"The Connection" by Nina Gerson

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There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

- Hamlet (1.5.167-8), Hamlet to Horatio

The thunder softened and the trees stopped lashing against the windows around 2:00 a.m. William and Hazel hadn't been able to sleep but now that the storm was settling, they put down their books and said goodnight. As the couple drifted off, the silence was soon filled by distant laughter.

“Did you hear that, Will?”

“Hear what?”

“I think she’s doing it again.”

“We put Sky to bed hours ago. Just try to sleep.”

The laughter returned even louder, but this time they heard sound of footsteps thumping along the floorboards.

“Not again,” said William as he pulled himself out of bed. He found his daughter Sky in her room, sitting at the edge of her bed, facing an empty wall.

“Sky, what are you doing awake?”

“I’m playing with Nate. I couldn’t sleep.”

“Just try to rest, Sky. I know it’s hard for you to accept, but Nate isn’t here.”

***

The next morning, William and Hazel decided to go see the psychiatrist who had treated Nate in the past.

“Please help us, Dr. Rosenberg,” Hazel began, “This has been going on since Nate’s death.”

The doctor took a moment to think about her response, then, masking her confusion, she replied softly,

“Nate was a rare case. He was a troubled boy. Death is heavy, and everybody handles it differently. Sky is still young, only seven years old, and she is having difficulty accepting Nate’s passing. Can you give me some more details regarding her behavior?”

“Well,” Hazel continued, “she speaks to herself often, but she claims she’s speaking to Nate. We find her sitting alone by the yard staring into space. She laughs when nobody is around.”

William jumped in, “At the dinner table she assumes Nate is always part of the conversation. Each time we try to explain to her that he is gone, she tilts her head with a puzzled expression and shrugs. She asks us why we don’t talk to Nate anymore.”

“She mentions secrets, and stories that she hears from Nate, things she won’t go into detail about with us because Nate swore her to secrecy,” William went on. “When we find her in the backyard and ask her what she is doing, she looks away, and lets out an awkward giggle. All she ever says in response is that she’s playing with Nate.”

Dr. Rosenberg nodded as the couple talked, making notes on her little notepad a couple of times.  She was calm as she listened to their stories. The doctor’s response made Hazel feel uneasy. She wanted answers. Hazel’s eyes turned glassy and her voice began to shake. She took a deep breath,

“I cannot have another child turn out the way Nate did, Doctor. It will destroy me. What am I doing wrong as a mother that's so destructive to my children?!”

“Like I said, Hazel,” Dr. Rosenberg responded, “Nate was disturbed. Parents have faults, but you have none that could propel a child to the tormented state that Nate was living in. Your home was not an unsafe space, but Nate was not safe within his own head. Sky is not the same as her brother. She is simply in denial about his death. She will grow out of it, after all it is only her imagination. Kids have wild imaginations!”

Hazel’s body language communicated helplessness as William stroked the back of her rough wool sweater and tried his best to be comforting. He, too, was scared.

“Our son was dangerous. He was unwell, Hazel. Sky will be okay.” William’s gaze focused on the floor. He shook his head trying to convince himself with his words.. He wanted to trust that his daughter would indeed be just fine.

“I think…What if Sky follows the same path Nate did? William pleaded with the doctor to listen.” “What if by the age of nine she no longer wants to leave her room, not even to eat dinner with us. What if by the age of ten, she is asked to stop coming to school because she is a threat to the rest of her classmates? What if she starts slamming doors on us with such aggression that the door knob slips off? What if we hear her sobbing each night for reasons she isn’t able to communicate to us?”

Pacing around the room, William continued, “Dr. Rosenberg, what if by the age of thirteen she is bullying her classmates and putting someone in danger, the same way Nate did. The same way Nate dared the boy to join him in the lake during a stormy night to see who can hold their breath the longest. It was a dangerous game Nate often played. That night, he led himself and another boy to their deaths at the bottom of our lake.”

“We don’t know Nate did that intentionally,” Dr. Rosenberg replied, “Nobody knows exactly what happened. All we know is that he’s gone.”

Hazel shook her head. “Nate was a bad influence on Sky when he was here, and he’s still distorting her thoughts somehow. We have to find a way to break the connection that persists between Nate and Sky.”

***

It was dark as Hazel and William’s car pulled up to their dream home. Buying the elegant lakefront home was their first purchase after William made partner at his prestigious law firm.  During the years that William worked long hours at the firm, Hazel left her teaching job to be home with their small children, Nate and Sky.

Staying home, Hazel began to notice that Nate’s behavior was unusual. She read child development books with avid interest and began to monitor Sky’s development also. It was during these early years that Hazel first took Nate to Dr. Rosenberg, the start of a long professional journey.

On that dim night many years later, Hazel and William noticed that the lights through their upstairs windows were flickering on and off. They knew Sky was in the house with the nanny. Perhaps they were just being paranoid about the lights? As they cracked open their front door, the shrieks of two children flooded through the eerie house. Hazel and William dashed into the living room to find Sky sitting alone laughing.

Dinner that evening felt off balance. The room was cold. Not the type of cold that can be fixed with a blanket. It was the kind of chill that comes with discomfort and worry. Hazel and William feared that they were not alone with their daughter. Sky barely touched her food. Instead, she just scratched the plate with her fork filling the silence with an unpleasant noise. Finally, William turned to Sky,

“You seem so unhappy. Maybe if we went out to the lake and said a final good-bye to Nate, in his resting place, you’d feel better.”

William, Hazel, and Sky bundled up in their warmest coats. They stopped on the way to the lake to pick flowers to leave at the site of Nate’s death. Sky drew a private farewell picture for Nate and the other boy. She neatly tucked it under a rock near the lake’s edge. Water lapped quietly at the shores of the lake. William led the way, as the family walked on the mossy wood planks of the old pier stretching out to the deepest part of the water. The family stood at the edge, peering silently into the unknown depths.

To this day, no one is sure how Hazel and William slipped off the peer, plunging into the frigid abyss. When asked, Sky simply shrugs, and replies, “Ask Nate…”

Nina Gerson is 17 years old; she lives in New York city and attends Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School.  Some ‘fun facts’ about Nina are that she speaks English and Hebrew, that she loves to bake healthy and nutritious treats, and that she recently won a scholastic gold key.  Her inspiration for “The Connection” came when reading a group of gothic stories in English class, “I was intrigued by our readings and wanted to use my imagination to create a suspenseful story with a spooky ending.”