench.

  I sit on the couch and listen to the music and feel just miserable. After a time I feel the lightest touch of whiskers against the back of my hand. A silken head pushes into my palm.

  Olivia has come out of hiding and she knows that I need her.

  I walk out to the woods with a gallon jug of pyrethrin. The forest is different during the day. Scattered light lies on the ground like handfuls of thrown grain. A deer pokes its face out from the foliage, dark eyes wide, then flees. I soon see why, as I pass the orange-juice-hair man with his dog. The dog grins at me like always. It remembers that time Olivia tried to get out. Then I overtake a family hiking in matching red jackets. I think they’re fighting. The children’s faces are small and serious; the dad looks tired. The mother strides ahead as if she’s alone.

  I walk on past the place where I would normally leave the path for the clearing, and then sit on a stump to wait. They pass in silence. The father nods at me. They are definitely fighting. Families are complicated.

  When their red jackets have vanished into the sunlit trees I circle back to the clearing. The groundsheet is still there. It lies wrinkled on the leaf mulch like the skin of a dead monster. Ants march busily across. It can’t stay here. It might draw attention to this place. I take a long stick and poke the groundsheet together, into a kind of pile. Then I hook it up and drop it into the trash bag I brought with me.