Little Hidden Darknesses
Three:

I was at a loss for words. A loss for thoughts, even. Branka’s voice crept under my skin, cold and sharp like a needle. It sent chills up my spine and down the sides of my arms, all the way into my fingertips. The iron gates creaked again, then slowly began to shut.

“F – Felt me in the fog?” I dared to ask.

“Yes,” Branka replied, still with her back to me, “have you never heard that expression before?”

I couldn’t say that I have.

“An expression? Oh, okay.” A moment passed in which we just stood there, me staring at the back of Branka’s head. Then, my arms started to move. I unzipped my duffle bag and dug inside, searching for the envelope. “Sorry to barge in like this, but I’ve got a letter –”

“Come,” Branka chimed in. She set off down the driveway, her strides both light and heavy at the same time. Light, because she hardly made a sound, and heavy, because with each stride I felt as though the earth gave way around her. As though she was in charge of it.

I reeled up my duffle bag and ran after her. “Wait! Don’t you want to know who I am first?”

“Frankly, I couldn’t care less.”

Again, I didn’t know what to say to this. A part of me ached to snap back at her, to maybe turn around and march right out of there, but the rest of me kept me from doing so. It carried me after her up the driveway, around a fountain and toward the mansion.

As I approached it, everything around us became quiet, more distant. The iron gates clipped shut in our wake, and I no longer heard branches ruffling in the breeze. There were no leaves on the ground to crisp under my feet, just some concrete steps and a large, wooden doorway.

Branka pushed it open with both hands, its hinges creaking and a gush of cold air stroking my face. She stepped aside and gestured for me to enter, her lips screwed into a knob.

“Thanks, I guess,” I said as I slinked past her.

“Don’t mention it. Really.”

I hesitated, but entered the foyer to see the tallest ceiling ever. The floors were of ceramic tile, laid out in a black-and-white, chequered pattern. A burgundy carpet ran from under my feet, all the way up a spiral staircase – at the back of which towered a large, stained glass window with people in it. A man and woman, both in Victorian-style dress.

“This way,” said Branka as she brushed past me. She smelled of the house, a blend of spices and oils. Ravensara. Cedarwood. I only recognised it because my mum used to slather it around our apartment. Something about protection and health. About banishing illnesses.

Branka spoke on, “If we keep the family waiting much longer, it’ll be my ass on the line.”

Then, she beckoned me down a corridor right of the staircase. With its ceiling made entirely of glass – two slanted shards that came together to form a peak – we were guided by the light from the setting sun. A faded lavender colour that matched the turquoise walls. I squinted down the corridor at a door at the end, cream-coloured and with a crystal knob.

My eyes skimmed the photographs on the wall to my right. They were all family portraits, recently taken I presumed, considering Branka looked the same in every one. The same size, same haircut, and with the same dismal scowl across her otherwise photogenic face.

When we reached the door at the end, she pushed me aside and gave three curt knocks before turning the knob. I winced at the warm, orangey light that spilled from inside. A drawing room, by the looks of it. One with thick, velvet curtains across the windows – already drawn for the evening – and a fire crackling in the fireplace against the farthest wall. A pair of sleek, patterned sofas surrounded it, both of which were occupied by three women.

Branka flicked her ebony eyes at me. “Go on,” she said. “I’m not your personal doorman.”

I gulped. While Alejandro was right to call her scary, I came up with several better words to describe Branka. Rude. Arrogant. A horrible host. And that was only off the top of my head.

“Here she is, mother.” Branka jabbed me in the ribs, and as my soles collided with the wooden floor, the three other women glanced over their shoulders at me. One more person emerged from the shadows right of the fireplace. A teenage boy, also about my age. With his dark hair and even darker eyes, he looked strikingly similar to Branka.

In fact, I reckoned they were twins.

“Finally,” he said, breaking the silence. “We were wondering whether you had run into trouble.”

Branka snorted as she shut the door. “You forget, dear brother, I am trouble.”

Another gulp forced itself down my throat. My knuckles spasmed and I realised I had been squeezing my fist around the strap of my duffle bag. I almost couldn’t relax my grip.

“H – Hello,” I dared to say.

Branka walked around me to join her brother by the mantel. She leaned against him with her arms crossed and a smirk around her mouth, visibly annoyed. Why, I hadn’t the faintest idea.

One of the women attempted a smile, though I feared her face might crack from doing so. She had her hair – also black, though not as piercing as Branka and her brother’s – pinned up high on her head, and wore a cobalt, pin-up blouse with frills around her neck. My aunt, most likely, as she was about my mum’s age. Though I couldn’t be sure just yet.

The fire sputtered in the fireplace.

“Welcome,” she said. “Please excuse Branka’s wretched behaviour. We don’t get many visitors here.”

I struggled to meet her eyes, a chill running down my spine each time I did. “Thank you, uh –“

“Mrs. Vinsant. But you can call me Lilith.” The woman – Lilith – narrowed her eyes at me, two pieces of coal by the firelight. “Please, come closer. Introduce yourself to the family.”

I felt all ten of their eyes following me as I padded across the drawing room, around the sofas all the way to the other side of the fireplace. Only now did I notice the gigantic portrait on the farthest wall by the door, swathed in a white sheet, its contents a mystery.

The sight of it distracted me, and I almost jerked when one of the other women started to speak. Another young girl, maybe in her twenties. She had dark features like the rest, though her eyes were bright green. “So, out with it already,” she said, curling her fingers around a glass of red wine. “Who are you and what are you doing on our island?”

“Easy now, Freya,” Lilith tutted as she crossed her legs. “We want our guest to feel comfortable.”

But comfortable was the farthest thing from what I felt.

I kept reminding myself of the facts: they were my mum’s family, my family. Our flesh and blood. And they likely only came forth as scary because Alejandro had put it in my head.

Or because of what had happened in town.

“My name’s Eira,” I said. “Eira Vinsant.”

None of the family seemed particularly surprised at hearing my surname. In fact, the only person who showed any type of reaction was the third woman on the sofa, a sixty-something year-old lady with white-grey hair and eyes as blue as my mum’s. As my own.

My grandmother, perhaps? The possibility made me swallow involuntarily.

“Tell us then, Eira,” said Lilith as she rapped her nails on the sofa’s armrest. “what are you doing here?”

“My mum,” was all that slipped out. I fished through my unzipped bag and yanked out the envelope, still a little damp from my journey. Luckily the address didn’t entirely smudge, nor the addressees. “She wanted to post this, but” – I cleared my throat – “she passed away before she could.”

This time, they did react.

Well, sort of. Branka let out something of a gasp, but her brother whispered something in her ear and she silenced. The old woman dropped her knitting and I swore I saw her eyes start to water, but Freya put a hand on her knee and the gloss at once vanished.

“A letter?” Lilith wanted to know. “From your mum?” She briefly studied my face, then shared a glance with the old woman before extending a pale, bony hand. “Let me see it.”

I reached out and gave her the envelope, then watched as she opened it and took out the letter.

The paper crunched in her hands, her eyes flicking across its contents, every sentence and every word. She moved her lips as she read, quickly, furiously. Freya leaned over her shoulder to take a look, but Lilith raised a hand at her and she sat back again.

Once finished, she folded the letter back up and sat for a moment, her eyes pinned to the fire.

“Mother, who’s it from?” Branka wanted to know.

No answer.

“What did it say?” her brother added.

Freya scolded them, “Branka, Aillard, read the room. Can’t you see mother needs a moment?” She tried to take the letter from Lilith, who yanked it from the tips of her fingers.

“Read the room, Freya ...” Branka grumbled with satisfaction.

“Oh, grow up already!”

“Be quiet. The both of you,” Lilith snapped. She glanced from Branka to Freya, then to the old woman. They shared another glance, almost as though they knew exactly what the other was thinking. Then, her attention returned to me. And she didn’t look happy.

Not at all.

I bit my bottom lip as she handed back the letter. “So?” I asked, as I didn’t know what else to say.

“So?” Lilith repeated, rapping her nails again. “I don’t know anyone by the name of Piper Vinsant.”

Damn it.

Not this again.

“But,” I began, yet Lilith forestalled me.

“That letter is a fake. A forgery. You’ve written it in an attempt to fool us, to rob us of our fortune.”

“What, no –”

“Ha!” Branka sniggered. She pushed away from her brother – Aillard – and ran her hands though her hair. “I knew you were a thief the moment I saw you. Thought you could fool us, eh?”

Lilith sneered at her daughter. “Branka, calm down.”

But it wasn’t Branka whom she had to worry about, as I could no longer hold myself in. Every feeling I had to shove down over the past few weeks bubbled right up. Loss. Fear. Anger.

Hope.

It didn’t bring tears to my eyes, no. It sent pulses of adrenaline through my limbs, making me tremble. My brain buzzed and my vision blurred. I was there, but I was also far away.

“I’m not making this up,” I said, my voice pitching. “Piper Vinsant is my mum. She grew up here.”

Lilith shook her head. “Sorry, we’re the only Vinsants here. It’s been this way my whole life.”

“Please,” I begged, even though I knew it wouldn’t change a thing. No amount of pleading could bring a person into existence, into someone else’s memories. But how could this be? How could they not remember her, when the letter … when she wrote to them about …

“If the letter really is from your mother,” Lilith went on, “she lied.” Her words echoed in my head for several seconds after she said it. She lied. She lied. She lied? Not possible.

Not my mum.

I parted my lips to contest some more, but Lilith raised her hand and I shut up. She glanced at Aillard by the mantle and said, “Please escort her off the estate. I can’t look at her any longer.”

“No,” I said when Aillard approached and grabbed my left upper arm. “I’ve come all this way!”

I writhed and wrenched and slammed my heels on the wooden floor, but Aillard proved too strong, like a tree rooted in the ground. He lugged me across the drawing room to the door, then yanked it open and shoved me into the now considerably darker corridor.

“And make sure to close the gates behind her!” came Lilith’s voice, followed by a grunt from Branka.

My mind flushed with even more protests, but I kept my mouth closed. It was no use. They had already decided I was a fraud. A fake. Akin to all those people in town, most likely.

Aillard didn’t say anything as he shut the drawing room door and grabbed my upper arm again. This time, I managed to wrench free, but he still pushed me to keep on walking.

“Okay, okay,” I yielded. “No need to be so rough.”

No response.

I cradled my duffle bag in my arms, the envelope still crumpled between my fingers and palm. Too many thoughts rushed through my mind, too many questions and too little explanations. I decided not to think, and instead study the wall again. The other side this time.

And that was when I saw it: a photo of my mum. Looking about my age, she stood on the concrete steps by the front door, smiling a great smile. I only saw her for a second, though, before Aillard shoved me in the ribs again and I stumbled forward, nearly onto my knees.

“Wait!” I cried as I tried to brake.

Another shove.

“What’s the hold up? Move!”

“No, that’s my mum.” I turned and tried to dodge him, my duffle bag all up in his face, but his strength only seemed to multiply. “She’s there, in that picture. Look for yourself!”

Aillard grabbed my elbows and whirled me back around. We both grunted as we skidded across the carpet in the foyer, all the way to the front door and down the steps onto the driveway. He didn’t let me go until we reached the gates, which were already opened wide.

“You’d get out of town if you knew what’s good for you,” he snarled at me, then pushed me through the gates. “And you better get indoors. Don’t want to be out when the fog rolls in.”

I watched with disgust as Aillard reversed up the driveway. Neither of us turned until the gates clicked shut, and even then I did so hesitantly. The sun had vanished beyond the tallest trees, though a purplish hue still stained the sky. I could hardly see anything except the road. The road and the forest on either side of me, now but a big, dark barrier.

The thing that concerned me the most, though, wasn’t the fact that the fog lay mere inches from tumbling onto the tar, but that I had just been kicked out of my last and only option.

I swallowed at the thought of it: I was homeless, parentless, and had absolutely no friends.

Well, I had one friend, if I could even call him that.

Alejandro.

The awkward Hispanic guy whose mum just so happened to own a motel. How convenient.

I allowed a breath of fresh air to fill my lungs, then glanced at the mansion a final time before I set off down the road. Its size no longer impressed me, nor its great amount of windows. Something wasn’t right about this place, especially were its inhabitants were concerned.

I thought about Aillard, and his final words before he left. Don’t want to be out when the fog rolls in.

Ha!

I grunted as I wove through the tendrils, careful not to touch any. While I didn’t believe Alejandro’s story about the fog being deadly, I’d rather not take any risks. He was, after all, correct about the Vinsants. They were scary alright, and definitely hiding something.

I knew for a fact I saw my mum in that photo. She did exist, and she did grow up here. The only question was, how come no one remembered her? Or, if they did, why pretend not to?