The Thirteen by Susie Moloney

Author:Susie Moloney
Language: ru
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Literary, General, Fiction
ISBN: 9780062117663
Publisher: Random House Canada
Published: 2010-12-31T05:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

IZZY WAS PARKED OUTSIDE the Chapman house, waiting for dark. She ached for darkness, wanted only to hide under black skies. She had ill work ahead of her and no desire to see it performed.

The foliage, once scrubby and sparse, had grown thick and wild around the house. The drive had grown over too, and a broad patch of brown grass ran up the middle, mixed with thistles and stinkweed. Twenty years of tire marks had compressed the earth, turned it grey. In spite of the (mostly abandoned) farmland around her, there was no greenery here, just blank, empty fields.

At the foot of the drive was the fading post that bore the house number: 362. Someone had long ago scratched over it with a key or a knife. It could barely be made out now. The house stood alone at the edge of Haven Woods.

It would be dark soon.

The thumping from the trunk had stopped. The car was still. Since the house was close to the river, she should have been able to hear spring peepers and crickets, but the yard was silent, as though nothing living could possibly stay for long.

It didn’t matter how often she came here or how fated her connection, every time she was filled with fear. Izzy, who inspired her own kind of fear in her women, sat in the car with the windows rolled up and watched fretfully, knowing that the random, uncontrolled evil that permeated the very boards of the house, and the earth around it, could turn on her as easily as it gave. Even with her gift of flesh today, she was in arrears, and it could all turn.

The house looked different now. The yellow crime-scene tape was long gone. The windows were broken, rocks thrown by teenagers on a dare.

But a girl never forgets her first time.

Do you know that house? her grandmother had asked her. She had taken a knife from her drawer in the bedroom and pressed it to Izzy’s side, under her left breast. The slice was fast and clean. Izzy had gasped and stumbled back with the impact, placing her hand there, covering it. The wound began to bleed through her fingers.

I was there her grandmother said, beaming at her. Before this. Long time ago, your mother dragged me away. The old woman’s mind was wandering, her expression faraway for a minute. Things fell apart. We weren’t strong.

She pushed the bedroom door closed behind Izzy. The room was illuminated only by the brown light coming from a dirty bulb under a dirty lampshade in the corner. Izzy pressed back against the door.

Her grandmother raised the knife, not as a threat but to emphasize. You must have thirteen. At all times.

women

find them yourself

She put the knife back into the bureau and took out a photograph, held it out to Izzy. My sisters. She pointed a frail finger at a smiling woman with dark hair. This is Aggie. Find Aggie. She’s still there, waiting. Find her, and she’ll be your first.

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