The Ghost of Longthorn Manor and Other Stories Read online

  As I write those words down, I can't help thinking that maybe I can hear another scratching sound in the distance, beyond the sound of my pen's nib. It's hard to be certain. I wish I could stop writing, just for a few seconds, but that's simply not possible. Instead, I continue to write, and I'm very much aware that Johnny is standing in the doorway and watching me. I could get up and shut the door, which I've been meaning to do for a while now, but it's always a little tricky balancing my notebook and writing while I walk. Finally, I ask Johnny if he'd mind shutting the door when he goes back to his room. Hopefully, that'll be enough of a hint.

  “Sorry I was a jerk earlier,” he replies.

  “It's fine.”

  “So you're saying I was a jerk?”

  “I'm saying it's fine. No, I mean, it's just okay.”

  Sighing, I realize that he's laughing at me again.

  “Have you got pills for that?” he asks.

  “For what?”

  “For this hyper... graph thing.”

  “I have pills.”

  “Do you take them?”

  “It's complicated.”

  “But you wanna get better, right?”

  “Of course.” I feel a faint shudder pass through my chest, and I desperately hope he doesn't ask any more questions. The last thing I want is to have to explain my whole life history, and all about how Mom died and how I developed this writing habit that kind of blew out of control. He's probably heard it from Rebecca, anyway, and I just want to finish my list and get back to sleep for another two hours.

  “I'm gonna go for a walk into town,” he says finally. “Just to check the local area out, see if we're truly stuck out in the middle of nowhere, miles from civilization. Do you wanna come, or is it, like... I don't know, is it hard for you to go anywhere?”

  “I'll probably stay home,” I tell him.

  “Because of the writing?”

  “Just because. I want to get used to the house.”

  “But you're not, like, a recluse?”

  “I'm not a recluse. I just like to take things slowly.”

  “Huh. I guess that makes sense. Well, I'll stop bugging you. It's gonna be pretty weird living together, especially since we never met before now, but I guess we're both in the same boat. I mean, we've both got pretty screwed-up parents, right?”

  “Sure.”

  He hesitates, as if there's something else he wants to say. Sometimes, I wish people would just come out with stuff, rather than pussy-footing around.

  “You're like a prisoner, aren't you?” he says suddenly.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You can't really do anything else. You can't stop writing. So you're a prisoner of this hyper... whatever it's called. It's like some kind of mania or obsession.”

  “I'm fine,” I reply, feeling a shudder pass through my chest. “Don't worry about me.”

  “I didn't say I was worried. I guess I'm just sorry I gave you a hard time earlier. That's all.”

  With that, he turns and heads back along the landing.

  “Shut the door!” I call after him, but then I hear the door to his room bump shut and I realize that my own has been left ajar. I really should go and shut it, even if that means balancing my notebook on my chest for a moment, but I can't quite bring myself to go to all that effort. I'm exhausted already, and I'm totally ready for sleep. First, though, I need to finish my list of ten blue foods. I've got eight so far, and I could finish the list with types of candy, but I'd rather come up with something more original. I'm sure I'm missing something obvious, so I just need to think some more.

  I'm not allowed to shut the door before I've finished the list.

  That's one of the rules.

  As I reach the end of the page and turn to the next, there's a brief moment when my pen isn't scratching against the paper.

  And I hear it.

  The scratching sound that Johnny mentioned, I mean. I hear it, somewhere off in another part of the house. I quickly start writing again, and the noise of my pen is enough to cover anything else that might be happening in any of the other rooms, but I definitely heard that other sound for a moment.

  I need to focus on blue food, though. I can think about the scratching, and the marks on the door downstairs, some other time. But the rule is, once I start a list, I'm not allowed to stop until it's done.

  Chapter Three

  “This is such an unusual house,” Rebecca says as she crouches next to one of the flowerpots and digs her trowel into the dirt. “There are so many different, overlapping styles. Have you noticed? So many owners over the years must have added their own individual stamp to the place. Either that, or the place has had to be repaired a lot.”

  “I thought it looked kind of ordinary,” I tell her, although I quickly realize that I should probably sound more enthusiastic. So I add that I like the house overall, and that I've noticed a few weird things, like the scratches all around the door in the kitchen.

  “Huh,” she mutters, furrowing her brow as she looks toward the back door. “I never noticed those.”

  “Can I grab a moment with Polly?” Dad says suddenly, coming along the path and stopping right in front of me. From the tone of his voice, I can tell he's annoyed about something.

  “Sure,” Rebecca replies. She knows something's up, too. “I should go unpack in the bedroom, anyway. I'll check out those scratches you mentioned, too.”

  Dad stays quiet until Rebecca's all the way inside the house, which means he doesn't want her to overhear us, which means he's annoyed at me for some reason.

  “So are you taking your pills?” he asks finally.

  “Of course,” I reply, not looking up at him.

  “Really?”

  “Sure, why wouldn't I be?”

  I wait for him to tell me what's wrong, but deep down I already know he's onto me. The only question is whether he merely has a suspicion, or whether he's got solid evidence. I've been trying to hide the evidence, but I guess I could have gotten sloppy. Or maybe he did the one thing that nobody is allowed to do. Maybe he took a look at one of my notebooks while I was away from my bedroom.

  “The car journey here was twelve hours,” he says after a moment. “In that time, you should have taken two anti-anxiety pills. And guess what I found tucked between the seat covers?”

  He holds his hand out, and I spot two pills in his palm.

  “You need to take your pills, Polly. Don't you want to get better?”

  “They don't make me better.”

  “It's not an instant thing. You need to take them over a period of time.”

  “I've tried that,” I tell him. “They don't work. They fog my head.”

  “They don't fog your head. That's just an excuse you use. Are you seriously going to just hide them away and spend the rest of your life scribbling in those notebooks?”

  “Of course not. This is just for now. I'll stop. I'm just not ready now.”

  “How about you take a break for five minutes?” he continues. “Just five minutes. Do you think you could do that?”

  “I'm busy right now. Another time.”

  “I don't understand you, Polly. I've tried so hard to figure out what's going on in that head of yours, but you really don't make it easy. Sometimes I feel like I'm making all this effort, and you won't even try to put your notebook down for five minutes and meet me halfway. Couldn't you try that, just once? Couldn't you make an effort?”

  “I've tried stopping,” I reply under my breath. “It's not as easy as you make it sound.”

  “Maybe it's as easy as you want it to be.”

  Swallowing hard, I realize there's no point arguing with him. He gets like this sometimes, and I know it's best to just wait for his anger to blow over. I'm sure he'll be back to normal tonight.

  “You're sure I'll be back to normal tonight?” he asks. “Is that -”

  I turn away, tilting my notebook so he can't see any more of what I've written. I hate it when people cheat like
that, and for a moment I feel a flash of anger. I just want to tell him to leave me alone, but I know I can't start acting like a grumpy kid. Besides, I understand his frustrations. I wish I could give him what he wants.

  “Polly -”

  Suddenly, before he can get another word out, Rebecca screams inside the house. I immediately look toward the upstairs windows as Dad races inside, and then slowly I get to my feet while writing these words. I can't run, not while writing at the same time, so I make my way into the house as quickly as I can manage. By the time I get to the kitchen, I can hear Dad running along the landing, and a moment later Rebecca starts sobbing. Heading through to the hallway, I can hear Dad telling her not to get upset, and asking what happened.

  “Is everything okay?” I call up to them. “Rebecca? Are you okay?”

  I wait, but all I head is Dad trying to comfort her. Something's clearly wrong, so I start making my way carefully up the stairs. Stairs are always particularly tricky, since I have to navigate while still writing, and these particular stairs are even more difficult than most since there's a tight bend halfway up. Finally I reach the landing, however, and I head over to the door that leads into the master bedroom.

  Rebecca's sitting on the bed, dabbing a tissue against the side of her face, and Dad is holding her hand.

  “What happened?” I ask.

  “Nothing,” Dad says quickly. “Go to your -”

  “Something scratched me,” Rebecca says, lowering the tissue to reveal a long, thin red cut that runs all the way from just below her left eye, down to her chin.

  I step forward, constantly shifting my gaze from the notebook to her face and back again.

  “Who did that to you?” I ask.

  “I don't know,” she stammers. “Nothing. Something. It was there and then it was gone.”

  “I'm sure it was nothing,” Dad says, taking on his usual role of smoother-over. “An accident, that's all.”

  “I was about to put some more clothes away,” Rebecca says, with shock in her eyes as she looks over toward the dresser. “Suddenly I felt there was someone right behind me, so I turned. In that instant, there was a flash of something dark and I felt this sharpness ripping down my face. And then it was gone, as quickly as it had come, and I didn't even see it. Not properly, anyway.”

  She dabs at her face again, before taking a look at the bloodied tissue.

  “Is there an intruder?” I ask.

  “There's no intruder,” Dad says firmly, and it's clear that he's annoyed. “I've already checked. Maybe it was a bird.”

  “Do you really think I wouldn't have noticed a bird?” Rebecca asks, turning to him. “If it was a bird, where is it now?”

  She pauses, before turning to look at me.

  “Are you writing this all down?” she asks.

  “Sorry.”

  She sighs, before getting to her feet with the tissue still pressed against her cheek.

  “It's not that deep,” she mutters, stepping past me and heading toward the bathroom. “Hopefully it won't even leave a scar. Daniel, if you really think it was a bird, then go and find the damn thing.”

  “I'm not saying it was definitely a bird. Maybe it was a squirrel, or -”

  “A kung-fu kicking squirrel that leaped at me?” she calls back through. “Whatever, just find it! I don't want it happening again and I don't want to talk about it!”

  “Did you see or hear anything?” he asks, getting to his feet and looking around the room, clearly at a loss as to where he should start.

  “Nothing,” I reply.

  “Well, then make yourself useful. Do you think that, in-between writing endless notes in that journal, you could chop some vegetables for the soup Rebecca was going to make? I mean, you've got one spare hand, haven't you?”

  “Sure.”

  “Then get on with it. I'll look around for whatever did that to her. This bloody house is already starting to get on my nerves.”

  Heading out of the room, I make my way carefully down the stairs and through to the kitchen. With each step, I'm still making these notes in my notebook, although at the same time my head is spinning and I'm trying to work out what could have cut Rebecca's face so badly. Obviously it wasn't a bird or a squirrel, so I guess she must have just swung something at herself by accident. I don't know Rebecca very well yet, so I suppose it's possible that she's the kind of person who'd want to cover up her own mistake rather than admitting the truth. Then again, I never got that vibe from her.

  As I walk step into the kitchen, however, I suddenly remember the scratches around the edges of the door. Turning, I keep writing as I take a closer look at the frame. Sure enough, there are lots of deep scratches, almost as if something was digging long, needle-like nails through the wood. I know that's not what actually happened, but it's definitely what it looks like, although I think somebody has painted the door since then.

  Maybe this house isn't quite so ordinary after all.

  Chapter Four

  I'm furious and my heart is racing, but I'm going to start from the beginning and explain exactly what just happened. Dad is storming about on the landing, and I know he's going to come to the doorway at any moment and yell at me again. I don't care, though, not really. He's wrong, and he doesn't understand, and he just thinks I'm some moody kid who should get over herself.

  “We'll talk about this tomorrow,” he says suddenly, appearing in the doorway and glaring at me. “It's late, Polly, and I think we all need to get some sleep.”

  “You blame me, don't you?” I reply, pressing the pen harder and harder against the page as I continue to write everything down. There are tears in my eyes, and I have to wipe them away so I can see properly. “I got angry, Dad! You know I hate it when people look at my notebooks!”

  “Who the hell would bother going through your stupid notebooks?”

  “Someone did! I woke up and some of them were open on the desk!”

  “So?”

  “So they weren't like that two hours ago!”

  “How would you know?” he asks. “You barely notice anything that's going on around you. You just stare at that stupid notebook all day.”

  “Someone was looking at my notebooks!” I say firmly, as I wipe more tears away. “That's not fair!”

  “You can't act like this,” he continues. “We're sharing a house with Rebecca and Johnny now. You can't start yelling in the middle of the night. For God's sake, you need to learn some self-control.”

  “I know about self-control,” I mutter under my breath, turning to another page in my notebook and once again pressing harder than usual as I write.

  “When I get back from London, we'll talk about going to see Doctor Gibbs again,” he says with a sigh. “I know you don't like the idea, but you're not leaving me any other choice. Maybe there are other things we can try, but I'm sure of one thing. You can't spend the rest of your life like this, Polly. Somehow, we have to cure you.”

  TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: A FEW LINES ARE MISSING HERE, BECAUSE THE INK WAS TOO BADLY SMUDGED. TEARS, MAYBE?

  “I don't care, Polly. Enough's enough.”

  With that, he pulls the door shut, hard enough to make the frame rattle. I hear him heading to the next room along, followed by the sound of another door being closed, and finally the only sound is my pen scribbling hard against the page. I want to scream about everything that happened just now, but I guess I'd only get another lecture about self-control so – instead – I decide to write another list. Ten ways today sucked, maybe, or ten pills I've tried over the past few years without any success, or ten things I remember about Mum.

  I know why Dad's really mad. It's because he know Mum's death is my fault. He hates me because I killed her.

  Great. The pen's nib just tore through the page. That's never happened before.

  ***

  “Did either of you guys hear the taxi this morning?” Rebecca asks as she finishes setting the dirty plates and pots in the dishwasher. “The one that picked Danie
l up around six?”

  “You must've heard it,” Johnny mutters, grinning at me across the breakfast table. “Weren't you up around then, making more notes in that thing?”

  “No,” I reply, writing with one hand while holding a slice of toast with the other.

  “You managed to get back to sleep, then?” he adds. “After all the excitement?”

  “If somebody hadn't come into my room and start going through my journals, I might have -”

  I stop just in time. There's no point arguing, and he'll only keep denying that he did it.

  “I meant to get up with him,” Rebecca continues, with a hint of concern in her voice, “but then I rolled over and fell back asleep. I think I heard the front door going, but I didn't hear the taxi. I'm usually a very light sleeper. I'm sure the sound would have woken me up.”

  “I'm sure he got away just fine,” I tell her. “Even if the taxi was late, he had time to order another one.”

  “I suppose so.” She seems lost in thought for a moment, fretting as usual. I don't know Rebecca very well yet, but I've already pegged her as a constant worrier. “Anyway,” she adds, forcing a smile, “I thought I'd drive to the nearest village this morning and take a look around, maybe do some shopping. Do you guys want to come?”

  “Love to, Mum,” Johnny replies, “but I have to stay home and pick cheese from my belly button.”

  He chuckles to himself.

  “Polly?” Rebecca continues. “What about you?”

  I open my mouth to tell her I'd love to go, but then I realize how awkward it'd be, exploring a new town while constantly writing in my notebook. I have to try some time. Just not today.

  “I have things to do,” I say finally.

  “Are you sure? It might be good for you.”

  “Thanks for the offer. Another time.”

  She hesitates, as if she really doesn't want to leave me here.

  “I could deposit you in a cafe,” she suggests. “That way, you could still get out of the house a little, and it'd be easier for you with the writing and so on. People wouldn't stare so much.”

  “Maybe tomorrow. Thanks again, though.”