Attic

She comes back to her body in increments; light and shadow, vague shapes, soft edges sharpening into discernable things. She blinks heavily, fingers twitching at her sides as she slides back into consciousness.

She’s standing at the foot of another set of stairs. The House has moved for her, moved her for it. The steps are steep and old, but the destination is clear. Her hand lands heavily on the dust coated banister, dragging the film upwards as she ascends. There are few steps to traverse, and she reaches the door quickly. She tries the rusted round knob, but it’s locked. She remembers the key around her neck and pulls the necklace free. It fits. Opening the door, she finds herself in an attic.

Sheets have been draped over most everything, white ghosts suspended over forgotten memories. She steps into the room, footfalls echoing off the high, wood beamed ceiling. She wonders what object are hidden beneath the white mounds, what arrangement of things could create such obscure shapes. The desire to find out isn’t strong enough to lure her over, but she continues to wonder all the same. Boxes, surely, photo albums, remnants of childhood, and family history, of lifetimes no one will remember.

The room starts to open at the back, white cotton ghosts dropping in numbers the further she walks, until she arrives at a large, unoccupied space. She notices the rope first: long and dark, it hangs straight down from one of the wooden beams. It doesn’t move, merely lays in wait for something she can’t quite put her finger on.

A large window sits beyond the rope, a simple circle of glass inlaid in the wall. Grime coats its surface, collecting heavily around the seams. The filth has turned it opaque, the scene beyond muddied, unseeable. She makes to move towards the window, intent on using her sleave to clear a section of the glass but pauses mid step when her eyes land on the entity.

It looms in the left corner of the room. Dark silhouette nearly indistinct from the dimness of the intersection. Even without eyes she knows it is watching her. Waiting.

She looks ahead to the window, to the rope, and closes her eyes.

The first time her father touched her in a way that didn’t feel quite right she was ten. The lead up is muddled in her mind, a routine so overplayed as to be unremarkable, but the after is sharp. Clear. He’d beckoned her over, patting his lap as he’d done before. An Invitation.

She’d loved him then. Trusted him. Took comfort in his large hands, his warm palms that would cup her cheek or stroke her hair. Sitting in his lap felt like a reward. A doting father. An affectionate daughter.

It started the same as always. Her legs thrown over his lap, seat resting on one of his larger thighs, head tucked under his chin. Her arms wound around his broad chest, clinging. His touch usually remained light. Hand casually resting on her back, or strong arm scooped around her legs to keep her in place. What happened instead was he grabbed her by the hips.

The grip was startingly, the force of it, the intention. She looked up to his face questioningly, but he didn’t look back. He moved her. Repositioned her small body until she sat with her back to his front, eyes staring out into the dim glow of the kitchen where her mother was making dinner.

His hands never left her hips as he drew her closer.

“Shhh,” his hot air brushed against her ear, uncomfortably warm. Not quite a warning, but a command housed in velvet.

That violation was the first of many. The first of years to come. Of mounting horrors, of her body being taken from her, of her youth being sullied. Of her mother turning a blind eye to the onset of closed doors, stolen moments. Her husband’s late-night escapades.

She would sometimes wonder what her mother was doing, thinking, as he put his dark filth inside her. Infected her.

Some days she could convince herself that her mother didn’t know. But most days she couldn’t swallow the lie.

When she left home for good at sixteen, she locked it all away. Threw away the key, buried her childhood as deep into the ground as she could manage.

And it had worked. The distance dulled the edges of the few memories that remained. Time did the rest. With every year it became easier to forget. Easier to move forward, reinvent herself. Become someone else.

She was no longer a scared girl cowering under her bed, but a competent woman. A capable woman. A woman seemingly untouched by her past.

Sure, she never felt quite right. Never felt settled, or secure, or happy, or healthy. But that was inconsequential. A quirk she could manage in exchange for her freedom. She had to believe in the fantasy she had crafted.

No one in her life knew. Didn’t even suspect the insidious rot housed inside her. And why would they? She hardly remembered it herself -even though she sometimes still woke in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, shaking from the feel of phantom hands touching her body- and whenever cracks would try to form, she was quick to seal them up again.

Not that she had many people in her life. She found it difficult to connect to others, hard to trust intentions, believe in kindness. She questioned the motivations of others constantly. Held everyone at a distance.

It was easier that way. Tolerable.

Her life was fine up until her mother called.

Her diaries. Traitorous traces of her past. Memoires of her abuse she’d forgotten to dispose of. Careless. Her mother found all of them. Read all of them. Belated sympathy, care coming far too late. Then there was the call, the message left behind the key to the box she buried long ago. Her mother’s words broke through every fissure she’d been shoddily filling for decades. Shattered her to pieces.

It had been too much. She simply could not handle the deluge.

Please stop, please stop, MAKE IT STOP!

Opening her eyes she looks back to the corner. The entity is gone. She walks towards the tail of the rope, picking up the frayed end. The weight of it is solid in her hand. Sturdy. She looks at the window as she loops the end around her neck.

She steps back, dragging the length of the cable with her. She runs, feet pounding against the floor, kicking up dust and debris, as she hurdles towards the window. She doesn’t stop, doesn’t slow, and she breaks through the glass cleanly.

Sound explodes, the window explodes, glass flies into the air just as she flies into the air.