Interfictions Read Online Free

you all right?” Jonas asked, cocking his head to the side. “Rose Billings, right? I haven't seen you since you were a little girl."
    "Yes,” said Rose, but she didn't know if she was saying yes to his question or to the house's question. She shook her head, winced, then looked up at Jonas again. Light cocooned his body, silvery and stringy as webs.
    "Come in,” he offered, moving aside for her to enter, and Rose went in, looking around for the source of the voice as she cautiously moved forward.
    Mary Kay Billings didn't hear from her daughter for three days after that. That night she called the police and spoke to Sheriff Dawson. He'd found Rose's car stuck in the snow. They called all over town, to Hettie's Flower Shop, to the pharmacy, because Rose was supposed to pick up cold medicine for Mary Kay. Eventually Rose called Mary Kay and said, “I'm okay. I'm not coming home. Pack my things and send them to me."
    "Where are you?” Mary Kay demanded.
    "Have someone bring my things to—House,” Rose said.
    "—House?!” shouted Mary Kay Billings.
    "I'm a married woman now, Mother,” Rose explained, and that was the beginning of the end of her.
    Jonas in his cups
    He had many of them. Cups, that is. Most of them filled with tea and whiskey. Jonas Addleson had been a drinker since the age of eight, as if he were the son of a famous movie star. They are all a sad lot, the children of movie stars and rich folk. Too often they grow up unhappy, unaccustomed to living in a world in which money and fame fade as fast as they are heaped upon them.
    Jonas Addleson was not famous beyond our town, but his family left him wealthy. His father's father had made money during the Second World War in buttons. He had a button factory over in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It's long gone by now, of course. They made all sorts of buttons, the women who worked in the factory while the men were in Europe. Throughout—House you will still find a great many buttons. In the attic, on the pantry shelves, in the old playroom for the children, littered in out-of-the-way places: under beds, in the basement, among the ashes in the fireplace (unburned, as if fire cannot touch them).
    This is not to say Rose Addleson was a bad housekeeper. In fact, Rose Addleson should have got an award for keeping house. She rarely found time for anything but cleaning and keeping. It was the house that did this eternal parlor trick. No matter how many buttons Rose removed, they returned in a matter of weeks.
    When Rose first arrived at—House, Jonas showed her into the living room, then disappeared into the kitchen to make tea. The living room was filled with Victorian furniture with carved armrests, covered in glossy chintz. A large mirror hung on the wall over the fireplace, framed in gold leaf. The fire in the fireplace crackled, filling the room with warmth. On the mantel over the fire, what appeared to be coins sat in neat stacks, row upon row of them. Rose went to them immediately, wondering what they were. They were the first buttons she'd find. When Jonas returned, carrying a silver tray with the tea service on it, he said, “Good, get warm. It's awfully cold outside."
    He handed Rose a cup of tea and she sipped it. It was whiskey-laced and her skin began to flush, but she thanked him for his hospitality and sipped at the tea until the room felt a little more like home.
    "The least I can do,” he said, shrugging. Then remembering what she'd come for, he said, “The phone. One second. I'll bring it to you."
    He turned the corner, but as soon as he was gone, the house had her ear again. “Another soul gone to ruin,” it sighed with the weight of worry behind it. “Unless you do something."
    "But what can I do?” said Rose. “It's nothing to do with me. Is it?"
    The house shivered. The stacks of buttons on the mantel toppled, the piles scattering, a few falling into the fire below. “You