Prologue: Aleysia

     “We can’t wait longer,” she said.

     “Why?”

     “Because we can’t. We’re getting too old, for one.”

     He clenched his jaws. They were arguing about timing. Of course, they were always arguing about timing. And time. Not the same thing.

     “I’m just sick of talking about it.”

     “You usually are. Which is why we never talk about it. And when we do talk about it, it always ends up like this. With you not talking.”

     He glanced at her, then down at the SLR lying in her lap. She stared out the window watching the rolling hills slide past, the grass sway. He turned back to the road ahead and the dark, cloudy sky.

     After several minutes he said, “Looks like it’s going to rain.”

     She mumbled, not so much in affirmative. More of a dismissal. Other things on her mind.

     “Mal. Stop the car,” she said, reaching over to cover his hand with hers, but not looking at him.

     “What. Why? Is there something wrong?”

     “Just stop.”

     “Why?”

     “Stop. The. Car.”

     “Fine,” he said and downshifted. He signaled and pulled the car off the turnpike. She barely waited for it to stop moving before flinging open the door and heading into the ditch. He killed the motor, yelled after her.

     “Aley! The hell are you doing?” She hadn’t closed her door. He watched her spring over a barbwire fence and take off a cross a waist-deep field of waving brown grass, camera raised above her head as though afraid of getting it wet.

     He heard thunder and shut off the car, muttering to himself. He sat there a couple breaths and watched Aley shrink into the distance, then got out, gathered up his windbreaker and locked up the car.

     Aley headed toward an abandoned, dilapidated farm house. The wood of its walls was gray and holey. The roof sagged. Trees a hand wide grew up all around it, right next to it, invading its personal space. Dark windows looked down on the prairie from the second story.

     He remembered she’d talked about it before, the house. That she wanted to photograph it. They must’ve driven by it a hundred times, back and forth on the turnpike. He always wondered what would lead to an abandoned house on the plains.

He hopped the fence and wondered if it was too early in the spring for ticks.

     “Aley!” Though he yelled, he knew she didn’t hear him. The grass was too loud from the wind. And besides, she was occupied. In the moment. He didn’t bother to hurry to catch up. Maybe she’d be finished when he got there.

     Each step made him feel more uneasy. The windows were watching. He stopped some 30 yards from the house. Aley, just ahead, kneeled and pointed her camera upward, framing her shot. He could hear the digital camera making its artificial shutter noises in rapid succession.

     He pulled on the black nylon windbreak and checked out the sky. The clouds roiled upon each other, as though boiling, and lightning danced between them. A soft peal of thunder rolled out, just audible over the rustling grass.

     Had she said something?

     “What?”

      She looked back at him. “I said, ‘I’m going to go inside and get a few.’”

     “Do you think that’s safe? The thing looks like it could collapse if you breathe on it wrong.”

     She rolled her eyes and started toward the front door, which stood slightly ajar. He checked the sky. His watch. The car. Then stuffed his hands in his pockets. He turned back just in time to see her nudge the door a bit more, then slip into the darkness of the house.

     He glanced back at the turnpike again, comforted by the headlights of the passing traffic, then began walking a circle around the house. He imagined what it must’ve looked like when it was loved. A fresh whitewash on the walls. A couple rocking chairs on the front porch. Had they been farmers? Where would they have kept their animals? He looked around for the bones of a barn and saw a pile of wood further back away from the road.

     As he made the final corner of the house, the turnpike back in sight just past the field and fence. A large drop of rain pelted him in the forehead.

     “Aley, it’s starting rain.” He turned toward the house. “Aley!”

     She didn’t respond and he moved closer, making his way to the dark front door. Several more large drops peppered his head and shoulders. He stuck his head through the gap.

     “Aley!”

     No answer. Fear hit him so fast, he felt like a bomb had gone off in his stomach, his limbs suddenly weak and quivery.

     “Aley!” It was near dark outside, pitch black in the house ahead of him. She did not answer. He dug his cell from his front jeans pocket and flipped it open for light then stepped into the interior. He took a couple steps forward, then had an idea. He thumbed her speed dial number and listened.

     The phone rang and rang, but he heard no responsive ring from her cell. Had she left it in the car? Surely she had.

     “Aley! This shit isn’t funny.” He walked further into the house, phone held out in front of him like a cross. He looked down, noticed footsteps in the dust deep enough he could make out the logo of her shoe brand. The tracks lead to and up a stair case. He kept thumbing a button to keep the pale blue light of the phone lit.

     Thunder rattled the house and wind whistled though the gaps of the house. The hair raised on the back of his neck and Malcolm swung the phone in an arc behind him, then up the staircase.

     He shouted her name again, took a deep breath, then bounded up the stairs, trying to worry about whether or not they’d collapse. The stairway ended with a short hall and a doorway that opened into a square room, windows in three of the walls. The footprints went to the room’s center and stopped.

     Malcolm searched the corners of the room in disbelief. There were no closets. No alcoves. No furniture. No place to hide her. The hair stood up on his arms. He walked the last few paces and stood where she’d stopped, then glanced out the windows, toward the fields, toward the car and the road. The rain fell in a staccato against the roof. He couldn’t hear himself breathing. His body felt cold.

     He dropped his head and looked at his feet. He noticed some discoloration of the wood floor, a lighter gray than that of the planks around it. Then he realized he was standing in a circle. There were strange markings, black as though charred and gouged into the wood, too rough looking to call carved. Another wave of chills swept through his body.

     Malcolm turned and ran. Down the stairs, through the house. He tripped coming out the front door, rolled and came back to his feet. He sprinted through the grass, arms pumping. The rain beat at his face, hair wet.

     A part of his mind knew she’d be in the car waiting on him, laughing at his mad dash across the darkness. He slowed enough to use a knobby fence post to hope the wire. He raced to her side of the car, slapped his palms to the window and leaned in.

     She wasn’t there. He turned and looked back toward the house and thought he saw a camera flash in the upstairs window. Or was it lightning.

     He didn’t feel the tears on his face, but he knew he cried. Malcolm fell to his knees and screamed her name into the storm until he lost his voice, but he couldn’t cross the ditch, the fence the field again to look for her.

     And it was too long until morning.