Chapter 7
At midnight, Ember was still lying awake in her bed. She hadn’t left her room, not even when her mother had called her down for dinner, and not even when Thalia put a plate of food just outside her door.
As she laid awake, listening to the silence in the house, she decided everyone must be asleep, and slowly opened her bedroom door. She padded down the stairs in her socks, slipped on the first pair of shoes by the door and a coat from the pegs by the door—she wasn’t sure whose they were—and slid out the front door, deftly shutting it behind her.
She stared down at the steps that led up to the door. She looked, but couldn’t find the books that Acton said he left for her.
Sighing and pulling the coat tighter around her chest, she stared out into the dark. The woods were nearly invisible, except for the tangle of upward reaching boughs that framed the face of the heavens. In all of her life, Ember had never seen so many stars. They were like a billion tiny mirrors in the sky, reflecting back what little hope and light there was on the planet; even as little as they were, they made Ember feel at peace.
Taking one more look to be sure all the lights were still off in the house, Ember trudged around to the side where Thalia’s window was located. The trellis was ancient, and made of weathered, rusting wrought iron, and it was entirely grown over by a thorny monstrosity of thick green brambles that, from a proper distance, looked like it was eating the house. The rust had gotten so bad that it ran down the side of the house like massive bloody streaks, adding to the illusion.
Several joints were broken, and the old welding spots had sharp edges. As Ember stared into the vicious mass of thorns and torn metal, and looked from the ground up at Thalia’s window far above her, she considered it a small miracle that she was still alive. She laid one had on an exposed, rusty grip, but still couldn’t remember any of it. She looked at her palms, but there weren’t any cuts.
Shaking her head, she was just turning to go back inside when something in the dark. A speck of something bright on the ground caught her eye. She warily scanned the tree line, and took two steps forward, toward the one lonely bit of white that wasn’t in the sky.
A deep chuffing made her stop. She broke into a cold sweet.
It was right next to her. She was frozen in place, and too afraid to even turn her head to see what it was.
It broke from where it had been standing stock-still and made for the trees. Ember’s heart quickened to a panicked race. The creature, whatever it was, tromped back into the wilderness.
And then she turned and ran back to the front door, not caring a damn about how much noise she made.
As luck would have it, she had managed to lock herself out of the house. As she frantically pounded on the door, screaming at the top of her lungs, she knew in the pit of her stomach that her mother would never open the door for her, and her key was still sitting on the nightstand.
When the door did pop open, and Ember saw her mother wielding a butcher knife and her grandmother swinging a meat cleaver, she tripped over her shoes as she took a shocked breath in and a quick step back. Shutting her eyes in anticipation of the impact, she felt someone catch the front of her shirt, and then her back slammed against something hard.
When Ember’s eyes reopened, she felt a blade against her throat as Gina kicked the front door shut.
“You damn fool!” Ethel hissed as she leaned in closer to Ember’s face. “You damn, stupid little girl!”
“Mom!” Gina said, pulling at the older woman’s shoulders as her knife clattered to the floor. “Mom! It’s Ember, put the knife down! She doesn’t know what she’s doing, put it down!”
As they continued to struggle, and Ethel continued to hold Ember against the entryway wall, it was the sound of sobs from the top of the stairs that finally made everyone stop.
Ethel’s grip loosened enough that Gina was able to pry the meat cleaver out of her hand, and she tossed it onto the couch. She ran toward the stairs and the sound of Thalia’s breakdown, hissing under her breath. “She’s never going to sleep again. Both of you go to bed—I don’t want to hear another noise until daybreak. Go.”
Ember stared into the crazed eyes of her grandmother as Gina disappeared up the stairs. As the sounds of Thalia’s panicked, short breaths and Gina soothing her drifted down the stairs, Ethel slapped Ember across the face. Then she hugged her. Not knowing what to do, Ember stared at the floor as her cheek stung.
Eventually, the sounds up the stairs quieted, and a door closed, muffling them for good. Ethel walked away like she couldn’t remember where she was or what was happening. Ember sank to the floor with her back against the wall, hugging herself in a stranger’s coat, and still not knowing whose shoes she was wearing.
The knife her mother had been gripping with white knuckles when she threw the door open was lying on the floor a few feet away from her. She frowned, wondering what her mother had expected to find when answering the door. A monster, presumably, to warrant such a use of force.
It made Ember smile ironically; the only monster on this island was already inside the house. It was Gina.
The next day, no one talked about it. Thalia sat at the breakfast table with puffy, red eyes, twitching at every loud sound and sudden movement. Ethel was oblivious, and Gina sat with no food in front of her, staring out the window.
Ember picked at her oatmeal, her eyes occasionally darting up to the people who were forcefully ignoring her.
“I need you to leave for a while today, Ember,” she said, just as Ethel started clearing plates away. She looked her in the eye. “I need you to get out of this house. Thalia needs things to get back to normal for a bit.”
Ember smiled sheepishly, feeling the blush creep up her neck. “Where should I go?”
“Out. Away.” Gina shook her head. “I don’t care where you go. Stay out all night…just give us the day. Just…” Gina hesitated, sucking air through her teeth as she glanced at Ethel. “Stay away from the other people here. They’re not the types I want you around.”
Gina’s words hung in the silence. Several minutes later, Ember calmly folded her napkin and placed it next to her dish.
“So, let me get this straight,” she started. “You want me to leave the house, and stay out after dark, and not talk to anyone all day. What am I supposed to do? You want me to walk laps around the edge of the island?”
Gina slouched into her shoulders, looking defeated for the first time in Ember’s memory. “Don’t go near the water. Or Main, stay away from there, and all the shops. Go for a nature walk. Or else, you can stay here, but only if you can stay in your room and be completely quiet.”
“You’re being serious,” Ember said gravely.
“Very,” Gina spat. “It was a mistake to bring you back here. I can’t think while you’re in this house.”
“Mom…”
Gina’s eyes flashed at Thalia. “You just need some quiet time, Lia. Ember’s going to go for a walk, and think about what she did.”
“No,” Thalia shook her head. “Mom, what are you saying? Just let her stay here, in her room. It’s safer.”
Looking caught between amusement and annoyance at Thalia’s sentiment, Gina turned back to Ember. “The choice is hers, I suppose. Stay and be quiet, or go for a walk.”
Staring around at her family, Ember decided that it was pointless to argue. Gina was nearly crazy, and Thalia seemed to have bought into her delusions that the world was out to get them. Every one of them except Ember, it appeared, because Gina wanted her to go wandering alone in the wild. Seething, she wondered if her mother was secretly hoping she would get eaten or murdered if she left the house.
She walked back up the stairs, intent on having a long day of reading, but her plans were cut short when she found all of her books were missing from her suitcase. She dumped the whole bag on the floor, eliciting a yelled warning from her mother when her shoes landed with a ka-thunk.
Poking around the mess with her foot, a
nd eventually spreading it all out, she stood in the middle of the room, turning slowly. The books were gone, and they weren’t the only thing missing.
The red wool coat that Acton Knox had given her was gone, too.
Despite herself, Ember ran down the stairs, making a horrible racket as she went.
“Where are they?” she demanded.
Ethel, Thalia, and Gina were all still sitting at the breakfast table.
“What?” Gina asked indifferently.
“You know what,” Ember insisted, trying to keep her voice calm. “The books. My new red jacket. Where are they?”
Gina looked down at the table, shrugging, and then looked Ember in the eye. She didn’t speak again, so Ember fetched her key, wallet, and jacket, and let the back screen door clap shut behind her.
She shook her head, shoving her hands into her pockets as she walked away from the house. When she finally looked down from the sky, her eyes landed on a bit of white in the middle of the fire pit her mother had made. It must have been the same thing that she had noticed the night before.
She knew what it was before she even got to the pit, but she was disappointed all the same. In the ring of ashes, neatly trimmed by carefully laid salmon and tan flagstones, just off to the left, was a ripped piece of a hardback book cover.
Ember picked it up, turning it over to look at the cover side, but there wasn’t a title. She didn’t recognize it, but knew immediately where it had come from. It was one of the books that Acton had left for her.
Her mother had burned the books that Acton had tried to give her. Beyond the fact that they were books, they appeared to be expensive ones.
It was an old red leather book, which was probably why it hadn’t burned like it was supposed to. Pressing her lips together to suppress a grimace, Ember looked at the soot that covered both of her palms, and it somehow felt like they ink of the dead book had bled all over her hands. She ached in her chest as she tried to decide what to do with the poor broken thing. It seemed wrong to simply throw it back in the pit, so she tucked it into her back pocket.
She stirred the ashes with a stick, looking for any evidence of the red jacket that had once belonged to Acton’s mother, but there wasn’t any. Wool burned easily.
When she was done, Ember turned back to the house. Gina was standing in the kitchen window, making no effort to disguise her lack of remorse as she held Thalia’s head to her shoulder, slowly stroking her hair.
With a chill already creeping into her dirty fingers, Ember thought she would have felt something…maybe anger, or depression. But looking at her mother and Thalia, all she felt was that she was interfering. Gina was the local crazy woman—she owned everything, and hated everyone that she allowed on her land. She hated one daughter and loved another, and she believed that everyone living around her was dangerous enough to warrant answering the door with a knife.
Apparently, she also burned books.
As Gina turned to walk deeper in to the house, taking Thalia with her, Ember shook her head. Thalia was being raised by two crazy women, and she didn’t even realize that anything was wrong. Ember started for the gate to get out of the yard, wondering if she hadn’t been the lucky one after all.
She wasn’t too far from the house when Acton Knox was suddenly standing in front of her, wearing his old leather jacket once again. There was a man with him that gave Ember pause, but she couldn’t place him.
“My crazy mother burned your books.” Ember said plainly, producing the cover scrap from her back pocket. “Your mom’s coat too, I think. Sorry.”
Acton slowly took the fragment, frowning. “I thought she might. You kept this?”
Ember shrugged. “My mom’s crazy. Book burning is evil…”
Acton shook his head, running his fingers over the surface. “That’s a shame. Are you going to throw this away?”
“It’s yours.”
“I gave it to you,” Acton said, looking up with interest.
Ember held her hand out to take the cover back from him. “No. I’ll hide it from her. I like books. Even damaged ones.”
Acton smiled as she took it, and then compulsively rubbed his hands together, seeming to notice the ash for the first time.
She meant to ask what had happened the last time she had seen him, and how much she had drunk. She meant to ask something important, about something she couldn’t remember, and stopping short on the stairs the next morning. But as Ember tucked the cover back into her back pocket, eyeing the stranger once again, the thoughts calmly slipped away from her. They hadn’t been properly introduced.
“Hey,” she said finally.
The stranger didn’t respond. He kept his eyes on his duct taped shoes.
“Ember, this is Joseph,” Acton said, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket to clean his hands. “Have the two of you met?”
Ember tried not to let her expression betray her confusion. She wasn’t sure if she had met Joseph or not. She might have, but she might have been too intoxicated to remember him.
“No,” she said with a smile, offering her hand. “I don’t believe I have.”
Joseph’s eyes flashed up to meet hers, and a light smile graced his small, damp lips.
“How wonderful,” Acton said with a smile. “Joseph is a friend of mine—I’m sure you’ll get to know each other very well. You have more in common than you know.”