My wife Lori and I agreed we liked the young couple who had moved next door recently. They seemed quiet, respectful folk, keeping themselves to themselves. Lori went over with a platter of cookies and welcomed them to the neighbourhood, which they accepted politely enough, using their unpacked boxes and moving mess to avoid asking her in. Amateurs, I thought to myself. A few days later, they both showed up on our doorstep, returning our dish with a few stems of roses lying in it. “From our garden”, said the young woman, somewhat shyly for a woman in this day and age, I thought.
No-one could accuse Lori of shyness. “Charming!” she cried and tried to insist they come in, but they refused, again saying something about their house needing attention. “Oh you can’t play that card forever, my young friends!” I thought. “Good luck!”
But there was little need for front door politenesses anyway. As the weather turned warmer, we would see them in their garden which was only separated from ours with a fence more frequently. Piqued by their early refusal to socialize, Lori said he came off as clingy. “Oh stop it Lori!” I said irritably. “Always finding fault with people!”
“She never comes out by herself.” Lori replied. “Haven’t you noticed? He comes out sometimes, and they go out together, but she’s never by herself.”
I shrugged. But Lori wasn;t done. “Honestly, this work from home stuff has made people mental! It’s not natural, husband and wife cooped up like that. Men need to leave the house in the morning, return at evening”.
Lori goes on a lot about the pandemic and what it did to families.
Maybe it was Lori’s remarks, that the next afternoon I saw them doing yardwork, I found myself paying more attention to them. “Hi there!” I called out to the wife, bent over the soil. She straightened up, startled, but then walked over to me. “What are you gonna plant?” I asked.
She smiled. “I have such a soft spot for roses! And we are left with such a bounty- probably more of these beauties!” She gestured to the rose bushes behind her, without taking her eyes off my face.
I realised she was looking hard at me. I blinked, disconcerted by her stare which didn’t match her light tone and movements. Her husband was walking quickly to join us. “Hello sir!” He greeted me cheerfully enough, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the young woman’s face- the way she was blinking rapidly, closing and opening her eyes deliberately.
Lori came up and we talked gardens for a few more minutes. Then they made some excuse and left. “You must have noticed that!” whispered Lori, barely able to wait until we were out of earshot.
“What?” I retorted, irritable because I felt confused and didn’t like it.
“Her eyes!” Lori exclaimed. “The way she moved her eyes! I’m telling you, something is going on over there!!”
“Nonsense!” I said. “You’re watching too much Netflix- you’ll say she’s a ghost of a dead woman next! Or a robot woman, programmed to blink incorrectly!” I tried to laugh.
That night, my sleep was haunted by her face, her eyelids fluttering deliberately, long and short flutters, talking about roses, but saying something else with her eyes. Memories of my boyhood books came back- long short, short short long, tap tap her eyelids . “It’s Morse Lori!” I woke up, drenched in sweat. “She telling us something - blinking in Morse”.
Lori sat up, and we stared at each other in the dark.
We didn’t see them for a few days. Then one afternoon, as we sat on our deck trying to enjoy the early sun, they came out, the husband carefully leading the wife by the hand. She was taking tiny steps behind him, a floppy hat covering her face.
We stood up and waved. The husband said loudly. “Darling, Lori and Henry are in their garden waving at us. Shall we walk over to say hi?” She nodded, and they began walking very slowly towards the fence. And then, I felt an uncomfortable rush of unfamiliar emotion as I saw what he was holding in his other hand- heavy garden shears.
Fear. It took me a moment before I realised I was full of sheer, physical fear.
As the four of us gathered at the fence, only then did we see a narrow bandage running across the young woman’s face where her eyes had been, now only delicate hollows in the pristine white gauze.