“What’s the matter?” Charity asked, toweling her hair dry.
“The wood grain.” Linda laughed uneasily. “Look at it.”
As Charity bent down, her knees popped. She made a face of discomfort, which then shifted to confusion. “What the—”
Beneath the spilled water, the wood grain had opened several small holes, like tiny mouths. The water was disappearing into them, and as Linda and Charity watched, small limbs emerged and stretched from the old boards.
“Wood dies, right?” Linda said. “It shouldn’t be able to grow after it’s…dead, right?”
“I think so.” Charity frowned. “Should we let someone know?”
“Let them know what?” Linda said, her head fogged and light. “Yeah, we should tell someone. Deja, probably. This property belongs to the network.”
“I’m not willing to believe this house is haunted,” Charity said. “For all I know, this could be another trick set up by production before we arrived. But if not, it can’t be good for the house to be absorbing water. Like, structural integrity and all that?”
“I’m with you.” Linda squeezed Charity’s hand, and Charity winced as she let go. “Let’s tell Deja.”
• • •
After they dressed, they found Deja. Once Tatum was ready to follow, Linda and Charity dragged Deja into the bathroom to have a look at the floors. The mouths had disappeared, though the new limbs remained.
“This is normal,” Deja said. She placed a hand against a smooth part of the wood. “You’ve heard how trees sometimes keep their dead alive? There’s a lot of that in this house, I’m afraid. A result of the fungal and root networks that travel deep under the manor. They pump energy and sugar and all that into the wood that forms the floor, and as a result, the floor tries to return to its living state. That’s why some of the weird things happen here. It’s a natural phenomenon we planned to milk for drama.” Deja scowled. “It was my great big idea, and I’m likely to be fired or demoted or resigned to the most minor of decision-making from here on out for it.” Deja stood, her knees creaking, and faced the women. “I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting. I’ve been worried about my job, my livelihood. You ladies understand.” Her eyes flashed.
Linda shuffled her feet as she forced herself to respond. “No worries.”
“So, the wood is living?” Charity drew out the words, her jaw set firm.
“It’s living dead, more like,” Deja tugged at her clothes, revealing more of her neck and chest, which she forced out proudly. “This old manor has to have major renovations every year when these limbs appear. I’m sure you’ve noticed some rougher spots and some newer floors. That’s why we got the place so cheap. That’s why we brought you all here. This whole thing is a silly confluence of nature’s fuckery and humanity’s frugality.” She shrugged. “Maybe try not to get the floors wet next time. Now, maybe we should get back on track with this show?”
“Yes, of course.” Linda started to frown, then shook it off and smiled instead. “Sorry.” It was the least she could do to placate Deja after her runaway attempt. Deja was too calm. Linda flashed back to the argument she heard between Brandon and Deja. Deja’s family had owned the manor. That’s why she knew so much about it. Linda chewed at her lip until she tasted blood. It was Deja’s blood who had constructed these walls, this floor. She swallowed down the copper taste and did what Deja wanted.
• • •
Linda woke in the night to Deja looming over her bed, a camera poised to capture Linda’s startled gasp as her eyes popped open.
“What the fuck?” she said, her breathing rushed.
“You didn’t think I’d forget about your indiscretion earlier, did you?” Deja set an earpiece in the center of Linda’s chest. “You’ve been misbehaving, Linda, and you know what’s at stake if you don’t do what I say. Now, put this in and follow me.”
Linda rubbed the sleep from her eye with one hand while she picked up the earpiece with the other.
“Where are we going?” Her heart hammered. Deja had never woken her in the night like this. In the moment of escape, she hadn’t thought of punishment, too consumed with the hope that she was on her way to uncover one of Deja’s lies. Girls who disobeyed the rules had been sent home before, but there was always a confrontation with The Groom before they went. After the show, women were publicly shamed when they were found to have boyfriends beyond the mansion, or when they refused the ring they were supposed to accept at show’s end. The manor, though, felt like a different playing field. Linda doubted that Deja would lead her to Tristan and ignite an argument. At least the camera was on. Linda popped the ear piece in and pushed herself to sit.
“Confessional time.” Deja stepped back from the bed, giving Linda enough space to stand, to dress, to follow.
• • •
As they walked the manor’s halls, Linda recognized the path. She had taken it with Charity the night before. A cold sweat erupted in her armpits as she thought over the implication. If Deja was leading her to the nursery, did that mean she knew about her and Charity and their almost-kiss—and worse, their sex in the shower? The floor creaked behind them
Deja glanced over her shoulder. “You’re going to love this place.” Her voice echoed in the otherwise empty passage. “I wanted to bring you somewhere you’d be comfortable.”
“What is it?” Linda hoped her voice didn’t register too high, like the voice of a liar.
“You’ll see.” Deja gestured for Linda to speed up. “We don’t have all night.”
Linda kept pace with Deja. Together, they entered the secret stretch. They moved, shadow joining with shadow, through the doors, up the little stairwell, and finally, to the threshold between the hall and the nursery. Deja’s flat expression didn’t change as she aimed the camera on Linda.
“Open the door,” Deja said. “Turn on the light.”
Linda did as she was told. She touched the brass knob, and it was warm to the touch, as though licked by fire. She turned it. The door opened.
When Linda flipped on the light, the room filled with a brightness that illuminated the life within. A bald root peeked from a yellow pot by the window, its stubby knots reaching as though to root upward instead of into the dirt. Palm fronds lined one wall, their giant rubbery leaves as wide across as human heads. In the middle of the room, brushing the wooden beams of a vaulted ceiling, a massive tree with spindly branches stretched. Its green leaves littered the floor.
Linda’s gaze took in too many of the plants at first, and they were no more than a sea of leaves and trunks and stalks and dirts. She breathed a sigh of relief at so much green, her body responding to the memory of the almost-kiss as her shoulders relaxed. She breathed in the wet dirt smell, but it was lined with something fouler. In the mess of twisted limbs, hidden within the camouflage of a barren apple tree that grew from the floor and stood so tall that its giant flat leaves graced the ceiling, she saw it: a body, hung by the neck, not with rope, but with the tree’s pliable branches.
The body belonged to Brandon Fuller.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Linda
Linda ran forward, tripping over a pair of shears on the floor as she rushed to the tree with Brandon’s body dangling from it. She pulled at his arms, her hands shaking as she tried to yank him free. When his arm popped out of its socket, she let go. Up close, his skin was sallow, drained of blood. She pressed her fingers against his neck: he had no pulse. She tugged weakly at a limb, but it refused to budge.
Linda scrambled backward and grabbed the pair of shears, then hacked at the limb with the sharp edge. Deja watched, but for Linda, there was nothing but the urge to do everything she could for the man dangling by his neck. She stabbed at the root. Why a root? Why not the ugly tie that hung from his neck, or a rope? Red sap leaked from the wound onto her hand. She kept hacking until the branch snapped, and Brandon’s body slumped to the floor. She knelt and felt again for his pulse. Still nothing. She pumped at his chest with both hands, then listened. She repeated the gesture until she was sure he was gone. Only then did she stop and stare at her hand, covered in red. Deja placed a hand on her shoulder. She jerked away from the touch.
Deja held a note out. “Suicide,” she said, her voice as neutral as before. “Goddamn it.”
Linda stared, her face slack even as her heart beat faster than she thought possible.
