Maddie's Ghost

Prologue: Scratches

It’d all started with the scratches. I don’t remember when they started, exactly, or how long they might’ve been going on before the first time they woke me up. When they did wake me up, I’d groggily turned onto my back in my bed and tried to pin down the slow, quiet scratching. I’d listened and eventually pin down where I thought I heard them coming from the far corner of my bedroom ceiling, barely discernible. I’d rolled over onto my side, adjusted my pillow, and lay back down. It was probably just a squirrel in the rafters, or maybe a mouse.
Then they got louder. At first, they were only quiet, small scratches that woke me around 2 or 3 in the morning. They got louder and started earlier and earlier, more and more frequently. It got to the point where it felt like they started up right after I’d turn off my lights and lay down. I tried to ignore it. I really, really did. But I couldn’t, I’d just lay there listening for what felt like hours until the sound filled my head. One night I didn’t sleep at all. I just lay on my back, staring at the corner of my bedroom ceiling, listening.

For a week after that I didn’t hear anything. I finally relaxed and got a few nights restful sleep. After a month of that horrible scraping, I felt that whatever annoying varmint that built a nest in my ceiling’s rafters had moved on. It was starting to get creepy.

Then the footsteps started. They were soft, like someone trying to tip-toe across the far ceiling of my room. I thought I was hearing things until there was a small creak, like someone stepping on a loose floorboard, and then nothing. My room was silent. I had a nightmare sometime that night.

That was three weeks ago, and I hadn’t heard anything more since. I let it slip my mind. Old houses make noises all the time and it’s been a windy early autumn.

Chapter One: Boots

I stumble over one of mom’s shoes at the bottom of the stairs. It’s wet and muddy, and now my right foot is wet. I sigh a little and make my way down the hall to the kitchen.

I’m surprised to find mom at the stove, her back to me. I glance around our small kitchen and see a large mixing bowl on the kitchen counter and what looks like pancake batter slopped around its edge.

“‘Morning, mom,” She spun around, making a yelp as her arm hits the mixing bowl and sends it crashing to the linoleum floor.

“Maddie! Don’t do that! Look what you did,” she shouts, glaring at me.

“Sorry, I’ll get it,” I shuffle over to the sink and wet some paper towels, oh I need to get more of them, and bend down to start cleaning up the spilt batter. It’s pretty lumpy batter.

“Honestly, Maddie, this is what I get for making breakfast for you?”

I throw away the dirty paper towels and pick up the mixing bowl, “sorry, mom, what’re you making?”

She huffed and turned back to the stove, tossing her long and messy auburn hair over her shoulder, “I was making eggs and pancakes, but now it’ll just have to be eggs,”.

“Oh, well, thanks. I’ll just get outta your way then,” I say as I move to sit at the one clear space at our kitchen table. I wonder if I should bother trying to move any of the junk for mom to have a spot too. She starts mumbling to herself and I slump over my chair. I try not to think about last night, or rather, this morning.

THUMP...thump...thump...

CLACK. I almost jump out of my skin when mom drops the plate of eggs in front of me, grinning, “Wake-y wake-y, eggs and bake-y!” I glare at her and pick up my fork and begin eating the mostly-cooked and only slightly burnt eggs on my plate. I guess mom forgot I didn’t like runny eggs. Oh well.

Her maternal duties fulfilled, mom disappears to our living room I hear the TV turn on. I wonder if she’s going to work later. She probably will, she’s been pretty good about it lately. I poke my eggs a little more before deciding that the only way they’re going down is if I get it all in one fell swoop, like medicine, or diving into cold water. I eat them as fast as I can without choking.

Avoiding the wet shoe, I go back upstairs to get dressed. My room is to the right of our narrow stairs, down the hall from mom’s and with the third bedroom and bathroom between them. My door was open still, and I can’t believe I’m hesitating in front of it. I shake off my stupidity. I didn’t hear heavy footsteps last night, I didn’t hear someone wearing boots clomp across my ceiling. It was probably just a rat or raccoon. A very fat raccoon.
______________________________________________________________________________

I pull hard on the front door until I hear it click and lock it behind me. The sun is pale in the sky, meek through the thin clouds. At least it doesn’t look like its going to rain.

My bus stops at the very end of my block, just around the corner from Ms. Georgia’s house. It’s a big, old house, but not old like mine. My house was put up sometime in the 70s I think, but Ms. Georgia’s house is early 1900s old. Old in that dignified way, much like Ms. Georgia herself I guess. Not that I’d ever tell her that, she’d have a fit.

As I get closer, I see Ms. Georgia sitting in her chair on her veranda (not porch, its a veranda). She catches sight of me and excitedly waves me over. I walk up to her veranda steps where she meets me, “Oh, good morning Maddison! How are you dear?”

“Just fine, Ms. Georgia,” I shrug, “and you?”

“Quite well, sweetie. I don’t want to hold you up, but I was wondering if you could do me a favor today?”

“Um, sure. What do you need?”

“Well, today I’m going to visit my dear Andrew in the hospital. Oh I do wish he wouldn’t insist on being in that cold place, full of sickness, you know, and terribly inconvenient to get there. Anyway, I won’t be able to do my weekly grocery shopping today, so I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind picking them up for me on your way home? I’ll give you the money and you know where the spare key is, right? Same place as always. Would you mind, dear?”

How she can rant so slowly and speak so quickly I don’t think I’ll ever understand. Must be a southern thing. Before she can start at it again, I tell her sure. She briefly disappears into her house and comes back with way more money than I thought she would and a note with her meticulously handwritten instructions. “Now, dear, just take this on down to Clark’s and Mr. Clark will get everything ready for you. Now, to school with you,” she says as she shoos me off towards my bus stop. I make sure to put the money and list in the pocket of my backpack without the hole.
______________________________________________________________________________

I really don’t like this place. The room’s walls are covered with faded motivational posters (HANG IN THERE) and anti-drug paraphernalia (JUST SAY NO, CRACK IS WHACK). There’s dirt and dust in the corners and it reeks of industrial cleaners and tropical lysol. There’s one window, but the blinds are always down. Broken, probably.

As much as I don’t like this particular office, I pretty much hate the guy sitting in it across a faux-wood desk in front of me. He adjusts his round glasses and shuffles through papers in a manila folder for several unnecessary moments. I don’t move, starring at the edge of the desk.

“So, Maddie, how are you doing?”

I start a little, but not noticeably, “Fine.”

“Fine?”

“Peachy.”

“I see,” he goes back to the papers, his eyes moving along the text. I know you’ve already read it. He picks up the sheets and places them back into the folder, taps it on the desk top to neaten up the papers. He sets it aside and clasps his hands on his desk and leans forward, all eyes and ears now. “Maddie, how are things in school?”

“Fine,” I resist the urge to fidget. I know he knows that I know he knows my grades. They’re... fine, mostly.

“They are decent, but they could be better, Maddie,” he sighs and leans back in his chair, a look of immaculate concern on his face, “but how are things at home?”

“Okay.”

“Now, Maddie, we’ve gone through this before. I can’t help you unless you are willing to open up. I know things must be hard after... what you’ve been through but really Maddie we won’t get anywhere without some cooperation...”

He keeps talking but I stop listening after awhile. Mr. Frowinski really likes to hear his own voice. I look over his shoulder at the back wall of his office, because frankly its far more interesting than him. He thinks he’s a real psychologist, even his name plate insists ‘Dr. Frowinski’. I never call him that.

“... so unless you want other measures to be taken, I suggest you cooperate, Maddie,” Mr. Frowinski leans forward again and I refocus with a start.

“Other measures?”

“Yes, Maddie. I’m concerned with your home conditions and, well, we don’t want social services to get involved, surely,” he adds with a look of almost-compassion.

I resist the urge to glare at this quack, who just thinks he knows best before I give him Standard Response #2, “Everything is fine, really, Mr. Frowinski,” yeah, I saw that twitch at the lack of ‘doctor’, “Mom and I are getting along good, she’s got a steady job, I got shoes on my feet, a roof over my head, and food in my gut. Things could be better, but they could be worse too. Can I go now, Mr. Frowinski? I gotta few errands to run...”

He watches me for a moment, like someone watching a curiosity at some freak-show and gives a sigh of exasperation. He opens the manilla folder (my school file) and makes a mark on some paper and closes it again. “Yes, you may go Maddie, but I’d like to see you again in a few weeks to make sure things are going well,” he scribbles a date on a yellow slip and hands it to me, “have a good afternoon, Maddie,” and I turn to go. I really wish he’d stop calling me Maddie.
______________________________________________________________________________

Clark’s is one of those nicer, smaller, quaint old-style grocery stores that are really hard to find these days. It certainly doesn’t look like much, but then again, not many places around here do really. Ms. Georgia swears this area was once quite the place to be, but I always found that hard to believe.

I shift my back pack and pull out the grocery list. I have to squint at Ms. Georgia’s immaculate, but very fine handwriting. “May I help you, Miss?” I glance up to see a short, kinda chubby and balding man coming out from one of the shop’s aisles. I quickly glance down to the list again, shrug and hand it over to the guy.

“Um, yeah, could you help me with this? I’m pickin’ up some groceries for a neighbor...”

He pushes his glasses up and his eyes dart over the list, “Ah, this must be for Ms. Potter, eh?”
I nod. “Not to worry, I’ll get this sorted right out for you. Ms. Potter has really particular demands, doesn’t she?” I shrug in response. He looks expectantly at me for a moment before clearing his throat, all business-like, and motions for me to grab a basket and follow him around.

“Here you go, Westmichford Milk... Arthur Farm’s Finest cheddar... Ah, yes, this too... only the finest for Ms. Potter, eh? How’s her husband faring? Cancer really is the worst, but Mr. Potter was always the go-getter type. Breker’s Orchard Prune Juice... ah well, it seems at least she’s keeping up with her health. I tell you, if people stopped eating that rotten stuff you get from those supermarkets, they’re live a lot longer. Or, at least, wouldn’t die from things like cancer. Take Ms. Potter, she’s been shopping here 35 years and she’s healthy as a mule! Oh! Don’t tell her I said that, I meant she’s as healthy as... well... as a prized show horse! Yes, certainly not a mule...”

I didn’t seem to bother Mr. Clark one bit to have a one sided conversation. Its kinda funny. It doesn’t take long for him to fill up the basket of necessities and to start ringing the stuff out. The whole time I don’t think Mr. Clark even paused for a breath.

After handing over the money (way more than I would’ve felt comfortable paying for this amount of groceries) and walking out the store’s shop, we both jump when a we hear a sudden SPLAT! against the front windows of the store, just missing me by a foot. Mr. Clark stutters to a stop when he sees the huge splatter of red paint on the windows. I give a long blink and then look over my grocery bags. Yeah, I should’ve known I wouldn’t be lucky. There’s red paint splattered all over me too. I hear loud laughter and the thudding of running feet beyond the store-front, but Mr. Clark is far too slow. They’re gone by the time he gets over to the door.

“Goddamn hooligans!” yeah, he actually says ‘hooligans’, “Great! Just great! Where’s my hose? I have to wash this off quickly... oh dear, looks like they got you too! Do you want to use the restroom in the back?”

I think for a moment, but shake my head. “No thanks. I’ll just wash it off at home.” I doubt it’ll come out but it doesn’t really matter much anyway.

“Well if you’re sure. Get home safe now, give Ms. Potter my regards. I tell you, what is this neighborhood coming too?”
______________________________________________________________________________

“Man, you look like you’ve been slaughtering small animals!”

I glance over to the source of the nasally voice and see a a kid a few years older than me coming up alongside me on a bike. I recognize him, his name is Dick. It’s a real fitting name. I shift the groceries into a more sure grip and ignore him.

“Nothing to say, Maddie? C’mon! What’s that red stuff all over you?” a snickering voice comes up behind me on my other side. I forgot this one’s name, but the shit-face grin he’s got makes me think he knows exactly what’s splattered on my clothes and may even know why. I keep moving on ahead.

“Where ya goin’, Maddie?” Dick asks, his expression a mirror of Forgot-his-name. He jerks his bike to cut me off. I stop and stare at him. “Cat got your tongue?”

“Hey, guys, aren’t you gonna be late? Get a move-on, the girls won’t wait forever,” a third voice says.

“Pfft, they better! C’mon, lets go Dick,” snorts Forgot-his-name. They both snicker as they bike away.

“Sorry about that Maddie,” the owner of the third voice comes into view. I stiffen. “Need any help with that?”

“No.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, Jim. I’m fine,” I resume my walking, but it’s more like marching. He bikes along side me.

“Hey, Madds,” I glare at him, “sorry, Maddie, I just wanted to apologize about, um, that,” Jim gestures to the red paint stains, “I didn’t know-”

“Whatever, just go on. I gottta get going,” I grate out, avoiding his apology.

He looks at me and shakes his head, “well... it was nice seein’ ya...” and pushes on a head of me, catching up with the other guys.
______________________________________________________________________________

Thump... thump... thump...

A slow and steady pace towards me from across the ceiling. Someone is stomping around in heavy boots. I hear it, I feel it as the ceiling creaks under the weight. It can’t be happening, there’s no way it can.

Thump... thump... thump....

They’re moving away now, but I can’t help but feel they’ll be coming back towards me again. I force my eyes to stay open. I know its not real. The house is just old and the wind is blowing too hard.

Creeeak

I take deep, quiet breaths. Nothing more than the house settling. How many times have I walked around and the floor protest just like that? I feel my heart beating steadily and my eyelids dropping again. Nothing to worry about. Nothing but the dark and mind tricks...
______________________________________________________________________________

“Oh thank ya dear for getting my groceries yesterday! Such a wonderful help you are, come on in darlin’ you look cold!”

It’s the next day, a Saturday, and for lack of anything else to do, I find myself walking past Ms. Georgia’s house. That lady has an uncanny ability to know just when I’m walking by. I think it’s got something to do with that chair she always has right by her kitchen window.

“Afternoon, Ms. Georgia. How’s Mr. Andrew?”

“Oh, wouldn’t ya know, he back on the down side again. He was doin’ real well for a while! That doctor said he might’ve even be able to come home, but, no, he’s back to being on the worse side of things,” she tells me as I slip off my sneakers. Ms. Georgia hasn’t even told me to take off my shoes, but it only feels right to do it when entering her house. I hardly ever bother at home. “How about an apple, dear? My dear cousin from Potter County sent them down to me, but the silly thing sent far to many!”

I nod and give my thanks. Ms. Georgia and I’ve got a system. I do things for like run small errands, do the more manual garden work, fix things around the house for her, and she gives me some of her ‘spare change’ and sometimes a meal or two. Nothing too big or fancy, just a mutual understanding. She could probably do most of the stuff herself, but I think she likes the company. I guess older people like to have someone to talk at. She doesn’t mind me not participating much conversation-wise. She mostly just tells stories about when she was ‘just a naive little thang’ on her dad’s old peach orchard in Georgia or stories about the neighborhood from when she was growing up. I don’t mind.

Today is one of those weird Fall days when the weather can’t make up its mind. The wind is blowing pretty steadily, but the sun’s out and it’s warm. When I finish up the apple, Ms. Georgia is bustling around the kitchen. I glance out down the hall to her parlor (not living room, she always insists) through the big bay window. The old maple tree in her back yard is nearly bare, and the wind is making short work of the other tree’s leaves.

“Isn’t it just terrible?” she asks me as she pulls out the chair and sits across from me at her kitchen table. “They say you eventually get used to the cold, but how can a-body get used to it if every year the cold comes earlier and earlier! I swear, in Georgia right now, the trees would still be green!”

“Really?”

“Yes! Sometimes I wonder if it’s worth stayin’ up here... the doctor said that movin’ South might be better for Andrew...” he voice trails off and she gets a far away look in her grey eyes.

“Maybe you two could become snowbirds?”

“Well! What? And be like those Jeffersons? Hardly!” she puts on the air of a greatly aghast lady, but her grin puts off the effect.

“Would you like help with those leaves, Ms. Georgia?”

“Oh! Would ya, dear?” I nod. “Well, that’d be most wonderful!”

As I work on raking up the leaves, Ms. Georgia arranges herself on the small back patio on an Adirondack chair and starts shelling the peas I got yesterday. After a few minuets, she launches into full ‘this reminds me of’ mode and begins telling another story; “You know, as much as I hate shelling peas, there really just is no other way to have fresh, decent tasting peas! That frozen stuff from the supermarket? The stuff from a can? That can hardly be called peas. Nasty stuff. Sure, it’s cheaper but really, time was were you didn’t even have to buy your peas, or most other vegitables either! The fresh stuff used to be cheap too! Why, for the longest time I got my peas right from Mrs. Karolina Iga Warszawski back yard. Iga, she preferred to be called, lived in your house actually. Her and her husband, Witold, were the first ones to move into your house, don’t ya know,”

I pause for a moment and look over to her, “Really? When was that?”

“Oh, let me see... so long ago... ah! must’ve been back in the late 60s. Yes, that was it. Before those hard times in the mid-70s. Iga had the nicest little garden going, had a true green thumb. A good thing too, poor homely thing, bless her heart. Could hardly speak a word of English and not the sharpest tool in the shed. Still, did her best to be neighborly. Can’t say the same for Witold, mind you,” she said with a disdainful and lady-like sniff.

“Why not?”

“A most uncivilized fellow. Somehow managed to make his way from the old coal mines to the smelting mills on the other side of town. He was always very rough with Iga. Why, I remember this one time when Iga was over here showing me how to make her delicious perogies, he storms into my house, three sheets to the wind! He’s still wearing his work boots (I swear her never took them off! walked right around his house in them and everything!) getting dirt and mud all over my kitchen. He grabs onto Iga’s wrist, going off on the poor dear in Polish about something, and starts dragging her out! I couldn’t believe it at the time. Andrew had to come and sort him out,” she shakes her head mournfully.

“Wow,” I raise my eyebrows a little and start raking again, “what... what happened to them?”

“Well, years went by. They were an older couple and when the mills started laying people off around, oh when was it? ‘75 I guess, old Witold got the boot. Became a real drunkard, I remember. Squandered away what savings they hard on gambling down at the track like a real idiot. I really was so fortunate to be with a man like my Andrew. Knew I would never allow that kinda conduct, no way,” she nods her head definitively.

“Sounds like a real dick.”

“Maddison! Watch your tongue!” but I can see the slight smile, even from over by the maple tree, “He was not a pleasant man towards the end though...”

I pause and lean against the rake, giving her the appropriate amount of attention for her ‘here comes the juicy part’ tone. She keeps shelling her peas and continues:

“Now, when was it again? Ah, yes, it was October of ‘78 when old Witold met his end. One late night he comes home from an evening spent wasting away in the bars. He stumbles around the house for a little bit before heading upstairs to find Iga, who was fast asleep in bed. He drags her out of bed, demanding she make him dinner! He goes on about how a man’s supposed to come home to his wife and a good, warm meal after a hard days work. A hard days work! Hardly. The man hadn’t done that in years! So he starts man-handling poor Iga to the stairs, and of course she does what ever he demands. She makes her way downstairs to the kitchen in her night-gown and starts making him dinner at 2 in the morning,” Ms. Georgia makes a face at the very idea of such a thing, “but she never gets to it though,” she pauses at her shelling.

“She doesn’t?”

“No, never does. She gets out her pots and her pans, turns of the stove burners, but never even gets to pull out the food. You see,” she locks eyes with me, her expression earnest, “there’s an enormous crash! and down comes old Witold, fallin’ down the stairs and snaps his neck against the wall when he comes to the end!”

Both my eyebrows go up, “Really?”

“Really!”

“How? Did he trip?”

“Well,” she leans back and resumes her shelling, “that’s what the police said. They said the old drunk tripped over his own boot laces comin’ down the stairs!” she shakes her head with exasperation. “I’ve always been a firm believer in takin’ one’s shoes off when enterin’ your home. It’s always much harder to trip over your own bare feet!”

Chapter 2: Obligations

I don’t think too much of Ms. Georgia’s story as I walk home later that afternoon. I know she wasn’t lying or anything, but she has been known to exaggerate a good story or two.

I’m about half way home when I hear a familiar engine rumble around the corner at the end of my block. Sure enough, here comes my Uncle Matt in his pickup. It’s a beat up and rough looking thing, probably older than me, but Uncle Matt can be real stubborn and refuses to trade it in for anything else. I stop walking as he pulls up alongside me.

“Hey Maddie!” he shouts as he rolls down the window. He’s an older guy with greying hair and a well kept beard. He pretty much looks like an older, more professional version of what dad looked like.

“Hey Uncle Matt.”

“You hungry, kid? How’s about a trip to Maud’s?” I shrug. “Ok then, hop in!”

As we drive to Maud’s we pass by Clark’s. Looks like he was able to get the paint off. Uncle Matt starts talking about his store and how he’s dreading that new Lowes coming in next year. “I still got convenience on my side, though. At least that Lowes’ll be towards the far end of the town, between here and Scranton proper. We’ll still be right here! We’ll be just fine.” He says it with a stiff-neck tone.

When we get settled at Maud’s I order the chicken-pot-pie like usual. As we wait for the food, I stare at the table top, waiting for the inevitable. “So, Maddie, I tried calling the other day.”

“You did?”

“Yep, said the line was disconnected.”

“Oh... mom must’ve forgot to pay the phone bill.” Shit. I forgot to pay the phone bill.

He’s giving me that look. I fiddle with my Pepsi. “Has Ashlyn been forgetting a lot of things lately?” he asks, trying to stare me down. I almost want to laugh. That never worked for dad.

“She’s been fine, Uncle Matt. Really. She’s holdin’ down a job and all. We just don’t use the phone much, so it probably just slipped her mind.”

He’s about to go on, but the food comes and he decides to go for that instead. “How’s school goin’?” he asks after a little bit. I shrug. “Passin’ everything?” Nod. “Gonna say anything?” I take a keen interest in my pot pie. “Maddie,” I look up at him, “you know I promised your dad I’d take care of you if anything happened to him. I meant it.”

“Yeah, I know.” He gives me a meaningful look. I go back to my pot pie. Uncle Matt’s a good guy, really. Always been very busy with his hardware store, so much so that Aunt Jess left him years ago. I know what he’s getting at but I keep telling him no. “I’m sixteen, Uncle Matt. I’m fine with just two more years. I’ve been lookin’ into Johnson Tech. They got cheap dorms over there.”

“Johnson Tech, huh? Not a bad place. Sure you don’t want to go to a better place though?”

It’s my turn to give him a look. “Well, if you get a good score on those SATs... don’t look at me like that, you never know!”
_______________________________________________________________

“So... you’ve been with Matt?”

“Yeah, took me to get some groceries,” I tell mom as I pass into the kitchen with an armful of bags.

“I could’ve gotten the groceries,” mom whines as she snoops through the bags.

“I know, but I was already out and stuff.”

“Matt’s a good man,” mom frowns at the contents of the grocery bags, “anyway, I’ll be back later. Real late,” she says, passing me on her way out of the kitchen.

“Night shift?”

She pulls back her hair, “Yeah, night shift,” she says slipping on her shoes and then she’s out the door. I shake my head and start putting the food away. Mom’s a bad liar.

As I’m putting aways the groceries, I hear voices from the living room. I pause and listen, “Mom?” No reply, but the voices continue. I put the milk in the fridge and and head towards our small living room. The TV is on. Stupid old thing. I begin searching for the remote and give up. It could be anywhere under all this junk. I press the power button, but it’s stuck. “Piece a junk,” I give it a good smack and it cuts off. Sure, the phone gets cut off but our old TV works just fine.

Done with sorting out the food, I head upstairs to my room. It’s not very big, but its not too small. The walls are a faded lavender, remnants of my short princess years from back in the day. Never got around to painting over it. The carpet was once white, I think. I’ve got two windows facing out the side of the house and broken blinds over them. My closet is open because I’ve given up on trying to shove everything into it. I’ve got a combo desk and bookshelf against the wall with my closet opposite the wall with my bed and dresser. I guess it’s pretty messy, but I find it kind of pointless to try to fight it. It’ll just end up messy again.

I kick off my sneakers and make my way to my bed. Crouching down, I start moving junk out of the way underneath my old bed. I find the old shoe box and drag it out from the far corner under my bed. I really need to clean under there sometime. I flip off the shoebox’s lid and stare at the contents for a moment. It’s not much really. Just some junk, mostly. I dig through the stuff on top and pull out the big, hardcover book. As I push aside the other stuff to pull it out, another book flops out over the edge of the box and falls onto the carpet.

It’s an old, faded, well-worn, paperback copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy that I’d forgotten I’d put in here. My dad gave it to Micheal one year for Christmas, or his birthday, or Easter or something. I reach for it and grab it and flip through the pages. There’s something stuck in the pages and I open to see what it is. It’s an old picture that I must’ve stuck in here some time ago. Mom has gotten rid of the rest. I turn it over and see it’s a picture of Micheal and I from a long time ago. I look about 7, so he must’ve been 11 at the time. I squint a little at the odd picture. We’re at a park, on one of those merry-go-round things. He’s sitting on the edge of it, hunched over a little, and he’s got a mildly annoyed expression on his face. I’m behind him, leaning over him with my chin propped on top of his head, grinning toothily, my arms reaching over his shoulders toward who ever is taking the picture.

A loud creak startles me out of the daze I slipped into. I pause to listen, but I don’t hear anything else. I look down at the book where they picture had been sandwiched, letting my attention drift over the page...

We’re sitting on Micheal’s bed, under a fort of blankets. My head’s propped in my hands, my elbows resting on my knees. He’s pointing a flashlight at the pages and reading: “For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much—the wheel, New York, wars and so on—” there’s a crash somewhere downstairs like glass shattering and my eyes flicker towards the noise, but Micheal keeps reading with all the obliviousness of being 13, “whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man—for precisely the same reasons...”

I put the picture back into place and itch my eye. I put the book aside and pull out the envelope that’s buried at the bottom of the shoebox. I reach into the pocket of my jeans and pull out the 10 bucks Ms. Georgia gave me earlier for raking the leaves and getting the groceries. I carefully pull out the money I’ve got stashed into the envelope and add the 10 to it. I thumb through the bills, counting as I go; ten, thirty, sixty, hundred-- $237 in bills and some change I don’t bother with. I’ve forgotten what I was going to use this money for, so I just tell myself it’s for a rainy day. That’s what people save up for, right? As I put the money in the envelope and put the envelope back in the bottom of the box, the junk back on into the box, and replace the lid, somewhere in the back of my mind I hear Micheal reading again-- “This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much most of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy...” 
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Weeks passed. Three weeks, to be more or less precise. It’s gotten colder and the leaves have lost all their color and are nothing more then brown dead wisps blown into alleys between buildings. Mom’s lost one job and found another and Thanksgiving is coming in early this year.

I’m sitting in my usual seat on the bus mulling over Ms. Georgia’s news. The bus clatters on as I remember her anxiously excited expression. ‘Oh, Maddison, the doctor said he’s done all he can do for my Andrew,’ she had said as she’d wrung her hands, ‘He said the best thing to do now is to go someplace warm and slow and well... I’ve-- we’ve decided that we’ll have to do just that...’ the bus jumps underneath me and my book bag leaps off the seat next to me, landing on the dirty bus floor, ‘I’m sorry, dear, but it get so cold here, so grey, so dreary... a nice, sunny winter would do wonders for Andrew I just know it!’ I’d just shook my head and put on my best smile for the fretting old lady, feeling the whole situation to be just too awkward. Why was she apologizing for moving? Not like it really mattered much anyway.

The bus squealed to a stop and I made my way to the front. I file in with the large crowed by the school’s double doors and shiver a little as a winter gust blows by. Hell, I wouldn’t spend another minuet here if I had any other place to be.
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It's raining pretty hard by the time I get home that afternoon. It's that cold, clinging kind of rain that's only one degree short of sleet and it is not pleasant to walk through. The house is dark and quiet as I shed off my wet jacket and shoes so I assume I'm home alone. I'm looking froward to just curling up on my bed under some blankets and passing out into a good nap. Late Fall rain does that; makes you all cold and grumpy and tired so the only thing you want to do is go comatose until the rain rolled on somewhere else.

As I make my way down the hall to the kitchen, though, I hear a sniffling noise coming from the living room. I round the hall corner and peer into the dark living room and see the source of the pathetic noise, mom. She's sitting dejectedly in the middle of the floor, her long hair hanging wildly around her face and there's something in her lap. When my eyes adjust I see it's a picture frame. "Mom, what are you doing?"

She starts a little and looks over to me. "Maddie?" Her eyes are all red and puffy and she looks like a little kid just after she broke something while running around the house. She shiffs at me and blinks.

"Well, who else would it be?" I ask as I make my way over, trying not to trip over anything on the floor.

"Oh, well," *sniff*, "Matt was over earlier," *hic*, "so, I thought maybe he'd come back," she said looking back at the picture frame in her lap. When I get over to her I can smell booze on her and I sigh.

"Oh," I crouch down beside her, "what'd he say?"

Mom clutched at the picture frame and started to shake, "M-maddie, it's *hic* all m-my fault!" she started to wail and sob and look a whole lot smaller.

"Mom-"

"No, it's all my fault! I-I'm a terrible m-mother!" she keeps going and it sounds like she's choking she's crying to hard and trying to talk.

"Um, mom-"

"I-if I-I hadn't t-told him to get o-out, Gabe w-ouldn't have l-left an-and got in that accident--"

"Mom, stop it-"

"An-and then M-Micheal, he, he said he *hated* m-me! He-he told me right before they f-found him--"

"MOM!" She finally stops talking and keeps sniffing and crying. God, I hate it when she gets like this. I sit down next to her and awkwardly pry the picture frame out of her grip an set it down on my other side.

"M-maddie-" she looks at me with big, red-rimmed eyes and looks for all the world like I'm about to hit her or something, "I-i'm a bad m-mom-"

"No, mom, you're not bad," I pat her on the back, "just take some deep breaths, you'll be fine."

She sniffs and then leans in on me and doesn't say anything else. She really reeks of booze and she's still hiccuping every now and then. This is why I told Uncle Matt not to come over when mom's home. He's a nice guy, but not around her, and then I get stuck with the mess afterwards. Nobody else ever sees her like this. I wait until she seems to stop and haul her up and push her towards the stairs. She shuffles up and I hear the shower turn on upstairs.

I pass through the living room and pick up the picture frame. It's empty. I stick it in the TV stand's cabinet and go to the kitchen to find some dinner. Uncle Matt, Mr. Frowinski, social services, they're all so quick to blame and put fault but they never have to put up with the consequences. I take some leftovers out of the fridge and throw them in the microwave. I go sit at the table and wait for dinner.
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It's still raining. I sigh and sit up in bed, wrestle my way out of the blankets. Another thing about rain or the any prolonged sound of running water will make you have to pee after a while. I stumbled out of my bed and find my way to the bathroom down the hall.

The house is quiet except for the soft noise of the rain like static on a TV in some other room. Even mom's asleep, or passed out. I don't know. As I pass the third bedroom I feel a floor board beneath me give a loud crack and I jump a little. Blinking some sleep from my eyes I pause and notice something odd. Through the dark I can see the third bedroom's door is open, just a crack. Weird. That door is always kept shut. I reach over and pull it shut and it gives a squeeks with disuse. I shrug to myself and go to the bathroom.

After I burrowed my way under my blankets again, I listen to the rain and try to go back to sleep. Just as I feel like I'm just about asleep, though, I hear something besides rain. I hear dragging above my ceiling. I fear something up there shift and I hear a creak somewhere down the hall. Not this again. I haven't hear anything in nearly three weeks, I thought whatever varmint that was making all the noise was gone.

I hear a door open, slowly and with protest. It's nothing. It's getting colder so the wood is just warping for the winter. Muffled footsteps coming down the hall. Mom is just going to the bathroom. A floorboard creaks in front of my door. She's sleepwalking so she missed the bathroom. *SLAM* A door somewhere down the hall bangs shut.

Fuck.
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The morning comes in grey and I'm awake far to early for a Saturday. I give up on trying to get any more sleep and shove my blankets aside. I wipe at my eyes as I stumble around my room, looking for some socks. I step on something cold and and stop, looking to see what it is. I pick it up and nearly immediately drop it. It's the empty picture frame from yesterday. I stare at it for a long moment before flinging open my bedroom door and going down stairs to the living room. I bend down and open the TV cabinet where I'd put it yesterday. I don't know why I bothered to look, and it wasn't in there, obviously. I put it back and close the door. Mom must've found it and put it up in my room. She must have.

Ms. Georgia moved out on Thanksgiving. Her house sold surprisingly quick, but then again it's the nicest one around. I had helped her pack over the weeks leading up to Thanksgiving day and I have to admit it was kind of funny watching her run around like a chicken that'd lost its head. She had a lot of stuff she'd gathered over the years and it all had to be packed just so.

When the day finally came and everything was packed up in U-haul, she pulled me aside and gave me $50. I stared at it in disbelief and tried to give it back to her, but she insisted. "Lord knows I've been a mess with this moving business, dear, and it must've been trying to put up with me. You've earned it hon. Now," she had reached into her giant purse (the kind only old ladies have) and pulled out a slip on paper, "here's my new phone number for down in Georgia. My dear great nephew has been kind enough to let us stay in his guesthouse. Well, anyway, you give me a call anytime you need somethin' dear, anything at all and you keep in touch. You give my regards to your mother and take care of yourself, you hear?" She had looked so earnest that I couldn't tell her our phone was still off the line. I just took the paper and said I would do all that stuff. She'd given me a sad smile and told me I'd better. Then she got into a taxi and it drove off for the airport.

That night saw the first snow of the season and over my turkey-stuffing-and-gravy sandwich I couldn't help but laugh at Ms. Georgia's impeccable timing for missing winter.