Haunted Hallways, page 9
Andrew looked at the gap they’d come through, which seemed further than three steps away, and gave a vigorous head shake.
Whoever was pleading for help, she couldn’t leave them—not when they’d been asking all day.
“Give me the torch, then?” she shouted.
Andrew pressed it into her palm. “Hold it for me while I get out.” The distance back now was as far across as the width of the library. She lit a path along a moss-textured floor, and he strode across, fists clenched, then sidled between the nearest row of shelves. She could just see the tiny sliver of the final gap beyond. The whispering softened—he must have got out. She turned toward the next row. Had the whispers come from the books?
Those texts were in English, though, or Latin, or French…
She continued between the next set of shelves. The floor softened further, her school shoes squelching. Should’ve brought a jacket—her shirt was too flimsy for this evening chill. “Hello? Vanakkam?”
The whispers stopped.
“Will you tell me what you want?”
Silence.
A fog grew as she progressed. Fine water droplets scattered her torch-beam by the time she reached that morning’s desk. She wiped the muddy base of her satchel on her pants—the damp had already seeped from the air into her uniform.
Her notebook was on top of the pile.
The pencil rolled off as she lifted it down, revealing the next, familiar book, with the title clear: The Water Cycle.
In Tamil, the words for “to listen” and “to ask” were identical: kedka. They weren’t communicating with her now, but what if she asked the right questions? She nudged the chair out. Its legs rocked on uneven ground, then steadied as she sat. She propped the torch against the partition to illuminate her notebook.
Who are you? she scribbled at the top of a page. Where are you?
Nothing.
Neengal yaar?
This time, her letters fractured, reformed. Ayalavar, came the answer, tiny, neat. Neighbors. Those nearby.
She continued in Tamil. Why are you writing to me?
We need your help. Your world is…
The text she’d written at the top rearranged, as if they needed existing pencil-marks to communicate.
…drowning ours. Your world is drowning us. You understand us.
Mira steadied her grip on the pencil and took a deep breath of musty air. Should have brought warmer clothes. Should take the books and go. But they were asking for her help.
How?
Don’t know.
What do you want?
Viduthalai. Pazhi.
Freedom. Revenge.
She shifted the library books into her satchel. Her fingers kept sticking to the covers. Common sense said to leave—this wet, dingy version of the library and these unknown neighbors’ desire for revenge weren’t safe.
But who, if their world was being destroyed, wouldn’t want freedom? Or even revenge? She should understand—it was mere luck she carried schoolbooks rather than a machine gun.
“Freedom means…?” No answer.
Over the full satchel on her lap, she wrote, Freedom means?
Let us come.
Weren’t they already here?
A squelch behind her, and she sprang up, feet sinking.
“Mira? Oh, you’re here.” Lily stood by the shelves, fuzzy in the mist and ankle-deep in the viscous substance replacing the floor. “You okay? What is this?”
The chair wouldn’t move, and Mira had to climb over it to get out from the desk. “I don’t know. Can we go?”
“Obviously, yes, please!”
Lily’s arms were folded, hands tight on her elbows. She lifted alternate feet, frowning at her shoes. Mira slung the heavy satchel over a shoulder and plodded through the sludge, notebook in one hand, torch in the other. Lily caught her arm. “Is this payback for all the bogs I dragged you through?”
“Nah, I would’ve made us wear boots if I knew. How’d you find me?” Mira slipped between the shelves, Lily close behind.
“I heard you muttering. Seriously, are you seeing this? It’s almost raining! Inside! And you’re…sitting taking notes?”
How could she explain? “Remember I said the writing changed? Like on the dining hall blackboard? Well, it does, when I look at it.”
“And that’s to do with the library flooding?”
“I think so?” The writers—the mysterious neighbors—were letting them leave. The distance between aisles had lost the earlier distortion, from when Andrew had left… “Where’s Andrew?”
“He came out positively yelling for Ms. Johnson. Then said something about voices and went to find an adult. He was a mess. We will be, too. Did you need your books that badly?” Lily sounded perplexed, not annoyed. And there was the dull yellow light between bookcases. Mira waited to answer until they reached the warmth of the library.
Greenish slime coated their shoes and trousers. Lily’s shirt clung to her, and Mira could feel hers doing the same. Steam rose off her bag.
“I was asking questions. They’re telling me to help, in Tamil. I think…I think they’re, I don’t know, spirits from the war or something.”
Lily grimaced, wiping gunk from her ankles with the side of her hand. “You don’t think it’s odd they asked you, specifically, not someone closer? Or an adult? Like they came to a boarding school in England to find you?”
She was trying to help, Mira reminded herself. “No, I do think it’s odd, unless they’re doing it everywhere.”
“You know weirdness has happened here before, right? We’ve heard the rumors. Maybe you hit a…weirdness patch and your stress attracted them. Gosh, Andrew should be back.”
They’d said Mira understood them, though. And she wasn’t the only one stressed—half the Seventh Years subsisted on chocolate and study guides, and rarely appeared in the dining hall. She tucked the torch under her elbow and wrung several drops of water from her shirt.
Lily copied her. “It’s like the rain we haven’t had this year all ended up in there.”
They’d said the same. Your world is drowning ours.
“What if it has? That’s what happens here, right? Short-term climate patterns give places different weather—isn’t that the Southern Oscillation you wrote about in your notes?”
“Something like that. So what, their world’s out of balance because of our climate? And where is everyone?”
The clock above the issues desk showed 9:30, meaning they’d been here over two hours—far longer than it had felt—past the library’s closing time. Mira snatched a pen from the issues desk. The ink smudged on moisture-curled notebook pages.
Neengal manitharkalaa? Are you human?
Aavi
Spirits—or steam. Spirits of the dead? Or another being? Or water vapor, overcrowded in an increasingly humid atmosphere?
Lily left no time to clarify. “That’s bizarre, but Sedgwick? Or teachers’ common room?”
“Ms. Sedgwick.” Their soft-spoken dorm master always asked Mira if she’d heard from her family. Leaving her satchel in the seemingly-empty library—Lily not even glancing at her abandoned novel—they returned to their wing. They also left a trail of goo on the flagstones that Lily, uncharacteristically, didn’t seem to notice, though Mira expected angry shouts any moment.
Ms. Sedgwick was responsible for the Fifth to Seventh Years, but gave them space in the evenings, with occasional visits to common rooms or strolls down the corridors to check all was well. Her door was ajar as usual, an invitation to students wanting to see her.
Lily knocked, calling in a questioning, anxious tone Mira hadn’t heard before.
“Come in!”
Ms. Sedgwick sat on her tatty sofa in electric blue pajamas, holding a steaming mug and a magazine. “Hello, girls. How’s your family, Mira? Oh, goodness! What’s happened?” She put everything down. “Are you hurt?”
“We’re fine, but there’s a swamp in the library, and we can’t find Ms. Johnson, and I don’t know where Andrew’s gone either—maybe he followed me back in when I went to get Mira?”
“These—” Mira began, but Ms. Sedgwick was halfway out the door, putting on her fluffy blue slippers, even though Lily hadn’t made any sense.
“Supernatural nonsense, and right at lights out! Are you okay to come, girls? Or do you need a rest and a shower? I won’t mind you staying up, obviously.”
“No, we’ll come,” said Lily. Mira tried to flatten her hair, which frizzed in the humidity, and waited for Ms. Johnson to lock the door.
“There are these spirits,” she tried to explain.
“They’ve turned the shelves around,” added Lily, and told how Andrew had shown her the entrance before going for help, how Ms. Johnson had disappeared, and shouldn’t the library be closing for the night now?
But when they reached the library, Ms. Johnson stood at the desk folding a cardboard carton. “Ms. Sedgwick! Mira, is this your bag on the counter? Lily, I thought you were going to borrow a book?”
“As you can see, Ms. Johnson, we came in a hurry.” Ms. Sedgwick gestured at her pajamas. “Lily tells me there were…occurrences?”
The librarian laughed. “Yes, perhaps a portal? Or so I hope—otherwise that’s worrying for the library. I’ll have to put in a maintenance request. I went to shelve some returns, but everything was rearranged, and the lights weren’t working. I got entirely lost.”
Lost any sense of time too, apparently. Mira edged forward for her notebook while the others talked. The last line, written in pen, was smudged; just one word replaced it.
Mira
“Stay with Ms. Johnson if you like, Mira,” said Ms. Sedgwick kindly. “We’re going to have a look back there. Andrew or other students might have wandered into—whatever it was.”
A spirit realm, Mira wanted to tell her. Or a steam realm. But if they wanted everyone to know, they’d have written in English. If Lily and Ms. Sedgwick didn’t care, maybe it wasn’t important to anyone else.
“Don’t go wandering off like Andrew,” Lily added as they went. Ms. Johnson gave her a wink and began sticking labels on the new books.
How do I free you?
The ink blotted, responding as she wrote. It’s already done
Blue spilt out from the page, misting around her.
She stumbled back. It followed.
Had she brought them out, in her sodden clothes and hair? In that stack of books? All the moisture that had escaped from between the shelves, was that them?
“Ms. Johnson!”
The librarian looked up. “Don’t worry Mira, they won’t hurt you.”
She seemed to be right. The ink swirls dissipated high above.
But Ms. Johnson never remembered her name.
“Ms. Johnson, are you…okay?” She kept her distance, standing a couple of meters back.
“Why yes, thanks for asking, Mira. It was cold and dank in wherever that was, wasn’t it? Though you seem to have got the worst of it. You’re soaked, poor thing! I had to clean so much slime off my shoes—that’s why I was gone so long—and it’s set off my sinuses, but I’m fine.”
She might be fine. She didn’t seem to be Ms. Johnson though. Sinuses invaded by spirits perhaps. Just like Mira’s hair and trousers and shirt.
But if they’d messed with Mira’s mind, they wouldn’t be writing to her. And they’d said she understood them.
She approached cautiously and opened her satchel. The Water Cycle glittered at her. “I’m sorry about these books. I was going to borrow them for an essay, but they got wet.”
“That’s not your fault, dear,” said Ms. Johnson, which was wrong. It was Mira’s fault they’d been able to find a way into the library at all. “But these are only a touch warped. Tell you what, I’ll make a note they’re damaged, so you won’t be in trouble if another librarian handles the returns.”
Her satchel was dry, too.
Where had they gone?
Ms. Johnson stacked the books back into Mira’s satchel, placing the notebook on top. “Don’t you worry about that essay tonight, though.”
Footsteps, and there was Andrew with Ms. Sedgwick and Lily.
“No ghost world, just Andrew,” said Lily cheerfully.
“It was there a minute ago! I was stuck inside.” Andrew had acquired slime on his shoes too. “I couldn’t find Ms. Johnson, and when I went back to Lily, she’d gone. I couldn’t remember which shelves we were at.” He shuddered. “Where I went in, I kept seeing tiny green flashes. There was a humming noise. I was bloody terrified. I ran in circles looking for you, but it wasn’t the library anymore.”
“You could’ve gone for actual help instead of—” began Lily, but Ms. Sedgwick said, “That’s enough. Lily, Mira, you may use the showers, but quickly, please—it’s well past bedtime. Andrew, I’ll come for a word with your dorm master. Goodnight, girls.”
Were they acting different? Was Ms. Johnson the revenge, or was that yet to come?
“If I’d expected this, I wouldn’t have showered after my hike,” said Lily. “Are they going to tell us what happened? There’s a lot of water damage; they’ll have to explain that to everyone.” Water damage, yes—but there didn’t seem to be much actual ‘water’ from the other world left that she could see. She imagined the neighbors spinning up into the arid summer heat, finding pipes, creek beds, and peat bogs to inhabit, filling in the spaces where they would be welcomed, or at least unnoticed.
She and Lily kicked off their shoes outside their door. Her socks felt crackly now, like she’d left them to stiffen on the floor after one of Lily’s hikes instead of putting them in the wash.
“I actually think I might know.” Mira took a fresh towel and her pajamas from the closet. “But it’s a long explanation.”
“I won’t get to sleep until you tell me! Is it to do with them writing to you?”
“Yeah. There’s some stuff back home to do with the war I should tell you about first, so you’ll understand.”
“You know you can tell me whatever, right?” Lily didn’t sound congested—she just sounded like Lily. If she was acting more open than usual, well…after today, Mira was feeling more open, too. As for Ms. Johnson’s sinuses, that could remain Ms. Johnson’s problem.
Mira let her hair get wet, though Amma would say going to bed with wet hair would give her a cold. Steam swirled, filling her shower cubicle. Were the neighbors inside? Would they always be with her now?
It might not be such a bad thing, if it meant she’d given sanctuary to those who needed it.
OF MICE AND PIGEONS
MOACHIBA JAMIR
Old Amongba could still remember the first time he stepped inside the halls of the Old Chapel in Mallory Thorne. Its arched entrance towered above his five-foot-three frame. He imagined the chapel’s walls had once been a pristine white, but had now turned beige with pockets of yellow daubing the facade. Inside, benches were arranged in rows like huge caterpillars in motion, until the front, where the hall opened into a carpeted podium. The choir boys were already seated to its left. Behind the podium, a large open Bible and a crimson cross oversaw the congregation below, mostly young students, but he also noticed some older people, presumably the teachers and staff of Mallory Thorne. One peculiar thing that struck Old Amongba was the puffy odor—probably due to the dampness from the open drainage flowing beside the chapel. Although he had grown accustomed to it over time, the smell had reminded him of that time he’d upturned his dying aunt’s bed to find black mold scattering unchecked—underneath was where the stench had been brewing, ebbing and flowing, spreading quietly like fungal leprosy.
He had already decided, then, that he would not be joining the Old Chapel after all.
As he was coming upon this conclusion, the gradual quietening inside was so subtle that Old Amongba didn’t notice it immediately. But sitting there in the last bench of the Old Chapel, he soon realized everything had gone completely quiet. No bells to announce the start of the service, only a quietening.
The chaplain walked up to the podium and faced the congregation, crimson cross and open Bible behind him. A gentle spotlight illuminated him from behind and from the front. He stretched his arms wide, and his tailor-made sleeves gleamed from the spotlight like iridescent wings. He welcomed his congregation, breaking the silence. He smiled.
Later, at home, Old Amongba would realize that he had been paying too much attention to the chaplain, whom he would later come to know as Chaplain Julius Thomas Thorne. The whole student congregation, in fact, was engrossed, lapping up every word that spilled from the chaplain’s mouth. At that moment, though, he was not entirely alarmed.
Every day after this first encounter, Old Amongba would decide to start off in search of work in another place. Yet, it seemed as if all roads converged toward the Old Chapel in Mallory Thorne, and so, every Sunday, he would find himself facing that imposing structure once again.
A month later, while he was listening to the chaplain’s voice emanating from the two giant speakers up front, Old Amongba felt the bench repelling him. Push-push, up off his seat. And as he stood there in the middle of the information session behind the general congregation, it dawned on him that he had just volunteered to be the nightwatchman of this Old Chapel, to be demolished soon.
After the service ended, everything happened rather quickly inside Chaplain Thorne’s office. The chaplain thanked him for his “much needed sacrificial service for the Lord.” He would have to start as soon as the chapel was demolished to make way for the new one and he’d have to come every night. The chaplain shook the man’s hands.
That evening, as the soon-to-be nightwatchman squatted in his thatched one room-kitchen, giving himself time to think about the events of the day, he realized—not completely accepting its implications, not fully burying his doubts deep-deep down—he hadn’t been invited to sit down in the chaplain’s office.
It wasn’t entirely a new experience for Old Amongba. Even when his unequal legs bothered him enough to shift his weight every few seconds whenever he stood still, he was never offered a seat. But even so, he had assumed the chaplain’s office would be different.
