Sickhouse

Those cranberry-crusted window sills

"You look younger than I remember," Sheridan sputtered.

The woman made her way to the staircase, a white hand gripping the railing. Dangling a slippered foot over the shadowy edge of the top step, her feet seemed to lace into the stairs. "How is that?" she asked, smiling a smile like that which a mother would hide after her child says a very serious, very silly thing.

Sheridan instinctively shrunk into herself, but upon stealing a glimpse of the woman and seeing she was sincere, she turned her shrinking to shrugging. "I don't know. I guess I just remember you being older than you ever were. I thought so, anyway." She smiled sheepishly. "When you're little you think everyone is bigger than they really are-teens, adults and dogs, wolves, you know? And then you get to be their age and you realize how small you really are."

"Ah, I see," she replied, gliding down to Sheridan. "Our veils are different. You look at me now and see me younger while I look at you and see you older. When was the last time you were here-or even seen me?" She was taking Sheridan's coat now.

"Gee, I guess that would have been around the time I started middle school. It's been a long time..."

She tried prying her eyes from the floorboards. She longed to look around the house, if only a single room, but she couldn't raise her gaze. Upon walking through the front door, Sheridan had felt the presence of a small table beside her, and had caught a coat rack in the corner of her eye. What she was certain of and what was clear was an ornate navy rug brushing the toes of her shoes like a wave crawling ashore.

"I am Avenie," the woman said, "from the letters."

"It's nice to meet you. Well, 'meet you-meet you', I mean-to really meet you. I'm Sheridan," she stammered out, regretting saying anything as she felt her words tumble out of her mouth. She stood there, blank, unsure if a handshake was expected. She fumbled with the bags in her hands.

Avenie placed Sheridan's coat on the rack and gently guided her forward, out of the doorway. "Won't you come in?"

Sheridan nodded, but she was already being taken into the living room. This was once her living room, too.

She sat on a maroon loveseat adjacent to a vintage sofa upholstered in sea-green velvet. Glancing around as discreetly as she could, she noticed how old everything was. The furniture and decor appeared to be antique or thrifted. Her mother would have hated it, but Sheridan quite liked it. The lampshades cast the room in a warm, sickly yellow glow, illuminating a dusty old walnut bookshelf brimming over with books. Across from her sat a ring-ridden coffee table covered in mail. Were she not a half-stranger to this place, she could see herself cozied up in the worn armchair by the window, gazing past the wild lilac branches pressing against the glass.

"I asked after who owned the house now at the county recorder's office, but it was a dead end. I found the last owner, but they brushed me off. They just told me to write here. How did you come to own the property?"

"Adverse possession. The owner abandoned the house. And ever since, I've taken care of it," Avenie asserted as she straightened herself against the sofa.

Too embarrassed to ask the woman what "adverse possession" meant, Sheridan simply nodded, looking away in case she had a blank or confused stare that would give her away.

"I love what you've done with the place," Sheridan sighed contentedly.

Brushing aside the mail, Avenie beamed. "Oh, I hoped you would like it."

Her words drew a smile from Sheridan. That a stranger would care what she thought of the state of something as meaningful as their house, something that was once hers, but now was not, filled her with a pulsating warmth.