STUFF I WROTE

Artist credit:  Anders Røkkum
(http://rockum.tumblr.com/)

The Unreliable Narrator

 

I rented the house, in spite of my misgivings.  But I was really good at that – ignoring my intuition. Had a life’s worth of practice.  I ignored my friend’s misgivings and even the real estate agent’s. Not that she came out and said anything, but I know the look. Like when I wondered about the series of five deep scratches that ran the length of the kitchen door frame.
I put my hand up to one set of scratches – it seemed like the thing to do, measure scratches – and they fit my hand. “I believe the previous renters had a dog,” the agent said, after a beat.

“Damn big dog,” my friend said. He was along for moral support, and for the entire tour his face looked as though I’d asked him to smell something that might have gone bad. After we went down to the basement, his expression worsened as if I’d asked him to eat it. “What’s that in the corner?” he asked. At the time, I knew he didn’t think much of the house, and I thought he was just looking for something to get us out of there.

But I looked where he pointed.
The darkness in the basement was like a perspective painting, narrowing and sharpening to the deepest black in the corner.  But even so I could make out a door.  A perfectly normal door with a large intricate lock. Plus a deadbolt. And a chain looped across it.
This is when I truly began to ignore the cold heating up in my belly. "Gotta keep the Boogeyman out somehow, huh?" I said, laughing. "Or in!"  The agent didn't get it. My friend wasn't listening. I stopped laughing.
"So where does that go?" I asked.
In a flurry of words, the agent answered, "I'm sure it goes outside I don't have the key the owners would prefer to keep it closed would you like to see the backyard?"
We shrugged and nodded.

Speaking of ignoring my intuition, did I mention I really needed this house?  Any house?  When your boyfriend has a nondescript house on the edge of town, takes a lot of business trips, and calls his "mom" every day - "Can I have my boyfriend is shady as hell for 650 dollars, Alex?"  650 dollars being the rent I just wasted when I blew this popsicle stand.

We tramped back upstairs. They walked loud enough to wake the dead, but I stepped carefully not to disturb the ether.

To be continued...