Merriton

“Why don’t we all go for a walk?” Sierra held the front door open for Samson, but he wouldn’t come in. The question felt like a trap to her. If she agreed too quickly, he’d carp on her running. If she didn’t take him up on the offer, he’d assume she was running elsewhere. She stood at the door, frozen in the mountain sunshine, unable to choose the right answer. Randy answered instead, “No, dude. Come in and look at the paperwork.”

Samson hesitated at the threshold, unwilling to come in. “I don’t want to come in. Why don’t we sit on the porch?” He motioned toward the long stairs with room for all three of them. Sierra sighed with relief. This had nothing to do with her running. She answered, “After that long winter, I’ll sit in the sun for a while.” She plopped onto the first step, grateful that the conversation wasn’t focused on her. Randy, however, refused. “No. All the stuff is on the kitchen table. Just come in for a minute.”

Sierra had looked over all the new contracts with the ISPs that Randy had added. Samson’s Tso Speed Tech was being installed in almost every Internet provider in the country and even a few in Europe. The new company was doing very well, despite the crash in the economy.

“I’d rather not. Let’s just take the paperwork over to Mount Zen Cafe to sign.” Samson’s strangeness finally burst through the fog in Sierra’s mind, but Randy spoke first, “The papers are RIGHT THERE.” He pointed into the house. “Just come in and sign them. We can go eat afterward.” She watched the two of them as if they were strangers when it finally dawned on her. “Samson doesn’t want to go in the house, Randy.”

Her eyes were drawn to the gravel road leading to the main road. It called to her. All she had to do was stand up and start running. She would be past the gravel and could head to Mount Zen Cafe. If she kept running, she’d pass Merriton altogether. If she ran long enough, she would glide by Samson’s house in Emigration. Keep running and she’d be Up North. It was more than a marathon to get Up North. People did Ultra Marathons all the time. She contemplated what it would feel like to run from Merriton and just keep on running until she got to the airport.

“What’s the matter with the house?” Sierra couldn’t take her eyes off the gravel road long enough to see the confusion on Randy’s face. She could hear Samon try to bumble his way through the conversation. “It’s just… I don’t know…” She turned and looked at her old friend from high school. His hair was long enough now to be pulled into a tight and thick lump at the nape of his neck. The winter glare had made his face dark, but the goggles left large yellow rings around his eyes. In the ranger uniform, he looked so different. No longer Asian, he appeared to be an American Indian to her. He looked like a stranger and she watched him struggle with his words.

“Every time I go in your house, I get all weird. All I can think about is getting fired from Zerbitz and every class that I ever got less than an A…” He backed away from the open door, gripping the porch railing. “Every project that never got finished…” Randy nodded, but Sierra could tell he didn’t understand. “I know what you’re talking about. You stayed here right after they sacked you. This place reminds you of it. I understand, Kevin.”

Samson smacked the porch railing and Sierra felt the vibration of it in her butt cheeks on the stairs. “Dammit, Random! You need to call me Samson!” Through the bushes and the shrubbery, Sierra could see Elvis and Vesta sitting on their own porch. Could they hear Samson’s outburst? Were they watching? She didn’t care, despite his loud voice. “I’m NOT going in that house! It’s HAUNTED, Random! Don’t you remember that FIRST night when we got here?! You said that there was more to this house than the suicide room and the light bulb EXPLODED! The house made it pretty damn clear that there is NOT more to it than that room!”

She watched Samson and Randy face off. Without a word, she stood up and walked over the threshold. As she passed Randy, she brushed her shoulder against his ever so gently, like a cat rubbing on the corner of a wall. She slid past the parlor and gathered the paperwork on the kitchen table. Her walk stayed silent as she left the house and walked on that gravel path toward Mount Zen Cafe. She knew that the two of them would follow her eventually.