Page 96 of Starling House
There was some talk about deeds and property rights. Don Gravely kept trying to bully the county surveyor out there, but the surveyor told Don he wasn’t paid enough to set foot on Starling land and that Don no longer had enough money to bribe him, which was perfectly true. With the plant closed and the family accounts all tied up in court because that librarian just wouldnotlet the case go, Don was starting to fall behind on his accounts. The mailman reported the delivery of several bills with pink paper visible through the plastic window. People said it was only a matter of time before a Realtor hung their sign up on the front lawn of the big brand-new house.
But by early fall even regular people were starting to wonder about the Starling place. As the leaves shriveled you could make out little slices of the house through the bare branches, and what you saw didn’t look good. The walls were leaning funny, slanting inward, so that it looked like the only thing keeping Starling House upright was wisteria. The county administrator began to mutter about health hazards and seizure rights. The older folks in town told him to hold his horses, that a new Starling always turned up at these times.
No one did. But one night at the end of September, right when summer finally starts showing signs of wear and the occasional dry breeze goes rattling through the woods, there was a light seen at Starling House. A high round window, shining like polished amber through the trees.
Some time after that the front door opened, and two people stepped out. They were looking up at the September sky like they’d woken from a very long sleep and weren’t sure whether they were still dreaming. There was a cat twining quite shamelessly around their ankles, and they were holding hands.
Nobody else will tell you this next part, but I will.
One of the people—a tall, hunched-up man with scraggling hair and a face like a sickly vulture—looked up at the big, ruined house and said,I’m sorry.And then,I know you always wanted a home.
The other person, a girl with red hair and a mean smile, said,Yeah, and I found one.
The man said he was sorry again. (He says that often.)
The girl nudged him in the ribs, good and hard, but she didn’t let go of his hand. She said,I wasn’t talking about the house, fool.She was looking at the ugly man as she said it.
A tiny indentation that might have been a dimple appeared in the man’s jaw. He bent to stroke the cat, which bit him.
They keep to themselves, mostly. The gates open every now and then, and certain people go in or out. A pair of middle-aged women, arms slung over one another’s shoulders. A boy with glossy black curls and a backpack full of expensive cameras and fancy lenses. A whole stream of lawyers and contractors, followed by a few pickups full of lumber and stone, chalky sheets of drywall, bags of concrete.
Those two must have all the deeds and rights in order, people think.They must have money to burn,people say, although they aren’t entirely clear on where it came from. All they know is that Starling House would not rot away after all. No one can say whether they’re sorry or not.
The house is an awful thing, of course, but it’s a familiar awful thing, and it’s nice to have new Starlings to gossip about.Don’t understand what they do up there all day,people say, in tones that suggest it isn’t anything good. There are plenty of theories, suppositions, lewd suggestions, and wild rumors. A few of the theories (and all of the lewd suggestions) are perfectly true, but none of them are the whole truth.
Most people conclude, somewhat mysteriously, that they’re writing a book. The hairdresser heard it was a romance, and the old meter man is hoping for horror. A member of the Historical Society claims it’s a history of the town—that one of their very own founding members is fact-checking it, in the form of footnotes and a bibliography—but that’s dismissed as typical hubris.
Whatever it is, it must be illustrated. Several people have seen the young man on the banks of the Mud River with a sketchbook propped on his overlong legs, sketching in subtle grays and stark whites, a hundred shades of velvet black.A children’s book, then,people say, but there’s only one children’s book they know of that has pictures like that.
Lacey, the new manager at Tractor Supply, claims she’s exchanged texts with the redheaded girl (who does look a bit like the young Gravely girl, it must be admitted, although nobody remembers Opal smiling unless she was committing a crime). Lacey says she asked what they were working on, and Opal said,a story.
what kind of story?
a true one
Lacey found this intentionally obscure, but she was a bighearted person who had always hoped for the best for Opal, so she offered her thoughts and prayers. Opal stopped responding, and eventually the gossip got old and people stopped talking so much about Starling House.
In spring the sycamores bud out and the honeysuckle goes green, so that you can’t even see the house from the road anymore. Just the wrought-iron gates and the long red lick of the drive, maybe a glimpse of limestone cross-hatched by honeysuckle and greenbriers.
But there are still the dreams, sometimes. You should be afraid—there are stories about this house, and you’ve heard all of them—but in the dream you don’t hesitate.
In the dream, you’re home.
