Interfictions Read Online Free Page A

have what every home needs,” said the house.
    "I'm no one,” said Rose. “Really."
    "I wouldn't say that,” Jonas said in the frame of the doorway. He had a portable phone in his hand, held out for her to take. “I mean, we're all someone. A son or daughter, a wife or husband, a parent. Maybe you're right, though,” he said a moment later. “Maybe we're all no one in the end."
    "What do you mean?” asked Rose. She put the teacup down to take the phone.
    "I'm thinking of my family. All gone now. So I guess by my own definition that makes me nothing."
    Rose batted her eyelashes instead of replying. Then she put the phone down on the mantel next to the toppled towers of buttons. She sat down in one of the chintz armchairs and said, “Tell me more."
    The first lost family
    Before the Addlesons, the Oliver family lived in—House. Before the Olivers lived in—House, the family that built the house lived there. But the name of that family has been lost to the dark of history. What we know about that family is that they were from the moors of Yorkshire. That they had come with money to build the house. That the house was one of the first built in this part of Ohio. That our town hadn't even been a town at that point. We shall call them the Blanks, as we do in town, for the sake of easiness in conversation.
    The Blanks lived in—House for ten years before it took them. One by one the Blanks died or disappeared, which is the same thing as dying if you think about it, for as long as no one you love can see or hear you, you might as well be a ghost.
    The Blanks consisted of Mr. Blank, Mrs. Blank, and their two children, twin boys with ruddy cheeks and dark eyes. The photos we have of them are black and white, but you can tell from the pictures that their eyes are dark and that their cheeks are ruddy by the serious looks on their faces. No smiles, no hint of happiness. They stand outside the front porch of—House, all together, the parents behind the boys, their arms straight at their sides, wearing dark suits.
    The father, we know, was a farmer. The land he farmed has changed hands over the years, but it was once the Blank family apple orchard. Full of pinkish-white blossoms in the spring, full of shiny fat globes of fruit in autumn. It was a sight, let us tell you. It was a beautiful sight.
    The first to disappear was one of the boys. Let's call him Ephraim. He was the ruddier of the two, and often on his own, even though his parents taught him not to wander. One afternoon he and his brother went into the orchard to pick apples, but in the evening, when the sun began to set, only Ephraim's brother returned to—House, tears streaming down his face.
    "What's the matter?” asked Mrs. Blank. “Where's your brother?"
    But the boy (William, we'll call him) could only shake his head. Finally he was able to choke out this one sentence:
    "The orchard took him."
    Then he burst into tears again.
    This, of course, sparked a heated debate around town. We who live here have always been a spirited group of people, ready to speculate about anything that might affect us. The general consensus arrived at was that the boy had been taken. Someone must have stolen him, like the fairies did in the old country. A stranger passing through, who perhaps saw the perfect round ruddy globes of Ephraim's cheeks and mistook them for apples. It is a dark thought, this possible narrative. But dark thoughts move through this world whether we like it or not.
    Mr. Blank died soon after his son's disappearance. He died, as they say, of a broken heart. Mrs. Blank found him in the kitchen, slumped over in his chair, his head on the table. She thought he was crying again, as he often did after his son's vanishing. But when she stroked his hair and then his cheek, she found him cold, his heart stopped up with sorrow.
    They buried Mr. Blank in the orchard, beneath the tree where William last saw Ephraim. And only