Miss Annabelle's Yankee
by Rob Shelsky

The light, a lost topaz in the night, twinkled from a window of the house on the far hill. Annabelle stared at the winking jewel of amber through an insomniac's eyes.

This is ridiculous, she thought for the umpteenth time. The place is empty, so it's probably just some homeless person, or...something.

She turned from her lace-curtained windowpane and padded barefoot across the hardwood floor to her sleigh bed. Feeling irritable, Annabelle flounced down upon the soft silkiness of the covers. Shutting her eyes, she willed sleep to come, but it would not. The North Carolina humidity wasn't what troubled her--rather, it was that mysterious honeyed illumination.

Why does it even matter to me? Annabelle wondered. What was it that drew her so to the light, and with such an intense, almost physical longing? After all, maybe it wasn't even really there, perhaps being just an optical illusion, a trick of reflected moonlight on glass. No, there was no moon. Portentous murky clouds, foreshadowing violent summer thunderstorms, encrusted the night sky, blotting out everything, including all the stars. On the winding country road, there were no cars this late whose headlights might cause odd reflections. Besides, the glow lasted for over an hour. It usually disappeared just after midnight.

* * * *

The next morning, Annabelle pottered downstairs for breakfast. Sitting at the oak table with golden sunlight streaming down on her from the kitchen's only skylight, she sipped from a steaming cup of aromatic tea. Annabelle nibbled on crisp toast slathered with raspberry jam that brimmed with last summer's sun. Still, her mind was not on her food, but on that yellow light. She had to know what caused it. It was now an obsession with her, she silently admitted this much to herself.

Annabelle waited until that evening. It was a short trip by car to the decrepit house. She stopped at the entrance to the graveled drive, struck by a sudden hesitation, almost shyness. This was trespassing. If somebody caught her here, what could she say, what explanation could she give that wouldn't sound crazy?

Finally shrugging off her fear, Annabelle gunned her little red Honda. The car bucked as she shifted gears and then trailing a cloud of dust, it raced up the drive, past the silhouettes of stately old oaks, sped between shadowed mounds of fragrant honeysuckle. She drove by collapsed outbuildings, now just dark piles of rotting lumber, and then pulled into the weed-choked front yard. The lurking hulks of two camellias formed a dusky arbor, guarding the old bricked pathway that led to the sagging front porch.

Annabelle just sat in the car for a moment. Through the windshield, she stared up at the house. Punctuating the facade of wooden clapboards, long ago weathered clean of any paint, were three tiers of black, gaping windows. There was one exception, the one glowing with the topaz light. The windows had little glass remaining in them. A few lingering shutters dangled at sad angles. The gabled roofline was swaybacked, its spine broken. Fallen debris and jagged shards of broken glass lay all about the yard.

What was she thinking? This place was derelict, ready to collapse. Annabelle could hurt herself by plunging through rotten floorboards, raking her pale flesh on rusty nails, or... She refused to consider another alternative: that some lunatic lurked in the dark recesses of the homestead, waiting to pounce on her.

Mentally bracing herself, Annabelle exited the car. She examined the area leading up to the columned porch. There were no signs of disturbances as far as she could tell. It was as if she were the first to visit here in years. Tilting her head, she stared up at the fitful gleam of golden light emanating from a third floor window.

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