And The House Lights Dim

And the House Lights

Dim

Tim Major

Text Copyright © 2019 Tim Major

Cover Image Time House © 2016 Daniele Serra

Harvester Logo © 2019 Francesca T Barbini

First published by Luna Press Publishing, Edinburgh, 2019

And the House Lights Dim © 2019. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of the copyright owners. Nor can it be circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar condition including this condition being imposed on a subsequent purchaser.

O Cul-de-Sac! (original to this collection)

Read/Write Head. First published in Garbled Transmissions, 2013.

Eqalussuaq. First published in Not One of Us #58, 2017. Selected by Ellen Datlow for The Best Horror of the Year Volume Ten, 2018.

Finding Waltzer-Three. First published in Interzone #255, 2014.

St Erth. First published in Into the Woods, Hic Dragones, 2017.

Tunnel Vision. First published in Kitchen Sink Gothic, Parallel Universe Publications, 2015.

The Eyes Have It. First published in The Third Spectral Book of Horror Stories, Spectral Press, 2016.

The Forge (original to this collection)

All I Can See Are Sad Eyes. First published in The Literary Hatchet #13, 2015.

Winter in the Vivarium. First published in Winter Tales (Fox Spirit), 2016.

Lines of Fire. First published in Game Over, Snowbooks, 2015.

Honey Spurge (original to this collection)

By the Numbers. First published in Voluted Tales Vol. 14 Issue 10, 2013.

The House Lights Dim. First published in Sanitarium Issue 11, 2013.

Carus & Mitch. First published as a standalone novella, Omnium Gatherum, 2015.

www.lunapresspublishing.com

ISBN-13: 978-1-911143-58-1

For my family.

O Cul-de-Sac!

O neighbours! If only we might speak!

Do you feel as I feel? Do you think as I think? Here we are, all crouching in our circle, so close to one another. It is maddening.

I see your people come and go. I hear snippets of their conversations. They are happy, your people, are they not? It is healthy, all this coming and going. But we remain rooted, facing one another implacably.

We are so young: sixteen this coming year. How many people have we had between us?

Recently I have paid less attention to your people than to mine, I confess. But in those early days, in those first glimmerings of consciousness, I was empty and I watched you all with intense fascination. There seemed so much to learn, and the opportunities for my education so few. Your people hurried to and fro—on what errands I had no way of imagining—and when they returned they appeared so grateful to see you. I came to distinguish between adults—more direct in their routes across our cul-de-sac, bustling into the cars on your driveways—and children, who dallied and bickered, whose movements were a joy to me. The children belonged to the adults and the adults belonged to you. When your people were nestled within you I gazed at the sky and the fields. I tested the radius of my attention, peering as far beyond my walls as possible. I perceived the disturbances of animals in the long grasses and swooping above me, I saw trees bending with the force of an unseen hand, I saw the rust-coloured roofs of the village that is tied to our cul-de-sac by an umbilical lane. I called out to you. I beckoned to your people. I was alone.

I was unoccupied.

My first people came a year later, following a smattering of visitors who declared me too large or too expensive or characterless. Their names were Anton and Beverly Grieg. They joked about show homes and the plastic fruit that still filled the wooden bowl beside the sink in my kitchen, but they were happy to have arrived and I was happy to receive them. More than happy! I embraced them from the moment they removed their shoes and padded inside me. Perhaps you remember the too-large white lorry with its rear end awkwardly jutting into our cul-de-sac, blocking three of your five driveways. Anton and Beverly Grieg set to filling my rooms with their furniture, their friends, their conversation. How they talked! Beverly was a lecturer at the university in York. Anton had once been her student and was, if anything, more passionate about learning than his wife. They talked of books and Francis Bacon and the governance of Britain and jazz music and the preparation of food and desire. These were the elements of their world, but they taught me about mine, too. They described the stars in the night sky, patterns hitherto unnoticed by me but suddenly, spectacularly, clear. They named the plants that encircle the lawn of my garden; they defined the willow, ash and pine trees. They lifted tiny creatures in their cupped hands so that I might better see them.

It wasn’t only their teachings that provided my education. Two radios—one in my sitting room, one tickling and buzzing in my kitchen—were rarely turned off. Anton and Beverly Grieg watched documentary films and news reports. Through them I was given the ability to see far beyond our cul-de-sac and I came to appreciate the enormity of the world.

Anton and Beverly Grieg occupied me for four years, four happy years. When they announced their intention to leave I struggled to hide my disappointment, my window frames creaking with the ache of mourning. However, I allowed myself to dream. I watched your people come and go, the great numbers of them within each one of you. I dreamed of a family of my own.

I was disappointed. Evie Rattle was a solitary figure, content to spend her time alone. That might not have been a disaster, I told myself at the time. Mightn’t we become all the closer, she and I, for the lack of other company? But she confided in me no more than in any human. She was absent for long hours each day, returning only in darkness and retiring quickly to bed. Worse still, she rarely watched television or listened to the radio, so my absorption of information was dramatically curtailed. Her work was as a laboratory technician—of what nature I still do not know, though the spines of the books on my shelves spoke of chemicals and pharmaceuticals. For a time, with my youthful lack of context that might allow me to distinguish between real and make-believe, I suspected her a witch.

Evie Rattle stayed with me for only a little over a year, thank goodness. Did you hear me when she left, o neighbours? It was with only the merest trace of guilt that I called out to you, hooting with triumph.

Then there were the many years spent with my most recent occupants, Piotr Brzezicki and Tom Grace. Though you may have thought me unchanged, judging solely from my exterior, inside I became a riot of colour, filled with mismatching furniture, colourful artworks and plastic trophies of their favourite television programmes. How I loved Piotr Brzezicki and Tom Grace! And I know that you loved them too, all of you—how could it be otherwise? Their joy in the pursuits they loved and in having found one another was infectious. Every day I awoke with renewed delight in seeing them happy. And they spent so much of their time with me, both pursuing their careers whilst burrowed inside me; Tom playing recordings of music as he tapped at his computer keyboard, Piotr listening to radio news broadcasts as he illustrated children’s books, bent forward over a tilted board. I spent the days lazily shifting my attention from one of my bedroom offices to the other and back again, constantly unearthing new details to be savoured. At night I watched them sleep until I myself slumbered.

And yet your people felt differently, did they not? I noticed it from the start. Your people watched from their windows, the adults ushering the young indoors when my people appeared together at my doorway. For so long I understood nothing about sexuality and the limitations and rules that your people perceived about it, and when I did I wished I did not. I only knew that Piotr Brzezicki and Tom Grace were happy—so happy!—when they were safe together within my embrace.

I was despondent when they began discussing their plans to leave me. When they yanked their trinkets and trophies from my shelves, their banners and posters from my walls, I felt myself sag. I felt myself no longer a youth. I felt myself settle into my foundations and, worse, beginning to show my age. I watched from each window in turn, trying to keep my people in sight as the two lorries backed noisily from the cul-de-sac, followed by the tiny car containing my Piotr Brzezicki and my Tom Grace.

I sat alone for months.

I cried out, but none of you paid me attention, full as you all were with life of your own.

*

It is wrong to be presumptuous. One does not need to be human to understand that wonderful things will never occur to those who expect wonder. I learned this not from the television or the radio or the spines and tiny print of books; I learned this from my experiences with those that I have loved.

I did not presume, and yet they came.

Carly and Marie and Oliver Scaife.

A family.

Marie Scaife is the oldest. Her hair is white at the crown and that white will creep inexorably down, I am certain. There are lines on her face that converge into arrowheads that point to her eyes, which are full of sadness and pride.

Carly Scaife celebrated her twenty-eighth birthday the day the family arrived. Marie—her mother, though Carly has never referred to her as such—set a cake on a plate on a pile of packing cases that first evening, and Carly struggled to blow out candles embedded in it, and it was all I could do to stop myself from flinging open my windows to let in the wind to help her and to demonstrate my delight at having them within me.

Oliver Scaife is an infant.

He is all I have ever wanted.

He is small and incapable of much. He arrived strapped to Carly’s chest and wailed. I whistled through my chimney in conversation. He is hairless and rarely opens his eyes. Marie says he is three months old.

Have you seen them, o neighbours? Have you seen them? I would send them to be witnessed by you, if I were not so reluctant to let them out from within me. Send your people instead and they will provide their reports. There has never been anything so wonderful in our cul-de-sac as Oliver Scaife and his mother and her mother.

*

I am watching you. For now I am content to let my people stroke at my insides and murmur at one another. I am hesitant of intruding upon them in these early days.

A change within oneself prompts other ways of seeing the world, does it not?

O neighbours, are your people as happy as I thought? They come and go often, but my ability to scrutinise, from my position here at the mouth of our cul-de-sac, is limited. They squint at the sky as they emerge from you. Their cars and bicycles buzz noisily from your driveways. When they return they hurry in.

Number four, your people have attracted my attention for so long. Five people, including three children! And yet the eldest only scowls as she stares around at our cul-de-sac, her hands upon her hips. The other two squabble and hit each other as they are pushed into their car seats by one or another of your adults. They are all tired.

Number two, are you as alone as I was with Evie Rattle? You have only one person. He wears a black suit and walks briskly out of our cul-de-sac and briskly back in. There are so many long hours in between.

Number five, I know there are people within you; I have seen your lights turn on and off and I have seen black shapes at your windows. But who they are is unknown to me. They do not look out at our cul-de-sac. Do they speak? Is it wonderful having your people with you constantly? Or is it agony?

Number three, I see that you have new people too, a man and a woman. Their overalls are spotted with paint. It must be a delight to receive so much attention. I am certain that your hopes are high of their loving you. Send them to meet my people, won’t you? Perhaps, vicariously, we may be friends. From the little I can see of your rear garden, it requires their attention.

Number six, have your people remained with you too long? That infant who was once so adorable is now almost an adult. His parents are wrong to leave him alone with you for such long periods. He has the face of somebody one should not trust.

*

Carly Scaife is learning, just as I am learning. She is not yet confident with Oliver Scaife. She struggles to feed him from her breasts and he struggles to get what he wants out of them. She listens to broadcasts on a mobile telephone wired up to a speaker in my master bedroom; the broadcasts instruct her to sleep when the baby sleeps. She tries but she does not sleep when Oliver Scaife sleeps; when he sleeps she kneels in her bed, leaning over the wall of his adjoining crib to watch him breathe. He is content when he is like that, but the only time I have seen Carly close to contentment is when her child is sleeping upon her chest while she sits on the wide sofa in my sitting room and she is watching comedies on the television and never once laughing.

The family have been with me for over a week and yet it is only now that I realise that we are alike, she and I. Carly Scaife is a mother and so am I. The infant began life within her, just as this family are within me. She holds him tight.

Carly’s hair is cut short. Marie remarks on it often; it seems that the hair was longer until very recently. To Marie this is significant. Carly wears floral print dresses and black leggings. She says she can no longer wear contact lenses, which means she must wear glasses in order to see. I sympathise. My attention sometimes wavers and often I wish I had more clarity of vision. Within my walls it is often dark and, while I do not yearn for my days spent with Evie Rattle, it is difficult to focus on more than one person in more than one room at a time. When Oliver is asleep I feel compelled to watch him.

O neighbours! I know what I said, but they are drawing me into myself. I have barely looked beyond my walls these last few days. You might all have disappeared and I would not know it.

Carly sometimes cries herself to sleep. Marie does not seem to understand her fully. She offers to help placate the infant, but Carly rebuffs her and keeps the bedroom door tight shut. What Carly needs is an embrace. If her real mother will not provide it, then I will.

Oliver Scaife likes to look at patterns on the wall. I angle my windows just so, to catch the sunlight and make shadow patterns of leaves above his crib. He thanks me for it, I am certain he does.

*

Marie Scaife is also a mother. But she cannot remember what it is to hold somebody within oneself.

One week after they arrived, Marie left the house on foot and was absent for an entire day. Carly and Oliver crept downstairs. Carly shifted the coffee table aside and stood in its space and whirled Oliver around and around above her head. Oliver did not laugh or smile, but he stared at her and then he twisted his body as she held him. It was difficult at first to know whether the contortion spelled delight or disgust, but then he looked up and around him—at me—and he spread his arms as if to say, Is this not magnificent?

When Marie returned she was driving a car. She parked it on my driveway, crunching its handbrake to prevent it from sliding back down the incline and into the turning circle of our cul-de-sac. She entered me and then backtracked, coaxing Carly to stand beneath the overhang of my porch. Carly held the infant and gazed at the car.

I’m not getting into that, she said. Oliver’s not getting into that.

I’ve had it checked over, Marie replied.

Carly glared at Marie until she closed the door, hiding the car from her. I shifted my attention outside: was the vehicle so bad? I glanced at the cars belonging to your people, the cars perched on your driveways, humming and cooling in the evening air. They all look alike to me.

We might need it if we want to get away, Marie said as they ate pasta at the kitchen table, hours later.

Carly glanced at my door, at the invisible car beyond.

We need money, Marie said. I’ll get a job.

Carly bent to fuss over Oliver in the basket on the floor beside the table. Then she rose, ate a mouthful of food, and nodded.

*

I do not know what employment Marie has found for herself, and I find that I do not care. Only occasionally does she take the car from the driveway. She is gone for long parts of each day and I am better able to relish spending time with Carly and Oliver.

*

My doorbell rings. It startles me—I have been watching Oliver in his crib and so has Carly. She is humming a melody that I find very beautiful.

I struggle to tear myself away, but then I shift my attention downstairs and outside before Carly’s feet have touched the carpet of my master bedroom.

I watch the boy standing on the doorstep warily. It take several moments before I recognise him; people look altogether different up close. Number six, he is yours, is he not? His wild, long hair pushed under his cap is unmistakable. On the front of the cap is written in blue text SO WHAT?, which is a reference to a composition by the jazz musician Miles Davis.

He scowls and pushes my doorbell again. I try to smother the sound. There is a child in here, asleep.

Carly edges toward the door slowly, slowly. She glances several times at the staircase and the trailing, invisible rope that connects her to Oliver in his crib. I am capable of metaphor, o neighbours.

I consider jamming the door, holding it fast.

Carly is quicker than me. Even as it appears she is having second thoughts, she yanks at the lock and pulls open the door. It stings like a wound.

Yes? she says in a voice that is not quite level.

The boy pushes back the peak of his cap. When I last paid him any attention he suffered from acne; now I see that it has cleared. He reeks of confidence.

Kieran, he says. That is his name. From across the way.

He gestures over his shoulder with his thumb. Carly tilts to see past him and so do I. I was right: number six. Number six, you sent him and I will hold you accountable.

What do you want? Carly says. She sounds very tired.

My dad said we should say hi sometime.

Where’s your dad?

Work. Summer holidays, but not for him.

Your mother?

Same.

You’re on your own?

I’m sixteen.

All right then.

Yeah.

Carly and I are so close that my anxiety transfers to her.

So you’ve done it, she says. You’ve said hi. And hi back at you.

So do you know anyone round here?

No. Abruptly, Carly shudders. I see it and Kieran does too.

If you want I could—

No.

Kieran stares at her and Carly reaches out a hand. She holds the brass knocker that is fixed to the centre of my door. Her grip is tighter than I would expect; it hurts.

Want me to wash your car? Kieran says.

Carly looks at the car as if she has never seen it before. No.

I wash everyone’s car. Everyone in the cul-de-sac, I mean.

It’s new. It doesn’t need a wash.

It’s grubby. There’s sand in the air came from the Middle East on the wind.

In Yorkshire?

Kieran shrugs. That’s what my dad said. Middle Eastern sand. Gets your windscreen proper filthy.

Seriously. Kieran, was that your name? I don’t want my car washed. I see something in Carly I have never seen before. A hardness inside.

Twenty quid.

Carly splutters. For a car wash? You’ve got to be kidding.

It’s what everyone pays. He waves an arm to gesture at you all, o neighbours, as if it proves something.

No. Off you go now.

Kieran grins and I do not know what it means. His eyes leave Carly’s face. He is looking at her body and now I know what the grin means.

Carly presses my door closed and Kieran’s head tilts, trying to keep her in sight through the narrowing gap.

Carly stands looking at the door. She shakes her head and then pads upstairs, following the rope back to Oliver, bundling it in her fists as she climbs.

I see her safely