The Marriage Book

The Marriage Book

I pulled up to my grandmother’s house, and when I stepped out of the car, I could smell a mix of pine and fresh air. I haven’t been there in a long time, but I remember the house as if I was there last week. The swing that I used to play on was still swinging from her oak tree. My brother Jake pulled ‌up behind me and we walked into the house together. “Well, this place hasn’t changed one bit.” Jake said as I grabbed his backpack out of his car.

“You know, grandma, she wouldn’t change anything. She wouldn’t buy anything new; everything in the house is probably the original from sixty years ago or whenever she moved in.” I said as I grabbed my suitcase and the papers from my car. 

We walked up to the house and I opened the door with the key her lawyer gave me during the will reading last week. We walked inside and the house was frozen in time. Everything was in its place and perfect like grandma was still in the house. I was waiting for the smell of fresh baked cookies to come lingering from the kitchen as if I was a teenager that came to visit for the summer. I put my bags down in the living room and looked around the room. I walked over to the pictures that hung on the wall and touched one of the entire family. Jake walked around the kitchen and opened the fridge. “We need to get some food Ava, if we will be staying here for a while. Everything is expired or expiring!” Jake yelled. 

“Oh wonderful. We will run to the market later today. Let's start packing up!” I yelled back to Jake. 

I walked upstairs to the attic. I stopped into grandma’s room and peeked it. Her bathrobe was on the bed and her slippers were next to the side table like they always were when I was young. The smell of her perfume still lingered in the air. I closed her door and headed up to the attic. 

As soon as I opened the door the smell of musk hit me like a ton of bricks. I opened all of the windows to air it out. Jake walked up behind me and held his nose because of the smell. “Why are we doing this?” Jake asked as he held his nose.

“Because grandma gave us the house in her will but we had to clean it out so the other relatives can take things they want. They are just not allowed to come into the house. Grandma said they are vultures and didn’t really care about her. We were the only two that never asked her for anything. She loaned cousin Molly money thinking she would pay her back.” I explained as I grabbed a couple of trash bags. 

“Did Molly ever pay her back?” Jake asked, holding a trash bag finally unclasping his nose. 

“Of course not. That was her inheritance. Now let's have a pile of trash and let's have a pile of treasures.” I said as I picked up some papers on the floor.

Jake nodded his head and began going through papers. We flipped through hundreds of papers and threw most of them away. I kept thinking that this was a waste of time until I found a photo album that was hidden underneath a dresser that was stored away up there. I sat on the floor and opened up the photo album. It was pictures of grandma in a wedding dress but none of the men was our grandfather. “Hey Jake, how many times has grandma been married?” I asked as I flipped through the book. 

“I thought she was only married once. Why?” Jake asked, walking over to me.

“There are pictures of random men standing with her and she is in a wedding dress.” I said showing him the photos. 

“That is interesting. There are dates on the bottom of each picture. One of the dates has a M next to it and the other has a D next to it. I wonder what that means.” Jake said as he looked closer at the photos. 

I put the book down and continued to go through the belongings. As I was opening boxes, I pulled out record books. There were different record books with different years on them, but one had marriages written on the cover. I first flipped through the books with the dates on them but that was just property records such as taxes and how much monthly expenses. The books also had pictures of the house in its different stages. The house went from a very small one room cabin to the four story house it is today. I continued to flip through the record books and Jake was reading the marriage book that was mixed in with the books about the house. It contained more pictures of the different men but there were more details about each man. “Umm Ava, What do we know about grandma? Like how old was she? I thought grandma was like in her eighties.”

“She was 92,Why?" I asked, sliding closer to him. 

“This photo looks like grandma when she was younger but it says she was married in 1941.” Jake said, pulling out one of the photos from the book. 

“Well she would have been 7 in 1941. But that girl looks like she is in her teens. Maybe it's her mother. Does it have a name on the picture?” I said, pulling the picture out of Jake’s hands.

I flipped the picture to the back and looked at the names on the picture. The picture shows Mildred and Roger's wedding in 1941. Mildred was my grandma’s name and her mother was named Edith. I grabbed the book from Jake and continued to flip through the record book. I flipped to 1941. I found the information I was looking for, grandma was 15 years old and got married to this man Roger because Edith allowed the marriage to happen. The record says that Roger died three months after they got married. I grabbed the original pictures I found. I flipped through the pictures and found her and Roger’s picture. The dates said February 1941- April of 1941. “M is for marriage and D is for Death. Jake, look Roger died in April of 1941. All these men died after marrying grandma.” I explained to Jake.

Jake stared at me with a confused look on his face. 

“Grandma lied about her age. She was 100 when she died. She lied about being married to other men. I wonder what else she lied about?” I asked gripping the book tighter. 

I continued to pull out pictures of different men all with different names, and dates on the bottom of each picture. When I was finished there were at least six more pictures of men with dates about a year or two apart. When I got to the end of the marriage book, I noticed that the names were listed in the back of the book and next to each name there was a word such as drowned or poisoned. I stared at the name words until it clicked in my head. “Grandma killed all her husbands except for our grandpa.” I blurred out to Jake.

“What?” Jake yelled, grabbing the book from me. 

“Grandma was a black widow. She killed all her husbands.” I said, staring back at Jake. 

“Where are they buried?” Jake asked. 

I went back into the marriage book and flipped back to Roger’s name. The words flower bed near shed were written on the bottom of the page. I got off the floor and walked over towards the window. I pointed towards the flower bed and said, “there.”

Jake walked next to me and stared at the flower bed. “What do we do with this information?” Jake asked. 

“Nothing, Grandma’s dead, there is nothing the cops can do.” I said, putting the marriage book back onto the floor. 

“We have to call the cops or do something. These men should have a proper burial.” Jake tried to explain to me. 

“Fine. You are right. I’ll call 911.” I said, grabbing my cell phone. 

I told the cops what we found in the attic and they told us they would be right over. I grabbed all the pictures and the record books and headed down the stairs. Jake said he would follow me in a few minutes because he wanted to continue flipping through some papers. I went downstairs and waited for the cops to come but they took their time and didn’t come for a while. I sat at the kitchen table and continued to flip through the marriage book. I wondered why she would kill these guys. I wondered what these men did to grandma to make her do this to them. Before I could find any answers to my questions, I heard Jake scream from the attic. 

I hopped up from the table and sprinted upstairs. Jake was sitting on the ground staring at the window. “What happened?” I asked as I tried to catch my breath. 

“There is someone outside. I saw someone staring back into the window.” Jake said with a surprise look on his face. 

I opened the window and peeked my head out. I felt something hard hit me on the head. I fell back inside and stared at the window. I rubbed my head when I saw someone in a hood slipping into the window. “Where is the marriage book?” The person asked. 

“It’s downstairs. The cops are coming.” I said, sliding myself closer to Jake. 

“You called the cops. Why? Mildred is dead. Who cares who she killed? You all weren’t supposed to come up this way, you all were supposed to stay downstairs. ” The man said.

“Who the hell are you?” Jake asked, pulling me closer to him.

The man pulled his hood off and I realized it was the lawyer. “I promised Mildred you all weren’t going to come up into the attic or you wouldn’t come up here first. Now go down and get the book. I am going to burn it,” the Lawyer explained. 

“No, the cops are coming to dig these men up. Why did Grandma do this?” Jake asked as he pulled me closer to him. 

“Well it all depends on the husband, but mainly they all had tons of money. Edith didn’t have much money after her husband died, so she had Mildred marry rich men and they would have an accident. This was a thing for about 10 years and then she met your grandfather and she was happy and in love. She had your uncle and then your mother and she was finished. Edith also died and Mildred didn’t see the pressure of the rotating husbands. She kept this a secret from everyone in the family until now.” The lawyer explained, as he took off his hood.

“Why did she leave the house to us?” I asked, pulling myself off the ground. 

“Because she felt you two would be either too lazy or stupid to look for anything or even come to the house to clean. You two haven’t come to see her in years, why start now?” The lawyer explained. 

“We loved her.” I quickly said. 

“You two are so self absorbed. I am actually surprised you showed up here to clean the house. The lawyer answered thinking we would leave or call off the police. 

I sat on the ground and I heard the police coming in the background. I glanced over at the door knowing I have to get down to the stair and have the book before the lawyer could get to it first. I would glance back and forth between the lawyer and the door. I lunged for the door as did the lawyer. Jake grabbed his foot and I was able to escape. 

I ran down the steps. I ran into the kitchen to grab the book. I heard the lawyer running down the steps and was able to jump on my back before I could reach the book. I flipped him off my back and grabbed the book. I ran out of the kitchen door and flagged down the cops who were racing up the driveway. 

The lawyer ran out the front door and jumped on my back once again. He was trying to grab the book from my hands but the cops yelled for him to get off me. When he refused they drew their guns at him and aimed it at him. When he saw the guns aimed at him he got off of me and laid on the ground with his face facing down. I walked towards the cops and handed the book over to them. I told them what I found and why the lawyer was at the house. 

Jake stumbled outside holding his head. The cops drew their guns on Jake. Jake fell to the ground until I explained to the cops that he was my brother and not a threat. 

I walked the cops over to the flower bed and he began to dig up the flowers until he pulled up a human hand. The cop continued to dig and found different bones. 

The cop called for backup. It took them hours to dig up the different flower beds around the house and search the house. When they were finally finished there were bones of about 6 different men and found their belongings in the house. They were found in a hidden closet in the living room. 

When the house was finally released, Jake and I sold it to an unknown buyer.