Here you can read the first three chapters of my horror novel, Cultivation. Find a synopsis at this link. You can purchase the book at this link.
1
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“navigation”
-Leonard-
The balding man opened the door, took a step forward, and eyed Leonard harshly.
“You folks lost?” said the balding man, a stilted frown on his face.
Leonard had just been about to knock. He stopped and stared back with a restrained smile and wide, twinkling brown eyes for a moment until both of them could keep it up no longer. Wide grins blossomed on their faces.
“Another friendly welcome, Dennis,” Leonard said, stepping forward to clasp his brother in a wide hug.
The hug was familiar, an act repeated a thousand times, and yet something felt different about this one. Maybe Dennis hadn’t yet showered. Maybe he’d gained weight. In fact, he’d definitely gained weight.
But no, that didn’t seem to be the source of what felt off.
Dennis chuckled and broke away quickly, surveying Leonard and his wife and stepdaughter. Leo was healthy and average, although secretly he felt his body beginning to feel the effects of age, something he hadn’t thought to expect from his late thirties. For today’s trip he’d worn jeans, a light blue button-up shirt, and a brown suit jacket. His dark brown hair and light brown skin were weathered, but healthy.
Browner-skinned Essie stepped up with a smile and took Leonard’s arm, short and beautiful in her jeans and rose-colored sweater, black hair short and violet-framed glasses on her face.
To see both his wife and his brother together still felt unusual to Leonard, two starkly separate worlds combining. Their familiar scents mingling for the first time in ages. In fact, Leonard was almost certain they’d only ever seen each other at the wedding, two Christmases, and one Thanksgiving.
Surprising that he still felt this way even after five years of marriage.
His stepdaughter, Julia, stood silently behind Essie. She was like a parodic “modern” version of her mother; decidedly-blank eyes drifted around behind blue-framed glasses, white jeans were torn, and her short, lopsided hair swept down past her right ear. Leonard flashed her a friendly smile. You remember your non-blood-related uncle who you’ve only seen four times, right?
“Get in here, Leo. Good to see you three,” said Dennis.
Essie smiled her tight-lipped, big-cheeked smile as she hugged him. “Great to see you again, Dennis.”
The autumn air was a bit windy and wet. Short-sleeved Julia must have been cold even from the short walk from driveway to door, but she didn’t seem to care. Nobody else was outside on such a nasty afternoon.
They gathered into the home and were swiftly seated on Dennis’s living room couch. Leonard sensed a faint coating of dust in the house that he diagnosed as a symptom of lack of female presence.
“Oh, that rug’s new, isn’t it?” observed Essie, probably smelling what Leonard was but trying not to show it.
Julia just wrinkled her nose.
Dennis stuck his hand in his sweatpants pockets and frowned as he surveyed his surroundings. “Yep. And the picture frame. And the coffee table. And…it’s been ages since you’ve visited. You been busy or something?” There was levity in his tone, and yet his claims were true.
“Guilty,” Leo confessed. Dennis had grown a fair amount fatter and balder in their time apart, he realized. Had it been that long?
“I thought you were going to say ‘or something,’” laughed Essie.
Dennis turned his attention to Julia, who had a smartphone grasped in her hand, the screen tied to her pupils with an iron cord. “You’re looking taller every time I see you, Julia. How are you?”
She coughed and looked up at him for a second. “I’m bien.”
Leonard could never be totally certain when his stepdaughter was making an attempt at a joke.
“I hear this trip is in your honor,” said Dennis, taking a seat in his sad-looking sofa chair.
A chortle escaped her lips. “If that were true, we’d be listening to my music.” She smiled. Dennis matched it, probably feeling proud to have elicited such a reaction from her. Leonard always did.
Amused, Leo set a hand on Julia’s shoulder. “We’re scouting out the university with her.”
“She doesn’t look like she needs a babysitter to me,” Dennis said. He raised an eyebrow and grinned, showing a set of unbrushed teeth.
A deep yellowness of neglect. Leo frowned, wondering why he hadn’t noticed that before.
Dennis went on. “You’re sixteen, right? You got your license?”
Julia nodded right at him. Did she even notice the grime that was bothering Leonard? “And even if they didn’t come, I could just stay with Maxine,” she said.
Leonard shook his head and kept up a smile. “Alright, alright, we get it.”
He cleared his throat. Maxine. His only biological daughter…
Maybe he ought to address the elephant in the room.
“We haven’t heard much from Maxine lately,” he said, “and we wanted to check up on her, too. So, it’s a good thing we’re all going.”
Essie, who had been distracted by a modern-style fancy clock on the wall, turned to her husband and nodded. “It’s nice to be together as a family once in a while.” Colorful beaded earrings jostled on her earlobes.
Dennis frowned with understanding. “Don’t hear a lot from Maxine, huh?”
She sighed. “…Less and less.”
That sigh communicated a thousand things. Her accompanying smile—just a bit less enthusiastic than her standard, automatic one. The momentary shrug of her shoulders. The hands set together in her lap with calculated restraint.
Julia’s eyes peered to her mother, expression perpetually blank. Leonard frowned as his gaze graced the floor.
Dennis only bit his lip and chuckled again. He scratched at his thinning hair and said, “She came to see me.”
The three stared at him bug-eyed.
“About three weeks ago. She stopped by with that boyfriend of hers,” he continued, arms crossed and back slouched. “We had a nice chat. She just started junior year. Studying sociology. Thinking about switching to psychology, but not certain.”
Leonard leaned forward with a distraught frown on his face. He could feel his mind rebooting. “Wh… How… C-can you start over?”
He shrugged. “There’s not much else to tell. I don’t know why she decided to come. She’s a good one, though. Sweet. Strong-willed. It is clear that there’s some, uh, distance between you guys, but I wouldn’t worry about it. You know how it is when you leave the nest for the first time.”
Did…did he even realize how absurd that was to hear for parents who had barely been able to talk to their child in months? He must have. Why…why did he think it was…funny?
Leo looked to Essie and scratched at his hair—thankfully all still there. Then he tried to laugh, rather unsuccessfully. “That’s not how medical school went for me.”
“Well, that’s med school. That’s different.”
“Yeah. It’s more intensive!”
“I’m kidding! It’s just a new generation, Leo. Times change and all.”
The dirty-looking grin was almost convincing. It said that Dennis was happy and prosperous. Yet everything else around …like that overflowing garbage can and that plastic six-pack empty of all but one can…told a different story.
“Maxine’s doing great. Trust me. Really, you don’t need to worry about her at all,” said Dennis. He leaned forward. “In fact, I could take Julia the rest of the way to Delton for you. Like she suggested. She can stay in Maxine’s dorm. You two wouldn’t have to worry about missing work.”
Julia perked up.
But…she didn’t smile at Dennis’s proposal. If anything, she looked bemused.
Essie watched him, and she swallowed. “N-no,” she said, brows furrowing ever so slightly. She was offended but trying not to show it. “We want to see our daughter again.”
Dennis cocked his head and nodded. “Alright.” The word carried light defensiveness—as if to say, “Sorry I suggested it.”
A long moment carried a palpably uncomfortable silence, like an invisible fog had swept in and encased them in thick foam. The dust and filth of the room flared in the crevasses of Leonard’s skin, and he found himself feeling concerned.
About what, he wasn’t sure. But he could tell…he could see, underneath Dennis’s eyes…that his brother’s divorce had done quite a number on him.
A deep sympathy welled up in Leonard.
Dennis stood up and sighed pleasantly, but Leonard noticed a slight tremble in Dennis’s chest and something else unsaid in his eyes.
Julia’s attention returned to her smartphone screen. She swallowed; her eyes were shifty.
Dennis stepped near to Julia and rested a hand on the arm of the couch. “So, are you guys staying for dinner, or…?”
Essie took her daughter by the arm and sat up straight, giving her all to brighten up again. “I wish we could, but we need to get back on the road soon. We’re sorry we can’t visit you more. Really. Both of us just work so often, it was…difficult enough to come down for this.”
Dennis waved his hand and nodded. “It’s no problem.”
Leonard’s eyes were trained on his brother’s face, trying to decipher the layers of…of motivation behind it.
Dennis took a deep breath and grinned again. He had to be trying his absolute hardest to convince them all was well. “Let me grab you some Cokes before you head off.
“And believe me: you’re gonna see for yourself that Maxine is doing great. Julia’s gonna be begging you to go to Fermin Delton University!”
-Julia-
* So I just stopped by your house and you weren’t there. Thenn I checked my messages and realized why lol
* omg…you’re a bit forgetful today, Tammy.
* Jules you are the forgetful one. You didn’t even text me
* We had to pack! And my dad’s been all stressed so it’s making my mom and me stressed…
* Uh huh.
You got any more excuses or are you running out?
* Don’t talk to me
* Wow
Did you make it there yet?
* No, we’ve got half an hour left I think.
* I wanted to go to a tour. Now I have to wait until my dad remembers he has a daughter. Why didn’t you take me?
* Because…I like to have three seats to myself.
* I’ll remember that next time you try and sit by me at lunch
* Not with your memory, you won’t, lol
Should I bring something back for you so you feel included and loved?
* Just take lots of pictures for me so I can visit FDU through you
* Oh yes, I’ll craft a detailed record for you!
College.
That was the next frontier. Realistically speaking, there was lots of high school to get through yet—Julia had just barely begun her senior year—but already she was feeling the thrumming excitement of leaving home at last and…getting her life started. She almost wanted to cry joyful, postpubescent tears at the thought.
This weekend was going to be a landmark on her memory. She wouldn’t ever forget the sight of this place.
Maybe that was a bit extreme—after all, she didn’t even know if she was actually going to attend FDU. But everything indicated that that was the most likely outcome. She wasn’t seriously considering any other school.
Now that they were back on the correct highway barreling south, she felt assured they hadn’t lost too much time to Leonard’s botched navigation. She leaned back against the window, extending her legs along the three back seats of their blue Toyota and touching the side of the car with her bare feet. She sighed deeply, wishing time would flow faster.
The car sputtered and shook, and she moved her head away from the window with a grimace.
Essie looked at Leonard with wide eyes and a smirk. “You felt that one, right?”
He frowned sheepishly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. And neither does my wallet.”
Julia remembered distantly a car from a time before her mother’s current marriage, a car that smelled more familiar than this one. Not better, as she seemed to recall its scent mingled with tobacco and boxes of her biological father’s belongings in a trunk. But more innately familiar than this car, which was clean but old, old, old.
She felt her phone buzz and found another message from Tammy.
* Isn’t Phil at FDU?
She smirked. She had been thinking about texting Phil. Before doing anything else, she quickly wrote up a message to him.
* Hey, I’m heading to Delton to tour the U.
A year older than her, Phil Jensen had been a good friend to her and Tammy when they’d all attended high school last year. Now he was enjoying freshman year and evidently making all sorts of new lifelong friends to spend his free time with.
The prick.
She exchanged another volley of texts with Tammy while she waited for Phil’s response.
* I just texted him.
* Hehe
* Stop texting me for a sec so I can focus
Another minute went by with no Phil response. She huffed and shut her eyes for a bit. She licked her teeth. Sometimes she felt phantom braces there still, and their confirmed absence always brought her relief. A few hours ago, Mom had been angry at her for forgetting her retainer for this weekend trip, but there was nothing to be done about it now.
Julia was interested in seeing FDU. Or anyplace. Last time she’d traveled, it had been to Columbus to stay with her aunts and uncles on Mom’s side. What a grand old time that had been.
Well, it hadn’t been that bad. They were fun in their own quirky way, leading much faster-paced, yet balanced lives than Julia was used to. Leaving town in any capacity was nice, but Columbus wasn’t her future.
Her future was this. Or something like this.
Freedom. It was so close, she could practically taste it.
It tasted good.
Her cell phone vibrated. It was Phil!
* Hi! That’s exciting.
Not very verbose. Had he really forgotten who she was?
Or worse, did he remember the wrong things?
It was almost more insulting to get a text like this than nothing at all. Maybe he just needed a little…prodding.
* Excited to see you again 😉
If he didn’t get the picture after that, it was hopeless. Before too long, his reply came in:
* Me too
She grumbled and slumped her head back. She texted Tammy again.
* FML
It’s like he’s forgotten who I am.
* What did he say?!?
* A grand total of 5 words
Hi! That’s exciting.
and
Me too
He’s dating someone else at FDU, isn’t he?
* I don’t know. I haven’t seen anything on his profile about dating someone.
* He doesn’t even use it that much. He might be keeping her a secret
* I doubt it. Just give him a bit more time.
Whatever happens, don’t let the weekend end without finding him and nailing him
Down.
Nailing him down.
She shut off her phone and laid back, shaking her head with a smile. She anticipated a good time whatever happened this weekend.
Essie turned on the radio, and a song began to play. “Blinding Lights” by The Weeknd. Julia let herself forget about Phil and start humming absently to the tune instead.
-Leonard-
Leonard’s trembling car seemed to be pacified now that they had veered off the highway and onto less bumpy roads with lower speed limits. Green hills sprouting bushes and trees all flecked with autumn colors whizzed past the car windows, accompanied by the occasional off road or country house. The roads had given him trouble, as tended to happen when he drove long distances, but with help from Essie’s navigation, he had corrected a few missteps and only lost minimal amounts of time. With a bit of increased acceleration, they would reach Delton before 7 pm, as planned. Knowing that eased his frustration.
As scenery rolled by, Maxine’s face came into his mind again. That face he hadn’t seen for so long. Like her father, she tended to let the challenges of the world either wear her down or fire her up. Though she’d been through a good deal in years past, he had always thought of her as indomitable. Just like him, she never stayed sad or anxious or defeated for very long. Often, hardships—like losing her mother—would only kindle greater passion to keep moving.
The latest and greatest example of that was completing her first two years of college at FDU.
He and Essie had sent her off with hugs and tearfulness. Leo remembered a few phone calls in the ensuing months keeping them connected. She needed them still, and they found they still needed her.
Then, at some point, it stopped.
Essie had gone into a panic, and Leonard soon became convinced to worry too. When Maxine didn’t respond to messages or calls, they called her friends and asked for her. They wrote the school. Still, there was nothing.
Until she came back for Christmas, and things went back to normal for about a week. In a stark change from her adolescent life, she wasn’t anxious, tearful, or full of racing thoughts. Things seemed brighter and better than ever.
The same process essentially repeated when she returned home for summer break between her freshman and sophomore years. When break ended, she waved her family goodbye as a friend picked her up to take the long drive back to school.
That was the last in-person memory Leonard had of his elder daughter, nearly a year and a half ago. Since that time, until two weeks ago when planning this trip, the silence had begun again, only this time less severe. She never spoke a single word to them unless prompted by phone calls or texts from him, or Essie, or Julia. Even then, she was guarded and vague and evasive, always saying she was really swamped with schoolwork and busy studying. When criticized for her lack of communication, she’d gotten defensive and angry. “I’m working hard. Why can’t I just live my own life?” – read a text Leonard recalled receiving, although he was sure his memory had scratched out a profanity or two.
And it had gotten worse when the next Christmas came around.
They had asked her when she was coming back. But Maxine answered that she was staying with friends, so thank you but no thank you.
The same thing happened when summer break came.
But Julia discovered a missing piece to the puzzle through social media: there was a boy. Leonard and Essie were concerned, but after many conversations with each other and with other parents, they resolved to let Maxine do as she wished.
She was an adult now, after all.
Leonard eventually got to the point of working extra-long shifts at the hospital, long enough to numb his mind against the worry and the phantom guilt.
Was her detachment related to something he had done? A way he had treated her? He couldn’t imagine that to be the case. Essie assured him as much. He loved his daughter more than anything. Yet still he wondered and worried.
Was I a bad father? Am I a bad father now? A bad stepfather?
He understood that parents and their young adult children often had bitter disagreements leading to periods of silence, but that was just the problem. Leo hadn’t had anything of the sort with Maxine. There had been no arguments significant enough to warrant such a dearth of communication. They had left on good terms.
What had happened to Maxine after she left?
Those thoughts, left unanswered, faded away with the passing trees as they tunneled through an overpass and he became aware of the radio. It was blasting a heavy-synth pop song Leonard was unfamiliar with—but Julia and even Essie, sitting relaxed in the passenger’s seat, seemed to be enjoying it.
He grinned at the sight of Julia in the rearview mirror laying down with legs drawn up on the back seats, tapping her fingers on her thighs with a closed-eye, contemplative expression.
“I’m running out of time… ‘cause I can see the sun light up the sky…” she muttered, echoing the lyrics with moderate success.
“See, we do play some of your music,” he said with a laugh.
The comment didn’t break her focus. “I’m drowning in the night… Oh, when I’m like this, you’re the one I trust…”
He turned to Essie and found her tapping her fingers on the door. “You know this song too? How old are you?”
She returned his gaze and gave her usual cheeky, parabolic smile. “Age has nothing to do with appreciating a good tune, Leo,” she said.
That sight of her playful smile was his daily and much-appreciated reminder that Essie was beautiful, and that she wasn’t going anywhere. For a moment they were in their early thirties again: Essie transformed into that charming, free-spirited, sexy girl he had met at the gym almost every weekend.
There were her green eyes with a softness and an understanding, her black hair in a ponytail, and her brown skin glistening with sweat. She hardly looked any different now, but he could still recall the subtleties of her younger frame.
On their first date he had seen her wear that slick black hair down to her shoulders for the first time and from then, it was all over: he needed to marry her. She’d put on a bit more weight in the half-decade since then, most of it going to her hips and thighs (he felt not a sliver of a grievance), and though her hair was shorter and her demeanor slightly more reserved, he was happy that it never felt far off from those golden days of yesteryear: the divorcee and the widower joining together in newfound love.
It was more difficult to remember Julia in the same way. Sixteen years old and not much like the spacey, active little preteen he recalled from just a few years ago. She seemed to fight against that old persona as if her happiness were dependent upon becoming somebody new. He found that silly, because he and Essie could see—even if she couldn’t—that she really was the same as always, underneath.
“Mom’s got it,” said Julia, showing teeth and smirking at Leo. Although she bore great resemblance to her mother, her rotating fashion choices seemed like something out of an edgy music video, with curly hair one day, and straight hair the next, almost always in that strange sweep down one side of her face. Sometimes curly was in and straight was out, other times vice versa. It alternated perhaps every other day, by Leo’s reckoning.
“Really? Shall we turn on the oldies for a few good tunes, then?” he teased.
She was unamused. “No.”
Leonard chortled.
[NEXT]
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