The last time she heard them they tried to make her do things.

Terrible things. They wanted her to hurt Martin. To smother him while he slept. To drown him in the bath. To burn the house down. To push him into the furn—

Cripes!

He'd just about remembered what happened to him that morning. What they'd gone through. What he'd done and what Ruby had done. The old white scar on his palm and the white slash on Ruby's, a half-forgotten nightmare. A buried memory.

She remembered him, covered in Ruby's blood. The silver sewing shears, rinsing them off in the sink.

The hurried phone call in the kitchen.

Ruby bleeding like a stuck pig on the sofa and poor little Marty with his hand wrapped in gauze, the bubbling wound oozing puss and blood.

She hoped he would never remember what had truly happened that day. Why his mother had to be sent away for a very long time. Be kept as far away from her son as possible.

He'd been so quick to forget it. When is Mommy coming home? Why does Mommy have to stay in the White Place? And she would tell him it was for his mother's own safety. Not for his. Ruby had to stay in the White Place because she was sick. Because she hurt herself. But not like how he hurt his hand. His mother had cut herself on purpose.

Only that wasn't the truth of it.

He'd asked about the woodstove this morning and she'd momentarily forgotten all about her cover story. So long since she last had to use it. That he burned himself on the woodstove, trying to climb up and sneak a taste of Ruby's strawberry-rhubarb pie.

She repeated it so often he eventually believed it, even though they never had a woodstove. She'd almost believed it herself. Why she'd said woodstove when she could just have said stove—the smoke, the black smoke—was anybody's guess. Now he'd be second-guessing himself. He'd wonder, if we never had a woodstove, where did I get the burn?

He'll go down the basement, Love.

Norma pushed the duvet aside and shot out of bed. She stepped into her fuzzy pink-bunny slippers, drew on her nightgown—ah, warmth—and treaded carefully to the bedroom door.

Having lived with Ruby for so long, not wanting to wake the old broad in the night, she knew every joint that creaked, every board that groaned. She reached the door with barely a sound, just the whispers of her slippers on hardwood.

The hinges squeaked as she opened the door. Not loud enough to alert anyone who wasn't already awake. The house was silent but for the wind rattling the windows.

Howling like banshees out there.

What an unpleasant turn of phrase, my dear.

She crept past Ruby's room to the stairs, holding the railing. She knew exactly how many steps to reach the bannister, how many more to the bathroom. A misstep in the night could be deadly. The last thing she needed was to fall down the stairs and break a hip.