Greenbriar Manor

Mari's Doll

Ingrim had woken up at 3 am. Mack was standing in the hallway holding a flashlight. There had been a huge storm and a tree limb had snapped and woke him up. The power to the manor was out and his mom was not inside the house. He had gone out to check on the horse and seen Brooklyn's dog carrying something in his mouth early this morning. His white chest was covered in thick red clay like he had been digging for something.  Things around here were getting strange. The laundress had been missing for a day or so and her mother longer than that. His mother had gone to their apartment and there had been no answer. Alot of newspapers had piled in front of the door and cobwebs hung on the curtains inside the window. It was if Fern and her family had just disappeared. The linens were coming to the house on time. Maybe she had unexpectedly had to sell the business. His mother and Fran were trying to get to the bottom of things. The horse was a welcome distraction but he and Mack had begun to notice that Brooklyn seemed distant and even angry. He looked as if he hadn't eaten and his dog always looked malnourished. Even the thicket to his house had grown up since spring. But Ingrim did not want to impose on anyone's privacy. His mother had warned him of that in the times Mack first arrived here. Fran and he had lived in truckstops and hotels and other places where they needed some space. Even now he tried to give his friend room to breathe. Sometimes he couldn't shake that Brooklyn never seemed to age. He had been here his whole life and Mack had grown too. They were looking more like men than boys these days. But Brooklyn had stayed the same since the day they met him. They had never even asked how old he was. Maybe his mother knew.  He would ask her after they figured out where everyone was. The one bad thing about storms and old houses was that everything in them seemed to take on a life of their own. Mack and him held hands and walked into the basement looking for a fuse box. At the base of the stairs was a mirror and a picture of a girl with dark hair holding a doll. When he picked it up he got chills. Something was wrong. The doll he was looking at was the same one the dog had been dragging around but there is no way that it could be. The back  of the picture said 19 and the rest of the date was smudged. He would recognze it anywhere it was Mari's doll and it spent most of the time in the treehouse. The thunder rolled outside as he found the fusebox. Mack held the light as he searched for fuse box 6. He pulled the lever and the house lights flickered on and off. For a moment they seemed to be in another part of the house. A great party was going on and lightening rent the sky from a grand window. The man of the house gathered everyone together in the cellar as the wind blew loud like a freight train. The doll fell and smashed against the ground beneath the tree as a limb cracked and fell. The ladder folded. A woman's screamed as the whirling wind battered the tiny brick house with hail stones. The dog whimpered in  a dark corner. The storm passed but just beyond was the doll. The dog would find it buried in the dirt. Mari was in the tree house holding onto the bookshelf. Waiting for Bridgette and Vera to come home.  He shook his head and stumbled up the stairs back into the house. Something was different now. Something about that doll and this tree limb falling tonight was a distraction.  He had to find his mom. Find them all. 

Fifty years ago

Bridgette had gone to Vermont.  Vera had come to visit, and her mother had sent her with two beautiful porcelain dolls.  One was more beautiful than the other and Vera had sought to take it for herself instead of giving it to the other needy child as a present. So, one day she stuffed it in the furnace box in the basement. That night there was a welcome home party for Bridgette but she never came home. The tree house was struck by lightning and so was the Manor because her doll was in the box it arced and caused the porcelain of doll to disfigure but only on one spot. The other doll that had been given to the help's girl was more beautuful and she was jealous but what had happened it that the house started to blend that disfigured sense of collection into the children and the air of the place changed. When the storm stopped the doll that looked like Bridgette was found covered in clay under the oak tree. A part of her face shattered. Neither of them were perfect anymore. Vera spent the rest of her life keeping that smudged porcelain doll out of the sight of others. Mari took over the smashed doll and set it up in the treehouse it would serve as a reminder to stay here and not worry about tomorrow. But the more she grew and the longer it took for Bridgette to come home she grew angry at the sight of it. Brooklyn took and hid it and began to do so every night so that peace would stay here instead of storms. But sometimes you just can't outrun the flood

Tonight had been the moment that they had begun to wake from this dream and it would be Ingrim and Mack's turn to search for truth.