A House With Good Bones

The next morning, Sam continues her research into Elgar Mills. She discovers that Mills was an associate of Jack Parsons, an infamous sorcerer and colleague of Aleister Crowley, who was a famous occultist with a wide following. Parsons was a rocket scientist known for “mixing cocaine, free love, amphetamines, statutory rape, mescaline, and ritual black magic” (138). According to letters written from Elgar to Parsons and archived on the internet, Parsons had plans to create a magical child. Elgar warned him against this, claiming that he, himself, had performed this experiment “to his Sorrow” (141). Elgar writes that “all Golems and Homunculi must inevitably turn against their Masters, as all Children must rebel against their Parents” (141). Sam also finds vague references to Elgar’s death when Gran Mae was 16.

Sam visits Gail again to discuss Edith. Though Gail insists she does not know what is happening in the house, she suggests that Edith does not have a mental health condition but is reacting rationally to her circumstances. Sam eventually pushes Gail admit that she believes the house is haunted, though Gail adds that “there’s something else all tangled up in it” (147) and she does not know what. Sam is unsure whether to believe this, reasoning that she does not believe in ghosts but that her reading about ritual magic and “Thelemic children” suggests she may not know anything. Seeing Sam’s hesitation, Gail acknowledges that Sam’s scientific background may make it difficult for her to accept what’s happening, since it “isn’t something [she’s] going to be able to put under a microscope” (148). Sam can only hope it goes away on its own.

The epigraph reads, “Revelation: Old-fashioned double flowers in deep, dark purple, with velvety petals shading to dark red. […] The exact history of this heirloom rose is unknown” (149).

Sam spends a sleepless night worrying about her mother and debating the existence of ghosts. She decides not to continue worrying about ghosts, as she doesn’t believe in them, but “bugs [she] know[s]” (152). She returns to the garden to explore the insects’ mysterious absence. She starts digging, unburying a glass mason jar filled with human teeth.

Sam remembers Gran Mae trying to take her baby teeth as a child. She hypothesizes the jar is a collection of baby teeth that Gran Mae saved until she notices it contains adult teeth as well. She shows the jar to her mother, who is shocked and horrified. Sam suggests that Gran Mae was “weird about [their] baby teeth” (158), but Edith frantically denies it and suggests they go into town for ice cream. Sam agrees, realizing that Edith does not want to speak inside the house. As they drive in the car, Edith explains that Gran Mae is “not gone.”

Sam reminds her mother that Gran Mae is dead. Edith insists Gran Mae is haunting the house. Edith recounts strange events she has dealt with: doors slamming, pictures falling with the wall nails cut through, and feeling the sensation of fear and anger she always felt when Gran Mae was alive. Edith tried selling the house, but every time she brought a real estate agent in, something awful happened. Eventually, she decided it was unsafe for anyone else to live there. Edith says that when Brad and his wife came to visit, Gran Mae broke Brad’s wife’s foot with a glass door because Gran Mae was racist. Edith also recalls Gran Mae keeping her husband’s teeth after his cremation. Sam points out that there are far more teeth in the jar than can be accounted for by dead relatives. She and Edith recall that Gran Mae was a hospice nurse who worked with elderly patients and conclude that she stole their teeth as well. Sam thinks that “if anyone was going to be too mean to stay dead” (166), it would be Gran Mae.

When they return home, the jar of teeth is gone, as is the photograph of Elgar Mills. Edith goes to bed and Sam once again falls asleep on the sofa. She dreams of a figure walking in the garden among the roses as a white object tries to wiggle between the rose bushes. A voice whispers, “Look at the mess you’ve made, little piggy. Who’s going to clean it up?” (167). In the back yard, a white thing stares inside through the glass doors.

The epigraph reads, “Sunday Dinner: An award-winning climbing rose with one-inch-wide apricot-yellow blooms. […] Sturdy and disease resistant, extremely thorny, suitable for hedges and animal barriers” (169).

Sam goes across the street to ask Phil if he has ever found jars of teeth or anything similarly strange in the backyard. Phil’s grandfather, Mr. Pressley, answers the door. Mr. Pressley is a conspiracy theorist and suspicious of Sam because she is related to Gran Mae but lets her talk to Phil. Sam asks Phil about the jar of teeth, and he says he has never found anything like that. As Sam is leaving, Mr. Pressley points out to her that “at least fifty black vultures were perching, and every single one was staring fixedly at [her] mother’s house” (177).

Sam visits Gail. She tells Gail that she does not believe in ghosts or magic, but admits that she may be dismissing it only because it is happening to her mother. Gail reveals that she and Gran Mae practiced magic but had significantly different philosophies of practice. Gail considers herself a witch, while Gran Mae was a sorcerer, working with darker kinds of power. Sam tells Gail about Elgar Mills, which Gail thinks explains Gran Mae’s behavior; she must have inherited his power. Telling Sam to set aside her scientific mindset, Gail says that Gran Mae had great power and “all she did was grow roses. […] as if she were building a wall of thorns to keep something out” (181). Gail suggests that Edith is trying to appease Gran Mae’s ghost. Sam runs back to the house, noticing dozens of vultures circling the house, “[a]s if the house were a dead thing and the vultures were about to land and begin to feed” (183). Inside, Edith calls Sam into the living room, announcing that Gran Mae has come to visit for Sunday dinner. Sam fears that her mother is having a hallucination until she sees her grandmother seated at the dining table.

Gran Mae appears to be “made of roses” (185). Rose vines from the garden snake in through the glass door, creating a puppet version of Gran Mae. Sam tells Gran Mae that she is not real, that Sam must be hallucinating. Gran Mae sends Edith to the kitchen to cook a ham for Sunday dinner and instructs Sam to sit at the table. Gran Mae berates Sam for being unmarried, digging up the jar of teeth, and reading Elgar’s letters. A rose vine full of thorns wraps around Sam’s wrist, cutting her. The pain forces Sam to admit she is not hallucinating.

Sam asks Gran Mae about magic, believing that Elgar taught her. Gran Mae responds that her father never taught her anything because he was too focused on his “other children [...] the ones he made. The ones who turned against him” (190). Instead, Gran Mae taught herself magic by watching her father closely. Gran Mae complains about Elgar, saying, “All I wanted was a nice, normal life, like everyone at school. Like everyone on TV” (190). When Elgar became ill and Gran Mae tired of caring for him, she “just let his other children in and walk[ed] away” (191). Sam finds the implication that children ate Elgar upsetting and changes the subject, asking why Gran Mae sent the ladybugs into the house. Gran Mae explains that Sam caused it by bleeding on the roses and demanding more ladybugs. Phil walks into the house. Sam screams to run, but he walks in and sees the rose-puppet Gran Mae. The front door slams closed behind him.