The Caliper House

~ an ‘After-The-Haunted-House’ story ~

By: Walter G. Esselman

Charlie Stormkin hesitated on the sidewalk beside her rental car.  Beneath her black Fedora, she watched the innocent-looking 2-story yellow house, which seemed to be basking in the bright summer sun.  It had been years since she had seen the house in person, and the sight made her heart falter.

Taking a deep, calming breath, she walked across the lawn to a shriveled flower bed.  There she picked up a rock that was bigger than her fist.

Moving up to the door, Charlie pulled an envelope out of her black suit jacket and put the rock under one arm.  Inside the envelope was a scuffed metal key and a note.  

“Ms. Stormkin,” the note read.  “I must admit that I did not believe you at first.  But after last month’s fatality, and then Officer Gallid, I give you permission, and the key in this envelope, to ‘clean the house’, as you put it.  I hope to God you can.  Be careful.  Yours, Seymour Caliper.”

Charlie put the key in the lock, and then froze.  Her hand began to shake violently.  Pulling back, she bit a finger through her leather glove and the pain helped her focus.  

“Come on, suck it up buttercup,” she growled to herself.

Taking a deep breath, Charlie grabbed the door and opened it.  It swung easily into the dark house.  The entryway was only populated by dust and scraps of crime scene tape.  

Stepping into the house, Charlie left the door partially propped open with the rock.  The electric lights were working, but very little light streamed in through the open windows.

“Get out!” hissed a voice from the darkness.

Charlie scoffed.  “Bitch please.”

She stepped further into the house.  Moving down the main hallway that bisected the large home, she went past the basement door, a number of rooms and stopped at the open door to the living room.  But Charlie’s steps halted as she remembered the night that her brother died.  

***

The front door swung open as Meggie glared furiously into the seemingly empty home.  The woman was dressed almost entirely in designer workout clothes, except for her shoes.  One expensive wedge shoe smacked into the rock holding open the door.  Meggie gave the rock an incendiary look, but did not cry out.  

“What idiot put a rock here?” she growled to herself.  Pushing the rock away with her foot, while careful not to scuff her shoes, Meggie let the door shut behind her as she moved into the house.  She did not even notice that when the door closed, it did so with a soft hiss, like a pressure vessel sealing.

***

Charlie’s chest clenched as she remembered that night.  But she pushed down those memories and stepped further into the living room.  The floor was a nice hardwood that looked scuffed, but still in great shape.  Her eyes roamed over it.

“Where are you?” muttered Charlie to herself.  She shifted the backpack off her shoulder to reach the zippers when she saw movement behind her.  Dropping the backpack, Charlie tore off her right glove and held up her hand.  On the palm was an arcane symbol drawn in Sharpie.

Meggie’s face appeared, blotched with rage.  “I Told You Not To Come Back!” 

Charlie let out a breath of relief as she dropped her hand.

“Jesus Meg!  You scared the crap outta me,” said Charlie with a wan smile.

“What’re you doing here?” demanded Meggie haughtily.  “Hasn’t your family done enough to this town!”

Charlie briefly glanced at the arcane symbol that she had drawn on her hand this morning.  She wished it worked against something like Meggie.  Putting back on her glove, Charlie glanced at her watch.

“Answer Me!” screeched Meggie, and actually stomped her foot.  “I told you to leave this town and never, ever come back.”

Charlie sighed at that.  “Yeah.  Best high school graduation ever.  But right now, I’m on a deadline.”

Picking up her backpack, Charlie opened one of the zippers and rummaged inside.

“You’re trespassing!” continued Meggie.  “And HERE of all places.  After YOUR brother got all those people killed.  Couldn’t you just leave it well enough alone!”

“That’s why I’m here,” said Charlie absently as she tried to keep calm.  She didn’t have time to argue.  “I’m still trying to make sense of that night.”

Meggie sneered.  “You can’t fix evil like a chemical spill.”

“You’d be surprised,” murmured Charlie, but then her brain caught up with events.  “And I’m not trespassing.  I have permission from the owner.”  Then Charlie grinned wickedly at Meggie.  “But you, you are actually trespassing right now.”

“Don’t try and change the subject.  I just saw you driving through town like you owned the place,” countered Meggie.  “And I had made it very clear that you were to leave this town and never, ever come back.”

Charlie glanced at her watch.  “Sometimes you gotta hitch up your pants and go looking for trouble.”

“Now you’re just babbling,” said Meggie in confusion.

Charlie took a Tupperware container from her bag and popped open the lid; but she was careful not to spill the contents.

“Stay if you like, at least for a minute,” shrugged Charlie.

“What’s that?” demanded Meggie.  “What’s that powder?”

“Bone shavings from a mummy,” said Charlie offhandedly.

Meggie’s eyes went wide.  “You’re joking.”

“Has to be at least 242 years old,” continued Charlie absently.  “Not sure why that matters.”

“Seriously, what’re you trying to do?” 

“Finding the symbol.”

“Symbol?  What symbol?”

Charlie took out a small handful of fine tan powder from the Tupperware.

“Careful with that, you’ll make a mess,” said Meggie unconsciously in mom mode.

Charlie threw the powder in a gentle arc across the living room. 

Meggie’s mouth opened to shout in outrage when a light shot up from the floor.  It stabbed into the cloud of powder which froze in mid-air.  With a gentle sucking noise, the powder shot down into the light and then formed a symbol on the floor.

“There you are,” smiled Charlie.  The symbol was drawn, a little crudely, in chalk and in its center was a fresh drop of blood.

“W...witchcraft?” gasped Meggie taking an involuntary step back.

“Oh, something much older than that,” crooned Charlie.  “Before witchcraft.  Before the rest of the angels.  And on that night, that symbol was copied out of a book and drawn onto the floor.”

“Where would you even find such a book?” whispered Meggie.

“Barnes & Nobles?” asked Charlie.  That drew Meggie out of her surprise and she went back to scowling at Charlie.

“I don’t understand how your brother could draw something like that,” said Meggie darkly.

“With chalk,” replied Charlie with a neutral expression.

“That’s not what I meant, and you know it!” spat Meggie.  “I mean, look at it.  It...it’s such an evil symbol.”

Sealing up the Tupperware, Charlie put it back in her bag.  She spoke patiently.

“It was the weekend before Halloween and a bunch of kids found an abandoned house where they could conduct some serious drinking in peace.”

“You spied on them,” said Meggie.

“I was a bored little sister, and I followed my brother,” said Charlie, carefully rephrasing Meggie’s words to speak the truth.

“I don’t know what my sister ever saw in your brother,” said Meggie.  “Lacy always had good taste before that.”

“Travis was a good guy,” growled Charlie, unable to stop her bubbling anger.

Meggie just made a dismissive noise.  “Everyone knows that there’s something wrong with your family.  Everyone knows that it was your brother Travis that got everyone killed that night.  You were there.  You saw him use black magic.”

Charlie balled up her fists, but then remembered that she had a job to do.  She unclenched her fists and looked at her watch.  Pushing aside her anger for now, she took out a container of Morton’s salt and began to pour a circle around the symbol.  She spoke as she worked.

“There isn’t white or black magic,” explained Charlie as she tried to find patience.  “It’s like a chainsaw.  It’s a tool that can cut someone free of a downed tree, or just cut off a hand.  Unfortunately, this tool opened a hole to someplace…”  And she stopped as she remembered that night with a deep-in-the-bones shudder.   “Someplace terrible.”

Completing the circle of salt, Charlie drew a smaller one that was connected to the edge.  Taken from a pocket, Charlie placed a small purple crystal inside the small circle.  Taking the glove off her left hand, she bit her thumb and put a small touch of blood on the crystal.

“Is this more ‘Not Black Magic’,” asked Meggie with a roll of her eyes.

“Sympathetic crystals,” explained Charlie.  “Break one and the other breaks and both send out a shock wave, not really felt by us, but it will crack that symbol and its companion like an egg.”

Meggie squinted at her.  “Are you having brain related event?” 

Putting away the salt, Charlie zipped up her backpack and walked past Meggie towards the front door.  

“Okay,” said Charlie as Meggie followed.  “You need to get out of this house while it's still safe.  I propped open the front door, so you should…”

Charlie halted when she saw that the rock was no longer holding the door open.  She did not look at Meggie for fear of smacking her.

“Did you remove the rock from the door?” asked Charlie carefully.

“And let the mosquitoes in?  Do you want West Nile?” scoffed Meggie.

Charlie clenched her fists, and then let them open slowly.  “You do realize that we can’t leave now,” asked Charlie.

Meggie made a dismissive noise.  “That’s stupid.  Now you’re just trying to scare me, but it won’t work.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Charlie saw something shift in the shadows, but when she looked full on, it was gone.  She glanced back at her watch.

“Okay, no more fooling around,” declared Charlie.

“Why do you keep looking at your watch?” asked Meggie.

“Dr. Whipple and I calculated that I have fifteen minutes from the moment the front door is open until this house is fully awake,” explained Charlie.

“Oooooh, the big evil house is going to get us!” jeered Meggie.

“Sweet meat,” whispered a voice.  Meggie whipped around and thought she saw something move in the darkened kitchen.  

“Um?  What was that…,” started Meggie uncertainly.

But Charlie shot past her, through basement door and down the wooden steps.  Before she reached the bottom of the steps, Charlie had already pulled out the container of bone powder.  Suddenly nervous, Meggie almost sprinted after Charlie.

Stopping at the bottom of the stairs, Charlie threw a small handful of powder into the air.  The powder just drifted to the ground.  Concern growing on her face, Charlie tried again in a different direction.

“Magic trick not working?” sneered Meggie as she tried to cover her rising fear.

“As a matter of fact, no.  No, it’s not.  And that means that the hole has moved,” said Charlie, biting on her lower lip in thought.

“Awww, poor little Charlie lost her hole,” grinned Meggie viciously.  

Charlie spun towards her.  “Right!  I understand that you blame my brother for your sister’s death, but right now we got bigger fish to fry.  That symbol upstairs was connected to a hole that night.  And now that hole has wandered off, so we gotta find it fast.  Tick! Tock!”

Bolting up the basement stairs, Charlie carefully held the container of powder.  She turned right towards a group of rooms and wished this damned house wasn’t m so freaking big.  Behind her, Meggie scampered up the stairs glancing furtively at the shadows.

“What did you expect?” demanded Meggie.  “You’ve always evaded questions about that night.  So people had to draw their own conclusions.”

Charlie saw an arm come out of a shadows behind Meggie, but then it withered away in the dim light.  

They’re getting stronger, and this house has dozens of rooms to check, thought Charlie with alarm.   

However, she squelched that panic and she steered her mind back to the job.  She threw bone powder into the first room on the far right, but nothing.  Moving on to systematically check each room, Charlie began to speak.    

“That night a book was brought…,” started Charlie. 

“With the spooky symbol inside?” interrupted Meggie with a malicious grin.

“And that symbol was...is powered by a drop of blood, freely given,” continued Charlie patiently.

“Who would do that?  And why?”

“The symbol was supposed to open a gate.”

“What was your brother thinking?”

Charlie did not answer.  “But then nothing happened.  Everyone cracked beers.  I left my hiding space, which had been in an adjacent room, and went to leave.”

Meggie grinned.  “Scared?”

“I didn’t want to see my brother sucking face with his girlfriend.  Ew!” said Charlie with a pained expression.  “But, I couldn’t get out.”

“The door was locked?” asked Meggie.

“More like sealed,” said Charlie.

“You can’t scare me,” boasted Meggie.

Charlie stopped in view of the front door as they passed it.  “Try it!”

Meggie hesitated for a moment, but then stomped over to the front door.  She pulled on it, but it didn’t move a millimeter.  The brass knob turned, but would not open.  Twisting around, Meggie gestured at the windows.  

“There are all these windows,” huffed Meggie.  “Didn’t you ever think of that?”

Charlie strode over towards Meggie at the front door.  Meggie just managed to hold her ground when Charlie moved around her.  Scooping up the rock, Charlie threw it at one of the front windows.  Meggie started to shout in outrage when the rock bounced off the window.  Moving closer, Meggie could not even see a scratch on the glass.

“Same thing that night,” said Charlie and she turned to march up the stairs leading to the second floor.  But she did look back when she heard a clatter.  Charlie relaxed when she saw that Meggie’s big wedge shoes had just slipped on the stairs.

“I can’t see,” spat Meggie angrily as she tried to cover her embarrassment.  “We need to let some sunshine in here.”

“Not going to help,” said Charlie as she walked to the upper floor of rooms.  “This is a ‘Domus Tenebrosus’.”

“Speak English!” 

Charlie sighed.  “It’s a ‘dark house’.  You’ll find references about them in texts going back all the way to Mesopotamia.  It’s a sign that something bad happened here.”

“No kidding.”

“No,” said Charlie patiently.  “I mean, ‘worse than six dead kids bad’.”

“What could be worse?” scoffed Meggie.  

“Just after I found out that I was locked in, there came noises from the basement.”

“Noises?”

“Like a crackling sound, and then a soft, distant chanting” said Charlie as she found another room hole-less.  She gave a rueful chuckle.  “Being white people, one of the kids urged the others to go downstairs to investigate.”

Meggie snorted.  “Your brother was such an idiot.”

“And one of the kids tried to stop them,” continued Charlie, ignoring the comment.

“That would be my sister,” nodded Meggie sagely.  “Lacy was always the brains of that group.”

Charlie gritted her teeth and stopped.  But she managed to keep her voice level.  “Down in the basement, they found a newly formed hole, and then...then something snaked out, like a tentacle.  It grabbed Patrick first…”

“Are you high?” sneered Meggie.

“Not yet,” sighed Charlie.  “So, I had been at the top of the stairs, peeking down, when it snatched him.  We ran.  But not far enough.  Not fast enough.

Charlie kept moving as she threw powder into rooms, which turned out to be empty.  Meggie was stalking close to Charlie as they slowed by two rooms, one on either side of them.

“This is all such bull…” started Meggie when she saw something in the room on the right.  The room was all shadows, but back in one corner there was something.  Someone.  A person shrouded in the darkness.

“Meggie,” called out the shadow person.

“Lacy?” asked Meggie after a moment’s hesitation.  She turned right and began to step towards the shadow of her sister.  But Charlie stepped in front of her.

“Wait,” breathed Charlie.

“Wait?  Why should I…,” began Meggie when another shadow person leapt out of the room on the left.  

This shadow person grabbed Meggie’s ankles and pulled her off her feet.  As Meggie fell, she slammed into Charlie, who fell near the Shadow of Lacy.  The Shadow of Lacy dove at Charlie who tried to roll away, but was too slow.  Jumping onto Charlie’s back, the Shadow of Lacy grabbed the backpack and tried to get purchase.  

“Not my fault,” hissed the Shadow of Lacy.  “Not my fault.”

Charlie bucked up and found that the Shadow of Lacy was surprisingly light.  Throwing the shadow off, Charlie saw Meggie desperately holding on to the door frame of the other room.

“HELP!” screeched Meggie in panic.  “Something’s got me.”

Scrambling across the corridor, Charlie dropped on her butt and braced a foot against either side of the door frame.  She grabbed at Meggie’s back and took of handful of shirt with her left hand.

“Ow!  Pulling on my bra,” wailed Meggie.

Out of the corner of her eye, Charlie saw the Shadow of Lacy leap at her.  It arced through the air, extending sharp claws.

Charlie pulled off her right glove with her teeth.  Leaning back, Charlie lifted her hand up.  The Shadow of Lacy suddenly slammed into something invisible like a shield.  Squealing, the Shadow of Lacy scrambled off the shield like it was crawling over a hot pan.  Whimpering, the Shadow of Lacy disappeared back into the room on the right.

Turning to Meggie, Charlie leaned over the other woman.  Charlie pushed the shield at the other shadow person while tugging on Meggie.  The shadow person let go scampering away, but not before Charlie saw that it was a shadow of her brother, Travis.  They moved out into the hall and stopped for a moment.  Charlie stood guard as Meggie tugged to  straighten her designer workout clothes.

Slowing her breath, Charlie glanced at her watch. 

“House woke up early,” she said almost absently.  “Have to tell Dr Whipple that the house only took a little over twelve minutes.”  Then she looked at Meggie.  “Okay, we gotta hurry.  They’re getting stronger.”

Charlie spotted the fallen container of powder.  She scooped it up as best as she could and moved down the hallway.  She eyed the container.   

“Getting low,” mumbled Charlie.

“What’s getting low?” asked Meggie adopting a petulant tone to cover the fear she felt.  “What’s that powder really?”

Charlie was still processing the question when she threw the powder into a new room almost absently.  There was that terrible sucking sound and the powder was gone.

“By the pricking of my thumb…,” whispered Charlie.

“What?  What’s going on?” asked Meggie as she almost bumped into Charlie, who had stopped suddenly.  

Charlie looked at Meggie.  “I need you to wait in the hall.”

“I’m not flapping out here in the wind,” huffed Meggie.

“This is really dangerous,” said Charlie finding a reserve of patience that she did not know she had.  “Just stay here.  Please.  Just this once.”

Meggie hesitated and Charlie moved carefully into the room.  Leaning forward, Meggie watched through the doorway.  

Charlie took out the container of Morton’s salt and threw some on the ground in front of her.  Some of the salt disappeared revealing a clean half moon divot in the seemingly solid wood floor.  

“What’re you doing?” asked Meggie.

“The hole is hiding itself, but it can’t stop being a hole,” replied Charlie.

Throwing more salt, Charlie started to find the edges of the hole.  Behind Meggie, a low moan drifted down the hall.  Meggie whirled around, but didn’t see anything.

“Hurry!” hissed Meggie.  She moved into the room though careful of the hole shape in the salt.  As Charlie found the exact border, she began to pour a ring of salt around the hole.  Like the symbol downstairs, Charlie made a smaller circle and put a sympathetic crystal in the middle of the smaller hole.  

As she did so, Meggie prattled on nervously.  “I swear if I see your brother, I'm going to give him such a chewing out.  He shouldn’t have been fooling around with this stuff.”

Charlie knelt by the salt circle and spoke to herself to try and block out Meggie’s words, but it was getting harder.

“All we have to do is smash this crystal and the one downstairs will break too,” said Charlie over Meggie.  “That’s why they're called sympathetic crystals.  Or we’d need two people on walkie-talkies trying to break the crystals at exactly the same second.  And that sucks.”

But Meggie just kept babbling.  “What was he even thinking? I mean, I know it was Halloween, and he was probably fooling around, but this...this was not just stupid...it was criminal.”

“And do you know how hard it is to get sympathetic crystals?” sighed Charlie.  “I almost had to go to Morocco.”

Growls joined the moans in the hall.  A shadow person darted by the open door and disappeared.  Charlie bit her thumb again and put a drop of blood on the sympathetic crystal.

“Blood freely given,” she whispered.

“I hope he ends up in hell for what he did to my family,” spat Meggie.

Charlie froze.  “That’s it!  Will you shut up?”

“Truth hurts?” sneered Meggie.

“If you could find it, but…,” started Charlie, but then she stopped herself.  She turned to her bag and took out a small five inch hammer.

“But What?” demanded Meggie.  “What aren’t you telling about that night?”

“Nothing,” said Charlie as she raised the hammer over the sympathetic crystal.

“I'm tired of being ignored,” said Meggie.  She jumped forward and grabbed the little hammer from Charlie.

“Hey!” cried Charlie as she stood up.  She turned toward Meggie.  “Give that back.  Now!  We don’t have time.”

Meggie held it behind her back.  “NO!  You tell me first!”

“We can talk after,” said Charlie as she tried to reach around Meggie, who kept turning until her back was to the hole.   “Over waffles if you want.”

“You’re going to tell me now!” shouted Meggie, who planted her feet and glared.

Charlie glanced towards the hall and saw movement in the shadows of the opposite room.  She looked back at Meggie’s steely expression.

“Damnit,” swore Charlie.  “It was your sister!  Okay?  Lacy drew the symbol.  It is her blood in that symbol, freely given.”

Meggie’s jaw dropped.  Her mouth opened and closed, but no words came out.

Charlie gave a little sigh.  “I was there.  Why do you think your sister dated my brother?”

“Mom said your brother seduced her, like a vampire,” whispered Meggie, but there was no malice in her voice.

“Lacy chased after Travis,” chuckled Charlie without humor.  “He told me one day that she was always asking about our family history.  The dark parts.  And she brought the book that night.”

“Why...why didn't you say anything before?” asked Meggie finally.

Charlie rubbed her fingertips against her forehead wishing she could forget that night.  But at the same time, it felt good to finally speak about it.

“Because before my brother died…,” said Charlie, and her breath caught as she remembered the shadow people grabbing Travis.  “Before...he made me swear not to tell everyone about Lacy....”  Meggie looked questioning at that.  “Travis didn’t want everyone thinking badly of your sister…The big idiot loved her...”

The Shadow of Lacy leapt at Charlie’s head grappling her.  Charlie spun and knocked Meggie down as the hammer fell out of her hands, spinning in the air towards the hole.  Charlie herself almost lost her balance and fell into the hole.  Grabbing the Shadow of Lacy and disentangling it, Charlie threw it at the door where the Shadow of Travis stood.  Both tumbled into the corridor.

But they were up in a shot and coming at Charlie and Meggie.  Sprinting forward, Charlie held up her right hand with the Shield Symbol.  The Shadows slammed into it, and then backed away as they sizzled against it.  

Recovering, the Shadow of Travis hit the shield with its fist and Charlie felt the hit right up to her shoulder.  The quick hit had barely burned the Shadow of Travis’ fist, so it hit again followed by the other shadow joining in.

“What...what are you doing?” asked Meggie, who stood stock still.

Charlie spoke through gritted teeth.  “Holding them back!  Now, smash the bastard.”

“Bastard?”

“The Crystal!” cried Charlie in frustration.

Meggie looked around quickly and then settled on the hole.

“Hurry!” called out Charlie.  Sweat broke out on her face and she used her other hand out to brace the one with the shield.

“Do you…,” started Meggie uncertainly.  “Um.  Maybe have another hammer?”

“WHAT?  What happened to it?”

Charlie glanced over her shoulder as Meggie gestured nervously toward the hole.

“I think it fell in there,” said Meggie.

Charlie swore.  “Well then…find something else to smash the crystal.”

And then Charlie gave out a cry of pain as the Shadow of Travis slammed the shield hard.  Charlie lost a little ground and the shadow people started to hit the shield in earnest now.  Meggie was just looking around the empty room.

“There’s nothing else in here,” said Meggie.

“Then use your head,” growled Charlie.  “Anything!  Hurry!”

There came a dark noise and Charlie could not breath for a second.  Drifting out of the hole, came a distant chanting.  Meggie looked down at the hole.

“Um.  What was that?” asked Meggie.

“Do you really want to find out?” cried out Charlie in frustration.

“I don’t see anything heavy,” whined Meggie.

Another sound came up from the hole.  It was a dry slithering, like a thousand snakes pushing up.

“If you don’t smash it, we’re dead!” said Charlie, but then she added.  “If we're lucky.”

Meggie saw something deeper in the hole and the blood drained from her face.  She leaned back and dragged off one of her wedge shoes.  The sounds started to fill the room.  There was now a raising wail.

Shoe off, Meggie dropped to her knees by the crystal and brought it down.  A dark green tentacle shot out of the hole towards her.  The shoe smashed the crystal and a blast of pressure hit Meggie.  She was thrown across the room as her shoe flew out of her hand.

Hit in the back, Charlie flew out into the hallway pushing the shadow people with her.  They smashed into the opposite wall falling back.  Charlie saw her shield wink out.

But then there was a blinding light.  

Throwing an arm across her face, Charlie covered her eyes, but a horrible screeching noise threatened to envelop her.  She blinked past the light and saw sunlight streaming in open windows, which were no longer dark.  

The sunlight hit the Shadows of Lacy and Travis like acid and they swiftly started dissolving.  Charlie’s hand started to reach the Shadow of Travis, but he quickly fell apart and was gone.

Charlie let out a small, sad noise.  “Damn.”

Then her right arm, which had held the shield, exploded in pins and needles.  She gritted her teeth and massaged it.

“Ow, ow, ow,” she griped, and tried shaking her hand, as if that would stop the pain.  Turning her hand over, the Sharpie ink was gone from the shield spell and the symbol was now raised on her hand like a giant welt.  Pain from her palm was now flooding her system.

“Okay.  Dr. Whipple was right,” said Charlie to herself through gritted teeth.  “I needed a bigger protection spell.”

Cradling her right hand, Charlie straightened her backpack and went into the room with the hole.  Or, more precisely, to the room without the hole.  There was a circular burn mark in the center of the floor.  The salt circle and the crystal were gone.  Experimentally, Charlie touched the edge of the burn mark with the toe of her black Converse All-Stars, but it was solid underneath.  

A groan came from Meggie.  She was lying against the wall with a wedge shoe nearby.  Charlie picked up the shoe with her good hand and laid it on Meggie’s hand, who grabbed it tightly.

“Come on,” said Charlie gently.  She helped Meggie up and held her in place.  “Put on your shoe.”

***

Outside, the sun seemed even brighter as Charlie pulled her Fedora down over her eyes.  She steered Meggie down the steps and out onto the shaggy lawn.  Charlie was fishing around her pocket for her cell phone when Meggie slumped to her knees and started to cry.

“You’re safe now,” said Charlie, but she felt awkward about reaching out to comfort the other woman.  There was still too much bad blood for them to be friends.

“It’s not that,” sniffled Meggie.  “It’s…”

Meggie tried, unsuccessfully, to wipe her nose.

“It’s just..,” started Meggie again.  “My sister Lacy was such a huge asshole.”

Charlie blinked in surprise.  Absently, she pulled out a small pack of tissues.  She dropped them in front of Meggie, who took one out gratefully and blew her nose.

“I always wondered if she had caused the trouble that night, but my family...they immediately put her up for sainthood,” burbled Meggie.  “Idiots!”

Meggie looked from the tissues and up to Charlie.

“I still don’t like you,” said Meggie, but she gave wan smile.  

Charlie returned the smile.  “Ditto.”

Pulling out her cell phone, Charlie dialed a number.  

“Mr Caliper, it’s done,” said Charlie into the phone.