The lake house is clean, almost too clean - it’s like nothing has ever left its place, but the lack of dust says otherwise. If Landis barely leaves this place, it makes sense that he’d have a lot of time on his hands to keep it tidy. Austin snoops around on the ground floor, stalking in and out of rooms, not totally sure what he’s even looking for. Bloodstained clothes? A murder weapon? Bones under the floorboards? Maybe it’s best to just sit and wait until Monty or someone else from the Sheriff’s department gets here, but something in Austin’s gut tells him differently.
The ghosts follow him back into the kitchen in a silent, gently drifting entourage. Austin lingers near the fridge. Do you really think anything’s in there? He brushes his fingers against the handle and hesitates.
“There’s no severed heads in there,” Wes says dryly from up near the ceiling, hugging one knee to his chest. “S’far as I know, anyway.”
“Landis doesn’t kill people without the lake telling him to,” Danton confirms.
Austin nods and opens the fridge quickly, blinking hard, still expecting to see body parts inside. There aren’t any to speak of. The light from inside the fridge is harsh and flourescent, its innards just as organized and sparse as everything else in the lake house - mostly lunch meat and bottles of water, condiments, a crisper drawer full of vegetables that look relatively fresh. The water bottles are packed inside, end-to-end, and stacked like bricks to save space.
Austin takes a bottle out of the fridge and the plastic crinkles in his hand as he squeezes it. The cap twists off too easily, like it’s been opened before.
“Doesn’t the plumbing here work?” he asks.
“Yeah,” Jeremy says. “I mean, Landis showers regularly, so I assume it works.”
Austin steps over to the sink and twists the handle. Sure enough, water gushes out from the faucet without an issue - barely even a sputter, which Austin would have expected from a house that seems so old. And in the middle of winter, too.
“It runs on a well,” Danton says.
So what are all the bottles for? Austin takes another bottle out of the fridge and holds it up to the light, comparing it to the one in his other hand. The water in both looks cloudy. Brown, almost. Austin pulls another bottle out to examine. This one has a handful of pebbles floating gently around inside of it. What the hell?
“Hey, that looks like-” Danton begins, and he’s only half-finished speaking when Austin comes to the same realization.
Oh, no fucking way. He wasn’t. Austin’s stomach flips. He shoves the bottles back into the fridge and shuts the door firmly, turning back around to look at the ghosts. Jeremy, and Danton both look back at him with wide-eyed expressions of concern. Wes looks indifferent, passing his fingers in and out of a lightbulb in the ceiling and making it flicker violently.
Austin opens his mouth to speak, maybe shout, but all he can manage in the end is “He was…?”
“I just thought it was regular water.” Danton floats downwards until his feet almost seem to clip through the floor. “I didn’t -”
He stops, and looks away from Austin, towards the floor. It’s a funny reaction - like maybe he isn’t telling the truth. Why protect your own murderer?
“I’m going upstairs,” Austin says, and leaves the kitchen, expecting the ghosts to follow. Only Wes does, and he doesn’t reappear until Austin is halfway up the staircase, bringing with him an invisible breeze that ruffles Austin’s hair.
“What are you even looking for?” Wes asks, drifting sideways through the wall. “I thought your cop buddies were going to come and drag the lake. You don’t need any more evidence than the bodies down there.”
Austin shrugs. “I don’t know. Just curious.”
He freezes at the top of the stairs, so abruptly that Wes starts to drift through the arm that he has outstretched to clutch the bannister. A pins-and-needles feeling spreads from Austin’s wrist up to his shoulder, but he keeps a white-knuckled grip on the bannister, his gut roiling and twisting into knots. Every instinct in his body is telling him he shouldn’t be up here. His muscles feel like they’re locking into place. Austin bites his lip until he can feel warm droplets of blood beading on it, and lets the pain wash over him, regaining enough control over his body to wrench his hand free and take a few steps forward onto the second floor landing.
“Shit,” Wes says, bemused. “You alright there?”
“Fine,” Austin mutters.
There are only three doors on the second floor landing, and one is a closet. The door directly across from the closet is a bathroom, which Austin glances into briefly and then ignores. The third door must be Landis’s bedroom. It’s unlocked - the handle gives easily when Austin twists it, and the door swings inwards.
The full moon is shining through the cracks between the shutters, so bright that the room is lit up even before Austin completes his search for a lamp to turn on, and he can see clearly that the bedroom is much messier than any of the rooms downstairs. It’s almost like two different people live here - one who meticulously stacks the food in the fridge, and one who leaves the bed unmade and clothes all over the floor.
Austin prowls around the room, once the light is on, examining what Landis left behind. A bass guitar sits on a stand near the window, and the strings are dusty, like it hasn’t been touched in some time. A camera with a cracked lens sits upside-down on the dresser. More interestingly, there are books left out on the nightstand next to the bed, and as Austin glances away from them, the cover of one begins to rearrange itself.
Austin doubles back to pick up the book with the moving cover. The art the front of it - an alien girl swooning in the arms of a tall astronaut with a chiseled jaw - gives off the vibe of a trashy science fiction novel bought for a dollar at the convenience store. But where Austin would expect to see a long-winded title about romance on different planets, there’s only one word.
LOOK
Austin glances over his shoulder. Wes is hovering near the window, trying to tinker with the bass guitar. Austin lets his eyes slide back to the book, and opens it to a random page. This time he watches the letters rearrange themselves, some shoving themselves in towards the gutter and some racing up towards the corners until all that remains is a single, cohesive sentence in the middle of the page.
that’s actually a normal romance novel. they just do that sometimes. no big.