by Greg Chapman
“I thought you were on vacation?” Barry shuffled a pile of fax machine paper in his hands.
“Yeah, yeah, I am,” Ben said. “I’m just following up on the Willow Street story.”
Barry’s bushy eyebrows rose. “Funny you should say that,” he held up a printout. “The police just sent this statement through.”
Ben almost snatched the document from Barry’s hands. He read the release. “God damn it.”
“Not what you were hoping for?”
He handed the press release back. “They still haven’t identified the victim because of the amount of decomposition. It’s such bullshit!”
“You think the cops know who the dead guy is?”
“I don’t know. It has to be whoever lived in the house, right? I mean, who else could it be?”
“Hey, you’re the reporter.” Barry walked off toward the editing desk.
Ben grabbed his keys. He needed to rest, but he doubted the mysteries he’d uncovered would let him. How could he sleep with Mitchell Cross’ crazy idea in his head, that the Kemper House would be watching him while he slept?
Chapter Eleven
Alice sat in her bedroom, examining the fragments of Amy’s iPhone and couldn’t help feeling they were the shattered pieces of her daughter’s soul. The Perspex screen and aluminium frame had been battered into crude shapes by Amy’s outpouring of frustration, and nothing Alice could do would put the phone back together.
And yet, she wanted nothing more than to restore her daughter’s mental health, the mind of that sweet and innocent girl she’d fallen in love with the first time she’d held her as a babe. Before she’d been exposed to the worst humanity had to offer. In order to have that girl back, Alice knew she’d have to put her daughter’s heart back together first.
She rummaged through the pieces of the phone, putting aside the cracked black outer shell, the display screen and battery, in search of its inner components. Amongst the dented metal she found the phone’s camera lens, glaring at her like a bloodshot eye. Using a pair of tweezers, Alice searched for the only other piece she was familiar with, the phone’s SIM card.
A knock at the door made her drop the tweezers.
“Mom?”
Alice quickly scrambled to return all the pieces of the phone to the clip-seal bag and hide it in one of the drawers. She crossed to the door, opened it, and discovered Amy.
“What were you doing?”
“I was trying to find some change, so we can get pizza, tonight.”
“Pizza? You hardly ever want to have pizza.”
Alice smiled and grabbed Amy in a hug. “I know sweetheart, I know,” she said. “But Dale is on a sleepover tonight, and I thought we could spend some time together.” Alice stood back and admired the wry grin on Amy’s face. “I just thought it’d be nice to have a bit of a girl’s night. We could get some pizza and watch one of those new age rom-com movies you used to like.”
“Really? You didn’t send Dale away because you want to “talk” to me?”
Alice touched Amy’s cheek. “Dale knew that you and I needed some quality time together, so he was actually the one who suggested the sleepover. He does love you. Now go and order pizza while I get some cash together.” She gave her daughter a gentle push out the doorway. “And pick out a movie too. Whatever you like. I’m just going to have a quick shower, okay?”
She closed the door. The sight of Amy’s perplexed expression made her feel guilty. Alice did want to spend time with her daughter, but she also needed to know why the girl destroyed her phone.
After Amy had tried to take her own life, they had made a pact to do everything they could to ensure it never happened again. That included Amy allowing Alice to install internet monitoring software on her phone, and she could now see which websites Amy visited, for how long, without being too intrusive. She had never asked for usernames and passwords to her daughter’s Facebook accounts, but now she wished she had. Because then she wouldn’t have to scrounge through the remains of her broken phone.
She listened at the door, making sure Amy wasn’t lurking in the hall, before she opened her dresser drawer and retrieved what was left of the phone.
Alice breathed a sigh of relief when she found the SIM card was still intact. She opened her laptop and inserted the card into one of the ports. The card’s contents appeared in a folder on the screen. She found a single movie file with that day’s date and opened it.
Time seemed to stand still as Alice watched the film. The footage was dark and unsteady, revealing the inside of a derelict house. The walls looked as if they were covered in flakes of ash. The operator of the camera was nonchalant, offering only fleeting glimpses of the architecture. Alice had no idea where this house was, and she doubted that Amy would have, either. So, who would have sent such a strange video? Alice knew it was easy enough to click on an unsuspecting file or link. Was that all this was? Alice strained to get a better look. The camera person made a sharp right turn. The view widened to a large living area, and started to ascend towards the ceiling.
But it wasn’t until Alice saw the shoes dangling in mid-air that she understood. She clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle a scream, but the tears ran freely. There was no mistaking who the shoes belonged to. Alice slammed the laptop cover closed, but the image of her daughter’s bloated face was etched on her memory.
She clutched at her abdomen as a wave of nausea roiled in her gut. Yet the sickness was burned away by a sudden rage. She thrust the pieces of her daughter’s phone to the floor, overcome with the same level of frustration and hate that had caused Amy to do the same hours before. Alice swore, letting free an exclamation she rarely uttered. She plucked the SIM card from the reader, ready to snap it in two between her fingers, when a thought emerged through the fog of anger. She still hadn’t answered the question of who had sent it.
The SIM card tight in her palm, she retrieved her own phone and fumbled with the casing. A fingernail cracked as she pried her own SIM card free and inserted Amy’s in its place.
Many frustrating moments passed as her phone rebooted, but when the screen finally refreshed with the contents of Amy’s card, a satisfied smile curled the corners of her mouth. Feverishly, she flicked through the received message log. If she could find the number of the creep who sent Amy the video, then she had something to take to the police. She didn’t know how the bastard had managed to put her daughter’s face in the gruesome video, but she would make him regret it for the rest of his life.
The beep of an incoming message shattered her resolve. The notification appeared on the screen, and a wave of sickness returned. The sicko was once again peddling his foul wares. Would he ever leave her Amy alone? She opened the message and saw another video file attached.
The video showed a young man, not much more than a boy, standing in a darkened lane. She felt a pang of recognition when she looked at the boy’s face that she found difficult to reconcile. The way he smiled at the screen, cold and detached, with eyes sunk deep inside pale skin extinguished Alice’s anger in an instant. Somehow, she knew this boy. Was Amy in a relationship with him? Did they know each other at school? While the possibilities flooded Alice’s mind, the boy on the screen moved.
Slowly, he lifted his right arm into view, and Alice saw he was holding a length of rope. He smiled a toothy grin, wet and wide. His eyes were unblinking and hungry. The rope was above the boy’s head, dangling and coiled in deliberate loops to form a noose. It swung pendulum-like from his plump fist. The noose was a taunt meant for Amy.
“You leave her alone… you little shit!”
She squeezed the phone until her fingers ached, staring at the boy’s callous expression. The more she looked at him, the more she remembered. She did know this boy She’d seen him many times, from a distance, almost every day.
He was one of the Campbell boys who lived down the road.
~
Alice gave Amy an excuse that she needed more cash for the pizza, and stormed
out of the house. She climbed into the Jeep, reversed out of the driveway, inadvertently screeching the tyres. She was only driving fifty feet, but she had to convince Amy she was going elsewhere. She roared up Willow Street, passing the Campbell house and turned into Blake. She stopped herself from mounting the kerb and driving the Jeep right through the Campbell’s front door. Her anger burned in her throat and pounded in her chest. She’d never contemplated taking a life until this moment.
Around the corner, hidden from Amy’s view, she screeched to a halt and turned off the ignition. The nearby Kemper House’s silhouette cast a long shadow, and she felt its watchful windows judging her. Alice still couldn’t fathom how she’d never noticed the house before, but the same could be said about the Campbells. She hadn’t given them a second thought until one of their scumbag children sought to hurt one of her own.
Gritting her teeth, she retrieved the phone containing the incriminating evidence of Zachary Campbell’s attack on her Amy. She was going to ram it down his scrawny little throat. She opened the car door and strode across Blake Street and back into Willow. The smell of death still pervaded, like a halo around the Kemper House, like the passing stink of a landfill when the wind changed. Alice pushed thoughts of the murder house aside. Now, there was only its neighbour, the Campbell’s at Number 70.
Her feet carried her fury by the neglected gardens on the Campbell’s front lawn and along the weed-choked path to the front door. Alice pounded the wood with the flat of her hand, only stopping when the sting became too much. She wanted the boy to answer, to see his smug hateful face contort with fear, the way hers did when she had found her little girl near death.
Another boy opened the door, lanky, long-haired and thin; he was already afraid. The sight of him took the edge off her determination, but only for a moment. She remembered Zachary had a brother, but she couldn’t recall this boy’s name.
Alice clenched her jaw and stood taller. “I need to speak with your parents—right now.”
The Campbell boy frowned. “Mrs. Cowley?”
“Is your mother home?” She looked over the boy’s shoulder.
“Is everything all right?”
“No, it’s not.” Alice shoved past him and walked through the door.
“Mrs. Cowley—” the boy said, flustered.
Alice looked around the living room and found it empty. “Carol Campbell? It’s Alice Cowley. I need to speak to you about your son. Right now.”
The boy came round to face her. “Do you know something about Zac?”
Alice felt her pounding heart. “What? Do you know that he’s been terrorising my daughter?”
“Sorry?”
She could see Zac’s brother had no clue what she was talking about, unless he was pretending not to know. “Your brother, Zachary. Where is he?”
“I wish we knew,” a gruff voice said behind her.
Alice turned to see the Campbell patriarch, Max, standing arms folded. How long had he been there, listening? He smelled of engine grease and sweat, his brow shone with both. Zachary definitely had his father’s eyes.
“Dad, she’s asking for Zac—”
“Shut up, Matthew,” Max said. “Go upstairs to your room so I can have a word with Mrs. Cowley.”
Matthew skulked away like a whipped dog. So, Max was the dominating type. But Alice wasn’t about to let him walk over her. “Your son Zachary has been sending my daughter disgusting videos.”
Max laughed. “Excuse me?”
Alice held up her phone. “My daughter received a video from your son, of him holding a noose. Did he not realise how damaging that could be to Amy’s well-being?”
Max stepped forward. “Let me have a look at this video you’re talking about.”
Alice lowered the phone to her side. “No. I want to talk to Zachary about this, now.”
Max’s jaw muscles twitched. “Listen here, you crazy cow. You think you can just barge your way in here with these bullshit accusations about my son? I haven’t seen Zac in two days. He hasn’t come home since they found that body next door. So, if you say you have a video of him, then I want to see it.”
Alice’s chest heaved with rage and fear. She never expected this. She had only wanted to get the truth. “No. I’m going to the police.”
Alice turned for the door.
Max reached out and grabbed her wrist. He pulled her so close she could smell the beer on his breath. “Give me the phone.”
~
Amy couldn’t help thinking about the last look on her mother’s face. And the way she had left the house, slamming the door behind her and leaving a smear of burned rubber on the driveway was unlike her. Everything had changed, the very moment she’d smashed the phone, and there was only one possible explanation.
Her mother knew.
Amy paced the house, claws of anxiety prickling the back of her neck. How could her mother know about the messages—the photos? She’d smashed that phone until there was nothing left. It was the only thing she could think of to keep it a secret, and yet, somehow her mother knew.
Recalling their earlier conversation, and her mother’s strange behaviour, Amy went to into her mother’s bedroom, straight to the dresser. She sat in the chair and caught her reflection in the mirror. Her face was white with fear, and just the thought of her mother knowing her secret sent her heart into a terrified rhythm. In her head Amy prayed she was wrong.
She opened the drawer and found only jewellery boxes and bracelets. There was no phone. She searched the top of the dresser, pushing aside hair brushes and the crystal ring holder she’d bought her mother for her fiftieth birthday. Despite the lack of evidence, Amy couldn’t escape the thought that the phone was waiting to be found. In her haste, she knocked a picture frame to the floor. It was a photo of the two of them at Liberty Island, taken a few months before she’d tried to kill herself. As she bent to pick it up, she noticed scraps of metal and plastic in the trash bin.
Amy raked through the bin for the chunks of phone, realising she’d made a grave mistake; she’d forgotten to remove its heart. Where was the SIM card?
Her mother knew.
She held the shattered remains in her sweaty palms.
Her mother knew.
The doorbell rang.
She dropped what was left of the phone and ran to the front door. She had to explain to her mother why she’d kept it a secret, and make her understand she’d finally found the courage to let it all go. She didn’t need to worry about what people thought any longer. Living was more important.
She opened the door hoping to see her mother, only to find a boy smiling at her. It was the boy from up the street. Zachary Campbell.
He was holding up a noose, which he’d fashioned just for her.
Chapter Twelve
Screams drew Megan Traynor to the front window. Through the curtain, she saw little more than silhouettes, shifting in the dark, but she heard a woman making threats about calling the police, while a man stood on his front porch and yelled about wanting to know where his son was. Megan watched the woman run towards Blake Street, climb into her Jeep, and make a U-turn with a long screech of rubber on asphalt. Everyone in the street was going mad.
Megan closed the curtain, but not before she caught a fleeting glimpse of the house directly across the road: number 72, the Kemper House. It stood tall in the moonless night, a dark cathedral. Someone had been murdered in that house, and yet her ridiculous husband saw no sense in keeping away from it. As usual, he only saw the tragedy as another award-winning story-in-the-making. His insatiable appetite for death was making her sick, and there was only one cure.
The spectacle over, Megan turned away from the window and walked to the bottom of the stairs where her suitcase sat, packed and ready. It was time to get away from Ben and his obsessions; from his lies. He thought that starting a new life in a new house would somehow save their marriage, and Megan truthfully had hoped it might be, but she no longer had the strength to try. She was only t
ormenting herself by staying.
She grabbed her phone and dialled for a taxi but a startling shriek cut the communication before it even began. She was drawn to the curtain once more, her ear trying to discern the authenticity and direction of the sound. Megan didn’t have to listen for long as the lone scream became many, long and razor-sharp in the dark. Megan ran to the front door and out into the yard. The cries made her skin crawl.
“Someone help me! Help me!”
The screams were coming from one of the neighbouring houses, number 65; she recognised the Jeep she’d seen earlier in the driveway, its headlights still on and the driver’s side door wide open.
“No! Amy!”
Megan’s feet and curiosity carried her closer to the place she didn’t want to go. Instinctively, she looked to her phone, ready to dial 9-1-1. For a fleeting moment she wished she had Ben by her side.
“Amy!” Amyyyyy!”
She was now close enough to smell the Jeep’s exhaust fumes, to feel the woman’s terror, and know something was terribly wrong. Megan stopped and thought to call out and offer help, but her instinct kicked in anew, advising her to be wary. As she argued with herself, the decision was made for her when the screaming woman ran out the front door in Megan’s direction.
“Please help me! It’s my daughter!”
Megan put her arms out to keep the hysterical woman at a distance. “What’s wrong?”
“My daughter … please! Help me!” The woman grabbed Megan’s arm and tried to pull her inside.
“What’s happened?”
“Please—she’s dying!”
“What’s happened?”
“She’s tried to kill herself! Please you have to help me!”
“Have you called for an ambulance?” Megan pulled away and dialled 9-1-1.
The woman latched on to her arm once more, fingernails digging through her sweater. Megan complied, staggering through the doorway as the call went through to the dispatcher. The woman’s daughter lay on the living room floor, eyes wide open and locked on the ceiling. The noose coiled next to her was like a sleeping serpent. It had left its distinctive mark on the girl’s milky-white throat.
