Slaves to the Spirits
Chapter Seven
Alexander cried when Ms. Porter left, the tiny little fool. Elisabeth couldn't understand why he was upset, watching her silver sedan reverse out of the driveway and disappear down the street. Her leaving seemed like something that deserved to be celebrated, not lamented, but trying to understand a toddler's brain was a difficult task ordinarily and trying to understand her brother's often seemed like some impossible feat, achievable only perhaps by psychics and maybe a few psychologists. It was irrelevant anyway, since he stopped crying only moments after the woman disappeared, seemingly stealing the memory of her from his mind as she left the neighbourhood.
"Why don't you hug him?"
Elisabeth frowned. "What?"
"Alexander," Emily said slowly. "He was crying. Why didn't you hug him?"
Elisabeth blinked, looked down, let out a huff of air in something akin to a laugh, too short to qualify, too humourless. "If I hugged him every time he cried," she said, but didn't finish the sentence, shaking her head instead. "Why didn't you?"
"He seems shy."
Elisabeth hummed, strolling around the front living room opposite the kitchen, ignoring the urge to glance across the kitchen counter and into the face of a stranger. "Your Christmas tree is very pretty," she noted, watching as all the lights changed colours in bright flashes. "It must have taken a long time to decorate."
"Maybe you and your brother would like to decorate it next year?"
Elisabeth sincerely doubted she would still be here come this time next year, but she figured saying it would be inappropriate and knew Ms. Porter would be mad if she had to drive back the same night to pick her up and bring her back to St. Emiliano's. "Don't think I don't love him," Elisabeth said instead, watching as her brother chased after a slowly-running Sam down the hall, too eager to appease the small boy, to earn a smile, a gurgle of laughter, the child's love. Watching the two interact, she decided instantly that she would not like it here.
"Of course you do," Emily smiled, sliding on a pair of oven mitts to retrieve the pie she had baked from the depths of the oven. "He's your brother."
That was half the problem. She was his sister, not his mother. She could never be his mother. "Yes, he is, Mrs. Uley. My only brother," she hummed.
Emily didn't detect the threat underlying her words. "I always feel so old when people call me that." She placed the pie on a cooling rack. "Call me Emily at least. I want us to be friends."
Friends. Elisabeth sat down at dinner later that night, thinking over that word. Friends. It was strange to think about the life the Uleys lived, imagined, desired. It all seemed to far from reality, like a dream floating away lazily on summer breezes and cool lake waters. Something impossible. Something so far from reality that it all seemed a little crazy, and she wondered briefly if she had fallen down the stairs and knocked her head on the banister, and this was all some hallucination she had dreamt up in the delirium induced by pain medication and the dark expanse of unconsciousness.
She would open her eyes to the cracked ceiling of St. Emiliano's medical ward - a place usually only occupied with by the younger children and those with runny noses and fevers - with a damp washcloth draped over her forehead, no longer cool, the paper thin sheets crumpled about her frame. She imagined waking up, brow twitching as she heard the dripping of a leaky faucet in a nearby bathroom, the hollow echo of water droplets filling a porcelain sink, Sister Constance's clucking about the halls outside, doors clicking shut quietly, and Sister Maria's rampage upon the boy's dormitories below, tearing up floorboards and tearing apart pillowcases in her rage.
You filthy, filthy boys - keeping things like this in the house, what were you thinking? God sees all, you know! He sees all of your disgusting acts!
There was the sound of drawers slamming shut directly beneath Elisabeth on the floor below, something breaking, muffled speech. Then there was the sound of a door opening across the room she lied in, slowly, creaking on its hinges, and then the slow paced steps of another Sister's heels sounded upon the old groaning floorboards.
Are you awake, Elisabeth? It's Sister Theresa, the voice said. You took a fall, do you remember? The washcloth on her face was taken away for a brief moment. The sound of water being rung from fabric, dripping back into a basin of water. You gave that poor boy Mason quite the scare, she said. He came rushing in here crying that you had been taken before your time.
Heavy footsteps rushed around the room beneath Elisabeth's bed, followed by the sharp ringing sound of a slap across the cheek. The yelling was muffled, but she was able to decipher it when she concentrated: Oh, we must pray, we must pray! Come, get on your knees and pray to the good Lord that he might spare you all yet! There was a collective murmuring downstairs, the sound of a few dozen boys praying, lead by a Sister's fervent cries for forgiveness.
The bed creaked with Sister Theresa's weight as she leaned over her patient, dabbing at her face tenderly with the damp cloth. Forgive me for saying this, she murmured, but I do believe that boy is quite in love with you.
Elisabeth squinted her eyes open in the bright light, staring into the youthful face of Sister Theresa, her bright blue eyes, the little smile playing on her lips as she toyed with the idea of a romance beneath the roof of such a dim house, such a miserable dwelling, such an atrocious space.
In love with me? Elisabeth croaked.
Yes, Sister Theresa said and averted her gaze, looking up towards Elizabeth's hairline where she gingerly dabbed at her skin. Very much in love, I would say. Perhaps even helplessly so.
No, Elisabeth chuckled breathlessly as her eyes slid shut once more, Mason doesn't love me. He's-
"More potatoes, Elisabeth?"
Her head snapped up as she gaped across the table, her confusion making its appearance on her face as her brow scrunched. Sam was staring at her, mashed potatoes in one hand, waiting almost expectantly.
"I'm sorry," Elisabeth mumbled, "I didn't quite hear you."
"Potatoes?" he repeated.
"Oh, no," she mumbled, and then chuckled, shaking her head. "No, thank you."
Sam shrugged, setting the potatoes down on the table after loading more onto his plate, before scooping up his cutlery, eager to cut into his steak.
Glancing quickly around the table, Elisabeth could see that nobody seemed to have noticed her trance. While Sam was tearing into his steak mercilessly, Emily was alternating between trying to get Alexander to eat pieces of vegetables and eating her own dinner before it went cold. Elisabeth frowned, staring down at her potatoes in confusion. A dream, surely. It must all be some strange wicked sort of dream she would wake up from in the morning.
It had to be.
