The Boy Who Drew Monsters: A Novel by Keith Donohue Read Free Book Online

fence that ran along the border between the house and the beach. She tugged and stumbled free, falling into the sand and beach grass.
    When the thing did not pounce upon her, when it did not swoop from the sky trailing a long tattered black shroud, when nothing overtook her but her own sense of the absurd, Holly laughed, sprawled on the ground. She had found nothing banging at the siding, no wolf at the door, huffing and puffing to get in. She convinced herself that Tim had come home, and that explained the second figure in her living room. All a misunderstanding, jangle of nerves. Picking herself up, she brushed the sand from her palms, certain that there was no one else inside with Jack, no maniac in a hockey mask, that indeed the only madness came from her own strung-out imagination. A relieved laugh, a laugh to stop from crying, a laugh she was afraid would never end.
    Through the fir trees, a pair of headlights appeared small and distant as Tim’s Jeep snaked along Shore Road, returning home at last. If that was Tim on the road, she thought, who was the second shadow? Abandoning her search altogether, she hustled inside the house, pulled off her coat, and hooked it by the door. “Were you walking around while I was outside? I thought I saw someone here with you.”
    Serene as a Buddha, Jack sat on the couch just where she had left him, still tuned in to the nature program, a gang of grizzlies catching salmon as they laddered their way up a stream. His expression had not changed. He seemed not to have moved. She ran her fingers through the frost clotting her hair and kicked off her slippers under the Christmas tree.
    “You saw no one? You heard nothing?” she asked, and he nodded without looking at her, though she could not tell whether he had been unaware or was consenting to a conspiracy. Dashing from room to room, she confirmed the house was just as she left it. At the foot of the stairs, she listened for a stranger hiding above, and she called once and was embarrassed by the echo of her voice. Every time she passed him on the couch she noticed Jack’s stare, as though he was daring her to ask again. He looked as though he had snatched the truth in his mouth and it was still squirming behind his teeth.
    By the time the Jeep pulled into the driveway, the scene was set. Holly had positioned herself next to their son and crossed her arms, affecting nonchalance.
    Blooms of red dotted Tim’s cheeks as he came in from the cold, smacking the meat of his arms and stomping his feet. “Brrr…” He shivered and chattered his teeth with great exaggeration like windup choppers. Jack squealed with delight.
    “Where have you been?” Holly asked.
    He unwound the scarf from his neck as he crossed the room to greet her with a kiss, the taste of liquor on his lips. “Sorry that took so long.”
    “Have you been drinking?”
    “Mr. Jip, isn’t it getting time for bed?” He checked his watch and mussed the boy’s hair. Squirming out of reach, Jack burrowed deeper beneath the afghan and snuggled closer to his mother. “Just one,” Tim said to her. “You know Fred and Nell. They are so grateful that we’ve agreed to take Nick off their hands. Second honeymoon, what do you think of that? What have the two of you been up to?”
    She considered letting the moment pass, but could not resist. “There was a noise. Outside.”
    “What sort of noise?” He seemed nonplussed by her demeanor. “Jip, seriously, time to hit the sack.”
    Irritation floated in her voice. “At first it was just a random knock, I thought something falling over, but then it went on, bang-bang-bang. Striking the siding like gunshot. And you weren’t here to go check, so I had to hop out of the bathtub sopping wet to see what was the matter. And then I thought there was someone in the house when Jack was all alone. I swear there was something else inside.” With a sneer, she added, “While you were out, sipping Scotch with Fred and Nell