They Lived

At 87, Mona Cabot lived alone. She’d outlived her late-husband David and all three of their children. She had four grandchildren, and only saw one of them, the youngest, Leanne. She was bright, blue-eyed, had a heart of gold, and not a wrinkle in sight. She stopped by daily.

With a key, Leanne let herself into her grandmother’s ground-floor apartment. “Just me,” she called out. She juggled a splitting plastic bag of groceries in her arm, setting them by the door as she kicked off her shoes.

“Leanne?” a faint voice called back, “am in the bedroom.”

“Nan?” she asked, stripping away her jacket and string crossbody bag. “What are you doing?”

Spritely, Mona Cabot could be described as. She’d bee struggling to make her bed for nearly fifteen minutes. “Bleedin’ thing.” She yanked the sheet. “Won’t go on.”

Leanne stood by the bedroom door, smiling and shaking her head. “I told you already.”

Her grandmother wiped back a grey curl form her eyes. “You know what I’m like.”

Leanne leaned across the bed and collected the sheet. “This fitted sheet is too small,” she said. “Yours is a double, this is for a single.” But every time Leanne tried explaining and throwing the sheet away, her grandmother would fish it out of the bin and put it back into the musty linen closet.

“Well, I don’t know, do I?” she scoffed.

“Nan, we changed your sheets yesterday,” Leanne continued. “What happened?”

“Upstairs,” she said.

“What?”

“The racket they were making.”

Leanne didn’t need to hear anymore. It wasn’t the first time her grandmother had an accident like this during the night. “Well, I’ll have a word with them, tell them to keep it down, and you should be wearing those special pants we bought.”

“No chance!” she scoffed back. “They’re too tight around my lady bits.”

“Right,” Leanne said, she’d heard it all before. “You put the kettle on then, I’ll do your bed. How does that sound for a trade?”

A single breathy laugh came from Mona’s mouth. “Good luck!” She smirked as she two-stepped out of the bedroom like she’d swindled her granddaughter into a poor trade.

“If you need help filling the—”

“Need help,” her voice chuckled. “I’m not an invalid yet, sweetheart.”

After making her grandmother’s bed, Leanne joined her in the kitchen. The small table had been set with a teapot, four small cups, and a plate of biscuits.

“All done,” she claimed, dusting her hands off on her jeans.

“Still here?” Mona said, steeping the teabags. “Thought you’d gone.”

“No, I just made your bed.” Leanne looked around the kitchen. It was spotless, not a single dirty dish in sight. “You been—”

She tutted back. “We just made the bed yesterday,” she said. “Well, you might as well take a seat now you’re here.”

“Have you been eating?” she asked, taking a seat.

“Eating, cooking, cleaning,” she listed. “I can do it all.”

It was all a repeat of what she’d heard, day after day, and although she knew the answer, she quizzed away. “What have you been up to today?”

“Not much,” she said. “You’re here early, aren’t you?”

“No, nan,” she answered. “It’s four in the afternoon.”

“Bleedin’ heck, time flies,” she chuckled.

“Nan, you were talking about the neighbours upstairs again,” she started. “I’m going to have a word with them. Do you remember what time last night they were being loud?”

“Upstairs?” she laughed. “Nobody lives up there.”

“You were just—” she paused and trapped her tongue. “Never mind.”

This wasn’t the first time Leanne heard her grandmother talk about how loud they were being upstairs. Over the next couple of days, she noticed her act strange around certain topics. The neighbours were one of them.

Leanne arrived a little later than usual this time, letting herself in as she heaved an overnight bag on her shoulder, she called out to her grandmother.

“In the kitchen,” she replied.

Leanne entered the kitchen, lugging her bag at the shoulder and hip. “Right,” she began.

Mona’s eyes widened to see her granddaughter. She had been stirring milk on the stove. “Off on your jollies?” She nodded to the bag. “I’d offer to join, but I’ve just put my rollers in.” She wore a thin hairnet; it kept her hair wound tightly around the foam rollers.

“No, nan, I’m staying the night,” she said. “You keep mentioning someone upstairs, but the flat is empty, and it has been for nearly three months.”

Her brow scrunched. “I know it’s empty.” She glanced back to the simmering milk in the saucepan. “Want some hot chocolate?”

She dropped the overnight bag at her feet. “Sure.”

Leanne’s mother used to make the best hot chocolate, a recipe she’d gotten from her mother. Perhaps the reason Leanne kept a close relationship, or the growing concern for her health.

Later that evening as Mona settled in bed and Leanne set the sofa up to sleep on. She lit a candle on the windowsill and climbed back into bed as the television play reruns of ‘Criminal Minds’. The volume was low, the subtitles were on, and Leanne was drifting to sleep.

Clunk.

Her eyelids opened.

The television was off.

Thud.

Her head cocked left to right.

The candle went out.

Bang.

She threw the blanket off, sitting upright in the darkness.

“You shouldn’t be here.”

Leanne jumped from the couch, screaming. She knocked the lamp in the darkness and fell into the wall.

As the ceiling light flickered on, it revealed a shivering Leanne in the corner and a concerned Mona by the switch.

“Oh, Leanne,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

“Na—nan, were you banging?” she responded with a hand to her chest, pressing at the bottom of her neck. “You nearly scared me to death.”

“Wasn’t me, dear,” she scoffed.

Knock. Knock.

Her grandmother scoffed again, with more aggression. “Turning this place into a brothel are you?”

Leanne picked herself from the floor. “Nan, I told you I was staying the night,” she said. “I haven’t invited anyone.”

“Oh, well,” she chuckled. “Must be for me.”

Knock. Knock.

“No,” Leanne responded. “I’ll get it.” She grabbed at her blanket, wrapping it around her shoulders. “Let me cover up.” She passed ahead of her grandmother.

Mona waited in the hallway while Leanne approached the front door. She wondered what time it was, and why on earth anyone would be coming around so late.

Opening the door, she was disappointed.

Nobody was there.

“Must’ve gone,” she said, closing the door.

“Nuisance caller,” Mona huffed back.

Knock. Knock.

Not the front door.

“Oh, would you look at that,” Mona chuckled. “It’s the linen closet.” She reached out for the handle.

“Nan,” Leanne snapped. “Don’t—”

“What?”

“What if it’s—rats?”

“I grew up before rats were chased from residential areas,” she chuckled back. “I can handle some—”

Knock. Knock.

With her hand on the handle, Mona looked to Leanne. “I’ll fight ‘em off.”

But as Leanne stepped forward, her grandmother opened the door.

Sucked inside. The door slammed shut.

Leanne tugged at the handle, pulling it, pounding fists, and stubbing toes. Her vocal cords were fried, she couldn’t shout any longer, she couldn’t fight. She’d grown weak in her adrenaline rage.

“No,” she let out in a whimper. “No,” her voice crumbled as she collapsed into the spot at the door.

Coming to consciousness as daylight filled the hallway, Leanne stood on shaky legs.

“Now, where was I?” her voice perked.

She turned to the mirror. A reflection of a face with wrinkles and grey hair. She stared at her features for a moment longer. They weren’t hers. They belonged to somebody else. And as she searched her memory for the face, an alarm rang out.

“That’s right,” she chuckled. “I should get cleaned up; this place is a mess.”

The face belonged to Mona Cabot, aged 87.

And it was the fifth time someone new had worn it.