Page 13 of The Treasure House

“God knows.” I shook my head. “Maybe he’s been out in the sun too long.”

“Did you like all those muscles, though?”

“Eat your popsicle.”

“Why doesn’t he want us to live on his street?”

I didn’t know. And I didn’t care. All I wanted now was to get inside that house.

Five

It turned out culch meant junk. And when Jake said the house was full of culch, he meant it.

“Watch where you step,” he warned us as he took us around the back of the house. “Elton from next door keeps this side cut back and mown,” Jake told me. “Which is good of him. He doesn’t have to.”

Flo trotted along behind Jake, taking the whole place in and looking like she was at Disneyland. “Mom, look, there’s attic rooms!” She pointed up at the shingled roof behind the brick chimney. “I call an attic bedroom!”

“It might be a while before you’re sleeping up there,” Jake warned her.

“Why? Are there ghosts? Do we have to get an exorcist?”

“There’s no room for ghosts, what with all the junk. And how do you know about exorcists at your age?”

“You don’t know what my age is. I could just be a very short teenager,” Flo rebuked him.

“Fair enough, kid.”

“Why is it full of junk?” I asked, jumping in before Flo could really start in on him. I tried to peer in the side windows, which were whimsically round, like portholes, but they were too dirty to see through. I got a funny little twist in my stomach at the sight of those round windows. They were like something out of a fairy tale.

“It’s kind of a long story.” Jake sighed.

“Give me the short version,” I suggested.

“There was a lady who lived here, she was a hoarder, she doesn’t live here anymore.” We’d reached the end of the neatly clipped and mown pathway and found ourselves blocked by overgrown bushes. Jake held back branches covered in splashy red berries. “Through you go.”

Flo slipped through easily, but the space between Jake and the house was narrow and I was forced to all but rub myself against him as I followed. He was warm against my back and a slow shiver ran through me. I felt him tense at my touch. I guess I rubbed him the wrong way.

The backyard was a wall of green. It was as though the woods had spilled all the way to the back porch. Once there might have been a garden under there but now it was a wildwood, with tangles of saplings around the old trees. The wind soughed through them, causing the leaves to snap and ruffle. Where flowerbeds and vegetable gardens once might have grown, there was waist-high grass dotted with wildflowers. The overwhelming green tangle breathed the perfume of sap and summer.

“It’s a little wild,” Jake told us dryly.

“It’s great.” Flo’s eyes were shining. “Are there any magic trees or tunnels or anything?”

“Are there snakes?” I added, eyeing the tall grass.

“Probably.”

“Probably!” I scanned the ground for signs of movement.

“Don’t crash out, Mom. There aren’t venomous snakes in Maine, I looked it up.” Flo was completely unfazed.

“Getting bitten by a nonvenomous snake would still hurt,” I snapped at her. I had visions of her ankles covered in puncture wounds. “You’re not to touch them.”

“It’s good to have snakes. They keep the rats and mice away, right Mr. Abernathy? That’s what my reptile book said.”

“Jake,” he corrected her. “No one calls me Mr. Abernathy.”

“Can I keep a snake for a pet if I find one? The book said snakes make good pets.”