The Calder Estate (1/1 Bee and Avery)

Avery

Tipple-Tossing Tatterdemalion
The story so far...

Since its construction, there hadn’t been a single photo taken that circumscribed the entirety of the Calder mansion within the boundaries of film. Its diffident peaks and buttresses hid behind branches, trunks, and needle blankets. The front doors sat back in the veranda’s lugubrious shadow. Stretching left and right, the walls seemed to twist through the surrounding nature, accommodating its flora and topography in symbiotic habitude. And through windows, darkened, Calder mansion looked back, into the lens, and to the viewer of its candid, unsolicited portrait.

In the next quarter mile, turn right onto Culvert Drive.

Harvey slotted the thin stack of photos into the visor. He’d see soon enough and determine the estate’s nature for himself. Already running ten minutes late, it was imperative he not miss another turn, for his own sanity at least.

In exchange for, what was by no exaggeration, all of Harvey’s savings, the current owner of the Calder Estate had agreed to allow them free roam of the mansion and grounds for a month. Out of ‘generosity’, they even had the amenities restored and the rooms cleaned, as though such weren’t implied in the negotiation. A jab at the integrity of the investigation. Such still riled Harvey. Worse were his coworkers, openly jeering and cachinnating. “He’s taking a holiday up in the hills to sing kumbaya and tell ghost stories with some poor soul he found on craigslist.” Fucking cunts-

Turn right onto Barker Street.

Harvey accidentally drove over the curb before righting the car. Klaus Edwards wasn’t a poor soul. He was privileged, not only with insight into the psychic, but also to be working with Harvey. Because it wasn’t emolument, but opportunity that Harvey offered him. Like daring adventurers of old, they would be vanguards of the new world, that which lay beyond the veil. They’d split the very fabric of reality and tread hallowed, ethereal ground. And all without peyote… because Chad at Starbucks didn’t pull through. Only in hindsight, squinting at street signs, did Harvey think, perhaps Chad was affecting drug knowledge and connections to seem edgy. That shit.

In half a mile, your destination will be on the left.

The car slowed to a crawl as Harvey eyed every building he passed. Summer heat swelled to fill the wind’s absence and the indelible scent of clove cigarettes and stale fast food came subtly back into perception. Acrid, mellow-sweet and a touch balmy, cleaning only seemed to tame it, not rid it. He was tempted to turn on the failing AC.

You have reached your destination

There, huddled between other entrepreneur boutiques, was the quaint shop he’d been lead to. Edward’s antiques. The place wasn’t as antiquated as its wares, the edges crisper than expected, the sign sanded and repainted likely more than once. If anything, it was oxidation in the bracket that revealed the establishment’s age. Harvey pulled to the curb and hit the horn three times in staccato succession. It was only after which did he considered that a text may have sufficed.

* * *​

“Everything is going to be fine Klaus, we’ve done this before and you know I can run everything around here just as well as you can.”

Klaus could only sigh in response, shaking his head slightly as he glanced over toward his sister. Though - and only at his insistence - she had changed out of what he quietly dubbed her ‘Fortune Teller Costume’ she was still wearing several beaded necklaces and bracelets, the colours vibrant to the point where they were almost kitschy. “I know that. I just-,” he paused, opening his mouth then closing it again as though thinking better of what he had been going to say. “It feels different this time.”

Clara responded with a lighthearted scoff as she hopped down off of the counter where she had been sitting next to a delicate tea set that had been brought in that morning. “You’re just being weird. When something feels different I’m always the first to know about it and I’m not feeling anything but smooth sailing right now.” She extended an arm in a sweeping motion to animate her words, a smile on her face that could almost be called cheeky.

“Ah right, I forgot that you’re all seeing now. My bad.” Klaus retorted, though a smile had worked its way onto his face. “Any premonitions about how my basement is not going to flood again?”

There was a sour look that twisted her features as Clara crossed her arms, sticking out her tongue in a moment of childish retaliation before she shook her head and let out a laugh. “Yeah, yeah. So I’m not great at predicting the weather.” She paused, though quickly continued when she saw the forming look on her brother’s face. “Or how it affects old buildings, so what, I’m pretty spot on with everything els-.”

A sudden burst of noise cut her off, loud even muted by the fact that they were inside a building. Klaus pulled his phone out the front pocket of his jeans, flipping it a half turn so it lay vertical against his palm, pressing the power button on the side of it with his thumb. The screen blinked to life, though the only notifications were from emails he had answered that morning and forgotten to dismiss. His eyebrows furrowed slightly as he slipped the phone back into his pocket, glancing once more out the display windows towards the car sitting idle out front the store.

“I think this is the guy. I must have missed his text, signal around here isn't always great.” Klaus crouched to pick up a duffel bag, once screen printed with the logo of the high school him and Clara had graduated from the lettering was now cracked and faded the cartoon mascot not faring much better. He shouldered it with ease, pivoting to take a look around the store as though mentally taking inventory. “You’re sure-”

Clara sighed dramatically and rolled her eyes. “For the last time, yes! I’m sure! Everything is going to be fine!” She took a few steps back to get a better look out the display windows then walked back toward Klaus. “Go then, shoo. Take some pictures for me - even if this Estate isn’t haunted like you keep insisting I bet it looks pretty cool, those sort of old houses always do.”
A look of resignation settled on Klaus’s face and he pulled his sister in for a one-armed hug, ruffling her hair with his free hand. “You can call me if you need me, or text me, or-”

“-email you, send a messenger pigeon, maybe I’ll even use the mail system!” Clara teased, squirming when her hair was mussed. “I’ve got it, just go.”

Klaus shook his head but didn’t say anything more. He readjusted the way the duffel’s strap sat on his shoulder then started for the front door, tossing a wave and a ‘bye’ over his shoulder as he went.

The humid summer heat hit him like a sack of bricks as Klaus stepped out of the front door to the antiques shop, not for the first time that week thanking whatever forces may be that he’d convinced his grandparents to retrofit the store with an air conditioning unit before the heart of the summer hit. He glanced back, able to only just see the dark shape of his sister leaning against the counter through the glass portions of the door which weren’t sandblasted. Without further pause he crossed the sidewalk towards the car that sat idling, leaning down to peer into the open passenger side window. “Harvey Jackson?”

* * *​

"The one and only." he affirmed at length, eyes narrowing in a cutting smile. In the muted shade of the car cabin, his glasses cast a jaundice shadow across his features, a sallow, chicken-fat glow. Harvey gestured limply to the back seat before adjusting the gps on his phone.

"Toss your shit back there and get in. Took you forever to get out here." he lied. "I've been cooking my ass off in this car." Though it was presumptuous of him to even jest as much. Endowed with the a-cup of asses, there really wasn't much to sweat. His counterpart, Klaus, Harvey noticed, seemed more sturdily built. Immediately he was jealous and inwardly quipped that one of them was certainly compensating. It wasn't that Harvey was petty and Klaus naturally inclined to a healthier physique. Never.

"I left a radio and map of the Calder Estate in the glove box for you." he added, his tone that of an afterthought. "Channel three should be open and connect with mine, or whatever jargon. We can talk across channel three."
 
“Klaus Edwards.” Klaus responded automatically though there really was no reason to, it was clear at this point that they both knew who each other was. He spared a glance towards the back seat as Harvey motioned to it, shifting the strap over his shoulder though he didn’t make any move to actually follow through.

“Sorry, cell reception can be bad here sometimes. Must have missed your call.” Klaus threw a furtive glance back toward the antique shop before reaching out and opening the door of the car, climbing in then tucking his duffel down by his feet. “You could have come into the shop, I’m sure the car woulda been fine on the street for a few minutes and we’ve got the place air-conditioned.” He offered a shrug as he pulled the door closed, shifting slightly to get more comfortable as he buckled the seatbelt, already feeling the weight of the heat now that he was in a more confined space.

Klaus nodded, though he didn’t reach for the glove box immediately instead waiting for Harvey to finish talking. “So, what are you hoping to get out of this place? You said something about not wanting to talk about it over the phone..?”
 
Going into the Edwards' shop wasn't a thought Harvey had entertained, and hearing the suggestion made him question if Klaus was hoping to try and sell him some trash that was better described as rusted-abstract-art than antique. To learn there was air conditioning though, that missed opportunity stung. As though to add insult to injury, he became aware once again of heat prickling his scalp. Bugger.

Harvey hadn't noticed how poor the reception was where they were, as he hadn't made the effort to text or call Klaus. But he knew one thing. The reception was only going to deteriorate further as they approached Calder estate. Past the bucolic limits of civilization, into mutinous, estival nature, and further still into territory that human knowledge could recall only through soft-drawn maps, there Calder mansion squatted at the lake's edge, waiting for them. The gps could only take them part way. They'd have to go by the owner's directions the rest.

Harvey locked the doors, and pulled his car back onto the road. Their journey began.

"Oh," he began, at length, to answer Klaus's question, drawing out that syllable. "You know. Everything." Harvey smiled, raising his brows momentarily for effect. "What I wanted to discuss privately, however, was our means of acquiring just that. Monitoring the place isn't going to do jack. I'd like to wake-up Calder Estate, by any means necessary. Something is there. History substantiates as much. There was the disappearance of Julia Patrick in the 70's. Roughly five suicides in the surrounding woods over 20 years. And the very clandestine nature of the Calder family! No one can say what eventually bankrupt them. Most were reclusive. What little information I could dredge up was on Agatha Calder, who was hospitalized with schizophrenia." Harvey paused momentarily, feeling what coincidences he'd listed were compelling enough, before doubling back.

"What I'd like us to do is put some life back in the place. Nose about, run some frequencies. I'm sure you've some tricks up your sleeves, no?" That was, after all, why Harvey partnered with him.
 
“By any means necessary?” Klaus echoed as Harvey continued to talk, though it was little more than a muttering the phrase sounded much less sure coming from him. He spared Harvey a quick glance before reaching for the glove compartment, setting the hand held radio aside for the time being in favour of picking up the map of the estate to look it over. It was a big place, bigger than any of the others he had been too, Clara was probably right about it ‘looking cool’.

Klaus waited until Harvey had finished talking, eyebrows having fallen into deep furrows the longer the other man had gone on. He had certainly done his research that was without doubt, troubling as the combined results of it seemed.

“Sure, I can bend spoons just as good as the best of them.” He joked folding up the map and tucking it back into the glove compartment again. “I’ll know if anything or anyone is around as well as other variables. Most of it I can only get to you in the moment though, don’t have much luck on the predictive front.” Offering a shrug Klaus settled back into the seat with the vague intention of getting more comfortable. He ended up turning slightly inwards to face Harvey, wanting to gauge his reactions, still not comfortable but it seemed that it was the closest he was going to get.

“Lemme just get this clear though. So the purpose of this ‘trip’ is to disturb whatever may or may not be dormant and sleeping at Calder estate, as well as stir up what might already be loose and roaming?” He asked. “I just want to make sure that you know that when authentic these things can be cruel, more than that they can be straight up malevolent. Having me here isn’t going to pacify anything we find. It-” He faltered as there was a slight pressure and his ears almost seemed to pop as Harvey hung a right and the pair passed through the city limits. He could feel the connection to his sister fade, it was still there but now quieter, a lamp that was turned on but not plugged into a power outlet. “-It sometimes does the opposite.”
 
Choosing to believe the future was flexible, liquid flowing the path of least resistance, Harvey had little use for prescience. Most practicing foresight tended to fall into two categories; sycophants and pessimists. Neither he needed in their investigation. And in a black, saturnine corner of his consciousness, Harvey didn't care. If their endeavors set them on course to inexorable death, so be it. To return empty handed was equivalent to a slow, spiraling suicide anyway. It was better not to know. Let him live in hope and suffer in consequence.

"Isn't the point of every paranormal investigation to find and record the real deal. No one has time for anything other than the authentic. An antiques dealer such as yourself knows that best." Harvey spoke with his free hand, gesturing, as his other kept the wheel. "If we should draw the attention of something a little inimical, then that is the risk we take. And without knowing what it could be in advance, we can't reasonably obviate the ill it may do us. But!" Harvey looked to Klaus in emphasis, the car turning slowly in direction of his gaze. With a jerk, Harvey corrected it. "But, it's not as though I came without taking any precautions. Should our adversary take physical form, well then, I do have a rifle in the trunk." the words trailed as he affected a demure tone, grinning. Technically it wasn't his, nor did he know how to use it, aim it, care for it, or even anticipate its kick. But he had it!
 
A flash of panic crossed Klaus’ face as the car jerked and he instinctively reached for the door handle, knuckles white from how tight his grip on it was even after Harvey had the car back under control. He almost regretted not offering to drive. Almost.

“I never said we wouldn’t find something real for you. In fact I can almost guarantee that we will, house as old as this. Not even to mention what you’ve found regarding its history. No need to stir anything up more than it is.” Klaus responded, it was only just dawning on him that he was getting into something much deeper than he would have preferred. Not that backpedaling was much of an option at the moment. “I just think that you’re going to find a lot more than what you’re asking for.”

Klaus blanched a little at the mention of the rifle. If it wasn’t bear traps, or homemade ‘specter’ traps - that were honestly more dangerous to their makers than the intended targets - than it was guns. He had never understood what about having a gun around caused such a boost in confidence in people. In his own limited experience with firearms they had never ceased to cause more damage than they prevented. “Lets just... leave that for worst case scenario. Trunk might be the safest place for it.”
 
Harvey laughed shrilly in mock incredulity. "How could I find more than I'm asking for? One can't have more than everything, and that Mr. Edwards, is exactly what we're after. Because the existence of life beyond our understanding and measurable physics is paramount. No discovery will ever rival the evidence we are undertaking to find. Not cancer, not space travel, not world peace. This-" Harvey slapped his hand on the dashboard, fingers splayed with emphasis. "This is everything." Having punctuated his digressive rant, Harvey seemed to deflate a little, wilting back into his seat before dismissing Klaus's other notions.

"And we're looking for irrefutable evidence. Not edited film or changes in air currents. For that we need to risk a little rudeness, nothing we can't palliate." Though the last part was a lie. "If Calder estate takes umbrage to our investigation I'm sure we can make it up to it... them. Whichever. And what good is a rifle in the trunk?" Harvey asked, suddenly seguing the topic back around. "If things go tits-up it'll be beyond access. We'll look like zit-faced teens in a horror film, scrambling for the car." He scoffed with a sciolist's certainty.

Haphazardly, Harvey swung the car sharply right and onto a side road he'd almost missed in all his drivel.
 
“Pretty easily I’d imagine.” Klaus mumbled in response to the rhetorical question, low enough that he hoped Harvey wouldn’t hear it or that he’d be too caught up in his rant to pay it any attention at least.

Klaus let out a sharp breath at the squeal of tires as the car lurched around the corner switching his grip from the door to the sturdier grab-handle - graciously dubbed the ‘oh shit’ handle by some - on the roof of the vehicle. He hadn’t gone for it first out of some sort of odd social courtesy but that had begun to fly out the window several near hairpin turns ago. Comfort was beginning to get lower and lower on his list of concerns.

“I get it. I guess...” Klaus paused, needing to think on his next words before saying them. Sure he knew what he wanted to say, though he wasn’t sure how much more running around in conversational circles he could take at the moment. It was much easier to deal with people when you weren’t stuck in a tiny overheated with them. “Not sure It’ll be as simple as that but sure, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.”

“It’s good for lowering the chances of me getting shot.” He shrugged, “especially if that’s the sort of outcome you’re predicting.”
 
For all his bravado and affectations, Harvey couldn't say what he was expecting. He knew what he hoped for, unassailable proof to substantiate his years of dogmatic diatribe. What that proof could be, Harvey wasn't sure. It needed to be solid enough to stand outside his questionable reputation, and make skeptics wonder. But, if Harvey were honest, proof was a secondary goal. What he wanted was to reestablish the certainty of his youth. He wanted an experience.

"I wouldn't worry." Harvey assuaged, and for a moment, he let candor slip through his facade of omniscient authority. "I don't even know how to use it." The corner of his lips lifted in what was a genuine, if not slightly embarrassed, smile that his cat's-grin mustache only seemed to exaggerate. He flipped the shades of his glasses up and refocused on the road.

Well-worn, but otherwise unassuming and placid, the stretch of macadam they drove was becoming eerie as descanos began dotting the verges with increasing frequency. As one was forgotten another would appear. White balsa crosses, thin as Harvey's religious faith, were festooned with paper-dry flowers and bearing fuliginous votive candles. Their flames had long since guttered. The road's layout didn't seem devious, neither winding nor sharp, so-

"Is this a popular road to drink on?" Harvey reasoned aloud, checking his gps. They were about to pass the knowledge of its limits, soon to rely solely on the owner of Calder Estate's directions.
 
“I’d say big trucks at night but this doesn’t seem much like it would be a popular road for anything.” Klaus responded, leaning forward in his seat, one of the upcoming crosses having caught his attention. Even from a distance, steadily closing as it was, it stood out. Whiter than its counterparts with blotches of still vibrant colour, flowers that had yet to wilt and brown under the heat of the sun. A few seconds more were all that Klaus had before it flew by, just another part of the landscape receding steadily into the distance. At the same time the gps let out a soft ping, reconfiguring for several seconds before returning to normal.

“That one looked recent.” He mused, “how current did you get with the history of this place again?”
 
The lack of traffic aside, Klaus's suggestion of trucks still could have been ostensible if the road they were on looped back to the highway. The highlighted portion of map which Harvey could see, however, proved such wasn't possible. The black tendrils of transportation, the very vessels of civilized life, just ended. Harvey eased off the gas, the car progressing along more slowly, cautiously.

"My research was absolutely thorough." Harvey stated in defense, more to convince himself than Klaus. Days of plumbing the internet, cross-checking public records, and squinting through a microfiche at news articles and obituaries, he couldn't have overlooked these deaths. So many as though habitual, more ritualistic than holidays. Every cycle on the dot. Had these car accidents been just outside the scope of his research, just far enough beyond Calder estate to be missed?

"Maybe they weren't news worthy." Harvey dismissed, retching a folded paper from his pants pocket. "Here." he offered it to Klaus. "They're the directions I was given by the owner. Better you read them aloud than I while driving. I think we're supposed to turn onto a service road next, or one for tractors or something."
 
Klaus frowned, sitting forward more so that he could look back at the road behind them instead of having to use the mirror. Not having been looking for them he’d missed the first couple of crosses they passed, not to mention the ones on the opposite side of the road but there had to have been well over a dozen of them. Each in varying states of age.

“Maybe.” Klaus replied, though he didn't sound convinced. “Even still, you’d think this stretch of road would have a reputation. This many deaths? Should be an abundance of rumors.”

With his thoughts still elsewhere Klaus took the paper from Harvey, unfolding it and smoothing the creases between his fingers to get it to lay flat. He leaned back in the seat again before he actually looked at the directions. They were written rather than typed, neat curling letters that sat parallel to each other even without the use of lines. “Says it’s going to come up on the left after a big tree.” A short laugh escaped him at that, having moved around a lot he’d seen his fair share of directions. Ones that were more detailed and ones that were, well, like these. Left at the tree, right at the rocks. It was interesting the things that were used as landmarks where civilization had yet to construct its own. “Gravel road, shouldn’t be too hard to miss but I’ll keep an eye out. You take a right after that, then just follow the road for a bit.”
 
Klaus had a point which Harvey was obdurately reluctant to agree with, feeling that in doing so it would undermine what knowledge he had of the area. But tacitly, he acknowledged it. If this many people had kissed a tree with their car and resultingly ate the steering wheel, then something had to be known among the people. The absence of traffic wasn't helping.

In an after thought, Harvey wondered if the descanos were even real. Perhaps they were a projection of Calder Estate's psychic force, a self-aware warning, a cry for solitude. He was tempted to slam the car in reverse and have Klaus take pictures. Maybe there were names or photos of the deceased at the memorials they could later look up and- Such risible thinking! Harvey mentally reproved himself. Eager for evidence, he was letting his imagination get the better of him, and he couldn't let that slide. How would he prove the pyrrhonists wrong if he did?

"Turn left after the big tree?" He repeated in question, instead of focusing on the grim, christian portents. "Onto a gravel road. What if it's overgrown by now?!" he balked. What defined a tree as big when the road was flanked by forest? Harvey was about to cavil for the sake of distraction when he noticed something in the road. Rocks, like scree spit out of the surrounding verdure. He slowed in approach. And to their left, the wilds opened into an organic tunnel, tenebrous beneath a dense canopy of deciduous trees. "You think that's it?" Before it stood a tree, fat, dark and knotted, eclipsing the skyline. Its roots crabbed around it like the legs of a spider, waiting. Harvey felt tentative looking at it.
 
“That’s what’s written here, guess there’s no road signs.” Klaus clarified. “These are recent directions yeah? I’m sure they would be more specific if they didn’t think it was blatantly obvious.”

Though he had been watching the road Klaus almost didn’t notice the tree and in conjunction the turn until Harvey pointed it out. A sense of unease curled itself in his gut at the sight of the landmark. There seemed to be something inexplicably wrong with it though logistically it was just another tree. Older? Yes. Gnarled? Sure, but there was still something that was eluding him. Klaus furrowed his eyebrows, attempting to nail down just what it was that was odd. It almost looked if it were new, as though it had only grown recently and was the youngest of all of the trees around it. That wasn’t possible though, it shouldn’t be at least.

Caught up in his own thoughts Klaus almost missed Harvey’s question, his response coming out stuttered. “Y-Yeah.” He cleared his throat then tried again. “Yeah I’d say that’s it.” Klaus glanced over at Harvey as they approached. “Does it look weird to you? The tree I mean.”
 
"Well," Harvey began, casting furtive glances to the tree as he drove past, into the mercurial shadows of the road it stood guard at. "I can't say it's gonna win any home and garden awards. It's like fucking Cerberus at the gates of Hades." He wrinkled his nose in a sneer. "It certainly is out of place though. It didn't resemble any of the surrounding species, like it had been purposefully planted there, maybe a marker explicitly for those going to Calder estate." Such was ostensible, though opened the question of why that species of tree in particular. Wouldn't one with resplendent blooms have been more welcoming?

The verdure grew thick overhead, sloping low enough to touch the car. Rat-scratching twigs and the slap-drag of leaves created an off rhythm. Harvey squinted into the roiling dark, growing ever deeper. He was tempted to turn on the headlights despite knowing it was before 6PM. Something of it seemed too lively, as though the leaves were all rippling, though there was little wind. The road came to an end, branching right and left, the left being completely impassible due to mutinous nature. He turned right, as the directions instructed.

They were on the homestretch. Calder Estate was just ahead.
 
“Kinda looked like it grew through everything.” Klaus thought aloud, the momentary image of the strange tree breaking ground already fully formed crossing his mind. Branches clawing their way through packed dirt and stone until they tasted air, writhing like long, bony knuckled fingers until they gained enough leverage to pull the body of the tree from the earth. Oily black markings on the gnarls and knots rolling like eyes in their sockets, even the shadows too bright as it possessed or devoured any contesting flora in its way.

Goosebumps rising on his arms Klaus pushed the thoughts out of his head, switching his focus to the road ahead though it didn't prove much better a distraction for his intrusive thoughts. Bare branches, both dead - bleached to gray tones - and alive - dripping with shadowed viridescent mosses and lichen, reaching out like clawed hands towards the vehicle only drawing back to complacence once they had brushed the exterior.

“Hate to be the gardener who has to tame all of this back.” Klaus joked, more to break the silence than anything else. He had a distinct feeling that even a team of gardeners couldn't control any of this, it grew as it wanted.
 
"I doubt the Calders ever cared much about the aesthetics of their surrounding verdure." Harvey quipped, suddenly recalling the photos he'd slotted into the visor. He pulled them free as he talked, tossing them in-stack to Klaus. "According to my knowledge, the Calders weren't known for entertaining. So if they wanted to clip the green into something sensible, it would be purely for their own pleasure and taste and-" he pointed to the photos with a perfunctory glance before looking back to the road. "If those images connote anything, it's that the Calders hadn't any sense of uniform taste."

"Look at the architecture." he insisted. "It's a variegated mess. There're Gothic peaks, Italianate eaves, Greek revival columns, Tudor style exterior walls, and a ranch style veranda at the ass end of one of its wings to name a few of its motley details. Never mind the labyrinth that is its floor plan. Some rooms are claustrophobic as all hell while others have vaulted ceilings that reach into blackness. And the dark wood! There is dark wood paneling everywhere with carved cornucopia accents and fat cherubs. It's like some gothic 70's hellscape; the lights need to be on 24/7. What the windows let in hardly illuminates shit." Harvey rambled, glad to have someone forced to share his company. The car had been crunching along with ease, and now, suddenly it came to an arresting stop as Harvey hit the breaks.

Nearly imperceptible against the dappled stone and shadow of the road was a rather pathetic looking iron gate. Its bars thin and oxidized, it appeared squat under the oppression of the trees overhead.

Harvey set Klaus with an impassive stare. "You care to get that?"
 
“Kind of looks like it’s been pieced together like a puzzle.” Klaus commented as he flipped through the pictures. Even as 2D images there was a wrongness in the way that the house had been assembled, like the person who had designed it had several manic changes of heart with stylistic choices as they were in the process of building. The sudden stop had Klaus looking up from the photographs even before Harvey spoke. It took him a moment to notice the gate, the rusted metal having adopted a similar appearance to some of the thinner branches that surrounded it.

“Uh, yeah. Sure.” Klaus replied, gaze darting from Harvey to the closed gate then back again. Setting the photos onto the dashboard he reached to undo his seatbelt, fumbling with the buckle for a few seconds before he finally got it open. He opened the door, hesitating for a moment before he stepped out of the car and onto the gravel drive, the smooth pebble-like rocks emitting a quiet grinding under his feet.

A glance back from where they had come had Klaus feeling queasy and he quickly turned and walked toward the gate. From where he had been standing the natural tunnel of overlaying branches and leaves looked as though it ended in gloom several metres behind the vehicle, the slightly skewed perspective giving it the look of a gaping mouth. Thankfully instead of a lock there was only a latch which Klaus undid with only a small amount of resistance. From there he gave the left side of the gate a push, having to walk it open the rest of the way then repeating the same with the right side. Once the gate was open and out the of the way Klaus walked quickly back to the car, sliding back into the passenger side seat. There was no reason to close it really, and he could have sworn that the nature on the right side of the gate had writhed when he’d gotten close.
 
Watching as Klaus took his time getting out, Harvey was tempted to patronizingly clap him along, rushing. The car only got hotter as they dallied after all. Harvey, however, resisted. Such would be unprofessional, and why weaken the already sterling rapport they were building! What they knew of each other personally was infinitesimal, couldn't fit the eye of a needle, but Harvey didn't feel Klaus was a pusillanimous prig like many others he'd had the misfortune of working with. Klaus didn't seem like a bad guy. Not some jeering clown or a man's man as Harvey had wrongfully presumed by the cut of Klaus' shoulders... or was he?

Harvey looked to Klaus' bag, then back to Klaus. There wasn't enough time to be thoroughly nosy. A shame. Harvey was tempted to palpate it like a Christmas present, trying to guess what was inside. But, the thought of Klaus potentially seeing him through the windshield, getting handsy with his duffel, was rather embarrassing. Harvey huffed in resignation of the idea and crossed his arms, impatient. Maybe some other time.

Harvey waited for Klaus to settle back in the car before peeling out, tires spinning, spitting rock and dust before they caught and shot the car onward. Not a minute past the gate, and the edifice that was Calder mansion came into looming view, a black silhouette cut from the nature encompassing it. The road split 'round a central fountain, its original form long lost to memory and time. All patina and verdigris, lichen and moss. Whatever the water-bearing figure once resembled was now amorphous and smooth from years of weathering. And in the pool, what water remained, look black and viscous.

Harvey drove around it and to the mansion's front. There he parked the car, and with affected enthusiasm announced, "Welcome to Calder mansion, Mr. Edwards! We're expected."
 
The relief that Klaus felt when the natural tunnel began to separate back into singular trees was squashed the moment he set eyes on the manse. Though it had looked imposing in the photographs they had been unable to capture the true unnerving size and mass of it. Calder estate loomed in every sense of the word.

As they rounded the bend of the fountain Klaus ducked slightly, having to crane his head to catch the peaks of the structure. Harvey’s comment about the Calders' not being ones to entertain came back to him and he made a face in silent agreement. Even if they had been the type to host, Calder Estate itself was not a venue that had been built with that in mind. There was an uneasiness that seemed to encompass the whole property, though that could have been just him. Klaus glanced over to the other side of the car, Harvey didn’t seem to have noticed anything or if he had he was clearly not concerned about it.

At the announcement Klaus forced a smile, reaching down to pull his duffle up off of the floor and onto his lap, one hand fiddling idly with the zipper. He was tempted to open it and rifle through what he had packed in order to find the ‘charms’ that he knew Clara has snuck into it before he left. He had always thought them silly, little things that she created with pieces of metal, broken wood, smooth pebbles, or shells usually looped onto necklaces of wire or twine along with several colourful beads. ‘Here Klaus,’ she had told him before slipping the chain of one over his head. ‘This will help with that girlfriend - or boyfriend - hunt that I know you’re secretly on.’ It had been a small wire cage with fabric and a rose toned shell inside of it, though that had been years back he had kept it - not because of its supposed properties of attraction but because it reminded him of his sister.

“It looks a lot bigger than it does in your photographs.” Klaus commented, even the glance he’d taken at the floor plan hadn’t had him expecting something this size.
 
Back
Top