Chapter 6

As Shayne turned abruptly and ran for the foyer, she heard the first

crash of shattering glass. She didn’t look to see what had broken. But out

of the corner of her blurry tear filled eyes she would have sworn that the

glass vase that was sitting in the middle of the claw foot table in the

foyer, just jumped off into the floor on its own. She hadn’t reached it yet

as it smashed against the cherry hardwood and nothing around it could

have disturbed it from its dust ring.

She leapt over the glittery shards and landed on the bottom step of

the winding stairs. Her feet barely made a thud as she ascended toward

her attic retreat. As she reached the hall, she watched as a large ornate

mirror quivered at the sight of her. The silvery glass began to vibrate as

she stared at her tear stained reflection. Her normally green eyes were a

deep violet as the glass bounced her reflection. Shayne stifled a huge sob

and the mirror cracked. Shiny shards rained from the frame into the floor

as she passed. Shayne chose to ignore it and pretend it was nothing more

than her mind playing tricks on her.

Her feet barely touched the wool rugs as she scrambled down the

hall. She skidded to a stop in front of an empty wall and slapped her

hand against the floral wall paper. The wall creaked and opened to reveal

a dark stairwell. Shayne didn’t even bother to flip the light on as she

climbed upward. Her legs and feet felt as if they were made of lead as

she disappeared into the dank.

Sobs wracked Shayne’s chest as she reached the quiet haven of the

attic. She tugged on the pull chain out of habit, not really needing light to

navigate to her favorite place, but the light that cast shadows from

around the room caused her to gasp. Even this, her secret retreat, had

changed. What was once her private play place was now littered with

boxes of her belongings. Her clothing, photographs and memories were

tucked into cardboard crates and stacked all around the dusty, cobweb

covered room. Shayne stepped past them gingerly to a three legged chair

in the farthest corner. Her body dropped involuntarily into it, as the flood

of tears she couldn’t hope to contain, spilled over her.

Shayne had to only look at her discarded property to know that

Jeffrey spoke a sort of truth. There was no way her grandmother Rachel

would have ever have allowed her things to be boxed up and put away in

this manner. She wouldn’t have left Shayne alone. And no matter what

had transpired, no Anderson could ever let the house fall into the hands

of an outsider.

It didn’t seem possible that she could be dead. Deceased people

didn’t walk and talk and touch and breathe. Hadn’t she proved already

that she could do all of those things, she argued with herself.

“There has to be a perfectly good explanation for all of this” she

whispered as she tried to calm her frayed nerves. Pieces of the puzzle

had to be missing, because she couldn’t seem to be able to see the big

picture at all. The more she thought about what was happening around

her, the more perplexed she became. Her tears slowly dried and she sat

in the quiet, to think.

Shayne spent several hours in the attic trying to figure things out in

her own head, but no matter what possibility she pondered, she was

always brought back to the same lame conclusion. The only way the

house could look as it did, and Jeffrey could have aged as he had, was

time travel. Even though she found the entire notion silly, it was the only

thing at all that made any sense.

Jeffrey claimed she had died ten years earlier, but to Shayne ten

years ago made her eight years old. She had no trouble remembering

being that young. She had been that age when she left the three nail scars

on Jeffrey’s skin. She could remember the last ten years of her life

clearly. She knew good and well that she had grown up in this very

house under the careful eye of Rachel who had raised her since she was

five.

It seemed a problem with no answer. Every thought she had seemed

to turn back on itself till she was so full of grief and confusion she

wanted to scream.

“You can’t be shipped to the future,” she scolded. Shayne put her

head in her hands in defeat. The darkness closed in around her and she

felt like she was losing her mind.

Shayne closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Suppose you did

go ten years into the future, how exactly did you get here?” she asked

herself. Shayne stopped and once against thought about what had

happened right before she had appeared in the kitchen. She knew she had

come home from school. Her grandmother had been waiting for her. She

gave her the locket. Rachel had hugged her and told her something as she

slipped the chain over her head. Then the world had gone away.

“That was it,” she thought as she fingered the locket. She looked at

it closely. It was undeniably beautiful and glittered brightly, but it didn’t

really look like a time machine. She held it up to the light, and then

swished it through the air like a magic wand. She even waved it like in

the movies and called, “Abracadabra,” before succumbing to a few

giggles at her own foolishness.

Finally in frustration, she reached around to unclasp the chain. Her

fingers made it to the clasp and froze. Her grandmother’s words rang in

her ears as if they had been summoned by the wind.

“Remember who you are, and protect the chain!”

Shayne’s breath caught. She could almost feel Rachel’s presence in

the room. Instead of removing the necklace she reached up and clutched

the locket in her fist. She wished more than anything that Grandma was

there for her to talk to. What she wouldn’t give for a bit of her wisdom

about right now.

A wind scattered dust in the windowless room. Shayne’s eyes darted

around as she looked for a source for the phantom wind. But it was as air

tight and still, as it always was. Her face paled as out of the corner of her

eye she saw a torn piece of parchment rise up on the spiraling cloud of

dust. It appeared to be a page of a diary that someone had reached down

and lifted from the floor. Shayne watched in wide eyed wonder as the

dust settled and the hand written paper floated back to the floor.

“Ok, that was just weird,” she whispered, afraid to actually approach

the note. “How was one supposed to perceive a letter the wind left for

you?” she asked the cobwebs.