The Girl: Unabridged Part 2 of 3

4 | The next few weeks were uneventful for Margo and the girls. She spent time getting to know them and telling them all about herself and her family that had passed away long before the girls were born. When the girls weren’t in counseling sessions or school, she tried to get them out of the house as much as possible, even if it was just to have picnics near the house in the field, or hiking through the expansive forest that surrounded the grounds. She showed them how to identify edible berries and what poison oak looked like to avoid it. She tried to give the girls normal experiences that any other young girls their age would be having. After all the darkness they’d endured with their parents’ deaths, they more than earned it. And after being so sheltered from their mother’s worry over the past tragedy of their sisters they’d never meet, the girls were beyond happy to go exploring outside or take a car ride to the city and go sightseeing.

One evening after they’d stopped at a McDonald’s drive-through and were binge-eating all the french fries, chicken McNuggets and cheeseburgers they could handle in the sitting room that Margo had since turned into a family tv den with tv trays for the girls and her to eat casual meals, the conversation took a wrong turn, when out of nowhere, Elyse spurted, “Our ghost girl really likes you. She doesn’t follow behind you when you move like she did with mommy and daddy, she just stays by us while we play.”

With that, a cold chill worked it’s way up Margo’s spine. She’d all but forgotten the conversation upon their meeting about “ghost girl,” and now knowing the whole story about her sister, she couldn’t help but feel there was no way this was just a coincidence. She wondered the things their mother must have said out of turn in the past that the girls must have picked up on. She mentally noted to bring it up next time the girls had a counseling session, but decided to gently inquire about this ghost girl. She made a plan to learn more and then write it down after the girls went to bed so she wouldn’t forget the details when she brought it up with Dr. Ross.

“Elyse, this ghost girl,” she started, “Is she a friend of yours? You said you aren’t afraid of her that she just stands there, right? So what is it that you think she wants?”

“I’m not sure. She’s never tried to hurt us. She just stays by us while we play, and she goes away at night. We’ve heard her walking around outside of our room, but she doesn’t bother us while we sleep.”

“One night,” jumped in Ella, “I got up to get some water and I saw her go into a room across the hall and just sit on the bed looking at the window.”

This is surreal, thought Margo. She was trying not to get too tied up in the story, because it was really starting to freak her out.

“Can you show me where you saw her, Ella?” asked Margo.

Ella nodded and put her little hand in Margo’s and led her to the room across the hall. It was a mirror image of the girls’ room without the dollhouse. There were two identical cream colored wooden twin beds with lavender bedding and lavender canopies along the right wall with a small matching table in between and matching nightstands on the outer side of the beds. There was a window directly across from the door on the other side of the room with a lavender ruffled window valance, and a cream colored wardrobe on the left wall with lavender colored flowers stenciled across the doors with brushed nickel knobs. The room had mahogany hardwood floors matching the rest of the house, with lavender and cream colored oriental area rug running beneath the beds. Where this room was purple and lavender, the girls’ room was pink and white.

Looking back at the girls room across the hall, Margo felt a rising sadness within her, and a disappointment in her sister. She felt like she’d just used the girls as a do-over without putting in any effort to do something different or unique for them. God knows she had the money to do it, and she didn’t work, so she’d had the time. A chill ran through her body and she realized that at one time, she had two nieces in this room, and one had been taken.

Ella had described how she saw the girl sitting on the bed looking at the window, and it occurred to Margo if the girls had in fact seen a ghost of their older sister, she was sitting in a room she had been abducted from looking at the window someone had gotten in through.

Margo led the girls back out of the room and made sure to close the door all the way behind her. An idea occurred to her.

“Girls,” she started, “what would you think about moving into a different room in the house?”

The girls lit up with nods of agreement and happy noises. She beamed back at them. She decided she’d let them pick everything - which room, which colors, and how they want it to look. They had plenty of rooms to choose from. Margo tucked the girls into bed that night and gave them each a kiss on the forehead, turned on their little silver carousel nightlight and left the room.

She walked to her room at the end of the hall and got ready for bed while planning out the next few days in her head. They’ll go to the hardware store and look at paint colors, they’d go to the department store and pick out new furniture and bedding. She was looking forward to the project and hoped the girls would enjoy it too. As she brushed her hair in front of the bathroom mirror, she realized that in the last few weeks, the girls had already come to mean more to her than anything else in the world. The realization turned slowly to a hollow sadness in her chest as she wished she’d had a chance to meet her other nieces, and how she’d wished she’d kept in touch with her sister over the years even if it was just to meet the girls and have family time. The party invites never mattered to her. She put her brush down on the counter, brushed her teeth quickly, filled up her glass of water and walked out of the bathroom into the bedroom. She put the glass down on her dark-stained nightstand and got under the fluffy duvet cover of the brass bed and pulled the chain to shut off the small bedside lamp.

5 | Margo dreamed she was swimming. The water around her looked murky, but she felt as if she knew where she was. She was making slow, languid strokes of her arms and legs through the water looking for something, but she didn’t know what. She suddenly realized she needed to breathe, but the water was reflecting light above and below her, and she no longer knew which way was up. She was struggling to hold her breath and the need for air became overwhelming. She began to choke realizing her body was trying to pull in air where there was only water.

***

Margo shot up in bed choking and sputtering. She heard beating at the door and what sounded like the girls shouting. She was covered in water running down from her mouth all over her nightgown and blanket. She fumbled in the dark for the lamp, knocking over her glass in the process. Once she got the light on, she leaped off the bed to open the door to calm the girls down.

Ella and Elyse practically knocked Margo down as she opened the door as they clung to her.

“Girls, what’s the matter? Are you okay?” All concern about her nightmare had fluttered away in the wake of the girls’ panic.

The girls were talking over each other. Shouts of “We couldn’t open the door!” and “We couldn’t get in!” followed by a bunch of worried complaints that Margo couldn’t understand while the girls were in this state.

“One at a time, girls,” she said, “but first let’s take a deep breath and let me take a look at you.” Margo looked the girls over, turning each around, lifting their chins and turning their heads left and right, turning their arms and hands over. They both appeared to be fine.

“Let’s start with Elyse first. Sweetie, what’s the matter?”

Elyse’s eyes were wide with concern. “The ghost girl followed you today. We heard her outside our door then moving away so we looked out the door and saw her go in your room. We tried to come open your door, but it wouldn’t open.”

Margo realized the girls must have heard her having a nightmare in the middle of the night and built a story up around their ghost girl in their tired little minds.

“Oh girls,” she said, pulling them both into a big hug. “There’s nothing to worry about. I’m fine. There was no ghost girl here. I had a bad dream and must have grabbed my glass of water and spilled it on me, that’s probably why I was dreaming of swimming and I woke up in a little bit of a panic. I’m so sorry I scared you both.”

“No, you don’t understand,” urged Ella, “That’s how mommy and daddy died. They drowned. In their beds. They didn’t have water by the bed.”

Well that did get Margo worrying. She decided while they went shopping, she’d make a detour to get the police records of what happened the night her sister died. For the time being, Margo gathered up the girls in her arms and they climbed up into the bed with her and cuddled in. She didn’t know if it was more to comfort them or her. She held them both tight, listening to them breath and didn’t fall back to sleep herself until the sun was starting to rise.

6 | They had a late start to shopping after the night they’d had, but the girls were in much better spirits having snuggled all night, and Margo made sure to whip up a big brunch of bacon, eggs and potato pancakes with french toast and orange juice.

They first swung by the police station and Margo had to fill out a few forms to get the police reports on her niece’s disappearance and sister’s death, while an older officer, who was round in the belly and had bushy hair peeking out his nose, was showing the girls his badge and how handcuffs and the little light, called a cherry, works. Margo had a little trouble getting the records other than whatever was of public record, but she’d sent Janet a message, who knew many of the police officers from past court cases, who then made a call to the precinct calling in a favor for Margo to get the full reports.

Afterwards, they picked out all the bedding at the local department store first, then hit the hardware store for paint swatches and they got samples of their favorite colors.

They stopped for lunch at a little mom and pop restaurant for burgers and fries, and headed back to the house to pick out the room they’d be painting.

The girls chose a room on the other side of the home on the second floor that overlooked the acres of backyard gardens. The evening was spent painting big sections of the wall so they could see how the colors looked on the walls when they dried. They’d look at them before bed, then again in the morning light before they made a final decision. The bundles of bedding and other items they bought for the room were stuffed into the empty room next to it that Margo decided she’d move into eventually, and the furniture they’d picked would be delivered the next morning. That night, to be safe, they decided to have a sleepover in the tv den with sleeping bags lined up next to each other with Margo in the middle and the girls on each side.

Margo didn’t remember falling asleep, but awoke in a dark room to the sound of little girls shouting out into the middle of the room. As her night vision became clearer, she could see the girls sitting up in their sleeping bags leaning over her lap. Margo was alarmed that someone could be in the house knowing it had happened at least once before when their sisters were their age.

“Girls! Girls! Get behind me,” she shouted as she tried to get her arms around the girls to pull herself in front of them.

“No!” yelled Elyse. “Stay behind us! She won’t hurt us!” And at that moment, Margo’s vision cleared enough to see beyond the girls to the figure in the middle of the room, and her eyes went wide with shock. It was a young girl, about the same age as Ella and Elyse, a little taller perhaps. She had dark blonde hair much like Margo’s, but it was wet and dirty, matted down with dirt and weeds. Her nightgown was tattered and her flesh appeared translucent. At that moment, Margo knew the ghost girl was real. All three of them saw the girl, so it couldn’t have been a hallucination. Margo swallowed a scream, gathered the girls up off the ground, grabbed her purse, and ran for the door. She put the girls down at her car and fumbled with her purse to get the keys and dropped them twice trying to get them into the lock on the door (with a quick mental note to get a car with automatic locks in the very near future), finally popped the door open, lifted each girl quickly and into the car through the front driver side. They quickly climbed over the center console to the passenger seat and squeezed in together, while Margo hopped in and started the engine. She switched the car out of park into drive and peeled down the driveway. She looked out the window to her left and saw the girl standing in the middle of the pond, highlighted by the moonlight. Terror flooded adrenaline through Margo’s veins and she floored it while the car fishtailed and skidded all over the gravel drive as they gained on the forest. Margo’s blood flow didn’t slow down until they were five minutes down the main road. She drove two towns over before stopping at a mid-rate hotel to stay with the girls for the night.

The front desk manager made no comment on their disheveled appearance or the fact that they were all in nightgowns and housecoats with no shoes as Margo handed over her credit card with a shaky hand, but as he handed her the room key, he asked, “Ma’am, is someone following you? Do you need me to contact the authorities on your behalf?”

Margo looked at the desk manager dumbfounded, until it registered that he must think from their appearance that they were on the run from an abusive spouse or something. “No, no I’m sorry for our state, we are fine. We had a tree go down at our house and already made the necessary calls for people to come out tomorrow. Destroyed half our stuff, we barely made it out and are still shaken up.”

“Did ghost girl knock a tree down?” asked Ella as Margo covered her mouth, then stepped in front of the little girl.

“Don’t mind them. Kids have such colorful imaginations and they are still half asleep. Thank you so much sir.”

“Have a good evening, and good luck with your home tomorrow. I hope you have a pleasant stay. Just go down the hall to the elevator on the right, take it up to the second floor. Go left when you step off the elevator, go left and the room should be two doors down,” he instructed as he handed the girls some cookies from the plate on the counter for guests. “Here girls, in case your mom lets you have a little snack before you go back to bed for being so good.”

“--Thank you so much! They sure can,” Margo jumped in before the girls could correct him, took their hands and turned them toward the hall to the elevator. “Have a good night,” she called over her shoulder as they started walking.

7 | She got the girls cleaned up from being outside standing on the ground without shoes on, settled them into the bed, tucked them in, and sat in the reading chair in the corner of the room watching the girls sleep and trying to make sense of the evening.

How had she seen this ghost? Where did it come from? Does it have to do with Stella’s older children? What does it want with her? Why is it docile with the girls and no one else? Is she the reason Stella and Adam died?

She sat contemplating when her eyes landed on her purse. She remembered then that she’d still had the police reports in her purse from earlier that day. She tip-toed across the room and gently opened the flap on top of her purse and pulled out the manila folders that she got at the station, then crept back over to the chair.

Margo spent the next two hours of the late night pouring over all the pages of details and accounts from volunteers when her niece had gone missing. No evidence of a break in except an open window. No sign of a struggle. Her sister didn’t wake or hear anything and had slept through the night. None of it made sense.

She then reviewed all the documents about her sister’s and Adam’s deaths. The worst was the photos. She hadn’t expected those. To see her sister’s discolored, bloated skin and lifeless eyes staring at the ceiling, Adam in the same condition, just laying on the bed-- the brass bed that she’d been sleeping in. Margo was fighting a bout of nausea. She put down the folder and closed her eyes for a moment, taking slow, deep breaths until she felt calm again to continue.

When she picked the folder back up and looked at the photo again, she saw a glass of water laying on its side on the floor, just like the night before when she’d had the nightmare about drowning and woke up with water all over her. Much more water than the amount contained in that glass. She read the rest of the report that summed up basically everything she already knew: died in bed, apparently drowned, no witnesses, no signs of a break-in, children didn’t wake in the night, but called 9-1-1 in the morning. That was the worst part. The girls were the ones to find their parents like that. What it must be like to be a five year old child and not only process losing both your parents at the same time, but also to see it with your own eyes and need to be composed enough to call for help. She looked over at both Ella and Elyse asleep on the bed. She could see their shoulders moving ever so slightly with each breath. Ella’s mouth was hanging open, with drool spilling down from the corner of her lips to the pillow. They looked so sweet and precious. She could not have pictured the girls in that ordeal if she tried.

Each event alone didn’t add up, but Margo had a gut feeling that everything was related somehow. She just didn’t know how. She decided if the police weren’t actively investigating, she was going to have to put on her “detective cap” and try to figure it out herself. She owed it to the girls to give them some closure and maybe prevent what happened to their parents from happening again.

After the social worker had told her about the other set of twins on that first day she arrived, and a few minutes after the girls mentioned a ghost girl, she had a sneaking suspicion that the ghost girl was their older sister. Though at the time, she was mentally denying the existence of a ghost, she had had another one of those gut feelings. And while all the paperwork said the girl was abducted, it was too obvious to deny that she may have been dead all along. The police didn’t find the girl because they were looking for clues to a suspect that left no trail. Could her sister have had some part in it? They said that she’d been suffering from depression and her husband was in rehab while she raised her two girls. It wouldn’t be the first time something like that happened in the world, she just dreaded to think that her sister could be the type of person to do such a thing.

8 | Margo woke up the next morning as the sun shined through the sheer curtains onto her face. She’d fallen asleep in the chair at some point and had forgotten to close the room darkening shade. As she moved, some of the papers that were still in her lap slid off and landed on the ground. As she was picking them up, all the paper rustling had woken the girls.

“Good morning,” she said, with a smile, trying to stay positive for the girls.

“Morning,” said Elyse while Ella was still yawning and opening her eyes.

“Mornin,’” said Ella. “Is there anything to eat?”

“I think they have a free breakfast downstairs. Let me call room service for some slippers then we’ll head down. We may be up too early even for the hotel breakfast.”

Margo called for the slippers and sat on the bed between the girls while they watched cartoons on the hotel television. She was making a mental list of everything she wanted to do: call the family accountant assigned to the girls and find out about her sister’s spending habits, especially around the time Mia went missing. She also wanted to meet her other niece, Maddy. She knew she would need to be delicate with her and her sensitive mental state, but also wanted to see if there was anything Maddy could tell her that might help them. She also wanted to get the records of everything Maddy had said before she’d been taken by the state for care. She knew to get access to the records, she might have to petition for guardianship of her since she was in custody of the state and Stella had left nothing in her will in regards to her older daughter. Margo would need to call Justine to find out where Maddy was living, and she’d need to find a babysitter. She didn’t want to traumatize the girls further. She didn’t want to ask Justine to watch the girls while she went on an inquisition out of fear that it would raise red flags with a social worker, so she decided to ask Janet for yet another favor.

A knock at the door signaled the arrival of their slippers and shortly after they were downstairs enjoying some waffles from the waffle iron put out in the lobby, a few sausage patties, some very dry or runny, depending where you scooped from, eggs, and some apple juice.

“I have a few errands to run today that I won’t be able to take you with,” she said. “I’m going to see if Janet can visit to spend some time with you while I’m gone, and hopefully by the time I get back, some of your furniture for your new room will be arriving if you are comfortable going back to the house. Have you ever seen the girl in the daytime?”

Elyse, always the bold one, replied, “Nope, never while the sun is still out. How do ghosts know to only come out at night? Or do you think they are there but because they are see through, the light goes through them so they can’t touch anything and no one can see them?”

Margo looked at her niece and wondered what all the thoughts in her mind must be like. “I don’t know. It’s as good a guess as any, I suppose.” Margo thought for a moment, then asked, “So you say the girl never tries to hurt you, but last night she’d been coming towards all of us.”

“That’s because you were there,” said Ella, “she was coming for you. I don’t know why she’s mad at you now. Did you do something to make her mad?”

“Don’t be stupid Ella,” Elyse chimed in, “the girl didn’t bother Auntie Margo until we went into her bedroom and then Auntie asked if we wanted to move to a different room. She likes to play with us, and now we are going farther from her room.”

“Elyse, do you know anything about the girl since you first started seeing her?” asked Margo.

“Not much since she can’t talk. But I think she’s the reason that mommy and daddy are dead.”

“Don’t say that!” shouted Ella. “Why would she watch over us but hurt mommy and daddy?”

“She tried to hurt Auntie Margo too, Ella,” Elyse said with an eyebrow raised with a look on her face that said she was waiting for her sister to get on the same page as her. She turned back to Margo.

“I think she’s related to us. She looks a little bit like all of us, don’t you think? If she wasn’t so dirty and soaked...and dead.”

“Well, that’s part of the errands I’m running today,” said Margo. “I’m going to try to figure out what happened to her, but I’ll have to make a few stops where I can’t bring young kids to. Do you think you’ll be okay at the house with Miss Janet?”

“Yep,” they replied in unison. Then they finished their breakfast, went up to the room and got as ready as they could be without any spare clothes with them, and headed back to the house.