Read Online The Humming Room by Ellen Potter - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Ellen Potter
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âItâs hard to sayâ¦I doubt he cares if anyone likes him or not. Thatâs why people think heâs strange, I guess. It seems unnatural not to care what people think of you, doesnât it? Like a person who never blinks.â
âPeople say that Iâm strange,â Roo said.
âYou are.â Violet nestled a sweatshirt back in its box. âBut Iâve seen stranger.â She smiled in a private sort of wayâa small, sad smile.
Â
Up in her room, Roo tried on all the clothes. They fit perfectly, much better than her old clothes really, which were all stretched out. She peeked in the vanity mirror, standing back so as to see her whole body. Dressed in the new brown corduroys and a green shirt, she looked like a fresher version of herself, as though all the wear and tear of her life had never happened. She raked her hand through her hair. Was it her imagination or did her face look fresher too? The color of her skin and eyes seemed clearer.
âMy name is Roo Fanshaw and I live on Cough Rock,â she murmured at her reflection. Her voice was timid, but the words themselves sounded right.
âI live on Cough Rock,â she repeated with more conviction. âI live with my uncle. Heâs away a lot. But I donât really mind. I found this little caveââ She stopped, realizing that she was no longer talking to her reflection but imagining what she might say to someone else. The shadowy image of the Faigne popped into her mind.
I might tell him about the cave, she thought. He seems like a person who could keep a secret. I might even tell him about the humming.
âDid you make the storm come?â she whispered to the mirror.
Roo jerked her head up suddenly, and her eyes narrowed. Something had changed in the room. It was such a slight shift that only someone whose senses were as keen as hers would have noticed it. The air quivered. She listened with the same concentration that she listened to the earth. Then she heard it. The humming.
She rushed down the hallway, the humming sound growing more and more distinct until she found herself inside the girlsâ dormitory. Here, the sound was the loudest, though still muffled. She walked around the room, pressing her ear against the walls, yet she still could not pin down where it came from. It was so distant, yet it was coming from inside the house. Not a ghost. No, this was a person, a living person, she was sure of it. Was it P. Fanshaw? Was it the same person who had bit her uncleâs face?
Finally, Roo perched herself on the iron headboard of one of the beds and listened to it. There was nothing frightening in it. In fact, there was something familiar about it, though she couldnât say what. It gave her the same sense of maddening familiarity she had felt when looking at her uncleâs face. The same yet not the same. It weaved through the air around her. Sometimes it sounded tentative, as if it were testing something out. Other times it would gain in force, calling out, almost pleading; then, as if it heard itself and was ashamed, it grew soft again.
Suddenly she knew why the humming sounded so familiar. It was exactly how she had sounded back in her own room, all alone and talking to her reflection in the mirror.
Chapter 8
Like most stretches of undisturbed freedom, Rooâs came to a sudden and unpleasant end. It happened the following day, while she was sitting in her cave watching a curious bundle of sticks moving across the water in the distance. It had a herky-jerky sort of propulsion that captured her attention. She watched it, squinting, trying to figure out how it could push against the current like that. At the sound of a boat motor starting up, the bundle of sticks swerved abruptly and beneath the sticks a large brown eye gazed in Rooâs direction. Roo blew out a breath of surprise and delight. Now she could see the stagâs rolling shoulders as it swam past Cough Rock,
âPeople say that Iâm strange,â Roo said.
âYou are.â Violet nestled a sweatshirt back in its box. âBut Iâve seen stranger.â She smiled in a private sort of wayâa small, sad smile.
Â
Up in her room, Roo tried on all the clothes. They fit perfectly, much better than her old clothes really, which were all stretched out. She peeked in the vanity mirror, standing back so as to see her whole body. Dressed in the new brown corduroys and a green shirt, she looked like a fresher version of herself, as though all the wear and tear of her life had never happened. She raked her hand through her hair. Was it her imagination or did her face look fresher too? The color of her skin and eyes seemed clearer.
âMy name is Roo Fanshaw and I live on Cough Rock,â she murmured at her reflection. Her voice was timid, but the words themselves sounded right.
âI live on Cough Rock,â she repeated with more conviction. âI live with my uncle. Heâs away a lot. But I donât really mind. I found this little caveââ She stopped, realizing that she was no longer talking to her reflection but imagining what she might say to someone else. The shadowy image of the Faigne popped into her mind.
I might tell him about the cave, she thought. He seems like a person who could keep a secret. I might even tell him about the humming.
âDid you make the storm come?â she whispered to the mirror.
Roo jerked her head up suddenly, and her eyes narrowed. Something had changed in the room. It was such a slight shift that only someone whose senses were as keen as hers would have noticed it. The air quivered. She listened with the same concentration that she listened to the earth. Then she heard it. The humming.
She rushed down the hallway, the humming sound growing more and more distinct until she found herself inside the girlsâ dormitory. Here, the sound was the loudest, though still muffled. She walked around the room, pressing her ear against the walls, yet she still could not pin down where it came from. It was so distant, yet it was coming from inside the house. Not a ghost. No, this was a person, a living person, she was sure of it. Was it P. Fanshaw? Was it the same person who had bit her uncleâs face?
Finally, Roo perched herself on the iron headboard of one of the beds and listened to it. There was nothing frightening in it. In fact, there was something familiar about it, though she couldnât say what. It gave her the same sense of maddening familiarity she had felt when looking at her uncleâs face. The same yet not the same. It weaved through the air around her. Sometimes it sounded tentative, as if it were testing something out. Other times it would gain in force, calling out, almost pleading; then, as if it heard itself and was ashamed, it grew soft again.
Suddenly she knew why the humming sounded so familiar. It was exactly how she had sounded back in her own room, all alone and talking to her reflection in the mirror.
Chapter 8
Like most stretches of undisturbed freedom, Rooâs came to a sudden and unpleasant end. It happened the following day, while she was sitting in her cave watching a curious bundle of sticks moving across the water in the distance. It had a herky-jerky sort of propulsion that captured her attention. She watched it, squinting, trying to figure out how it could push against the current like that. At the sound of a boat motor starting up, the bundle of sticks swerved abruptly and beneath the sticks a large brown eye gazed in Rooâs direction. Roo blew out a breath of surprise and delight. Now she could see the stagâs rolling shoulders as it swam past Cough Rock,
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