by Greg Chapman
Amy’s heart thrummed faster at the prospect. She had always found her counsellor pleasant, but not too probing.
Was all that about to change?
“Hi.” Amy said, avoiding eye contact as Dr. Ruskin sat on the other stool. She felt the counsellor’s pale blue eyes on her. Ruskin said nothing, which only served to unsettle her more. “Is something wrong?”
“I was just on the phone with your mother.”
“My mom?”
Ruskin put the clipboard in her lap and interlaced her fingers on top of it. “Yes, and she mentioned the goings-on in your neighbourhood, this morning.”
Amy gritted her teeth; why did her mother always have to overreact? Dr. Ruskin must have sensed her frustration, for she pried further.
“Your mother was concerned the events might be upsetting you.”
Amy shrugged, cautiously mindful to manage her reactions. “Someone died in the house down the street, that’s all.”
“Your mother said the police were involved; that someone might have been murdered?”
“I guess.”
“Did it make you feel anxious Amy?”
The girl bit her lip and studied the weave of the rug beneath her; she wished she could dive into its labyrinthine pattern.
“It’s okay to talk about it,” Ruskin added.
“I don’t want to talk about it. It’s got nothing to do with me. I didn’t even know anyone lived in the house.”
“That’s understandable. We all live busy lives these days; it’s hard to get to know anyone.”
Amy tried to offer Ruskin a reassuring smile. She knew where the counsellor was going with the conversation; secrets and lies. “If you want me to talk about how I tried to kill myself, why don’t you just ask me?”
Ruskin straightened and opened her clipboard. The session had now officially begun.
“I believe I already know why you tried to take your own life, Amy. I wouldn’t make a very good counsellor if I didn’t, now would I?” Ruskin’s tone had sharpened, which made Amy straighten in her own chair. Ruskin peered at her over her glasses. “You know I’m only trying to help you understand why, Amy, so we can prevent a repeat occurrence.”
“It won’t happen again.” The hairs on the back of her neck stiffened when Ruskin’s eyebrows lifted. “Just because somebody died in my street, doesn’t mean I’m going to try and kill myself again.”
“That’s true, but these types of incidences can be enough to bring back memories of when you did try.”
Amy stood and plunged her hand into her bag, desperate for her cell phone, forgetting that it wasn’t working. “I’m sorry, I just can’t do this today… I’m going to call my mom.”
Ruskin craned her neck to stare at the phone. “Are you still on Facebook, Amy?”
Amy froze, desperate to keep a blank expression. “Only occasionally.”
“You have to be careful.”
“I know.”
“Remember the real world, the people you live with and talk to each day, are the ones who really matter.” Ruskin was starting to sound like her mother.
“I know.” Amy said, and she started for the door.
The counsellor’s voice followed her. “Amy, the people you try to connect with on Facebook don’t really know you like your family. You should talk to your mother. Tell her what you’ve been feeling.”
Amy stared at the doorknob; she was torn between staying and listening and running away. “I can’t talk to her anymore.”
“Why not?” Ruskin had crossed the floor to stand beside her.
“She doesn’t listen. She never has. She doesn’t listen to anyone, not even Dad, who she was supposed to love.”
Ruskin placed a hand on Amy’s shoulder. “Do you honestly think strangers on the Internet will listen?”
“They do listen! They support me! They never judge me… because they’re my friends.”
“But it’s not the same as talking to someone face-to-face—like we’re talking now.”
Amy scratched at her hair. “Please… I don’t want to talk to her, okay? I don’t even want to look at her!”
“Amy…”
“No!”
The girl fled the room, swinging the door wide and racing out. In the reception area, more people had arrived for their sessions with Dr. Ruskin. She felt their eyes on her, the same ogling gazes her mother offered her every day. By the time she made it to the elevator, her eyes were blurred in a flood of tears.
~
Ben waited until the media crews had thinned out before he ventured back across the street. As the sun began to dip in the western sky, the deep shadow of the Kemper House crawled across the neighbouring houses, a lengthening obelisk of darkness. Ben slinked around the corner into Blake Street, where the west-facing side of the house was cast in a different, more disturbing light. The wood was caked in years of filth, the paint peeling away like a scab. The windows, which had been closed for God-knew how long, had been opened wide by the forensic officers, who were more than likely eager to smell anything but the scent of death. A few of these men were still working inside. Ben would have given his left nut to see the rooms, but sadly his camera would probably be as close as he was ever going to get.
He slipped the Nikon 450 with its 500mm lens out from under his jacket and slowly raised it to his eye. Through the lens, Ben was provided a tantalising glimpse of the room’s interior. The walls inside were not much better than those outside. The paint, darkened most likely by dust and a prolonged lack of exposure to natural light, was also peeling in many areas. Yet whoever had lived inside the house had chosen not to address the problem. Instead, they had applied strange symbols and script to every available wall space. Ben twisted the zoom on his lens to get a closer look at the symbols. They’d been painted by a crude hand, little more than scratches. The marks were a dark colour, brown or red. One resembled a hexagon with an inverted triangle inside. Ben snapped a photo of it. Panning the camera to the right, he saw the scribbling of words.
Lidské duše.
“What the fuck does that mean?”
He pressed the capture button over and over, eager for every detail. The house was becoming more interesting than the dead man. When one of the forensic officers noticed him taking photos, Ben quickly lowered his camera. The officer scowled and drew a curtain.
“Shit,” Ben said.
Contemplating another plan of attack, he noticed Detective Baltzer exiting the house. Ben figured Baltzer would give him more than he’d divulged at the press conference; he’d done so before. All he had to do was make it worth Baltzer’s while. Police provided information anonymously all the time, and Jacob was ready to pull out The Gazette’s chequebook if it helped spice up a story, but Baltzer was one of the few cops who wouldn’t shirk his personal and professional integrity. Ben crossed the street. “Hey, Baltzer.”
The detective was about to get into his car. His bushy eyebrows furrowed. “I don’t want to talk to you.”
Ben sidled up to him and checked no other reporters could see them talking. “Hey, so what’s going on in this place? Is this a murder, or what?”
Baltzer grimaced, opened the car door firmly, got in and slammed it closed. He’d left the window down to abate the heat. “Why would you think I’d tell you anything, regardless of the shit you pulled at the press conference?”
Ben chuckled. “Aw, come on, you know I was just pressing you for facts. That’s what we reporters do. We’re here to make you look good for the constituents.”
Baltzer turned the ignition over. “You’re a fucking piece of work, Traynor. That was low, pulling that shit about our caseload.”
“Jesus, calm down,” Ben said, put off by the cop’s stern demeanour. Usually the veteran detective was more professional. “Look, I can see you’re shaken up. What’s going on in that house?”
Baltzer pressed the button to raise the power window. “Some fucking sick and twisted shit.” He flashed Ben a fiery gaze. “And if yo
u print that in your story, I’ll fucking send your ass to jail.”
Chapter Six
While police officers kept a silent vigil outside the murder house, Ben returned home in order to put his thoughts into words. He sat on the bed in the master bedroom, with the door closed. He knew there was no chance Megan would enter, but all the same he needed his privacy when work had to be done. It was one of the things that frustrated him the most about his quarrels with Megan; she just didn’t understand the work. He played back his conversation with Carol Campbell, transcribed it and then opened a fresh Word document on his laptop. His fingers danced across the keys.
The morbid appearance of the house alone should have served as a warning to the residents of Willow Street, but it was the hideous smell of death that alerted them not all was well in their quiet, suburban neighbourhood.
Ben smiled at his prowess. He was off to a bristling start, but he knew the story needed more scandal. The keys clacked in response to his fingers.
Number 72 Willow Street, a decrepit abode lost to time, finally revealed its secrets yesterday, when police discovered a body inside. Police are yet to determine whether the man, who is yet to be identified, was murdered.
Readers would be hooked, Ben knew it.
One such resident, Carol Campbell, who lives next door to the murder house, admitted she had no clue she had a neighbour at all, until the smell pervaded her home. Also clueless are the local police, who are concerned the man’s murderer might still be at large in the city and that the madman might be answering the call of some occult ritual.
He sat back, interlaced his fingers behind his head, and re-read what he’d written. Sure, it wouldn’t win a Pulitzer Prize but it was still the heady dose of fictional non-fiction the readers of The Gazette expected. He grabbed his phone to call Jacob at the paper. It was just closing in on 6 p.m.
His editor answered on the sixth ring.
“Jesus, you obviously don’t want the story of the day,” Ben said.
“Traynor? I was wondering when you were going to call. You know we’re still holding the front page?”
“Don’t lose your shit. I was about to email it, but thought I’d call and give you a taste.” He heard the man tell someone to leave the room.
“Okay, okay, let’s hear it, but it better be good.”
Ben licked his lips. “Okay, get this. I spoke with Detective Baltzer and Christ, I’ve never seen the guy so worked up.”
“Baltzer? They put Baltzer in charge when he’s in the middle of the missing hookers case?”
“Yeah, yeah I know, I brought that up and it really pissed him off. But listen, there’s something weird about this one. I got a look through one of the windows, and there were strange words hacked into the wall. Like Latin or something.”
“No fucking way. Go on I’m listening.”
“This house, Jesus, it’s like Amityville meets The Addams Family. You should see it.”
“You get photos?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ve got photos. But listen, it looks like the neighbours had no idea that anyone lived in the house.”
“Really?”
Ben brought up the transcription of his “interview” with Carol Campbell on his laptop. “The next door neighbour said she had no fucking idea, until the smell surfaced.”
“Oh, that’s gold. This is going to be a great front page.”
“It’s on its way.”
“Send it direct to Chelsea at the sub’s desk and we’ll piece it together. Don’t forget the photos.”
“Fantastic.”
“Now, this Carol Campbell—did you get her photo too?”
“Uh, no, I sort of happened to get her story while I was introducing myself. I am her neighbour, after all.”
“You’re joking?”
“Nope, I just happened to have my Dictaphone running as I was talking to her.”
Jacob laughed down the line, a guffaw fuelled by tobacco-streaked lungs. “Oh, you sly bastard.”
Ben rubbed his bottom lip. “Now listen, Jacob, if you can, keep my byline off this one, okay?”
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah, I don’t want the neighbours knowing I’m a reporter, especially if I’m going to keep fishing for leads.”
“That makes sense. Just send it through to Chelsea and we’ll take it from there.”
Ben ended the call and smiled with self-satisfaction. He reached for his notebook once more when he saw Megan standing in the open doorway. There was no look of scorn this time, only disappointment.
“You really are a piece of work,” she said.
She slammed the door.
~
“What do you mean, Zac hasn’t come home?” Max Campbell tossed his keys onto the table and gaped at his wife who was pacing at the back door.
“What I just said—he hasn’t come home from school.” Carol peered through the window into the backyard. The police floodlights at the house next door illuminated everything.
Max strode to the fridge, retrieved his dinner of macaroni and cheese, and threw it in the microwave. The muscles in his lower back seized, getting their revenge on him for unduly stretching them beneath the rusted body of a 1987 Toyota Corolla with cracked suspension. “He’s probably at a friend’s house with what’s his name, Toby.”
“Tony,” Carol said, rolling her eyes. “And no, he’s not there. I checked.”
Max watched his meal turning in the microwave. He knew exactly how it felt. “What about Matt? Does he know where he went?”
A pang of recognition crossed Carol’s face, and Max remembered that he’d married his wife for her looks (when she’d had them) and not her wits. The microwave beeped out its tones of completion, but he had a feeling his meal would go cold well before the mystery of the whereabouts of his negligent son was solved. He took the meal out of the microwave and stood waiting for his wife to do anything other than worry.
Carol’s gaze was locked on the backyard. “I don’t know!”
“Have you asked the boy for god’s sake?!”
“No!”
Max tossed his plate on the table. “Oh, no don’t worry. Leave it to me!”
He stormed out of the kitchen. His steel-capped boots thudded on the timber as he ascended the steps. “Matthew, you get your ass down here, now! I need to talk to you.”
The boy appeared from his bedroom a moment later, water beading on his skin, a towel draped around his waist. Death metal music poured from the room. Max eyed the teenager’s wet footprints leading back to the shower: one boy absent, the other absent-minded. He needed to give them both a whipping. “Where the hell is your brother?”
Matthew stared at his father. “How should I know?”
“Your mother said he never came home from school.” A guitar riff, which sounded more like a cat being put through a tree mulcher than music clawed at Max’s ears. “Jesus, can you turn that crap down so I can have a conversation with you?”
Matthew disappeared behind the door and turned down the music. When he came back, Max noticed his son’s face wore the expression it always did the moment before he confessed to doing something stupid.
“Sorry…” Matthew said.
“So—where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
“Bull.” Max raised a callused finger. “You know exactly where he is. Is he down at the tunnels again, smoking that goddamn weed?”
Matthew shook his head far too quickly.
“Right, so he’s somewhere else then. Are you gonna tell me, or do I have to beat it out of you?”
Matthew gulped. “Dad, I’m sorry, but I don’t know where Zac is, honest.”
“Honest, my ass!” And now the finger was being pointed. “You get some clothes on, boy. You’re gonna take me to where he’s at, right now.”
Fear, which had always come so easily to Matthew, ever since he was an infant, showed its ugly face again. But Max didn’t care; if fear was the only way he was going to keep his two son
s in line, he’d serve it up to them in spades.
~
Max shoved Matthew into his pick-up and reversed out of the driveway. The Kemper House blazed with artificial light and swarmed with police.
When the hell are they going to leave?
Matthew stared at the house with that doe-eyed look of terror he always wore.
“So where are we going?”
His son recoiled as if he’d been spooked. “What?”
Max put the truck into drive and started up the street.
“Wake up, boy. We’re looking for your dumb ass brother.”
“Dad, I told you, I don’t know where he is.”
Max clenched his jaw and slapped Matthew across the back of the head. “Don’t give me that crap. I know you know where he is, and we’re gonna drive around until we find him—all night if we have to.”
“Dad, why don’t you believe me?” Tears welled in the boy’s eyes.
Max grunted and turned right onto Blake Street. “You know, you’ve gotta grow some balls, boy. When I was your age, my dad already had me working at the shop. If I had my way, I’d have your ass out of school and alongside me at the garage. But no, your mother wants to wrap you two up in cotton wool.”
Matthew wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. “If you want to drive around all night and waste your time, you go ahead.”
Max’s knuckles flared white as he squeezed the steering wheel. He pulled the truck to the side of the road and grabbed Matthew by the scruff of his jacket. “I should beat you six ways from Sunday, you little shit. Now, I’ve had enough of your attitude. You either tell me what Zac’s up to, or I go home and throw all of your shit in the trash!”
Matthew gaped, and it made Max feel in control again.
“Yeah, you heard me. All your crappy music CDs, your posters, your good-for-nothing books, all of them are going to the landfill.”
Matthew’s fear pooled in his eyes and quivered his lips. “Why are you such an asshole?”
“You keep lying to me, boy, and you’ll find out. Now…” Max pulled back into the street. “Now, let’s start this again.”
~
