DEMENT: A Texas Ghost Story

Chapter III

The egg seeps from its cracked shell and splatters into the hot skillet with a hiss, its edges immediately turning opaque and white like a cataract. Another egg soon follows, merging with its sibling until they resemble a pair of staring yellow eyes on a misshapen white face.

Amy Lark hopes this little show of domesticity will earn her some favor in the judgmental eyes of Dorothy Cobb, though Amy knows she is no Betty Crocker. She wipes the snotty egg whites from her hands with a towel and sets about tearing at a plastic package of sausages with her teeth. She dabs at her forehead with the back of her hand before sweat from her brow drips into the breakfast. The smallish kitchen grows uncomfortably hot very quickly when the stove is on.

The room is packed almost claustrophobically with cupboards at foot and at head, a set of wooden barstools that once belonged to Amy's mother, a sink, a stove, a small refrigerator, and of course the huge cupboard that occupies most of the space. The cupboard is a massive, ragged antique. Rust covers the brass handles, and the black paint curls away from the wood. The thing is big enough to hide a whole standing person and heavy enough that Amy decided when renovating the place that it was not worth the trouble of attempting to move. She uses it to store kitchen towels and her grandmother's china.

There comes a faint rustling of movement from above, followed briefly by the sound of footsteps lightly tapping along the hall and down the stairs. It seems the visitor is awake.

"Is that you, Doctor Cobb?" Amy calls. "I'm in the kitchen." She listens as the footsteps wander their way uncertainly through the den and into the back corridor, and finally to the kitchen door. It swings open gently. "Good morning," Amy smiles, forcing into place the same big cheesy grin she reserves for government inspectors and traffic cops.

Doctor Cobb leans into the room, her magnified eyes darting about inquisitively. She wears a set of dowdy beige pajamas and clutches a fresh stack of folded clothes to her chest. "Morning," she says.

"Breakfast will be ready soon," Amy says, gesturing for Doctor Cobb to come in and take a seat. "You sleep alright?"

Doctor Cobb eases herself onto one of the barstools. "Well. Alright enough, I guess. Sleeping in a strange place, you know."

Amy nods. "Sure."

"Do I hear rain outside?" Doctor Cobb asks. Sure enough, under the sizzle of the eggs and sausages on the stove, the gentle pattering of raindrops against the house can be heard.

"Oh yeah," Amy says. "Wasn't on the forecast, but the weather's like that out here. Fickle."

"Yeah." Doctor Cobb nods absently and sits in silence a moment, watching Amy slide the greasy food out of the pan and onto a plastic plate on a plastic tray next to a plastic cup of water. Amy attempts to find solace from the deafening quiet in the hissing of the pan. Doctor Cobb looks down at the clothes in her lap. "I'm sorry. Where did you say the bathroom was?"

Amy gestures vaguely down the hall. "That way."

"Thanks." Doctor Cobb stands and makes for the door, then pauses. "Towels?"

"In the cabinet above the toilet," Amy says, not looking up as she drops a couple more eggs into the skillet.

"Good," Doctor Cobb says. "Thank you." She vanishes from the room, leaving the door cracked behind her.

Amy hopes dearly that her interactions with Doctor Cobb will grow less uncomfortable with time. She is not sure she likes the way the doctor studies her through those big dinner-plate glasses, rather like she is a criminal in a police line-up.