Flipping Fates Read online

  Prisha smiles beautifully. “We spoke on the phone, and last week when I was in Denver he flew in so I could meet him. He’s very kind, a son of my father’s childhood friend. Same age. Similar degree. I believe we will be very happy indeed.”

  And she does believe it.

  Honestly.

  That’s not what I expected. Most of the time arranged marriages I’ve heard about are in fairytales or fantasy movies, and nobody is happy. But—Prisha is.

  “That’s—wow, Prisha, that’s great.” I hug her, and she hugs me back. “Congratulations.”

  “Thank you, my friend.”

  “Will the ceremony be here?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

  “Oh, no.” Prisha shakes her head, her dark hair spilling around her shoulders. “It will be in Mumbai.”

  “Is that where you’ll live then?” Laurel asked.

  “Yes.” Prisha nods. “He has a job in the city, so I will stay in Mumbai after the wedding.”

  I take her hand and hold it. “I’m so happy for you, Prisha, but—we’ll miss you.”

  “And I you.” Prisha pats my fingers. “You will be very happy to know, Trisha, that my fiance is also a believer. I asked my parents specifically.”

  I squeeze her hand. “I’m so glad, Prisha. I’m so excited for you.”

  “And the wedding is still many months away.” Prisha beams. “So let us dig into this horrible orange house and enjoy our time together, yes?”

  “Yes!” I hug her again.

  Laurel jumps into the hug as well, and we all laugh.

  Prisha exclaims louder and louder the closer we get to the house, and once she’s inside I can hear her cries of alarm. By now I’m sure she’s rethinking her decision to volunteer for this project.

  I’m not sure where Keith and Nathan have wandered off to, but hopefully they’re getting along. Hopefully they’re not out getting tattoos together. Not because tattoos are bad. Because they’re supposed to be here working. I don’t have a problem with tattoos. I specifically don’t have a problem with Keith’s creepy skull tattoo either.

  I toss my coffee cup into the trashcan next to the front porch and regard the house with a long-suffering sigh.

  Our little singles group has conquered a lot of challenges before, but this will be the first time we’ve attempted a service project with only six of us showing up. We’ll see how today goes, but I might have to tap some of the young-married groups for help.

  The URM plans to auction this death trap off to the highest bidder as soon as possible, and it’s up to us to get the place in a condition that will make the sale profitable.

  That condition preferably won’t include creepy dolls in the basement or random cereal boxes in the corners.

  The house looms in front of me, almost like it’s alive and breathing. That’s not possible. I know that. It’s a house. Not a person. But the place has an atmosphere.

  As I’m staring at the front of the house, a shadow moves behind the window on the second floor.

  My heart leaps before I realize that Nathan and Keith are probably looking around.

  Yeah, Cecily needs to get here soon. She’ll keep me focused with her lack of humor. I shake myself and stop as I feel eyes on the back of my head.

  Slowly, I turn to look down the street, and I spot an old man across the road, peering out from behind a rough elm tree. His thin gray hair is wild and frazzled, and the rest of his face is hidden behind a pair of cheap sunglasses. He mouths something at me before he turns on his heel and hobbles away.

  Weird.

  Just weird.

  I don’t like this house. I don’t like this place.

  Where is Cecily anyway? If she isn’t here in the next ten minutes, I’ll call her and demand she crawl out of her Star Wars bedsheets and get here pronto.

  I glance up at the window on the second floor again as the dark figure moves past the crooked glass pane. I hope whatever garbage Nathan and Keith are finding on the second floor is easier to deal with than the absurd towers of junk on the first floor.

  I step forward, and the porch steps creak under my weight. A slamming door makes me stop, and I peer around the side of the house to see Nathan and Keith coming out of the RV.

  My stomach flips.

  Nathan and Keith were in the RV? Not upstairs?

  Okay.

  There’s an explanation, certainly.

  It must have been Laurel. Yes, Laurel and Prisha went inside, and they must have gone upstairs right away. And walked back and forth in front of the window obviously so that I would see them. Yes. That’s the best explanation.

  I take several calming breaths until I don’t feel like the world is tilting around me, and I step inside the house. The dim murkiness of the inside falls around me as I make my way through the narrow, claustrophobia-inducing towers of junk to where Laurel and Prisha are laughing in the dining room.

  Laurel waves at me as she spots me over the piles of stuff.

  “Hey, Trisha, you got the key to the second floor?”

  I press my hand against my pocket where the keys dig into my hip.

  Okay. So maybe Laurel and Prisha hadn’t gone upstairs yet. So much for that explanation.

  “Yeah, I’ve got them.” I keep my voice steady.

  Cecily and her lack of a sense of humor really needed to get here soon.

  Making Out in the Creepy Basement

  The basement door creaks and groans as it swings open, the ominous wooden stairs descending below into the darkness like something out of a horror movie.

  I swallow the urge to whimper.

  So much for never going into the basement again. How long did that resolution last? Two days? At least I’m not alone this time.

  Well, technically I wasn’t alone last time, but Cecily hardly counts as a person.

  Aaron tests the light switch on the wall, and when nothing happens, he grunts and makes a face.

  I glance over my shoulder at him, smiling at the furrow between his eyebrows. “I told you the lights don’t work.”

  “I was hoping they just didn’t work for you.”

  “What? Like the lights have a vendetta against me?”

  “If an inanimate object could have a vendetta, Trisha, it would be against you.” Aaron’s eyes sparkle at me.

  “Wouldn’t that be exciting?” I roll my eyes.

  Setting my tennis shoe on the first step, I twist the flashlight on and aim it downward. “Prepare yourself.”

  “For what?” he chuckles, placing his hand on my shoulder as he walks down the steps behind me.

  “To be terrified beyond all reason.”

  Aaron’s voice is warm and rumbly at my back. “I think you’re exaggerating how scary these dolls are.”

  I scoff. “Wait until you see them.”

  The vaguely damp scent of the basement envelopes me as I step off the groaning stairs and onto the cold cement floor, the harsh white light in my hand illuminating the piles of junk in every corner of the main room.

  “Yikes,” Aaron mutters behind me.

  “Right?” I turn the light back to him. “How does one person collect so much junk?”

  Aaron moves to stand at my shoulder. “I’ve got an uncle in Dublin who’s a bit of a hoarder.”

  “Really?” I glance up at him.

  “Yeah.” He smiles. “I’ve told you I’ve got family in Ireland.”

  “Oh, I know about your Irish-ness. It’s the hoarding gene that’s got me worried.” I shake my head in mock disappointment. “That might be one too many genetic predispositions than I can manage.”

  Aaron flashes that heart-stopping grin of his at me. Even in the eerie darkness illuminated only by flashlight, it still makes my stomach tighten.

  “Is that so, Miss Lee?” He leans down, slipping his hands around my hips as he presses his face against the wild frizz of my hair. His breath tickles my neck.

  I gulp a lungful of musty basement air as I turn out of his hold. “It is. I just d
on’t know which is scarier. Being a hoarder or being—”

  Aaron’s lips find mine in the dark, and my brain short circuits.

  Words had been—I had been wording. Kissing is happening now. Kissing is better than wording.

  The first time he’d kissed me a few years ago, it had been awkward. We’d gotten in a bit more practice since then, and apparently Aaron was a very fast learner.

  Oh, Aaron was good at this. One big hand cradled the back of my head, fingers wound in my crazy hair, his fist gently pressed against the nape of my neck as he kissed me. The other hand splayed across my lower back, drawing me close to him.

  I have hands too, you know. But one of them is clutching the flashlight, and the other one is just sort of flailing. Did I mention that Aaron is good at this?

  Eyes closed, floating in his arms, I hum happily as he pulls back. Not far. Just far enough to set a soft kiss on the tip of my nose.

  “You were saying?” he whispers against my forehead.

  “Was I?”

  “Something disparaging about the Irish.”

  “My mistake.” I tilt my chin up and smirk at him. “What was that for?”

  He hasn’t let me go yet, still holding me in the crook of his arm, pressed lightly against his chest.

  “What?” His eyes twinkle. “I can’t kiss you just because?”

  “We’re standing in the creepiest basement known to man, and you want to make out?”

  “I always want to make out with you.” He presses a chaste kiss to my lips and slowly untangles his fingers from my hair, taking a step back.

  Losing the warmth of his arms in the chilly, smelly basement makes me frown. “Well,” I adjust the flashlight, “you never know who could be watching.”

  “Oh, like your dolls?”

  “Keep it up, fuzz face.” I poke him in the arm. “When you see them, you’ll be just as creeped out as I was.”

  “Sure I will.” He allows me to move past him and settles the flat of his palm against the small of my back.

  I shine the light around in the big main room. Something’s not right. Or at least, it’s not the same as it had been the last time I’d been down here. But I can’t put my finger on what has changed.

  “Has anyone else been down here?” I turn in a slow circle, shining the bright light at the piles of junk and trash.

  “I don’t think so.” Aaron brushes something off my shoulder. “The door was locked this morning.”

  Yes, it was. I’d unlocked it myself.

  Which brought up another question, because I didn’t recall locking it in the first place. Maybe Keith had.

  The beam of light catches on something shiny.

  A bicycle.

  Oh, the paperweight. Cecily and I had found it when we were locked down here.

  “Is that a bike?” Aaron snorted.

  I slowly turn back and look at the stairwell. I had to be losing my mind. I didn’t remember the bike being this far into the basement.

  “What?” Aaron sets his hand on my waist.

  “It moved.”

  “What did?”

  “The bike.” I point the light at it.

  The bike currently leaned against the concrete of the basement wall. Previously, it had been propped up against a pile of cardboard boxes and trash sacks.

  “So?”

  I glance up at him. “So?” I think my voice goes up an octave. “It’s been moved.”

  “Then I was wrong, and someone else has been down here since you and Cecily were locked inside.”

  “But the door was locked.”

  “And you and Keith have the key.” Aaron offers a gentle smile.

  I take a steadying breath.

  That’s right.

  I have a key, and Keith has a key. So if I didn’t come down to the basement and move the bicycle, Keith must have. Easy explanation.

  Aaron pats the side of my face. “You all right? You went kind of pale.”

  “How can you see anything down here?” I turn away and shine the light around, revealing all the oddly shaped piles of junk, until the light falls on the garish red door at the other end of the room. “There.”

  “Ugh. Red.” Aaron muttered.

  “That’s what I said.” I start toward it. “Cecily didn’t seem to think it was a big deal.”

  We approach the red door slowly, picking our way around cardboard and Styrofoam and giant rolls of plastic wrap.

  “You’re worried about the magical moving bicycle,” Aaron said quietly. “I’m worried about the massive number of giant plastic wrap rolls this guy has. Either he was planning to repaint this whole place, or he’s killed about a dozen people and buried them down here.”

  “Don’t even joke about that.”

  “If he’s got a bottle of elderberry wine in the cabinet upstairs, we can get nervous.”

  I can’t stifle a giggle in spite of myself. Aaron has an unending supply of Carey Grant movie references always at the ready, and I’m never sure when he’s going to throw one out.

  We reach the door, and I push it open, allowing the light from my hand to spill into the darkness beyond.

  “Oh, man.” Aaron lets out a loud hiss over my shoulder.

  As before, at the center of the room behind the red door, the large shelf of porcelain dolls greets us. Their dull, unblinking eyes are like glass daggers, stabbing at us through the dark.

  Aaron walks to the shelf and picks up one of the dolls. “That is not okay.”

  I hover at his elbow. “Creepy, right?”

  He turns the doll over in his hands, its limp hair flopping and sequined dress sparkling in the flashlight glare. Aaron narrows his eyes at the doll’s face.

  “Not that I’m into dolls,” he says slowly, “but—would anybody actually buy one that looks like this?”

  “Oh, you’re not into dolls?”

  He raises an eyebrow at me.

  “And you think I am?” I draw back in pretend disgust. “Why? Because I’m a girl?”

  He shrugs. “If the shoe fits.”

  I grunt. “Well. You’re a boy.”

  Aaron laughs and sets the ugly doll back on the shelf. “I sure am.”

  “And you’re Irish too.”

  “The truth hurts.”

  I duck under his arm as he tries to grab me again, and I step around the shelf, shining the light at the other piles of junk in the room. There is no rhyme or reason to it. All the rest of the items in the room are just as scattered and disconnected as the rest of the house.

  “What was that, Trish?”

  I poke my head around the shelf to look at him. He’s standing in front of a pile with a penlight he produced from somewhere.

  “I didn’t say anything.”

  He turns to me. “You didn’t?” He frowns.

  “No.”

  “Oh.” He scowls. “I thought I heard you.”

  A slight chill creeps up my arms. How long do we have to be down here anyway? Was there a reason other than showing him the dolls that I wanted him down here for?

  As we stand in the silence of the basement, the cold dank air seeps into me. Voices echo overhead before I remember that Laurel, Keith, and Prisha are upstairs, but my heart is still pounding. With every breath, I’d swear phantom fingers trailed along my forearms, crawling around in my scalp.

  What was it about this place?

  It’s just a basement. Isn’t it?

  “There are lights in here, but I think they’re all burned out.” Aaron points his penlight at the ceiling. “We’ll need to change those bulbs out, and then we can get to work cleaning this area.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” I walk toward him.

  He stows the penlight and smiles at me. “Want to get out of here?”

  “That obvious, huh?” His expression is kind.

  “This place just creeps me out.”

  “It certainly has a vibe.”

  “A vibe?”

  “Yeah, a vibe.” Aaron smirks. “How wo
uld you describe it?”

  I blink at him. “Scary beyond all reason.”

  “Yeah, you said that already.” He chuckles and guides me to the red door.

  I take one last look around the room and pause.

  “Hey, Aaron?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Did you put that doll back?”

  Aaron frowns in surprise and looks back at the shelf. “Yeah.” He points to the middle row where one of the dolls rests slightly askew from the others. “Why?”

  The light cast on the shelf shows an empty space on the bottom shelf, in the middle. It’s glaringly obvious. How I missed it when I walked in, I don’t know.

  Slowly, I walk to the shelf and kneel, shining the light on the bottom shelf.

  “Are you saying a doll has gone missing?” Aaron chuckled. “Maybe Keith came and got one.” But he doesn’t sound convinced. “Maybe you just thought it was there when you saw them the first time.”

  I shine the light on the shelf, revealing a pattern in the dust that marked where the porcelain doll’s stand had sat. Aaron cleared his throat.

  “Huh.”

  I glare at him. “Yeah, huh. It’s creepy.”

  Aaron carefully tucks me into his arm as he leads me out of the room toward the stairs. “We should talk to Keith. If he hasn’t been down here, then we have a problem.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t know, Aaron.”

  “No.” Aaron pauses by the stairs to let me go up first. “If things are going missing, that means someone else has a key. We need to know this place is secure, and if Keith can’t guarantee that—well, we need to know.”

  I nod and hurry up the steps.

  This time, on the first floor, I lock the door behind us.

  In the sunlight upstairs, I can breathe easier. Also the fact that the team has done a tremendous amount of work helps. The path between the front room and the dining room is wide enough now that three people can stand across it.

  The front door bangs, and Keith ambles inside with a fresh cylinder of trash bags. He grins at us, the stretch of his neck muscles making the skull tattoo ripple across his skin.

  “How was the basement?” he asked.

  I gesture to Aaron and he shrugs. “Scary beyond all reason.”

  This is why I love him.

  “For you too?” Keith cackles. “Must be some freaky dolls down there to unsettle a big guy like you.”