Holding Darkness Within
Sollipsist
5.
A solitary walk back from campus gave Heather plenty of time to fume about the bewildering difficulty of her courses this year. She’d always considered herself a pretty smart girl, and nothing that the school had thrown at her in her first two years had given her much reason to doubt it. The first few weeks of this semester, on the other hand, had her sitting through long classes feeling as if she’d accidentally walked in on a PhD level nuclear science course taught in Esperanto. Her brain felt clumsy and numb, and she had to force herself not to tune the professors out and doodle dirty pictures in her textbooks.
At least the rains had stopped, for the time being. The past week had seen a seemingly unending rainy streak, a slow steady pour that could make one forget there had ever been blue skies. The narrow tree-lined streets and old, uneven sidewalks were still nearly drowned with puddles. Heather jumped one and shifted her backpack to the opposite shoulder. The strap was starting to rub a little, and her feet were throbbingly puffy, but she felt her spirits lightening a bit as she neared her house. Min had offered to drive her back, but she had a late afternoon class and Heather didn’t feel like waiting as long as the skies stayed clear. She could have killed the next hour and half out in the student union, or doing some helpful library time, but she felt the need to get back to the house and relax a bit. Somehow, her troubles seemed less urgent once she walked through those doors.
When she walked in, dropping her backpack at the door, she could hear Ian and Caitlin chatting in the kitchen. She had to admit she’d developed a grudging acceptance of the boy. He turned out to be a surprisingly considerate housemate, willing to drive Heather around when she needed a ride and even impressing the girls with his skill and generosity making meals. And best of all, he never took up more than a few minutes in the bathroom.
“Hey, y’all,” she said as she entered the kitchen. “Min had another class, so I walked home.”
“It’s stopped raining?” Caitlin asked. She was sitting at the small cafe table in the corner, while Ian perched casually on a countertop. Heather shooed him off in order to get a glass from the cupboard. She filled her glass with water from the tap, and took a long refreshing drink.
“Yeah,” she answered, when she had drained the glass. “Thank God. That umbrella was a pain in the ass.”
“Well, we made history,” said Ian. “There are people still talking about our party. I guess a lot of people hooked up or at least got more wasted than they’ve ever been.”
“I know, it’s kind of embarrassing,” said Caitlin. “People I don’t even know are asking when we’re going to have another party at the ‘Love House’.”
“Over my dead body,” said Heather. “I’m still finding empties lying around.”
She sighed heavily and dropped herself into a kitchen chair.
“Rough day at work, honey?” Ian asked.
“Anybody else feel like it’s all harder this year?” Heather asked.
“Yep,” said Caitlin. “You just missed me telling Ian today’s sob stories.”
“No doubt,” said Ian. “Last year, when I was fucked up all the time, I always knew that I could easily get back on top of things when I had to...and I did. This year, it’s looking like I’m gonna have to work my ass off just to stay afloat.”
“You’re staying straight? I find that hard to believe,” said Heather.
“Well, I can cut back, anyway,” he laughed. “I know when to say no.”
“Aww, aren’t you afraid you’ll get all serious and...you know, motivated?” Caitlin smiled.
“It’s weird, usually when I stop my daily dosage I get a little irritable or have trouble sleeping,” he replied. “But I haven’t smoked since Sunday night and I’m still feeling pretty laid-back. I could almost take a nap right now, I’m so laid back.”
“I know!” said Caitlin, stretching. “I need to write twenty-five hundred words by tomorrow, but I think I’ll have to burn the midnight oil later. I can’t keep my eyes open!”
By the time Min got back to the house, the sun had set and the house was full of darkness. A quick discrete check of the upstairs rooms revealed that all of her housemates were asleep on their beds; she blushed and quickly ducked out when she saw Heather sprawled out in the nude atop her sheets. Min incredulously checked her watch again. “Wow, some dynamic roomies you have!” she whispered to herself, quietly laughing.
She couldn’t deny that she too was tired after her late class, but just being back at the house had given her a boost. She managed to keep herself busy in the dining room with homework, coffee, and music-considerately channeled through headphones. A few hours passed this way, with Min lost in her studies and other thoughts.
She jumped when Ian tapped her on the shoulder.
“Sorry to scare you,” he said, laughing.
“No problem,” Min said, easing the headphones to her shoulders. “Everyone passed out hard after classes, huh?”
“Yeah,” Ian said, flopping down on the couch. “I could probably go right back to bed and sleep through the night. I feel like my legs are made of lead.”
“Awww,” she sympathized. “If I didn’t have all this coffee in me, I’d be that way too. Once it wears off I’ll drop where I stand. Or sit, in this case...I guess it’s not as impressive to say it that way. Mmm, coffee...have a cup, why don’t you. And get me another one while you’re at it.”
“Ooo, feeling bossy tonight,” Ian laughed, standing back up. “That’s okay; I love it when beautiful women tell me what to do.”
Min winked. “Good boy.”
Conversation with Ian slowly tapered off, and when Min realized he’d nodded off on the couch, she pulled her headphones back on and tried to get her studious momentum working again. The caffeine was losing its potency for her, however, and she felt herself getting less and less likely to maintain any sort of productivity. She found herself looking at his reclined form and mentally totaling up his attractive points. Though they added up to a respectable sum, Min was just not moved in any way when she regarded him. He was good-looking, nice, and funny...and even sexy, in an objective way; she could see recommending him to a friend but never dating him herself. Min tried to picture her ideal man and came up with nothing more than vague abstractions.
Dating had always been an odd situation for Min. Many of her dating memories were of uncomfortable silences. The guys almost always expected her to keep up her approachable, rapid-fire social conversation. She had derived much more enjoyment from flirting or teasing, especially in public, than she ever got from one-on-one encounters. She wondered if she had sex sometimes just to end the awkwardness. She figured she’d had a healthy number of partners; probably not as many as Heather (who she respected for her up-front ease about sexual matters), but definitely more than Caitlin (who Min suspected might still be a virgin). Not that Min thought of herself as slutty, of course...but her eager curiosity couldn’t bear to think of untapped possibilities for naughty fun. She suddenly realized she’d begun to drift off, in the midst of vague lascivious reminiscences.
“Nope, not gonna get anything more done tonight,” she said aloud, waking Ian. “You should get back to bed, too.” He grunted and trudged zombie-like up to his room.
Heather was having a strange dream. It was detailed and vivid, yet filled with obvious impossibilities. For instance, while she could feel the thin wrap of her bedsheet, she couldn’t muster the strength to move her arms or legs. She could see the patterns of the cracks on the opposite wall, but she knew it was the middle of the night and her room was almost pitch black. And strangest of all, Terri was laying beside her, naked, with her arms behind her head. The redhead was smiling up at the ceiling as if stretched out on a grassy hill watching fluffy summer clouds.
“Uh, hey Terri,” Heather said.
“Hey.”
The girls lay silent for a few minutes. Heather tried to remember why it was strange that Terri was there.
“Where have you been?” she finally asked.
Terri luxuriantly stretched and ran her fingers through her thick, curly hair. “Oh, around.”
After another quiet period, Heather spoke up again.
“Sooo...you know, you still have a room. And your own bed.”
Terri reached over and began stroking Heather’s hair softly. “Am I bugging you?”
“No...it’s kinda weird, though. And for some reason I can’t seem to move.”
“Do you really want to?”
“No...I guess not.” Heather sighed, feeling the other girl’s gentle fingers in her long straight hair. Both Terri and Heather’s mother used to relax her this way after a long day. When they had been roommates, she had fallen asleep more than once to Terri’s soothing touch.
“You’ve been kinda stressed-out lately,” Terri sympathized.
“Yeah,” Heather answered, letting her eyes close. “Everything seems so much tougher this year. I thought I’d be getting the hang of it by now.”
“Not everything is hard, though,” Terri answered. “You have a lovely house filled with people who care about you.”
“I know,” said Heather. “It’s just, as soon as I leave it, things go wrong.”
“Maybe you should just stay here then,” smiled Terri.
“Funny you say that,” Heather replied. “I’ve thought that, a couple times. Like last week when the weather got bad; I looked out the windows and thought, ‘I could just stay here all day. Forget school, forget everything.’ It all just seems so, I don’t know...homey here, y’know?”
“I know,” Terri said. She began to caress Heather’s cheek with one hand while continuing to stroke her hair with the other.
“And I missed you so much,” confessed Heather. “We don’t talk about it much but we all really really miss you. You’ve been there for me ever since freshman year. I miss talking to my best friend.”
“I’m here now, sweetie,” she responded. “It will all be okay.” The redhead leaned over and lightly kissed Heather on the forehead.
Heather smiled, and fell back to dreamless sleep.
Down the hall, Caitlin was leaning back in her desk chair, still slightly groggy from an extended nap but determined to plod along until her literature paper was complete. Her eyes had some trouble focusing on the PC monitor in front of her. She’d always been able to crank out these meaningless reports without thinking, but she kept being distracted by flashes of scenes and dialogue that got jotted down in her “ideas” file. There were lots of these jottings now; used to criticizing herself for being unoriginal and prosaic, now she wondered if she had the writing chops to do justice to the surreal and outré possibilities that had recently flowed forth. They were in any case much more tempting to follow up on than “Feminine Protagonists in Fin de Siecle Literature”.
Still, her research on the time period had her casual architectural interest stimulated. She realized once again that she was sitting in a house that was built around 1890, the same time as Hugo’s Paris and the excesses of the Gay Nineties. She did some casual web searches on the era, and then typed in the address of the house on a whim. Unfortunately, it was a rather common address, especially around New England, and when she specified the name of the town it gave no results at all. She tapped her teeth with a pencil and wondered how she could find out more about the house’s history. First she was going to explore it some more, but that would wait until daylight hours. And definitely until her paper was done.
Min got up to take a piss, and realized she was thirsty. She saw the light on under Caitlin’s door and thought of stopping in, but she was pretty tired and didn’t want to disturb the hard-working girl. Caitlin had such drive, thought Min, always putting in extra time with her work. Min herself was admittedly bright but also quite distractible; her schoolwork was marked by exceptional beginnings that trailed off to mere dutiful competence as she found another source for her enthusiasm. She carefully and quietly descended to the first floor and made her way towards the kitchen.
She pulled on the chain, and blinked in the sudden pale light. Grabbing a quick drink of water, she leaned up against the old thick-bodied refrigerator and tried to muster her strength for the long walk back to bed. The thought of passing out on the couch came to mind, but even that was many steps away. Why didn’t they have a bed in the kitchen? she foolishly wondered, and then remembered the cozy enclave hidden behind the wainscoting. Just a quick nap, she promised herself, and then I’ll drag myself back up to bed. She pulled the small door open, and cuddled into a snug half-kneeling position with the soft velvety crimson all around her. It was almost better than her bed.
The next morning, Caitlin waited until her groggy housemates had left for class before beginning her explorations. Her schedule this semester allowed her to get a late start on alternate days, so she didn’t have to be out the door for a few more hours. Her first stop was the attic. She was frustrated that the pull-chain that opened the trapdoor was stuck up in the handle; no amount of stretching and jumping brought her anywhere near close enough to snag it. Finally she found herself standing shakily on her toes, on top of a chair. She reached up, holding the point of a closed umbrella, and tried to hook the rope with the curved handle. A few wrenching losses of balance later, she succeeded, freeing the rope. It slapped her in the face limply as she hopped off the chair.
She heaved downward on the pull-chain, almost lifting herself off the floor. The trapdoor creaked open, and a rickety segmented set of steps slowly unfolded with an alarming splintering noise. She tested her weight on the raw wood, and it seemed relatively sturdy, so she hoisted herself up and into the darkness of the room above.
She’d assumed, for some reason, that it would be a low cramped area, but in the peaked center she found herself able to stand upright and look around. Bright dusty stripes of morning sunshine filtered through seams and cracks, and at either end of the attic glowed from behind windows grey with neglect. The air was unsurprisingly close and dusty, and the main building material seemed to be cobwebs. Caitlin wondered how long it had been since the last time anyone had a need to enter this place.
Initially, she was disappointed; besides the cobwebs and a few broken pieces of furniture, the attic seemed empty. She walked with care from one end to the other, scanning the corners for a chest or trunk or box of any kind. Almost ready to give up, she glimpsed a raised rectangle of dust not too far from the trapdoor. Brushing it off, she saw it was a slender case, like a portfolio, and mostly intact despite a spatter of some unknown whitish mildew. She carefully pried apart the stiff opening, and was overjoyed to see a small stack of yellowed papers covered in a flowing, spiraling handwriting.
“Let’s get you to better light,” she said. She climbed back down the wobbling wood ladder and brought the folio into her room. There, in the brightness that her tower’s windows provided, she gingerly extracted the stack of paper from the case and examined them. The paper was darkened and stained with age, and the handwriting would have been difficult enough for modern eyes to read even without the fading of the blue-black ink. But Caitlin’s joy at her find, and surging historical interest, allowed her to slowly reconstruct the words.
The first several sheets were a series of love letters, written a young woman in Boston named Emily and dated 1897. The recipient was never mentioned by name, only as “my beloved” or later, “my betrothed”. He was quite possibly living at this very house, though; at one point she wrote “how I long to visit you again at your new house in the country.” The letters were both innocent and formal, as if the girl were trying to impress her love with unearned maturity and sophistication. She alluded to a recent tragedy (“so soon after your terrible loss”) and also to current events (“we could ride the new underground trains around Boston”) but much of the correspondence was simple girlish sentiment. It seemed from the last of the letters that the girl was concerned about her fiancée, and hurt by his failure to reply more quickly (“if your heart has found another, or grown cold to my memory, common courtesy should at least dictate more timeliness in your replies”). Caitlin found herself frustrated at the abrupt and inconclusive end to the girl’s lovely and plaintive correspondence.
The last few papers were of relatively more recent date; a soldier in the first world war writing to his family from the battlefield. Caitlin found herself pitying the poor soldier, who gave a detailed description of his experience with poison gas attacks during the battle of Verdun. He mostly spoke of himself and his fellow soldiers; Caitlin skimmed quickly, looking for something more relevant to her personal investigations. It was only in the last of the three letters that she found a reference.
“Your last letter left me in fear for you and our family,” it read. “This war makes cowards of men, but I’m more afraid of what I will find when I return. I said all along that you should have stayed in Burlington, among friends and relations, rather than taking that maidservant position. Now your employer has revealed herself to be a wicked, godless woman, and all the men under my command are insufficient to grant you a moment’s peace.”
More questions than answers, really, but Caitlin was able to begin her log of her findings. She selected a fresh notebook, and wrote everything she knew about the house in the first few lines. There was a man who lived in the house not long after it was built, who’d had a relationship with a young society girl from Boston. There was a woman who had come to work for the owners of the house, whom she apparently grew to loathe, while her husband was fighting in WWI. Scant info, but better than nothing. Caitlin let her mind wrap around this information while she unwillingly washed and dressed for classes.