God's Tuesdays [1]

I don’t think she’d cleaned her house for a century or two.

“And here’s the spare room,” Mrs. Valasquez said, motioning me in as she opened the final wooden door at the end of the hall. Like the other rooms, it was divied up between the dust, moths and flies, along with the occasional cat. I think the prowling felines creeped me out more than any of the bugs; their ash-gray bodies ducked in and out of hiding places like a bunch of startled shadows, with amber eyes that gleamed with the haunting light of a phantom‘s torch. I decided I wouldn’t let on about my cat phobia…my friends had enough things to tease me about.

“--and if you could just dust this place up, that would sure butter my bagel,” Mrs. V concluded. ‘Butter my bagel’ wasn’t a weird thing for her to say - ‘jolly my Roger,’ ‘peanut my butter,’ - they all meant the same thing in Mrs. V’s world. If I could ‘lickety her split’ or ‘corn her cob’ I was in good shape.

I nodded. To be honest, I don’t talk much, maybe because my dad used to enjoy shutting my trap with a good punch to the jaw if I said anything that peeved him. Luckily we hadn’t crossed paths for a good three years.

“Well, I’d better be off for the tea,” she said, wiping her white-gloved hands together with a sort of finality. “I’ll let you get to it.”

The steps groaned, griped and whined as she made her way down, foot-by-foot, and opened the door. I waited for her image to disappear from beyond the stained-glass window, and then looked around. I was alone in a creepy house. The creepy house.

Maybe thirteen’s too old to believe in stupid ghost stories, I dunno, but I couldn’t help but wonder. Had she really killed her own husband? And her daughter, too? A kid named Foster Wilmer from school told me that she’d gone totally bezerk and killed Mr. Valasquez and their 12-year-old daughter Julia way back in the day. I told Foster that was a load of B.S., but…

Well, I gave the last room an extra peek for any moping spirits.

Realistically, I didn’t have anything to worry about anyway; after all, my own house was parked two feet away from hers. From Mrs. V’s bedroom on the second floor, I could peer straight into my mom’s study. But a house like Mrs. V’s could give Dracula nightmares. At one point in time, before Columbus sailed the ocean blue, Mr. and Mrs. V must have built this house, and honestly it had probably been nice…in its own way. Now it was more like a creepy relic, with grayed wooden floors that moaned and faded walls that groaned and mice that squeaked and cats that hissed and things that went bump in the night.

Bump, something upstairs said. Bump-bump.

I’d bet Foster Wilmer wouldn’t even believe it. Bump, bump, bump thump, roll, rattle…silence…thud. My heart seemed to mimick the sounds.

“Stupid cats,” was my shaky excuse. I took my broom and dutifully did my job, sweeping up the mounds of dust until they formed mini mountains, then sending them outside to pollute the ozone while I washed dishes and dusted off Mrs. V's hodgepodge of strange knick-knacks. A couple baseball cards were in the closet - probably once belonging to Mr. V - and even though they were classics that had probably never suffered the wear and tear outside the mint-conditioned cases, I couldn’t hardly stand to even touch them. Snooping through a dead guy’s stuff’s just a little creepy, y’know?

Well I did my job but I was out of there as soon as I could be, even though the house was silent again. It was only when I had my hand on the doorknob that I heard another sound - a soft and swift a-choo!

Sure, call me a wuss, but I’ll be honest - that sent me off at the speed of sound.

“Hey, Rusty, how was you job?” my mom asked with a hint of amusement as I bolted through the door. For the record, my real name’s not Rusty - I’m just called that because my hair’s this reddish-brown, and somehow the name stuck. Answering my mom’s question with a little white lie, I regained my composure and said, “Fine.”

Mom laughed in that way that was so warm it could melt butter. I know kids are supposed to be embarrassed by their parents and stuff, but my mom was awesome. Her hair was redder than mine, as red as her Irish mother’s, and it was tied back in a messy bun by a butterfly pin, which could only mean she was working on a big project in her studio. I could also tell she was working because unfortunately the house didn’t smell as delicious as usual. If she wasn’t caught up in one of her “master plans,” then she cooked something that could make you drool like a dog. Her robin’s-egg blue eyes gleamed. “Didn’t run into any ghosts, did ya?” For a second the faint Irish accent returned in her voice, which was another thing I loved. “No spooks to speak of?”

I rolled my eyes. “Mom, I’m too old to believe in that -” I thought of a cleaner word, “stuff.”

“M-hmm,” she said with the raise of an eyebrow. I thought she’d say something else, but instead she made a beeline up the stairs towards her study. Her work awaits.

Meanwhile, I grabbed a cookie from the jar my mom hid. I’d found her secret hiding place when I was nine, she just didn’t know it yet. There are good things that come from a mom too absentminded to remember when she’d filled the cookie jar.

I stared out at the house next-door as I nibbled through the sugary dough. I’d turned out all the lights to follow Mrs. V's orders, and now the tattered remains of white silk curtains hung limp around dark portals that glimpsed inside. There were a lot of stained glass windows, too, the only part of her house to catch the sunlight on days there was any to catch. Now in November the rainbow images were lifeless too.

I thought of the thumping I’d heard from upstairs. Upstairs where? I’d been upstairs; it’d been like somebody was on the roof. But not exactly. Mrs. V hadn’t included a third floor in the tour, and there wasn’t really one to show.

Well, not really. My room was on the third floor of our house, one that used to be an attic. But the walls were higher than even those in the other rooms’ were, and even though they slanted in, there was a lot of room for my hammock bed, dresser, desk, and hilltops of clothes piles that carpeted my wooden floor. Out my window I could see the upper part of Mrs. V’s house - where there was nothing but a little window with a pair of old curtains drawn. I figured it was her attic, but it was probably boarded up now, because Mrs. V never brought it up when she showed me the house, and I sure hadn't seen any way in or out.

Maybe…because that was where dead Mr. V and their daughter Julia were.

The thought gave me chills, and I thought about the bumps and thumps again, and as I’d walked out the faint little a-choo! Foster Wilmer was a liar, I was too grown up to believe in ghosts, and there was nothing a little old lady needed to hide…

but I was scared.