The House in the Pines

In the past, Maya and Aubrey wake up after a sleepover to find eight missed calls from Frank. Maya opens up to Aubrey about her memory gaps. Aubrey believes her because she has experienced them too. When Frank and Aubrey shared coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts, Frank suggested Aubrey pick up a book about a famous mesmerist (similar to a hypnotist). The two talked about magic, and then Frank offered to show Aubrey a trick—making a key levitate. When Maya showed up, more than an hour had somehow passed without Aubrey realizing.

Suddenly, Frank comes up to Maya’s screen door. Maya’s mother is out jogging and the two girls are alone with Frank. Maya grabs a knife to protect them. Aubrey tells Frank she knows his secret: “I know what you did to us” (258). Maya decides to call the police. She can’t find the landline so she goes upstairs for her cell phone. From her window, Maya sees Frank take out his key. Before Maya makes it back downstairs, Aubrey suddenly falls over, dead. Frank appears shocked and claims they were just talking when she collapsed.

In the present, Maya comes to terms with the fact Frank was hypnotizing her that summer. Maya wants to tell people what Frank did, but worries no one will believe her without concrete evidence. She also still doesn’t know how Frank killed Aubrey. Maya decides to surprise Frank at the bar he frequently visits and confront him while secretly recording their conversation. She leaves an alarming note for Brenda: “Mom—if you find this, it means I need help. I’m at the Whistling Pig.” (265).

Maya orders a drink at the bar and waits for Frank. When he appears, Maya realizes that he must be over 10 years older than he claimed. She pretends to be surprised to see him and invites him to join her for a drink. As they make small talk, Maya catches Frank playing with his key in her peripheral vision. Frank talks about his father, who practiced his hypnotism on Frank and Frank’s mother to make them complacent and obedient to him. Frank realized what was happening and started secretly studying his father’s notes, until he became a better hypnotist than his father.

Frank is hypnotizing Maya while he explains this, again using the key. While Maya is hypnotized, Frank confesses to killing his own father, Aubrey, and Cristina. He killed Aubrey because she figured out that Frank was hypnotizing her and Maya. He killed Cristina at her own request: Cristina wanted to escape permanently into the fantasy world Frank created in her mind. This explains why Cristina loved Frank and his cabin so much and why she got a key tattoo.

Frank is telling Maya all of this because he plans to kill Maya the same way he killed Aubrey and Cristina—through hypnosis. He creates a vision of Maya’s father and Maya is momentarily drawn into the fantasy. However, remembering her father’s novel, Maya thinks about the idea of one’s true home, which reminds her that she is in the middle of a fantasy. Her true home is with her mother and Dan. Just as Maya begins to fight off Frank’s control over her mind, Brenda appears and demands to know what is happening, snapping Maya fully out of the trance.

In the past, the police interview Maya after Aubrey’s death. No one believes Frank killed Aubrey. Even Brenda struggles to believe that Frank could be at fault. Maya’s only evidence is the feeling that he “put us under a spell” (285), an accusation that further fuels everyone’s disbelief. Brenda ends the interview concerned about Maya’s mental health based on her “illogical paranoia.”

In the present, Maya is interviewed by the police again. This time she has evidence to back up her accusations: She captured the entire conversation with Frank on a voice memo app, though most of it is too faint to truly hear. She shares the recording with Detective Diaz, who finds enough to incriminate Frank: In the recording, Frank tells Maya that “her limbs were too heavy to lift,” and to “Relax your heart” (291) right before Brenda interrupts. Detective Diaz asks Maya about her alcohol and drug use history, but treats Maya as a credible source.

Maya visits a doctor who thinks Maya wants another Klonopin prescription. However, Maya never wants to take Klonopin again. The doctor instead prescribes the antidepressant mirtazapine to help her sleep. The mirtazapine has a positive effect on Maya’s mental and physical health.

Before Maya returns to Boston after Christmas, she and Brenda treasure the last few days of Maya’s trip and take a walk around Silver Lake. Despite its history of contamination, the lake is starting to see the return of wildlife.

Dan visits Maya and Brenda in Pittsfield the day after Christmas. Dan and Maya reconcile and Dan apologizes for not believing Maya about Frank. They head back to Boston, but stop at Dan’s parents’ house on the way so Maya can make things right with them after her last visit. While Dan’s father acts like nothing happened, Dan’s mother asks probing questions about Maya’s behavior and well-being. Maya opens up to them about her Klonopin withdrawal, alcohol use, and Frank’s involvement in Aubrey’s death—a conversation that allows them to grow closer.

Maya researches Frank’s father and the scandal that caused his fall from grace. Frank’s father discovered a hypnotherapy method that unlocked a patient’s involuntary nervous system, giving the hypnotist access to heart rate, blood pressure, and other vital processes we don’t consciously control to help with pain management. However, when a patient died during a clinical study, Frank’s father lost his job. This explains how Frank used hypnosis to kill—by controlling vital functions through hypnosis. In her research, Maya also finds the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale. Hypnotism doesn’t work on everyone and the scale suggests daydreamers and people with strong imaginations are more likely to be susceptible. Maya also discovers that Frank’s father pioneered a hypnosis technique called The Bellamy Induction that trained patients to quickly fall into a trance at the sight of a particular object—such as a key.

Maya gradually tapers her mirtazapine prescription, until she no longer needs medicine to sleep. She still thinks about Frank from time to time, but she doesn’t ruminate over him. Maya and Dan get a dog and name him Toto, after the Wizard of Oz. Maya finally embarks on a writing project—finishing her father’s novel.