1: Mathilde

The phone rang in the black night, ripping Mathilde out of her frosted quiet thoughts. She let the ring fill the trailer and build pressure into the walls. A shot of cool pierced through her sternum, expanding underneath the skin of her belly. Dread. The icy floor stung her toes, and she wrapped a flannel robe around her body, seeking out the boiling tone in the kitchen. She gripped the receiver to her ear and heard a bloodless voice.

“Al allait mourrir. Al allait mourrir.”

“Who?”

“I’m sorry.” Her sister wept.

The car ride to Halifax from Clare took three hours. She drove down the highway, blackened except for the moon hanging like a rib above the evergreens. Snow drifted across the road, fuzzy light sand dancing in her headlights. She didn’t flip on the radio. The hum of the wind pushing back against the car asked her if she truly wanted to know. It asked her if she’d rather be sleeping.

The house was unlit. She didn’t bother to close the car door. She shut off the engine and bolted. Cold shot up her arm as she banged her fist on the wood. When there was no answer, she found the hideaway key tucked in one of the potted plants. The lock clicked and the door swung into quiet darkness. How cold. How dead. Her boots echoed on the hardwood, and as soon as she entered, she saw a shadow run up the wall behind her and suspend in the corner. It was already a haunted house. She tasted the roof of her sticky dry mouth when she flicked on the light switch. Blood. Not a pool or a drop. Streaks. They curved on the floor. Around from the kitchen and to the top of the basement steps where they descended into darkness. But Maddie followed the blood up, not down.

In movies, dead people’s eyes close immediately or remain open, focused and rigid. These eyes were half-opened in a timestamp of death. The pupils had shrunk to pin tips. The whites were crimson. Fear ripped her out of the basement, stumbling up the steps and into the calm street lined by golden lamp light, her throat filled with sick. She stumbled, possessed, until she made it down the hill to the Macdonald Bridge where she stood until the sun rose, shimmering on the horizon. She contemplated what it would be like to breathe salty water into her lungs.

“Are you okay?” A voice hovered over her shoulder.

Mathilde turned and saw a woman standing in a thick winter coat, her cheeks bright red and soft. Mathilde nodded and ungripped her hands from the railing. She looked away from the cold, salty harbour below.

Mathilde sat on a bench in Parade Square and lit a new cigarette with a dying one. Despite the morning sun, flags on the building hung limp while white snowflakes fell silent and full. The trees were skeletons raising their arms up in crooked surrender. She counted the cars. If five drove by, she’d go to the police. If none went by, she wouldn’t. She counted the people. If two walked by with red coats, it was only a nightmare. Black, it wasn’t. She looked at her watch. If she stopped crying in twenty minutes, she’d walk to the liquor store. If she didn’t, she’d walk back to the bridge.