The bucket is full and that should be enough.
Naima has everything she needs, and everything she wants, and more besides. Providence does just what it says: whatever you need, it provides. Coming here was the right thing to do, the best thing. Coming here was the only thing that made sense. Coming here was Naima’s idea, after all.
Naima woke hours ago. Her belly and heart are full, the sun smiles through the curtains and her wife is sleeping in. Neither of them have work to go to—no one works in Providence. If Naima closes her eyes and listens, she can hear their son playing quietly in his room, and Providence with its eternal hum. The sound of life being lived, enjoyed. The ever-present rumble of perfection.
The bucket is full and that should be enough.
It is, she tells herself, standing redundantly at the sink. Her attempt to wash their dishes is thwarted by the house. The house is outfitted to anticipate their every need, and it does. Naima has barely reached for the tap when the house takes over, covering her breakfast plate with suds and cleaning it better than she ever could.
“Annoying, isn’t it?”
Naima ignores the voice because the voice isn’t really there. The voice hasn’t been there since they arrived at Number Five Pleasantview Drive, Providence, New Eden. Naima thrusts her hand towards the fridge and the house deposits a square of chocolate into her waiting palm. Naima eats chocolate because she likes it, and not because she is nervous. There is no need to be nervous in Providence.
Still, the voice chatters. “It’s sad, really. Not being allowed to do anything for yourself. Takes the zest out of life.”
Naima steps out onto the patio, the air immediately cooling to suit her. She moves to the plants in their terracotta pots, meaning to prune them, but the house directs her back to the patio table where a steaming mug of green tea waits for her. Naima’s fists ball at her sides.
The bucket is full and that should be enough.
“Who’d choose to come here, I don’t know,” the voice prattles on.
Naima spins in her chair. “Stop it. Shut up. Just—” She lets out a growl of frustration, throwing her hands up. Then, she stills.
Where there is a voice, there is also a girl—barely there, see-through but for the barest wash of features, the lightest swish of clothing, but a girl all the same. She smiles placidly, and then disappears.
“Naima, hon, who are you talking to?” Tessa is sleep-rumpled and frowning.
“Oh,” says Naima. “Just the house—” A red light pulses to life above the door. “—I mean, no one. Thin air. Myself.” The light blinks out.
“Okay,” says Tessa, uncertain. She stares at Naima for a long moment before the shrill squealing of their son pulls her back into the house. Naima’s shoulders fall. She swallows, her stomach rolls.
Naima eats another square of chocolate and it is not because she is nervous.
***
The next time Naima hears the voice, she is supposed to be sleeping.
“One of those nights, eh?” says the girl.
Naima doesn’t answer. Those nights do not exist in Providence; Naima is awake because she wants to be, and the chocolate is on her nightstand because she likes it, and she’s hungry. Naima glances up at the dormant light above the bedroom door and holds her breath.
The girl looks up too. “Ah,” she says. “I understand. That’s what got me too, in the end.”
Naima shoves another piece of chocolate in her mouth to keep from asking what, and why, and how, and when. She doesn’t want to know the answer. She wants to sleep, tugging the blanket up over her head and settling against the curve of Tessa’s spine.
The bucket is full and that should be enough.
***
Tessa has not noticed the red light, but she has noticed the chocolate. “Love,” she says one evening, “what’s wrong?” She inclines her head to the chocolate poised in front of Naima’s lips. “You’ve not done that since…”
The red light flips on.
Naima stares at the light. “It’s just so good here,” she says, stiffly.
The light hesitates, then extinguishes.
“Liar,” whispers a voice by her ear.
Tessa frowns. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing, everything’s fine.” Naima slips into the kitchen so Tessa cannot ask her again. Naima wants to wash up because she enjoys it, not because she is stressed. The house beats her to it, and Naima cannot help herself.
She snatches the plate from the sink and throws it to the ground.
The plate smashes. The red light blazes. The doors lock. These things happen simultaneously.
“Oh, you’ve done it now,” says the voice.
“What’s happening?” says Naima.
“What always happens,” says the voice. “Providence will provide.”
“Provide what?”
“What you want, of course. A way out, but you’re not going to like it.”
Naima stares at the door. “My family—”
“Won’t remember. Or, they will, but they won’t mind. No one minds in Providence.” The girl smiles sadly. Naima can see her again now.
“Is that what happened to you?”
“Something like that.”
Naima turns away, gripping the counter. She doesn’t want to look at her for this part. “Will it hurt?” she asks.
“Like you cannot imagine,” says the voice.
Naima swallows, her head and her heart filled with Tessa and their son. His illness, and the promise of Providence. Providence would make him well—that’s what Naima had said when she finally convinced Tessa to come, to upend their life, so they could fix it, so their little boy could live.
Naima opens the fridge and snaps off one last square of chocolate. She slips it into her mouth, savoring the taste. It really is good. The best she’s ever tasted. As it melts on her tongue, she looks up at the light, red and inevitable.
The bucket is full and that should have been enough.
Elou Carroll is a graphic designer and freelance photographer who writes. Her work appears or is forthcoming in The Deadlands, Baffling Magazine, FOUND #2, In Somnio: A Collection of Modern Gothic Horror (Tenebrous Press), Spirit Machine (Air and Nothingness Press), Ghostlore (Alternative Stories Podcast) and others. When she’s not whispering with ghosts, she can be found editing Crow & Cross Keys, publishing all things dark and lovely, and spending far too much time on twitter (@keychild). She keeps a catalogue of her weird little wordcreatures on www.eloucarroll.com.