The Graveyard Shift

by Brandon Meyers

  When had this happened? And why? Once more I felt the boiling surge of pure anger rising inside of me. But it was halted by exhaustion. My senses dulled, blackness again threatening to overtake me. My windows snapped instantly to their highest positions, but slowly slid back to rest against the sills.

  “That’s what I thought,” Jack said, smirking as if I had confirmed something to him. “I hope you don’t mind that I’ve taken the liberty of doing a little rearranging. After all, I’ve only got another week to get this place fixed up before the gallery opens. Your little stunt with the fireplace set me back a whole six days. I’m just now finishing.”

  Six days, he had said. How was that possible?

  “Don’t worry, I’m in the process of making sure that sort of thing never happens again.”

  To my horror, I could see instantly what he was talking about. It wasn’t just the furniture. All of the Everton’s belongings were gone. Every single item. Jonathan’s lamp was gone. As was Gloria’s vanity mirror in the bedroom. Even the refrigerator and stove had been replaced with old, antique-looking models just slightly differing in appearance from the Evertons’, and to a stranger, they might have looked as if they had had been there all along. But I knew they were different. I knew they were replacements. They all smelled—and felt—like Jack.

  And so, when I tried to light the stove and set his new curtains ablaze, the only fireworks I found were in the corner of my vision. I became woozy once more, and after my vision hazily restored itself, I saw that the knob on the stove had not so much as budged.

  I tried to slide the new beds across the room. I tried to tip over the new desk. I tried to toss the new lamp into the new vanity mirror, and all I mustered was the pulsating burst of dizziness that left me feeling weak and exhausted.

  These were Jack’s belongings, all of them. And as they were his, I could not touch them. Not the same way I touched and willed the Evertons’ things to move. I scanned the house furiously for a chair, or a waste bin, or even a single hardback book that once had belonged to Jonathan that I could now use to bash Jack Thorpe over the head. And there were none. Everything in this house belonged to Jack.

  Jack walked freely through my hallways, mocking me with his smugness as he hoisted another sculpture on top of a pedestal anchored painfully into my floor with screws.

  “Oh, don’t worry, you can still do things. You can still turn on the lights, open the windows, close some of the doors, etcetera. I mean, I want you to make yourself heard. That is the whole point, after all.”

  I was too angry. I didn’t know what he meant by ‘some’ of the doors until he got up and started walking. Right as he went through the threshold into the hallway I willed the door to slam in his face, only… there was no door anymore. In fact, none of the rooms had doors anymore. Only empty closets and unused guest rooms and the front entrance held doors, and I quickly learned that the front entrance doors were new as Jack pushed through, undisturbed, on his way to his truck.

  When he returned, the lights were flickering, the vents were snapping open and shut, and the blinds, which had been firmly nailed down, were rapping against the windows. It made him smile. The only substantial protest I could make was to throw Jack’s sunflower painting off my wall by ejecting the nail upon which it was hung. The picture flopped flat onto the floor, relatively unharmed.

  “That’s the spirit. But go easy, will you? Don’t want to wear yourself out again, do you?”

  Jack chuckled beneath his breath as he lugged his tools upstairs, stomping up the staircase with the cockiness of a man who’d won a war. Except, he hadn’t won the war. He’d only won the battle. And as the carpeting crinkled beneath his shoes, I felt the tides beginning to shift, much as the carpet shifted within my grasp. No sooner had Jack reached the second to the last step than did I split the carpet away from the stairs at a weak seam. It was as Jack started flailing backwards that that smug grin was swept out, literally, from beneath his feet.

  Jack did a backwards somersault down the steps, hands and feet splayed and pawing madly as he tried to stop himself. His tool chest exploded at the bottom of the stairs, spewing wrenches and screwdrivers every which way, and soon after came Jack, eyes wide and teeth clenched as his back knocked heavily into the corner of his fallen chest. He slid to a stop on the hardwood floor, and though the breath was pushed from his lungs, he clambered to his feet. His body was battered, but he was otherwise fine.

  “You fucker,” he growled hoarsely, collecting his tools and scooping them into his chest mindlessly. “You think you’re smarter than me?” He took a hammer, heaved it over his head, and knocked a gaping hole into the wall. “You feel that? I own you. Not the other way around.”

  I did feel it, and it angered me. But ten minutes later, after the carpet was ripped up from the stairs and the tools were all collected, I was reminded that I could do nothing about it. And though he walked with a limp, Jack was still mocking me. Laughing at me. And while he did the rest of his repairs, he left that hole in the plaster as a reminder that he was in charge. He told me this, as he passed by and stomped up the stairs that could no longer hurt him.

  “I’ll fix that last,” he had said. “Because I want you to remember this moment for a very, very long time.”

  From there he quietly went about his day. As for me, anger melted away into sadness. I was no longer a helpful servant. I was a freak show. A prisoner. And with nothing belonging to my old master remaining in my possession, I could not so much as touch Jack. I couldn’t even reminisce over better times. Everything relating to Jonathan was gone.

  Everything except the painting of the Everton family that Jack had so tenderly put in storage, something I realized as I scoured the otherwise empty wine cellar.

  And so Jack, once again restored to arrogance (even if he had a few bruises and walked tenderly on his left leg), didn’t notice the enormous canvas that lifted out of the cellar and slowly made its way up the stairs. Nor did he notice it when the square frame rounded the corner and zipped into the hallway. He was bent over a painting of his own in his office, dashing paint to canvas, when the blur of movement caught his eye.

  It was too late. The painting of the Everton family connected with his temple, and as his head dipped in pain, the painting arced upward and fell yet again. The wooden canvas, more brittle than I had anticipated, crumbled as the painting was smashed against his head repeatedly until there was nothing left of it. All that remained was a man, crumpled on the floor with blood welling at the corner of his forehead, and a pile of broken wood.

  I wanted to see fear in Jack’s eyes. I wanted to see apprehension—the thought that he had made a grave mistake. But it was still not there, and the man that sat up, sporting a fresh black eye, he smiled at me as he always did.

  “Such a clever house, aren’t you? You do know that eventually you’ll run out of things to hit me with, don’t you? And if anything, you’re just helping me. Wouldn’t want you pulling this kind of stunt with a paying customer, would we?”

  He pulled himself to his feet and winced as he touched the side of his head. The fingers that came back were coated in blood.

  “It’s funny,” he said, as he glanced up at the ceiling. “You see, I will heal, but you? You don’t heal unless I say you heal. And soon you’ll learn that you don’t attack unless I say you attack. Like a faithful animal obeying his master.”

  I snapped the windows open and shut like a dog gnashing its teeth, and much like a canine growling from the end of its leash, I did nothing to intimidate Jack. If anything, he welcomed my outbursts.

  “Yes, you're going to need that attitude for the grand opening next week,” he said, as he walked to the kitchen. He pulled open the refrigerator—one of many new appliances I couldn’t touch—and pulled out an ice pack that he applied to the corner of his head.

  “Hah. You must really be so angry right now,” he said, laughing, “to sacrifice the last and only remnant you had of that family. Now you have not
hing of them but old memories.” He nodded. “Old memories that will soon be replaced and long forgotten.”

  And with that, I realized that Jack Thorpe deserved to die. But I was so weak that there was nothing I could do about it.

  I spent the remainder of the day watching silently from the safety of my walls as the arrogant man continued to fill me with foreign objects. He hung nothing on the walls and put nothing in the plaster, but did erect hundreds of stands and display easels throughout my rooms. The displays remained empty that day, but I knew that soon they would be filled. And soon after that my halls would be tainted with the presence of an endless stream of strangers. I would become nothing more than a novelty, unable and unwilling to preserve my proud existence. Already I felt weak. This man had removed the spirit right out of me, had excised it by extracting a few pieces of furniture. I felt lamed. Jack taunted me no further but I knew that on the inside, that awful fellow was laughing.

  At least I had the good sense to retrieve the crumpled canvas of the Evertons from its shattered frame and carry it down to the cellar before it could be thrown away. Jack had not seen that. I was certain of it. After watching the artist for a few hours upstairs I returned to the basement to study my final remaining possession. The upper left corner was missing completely and what remained looked like it had been shredded in one great bite by a German Shepherd. Fortunately the painting was large and none of the shining faces had been disturbed. My family was still whole.

  Theodore and June both wore mischievously honest smiles, as if they had paused in the middle of jabbing at one another, a moment of truce demanded by their mother for the taking of the photograph. Behind them stood Gloria, looking like a proud young woman, filled with the matronly responsibility of a mother, but no less beautiful than she had been when we’d first met. Jonathan was a step behind her and to the left, with one mighty hand on his wife’s shoulder, and another on his son’s. His towering presence demanded respect, but his warm smile begged that you also be his best friend. He presided over his family like a guardian angel.

  And behind them all stood my flaming hearth, full of warmth, unlike the vacant and dusty cellar in which I had currently occupied myself. It was a scene that brought life back into my weary heart. These were the people—the only people—whom I had ever truly loved. And as I looked into their faces, those hues of tan, waxy oil came to life on the canvas. I was reminded of the family dinner in the great hall that took place just after the original photo for this portrait had been taken. It was a brisk fall evening and the children were still in their school uniforms. I could practically smell the spicy, peppered scent of Mrs. Everton’s famous garlic chicken being roasted in the oven. Magnificently carved mahogany chairs scooted back and forth on my floor as the family passed around the dinner plates. Silverware clattered and contented voices rang out. As the night went on, Jonathan’s laugh became infectious after a glass of wine. His business was prospering, and so was his family. My family. I could feel the jubilance of the scene and for a blissful moment I was transported away from all of my current troubles.

  I allowed the scene to replay again and again in my mind. Time was, for a beautiful little while, a forgotten concept.

  But like all good things, my revisiting of the past did at last come to an end. I found myself alone in silence, abandoned of laughter. Night had fallen and my floorboards were still and quiet. I stared at that painting for a while longer, my sentimental reminiscence slowly growing into anger as I thought of the man upstairs. My love and deepest respect for the Evertons intertwined with my pure, cheated hatred of Jack Thorpe. The two twisted together like a rope, each fighting to strangle the other, but at the same time growing together with more strength.

  And that was the moment that I realized that I was not powerless. I had not been completely neutered by that despicable man. I was not beaten and I was not alone. I stared down at the slightly curled canvas with paint-flaked edges and felt it, the raw power within my bones. Not just the superficial strength I’d had over the Evertons’ departed furniture, but the real, intrinsic power that my love for them had infused into my bones. It was unbelievable. It surged so incredibly that my very foundation trembled. Dust shook loose from the cellar rafters, drifted a layer of dirty snow across the surface of the painting. But I no longer needed to see the picture, because my family’s faces were seared into the forefront of my mind. Upstairs, the bricks of my hearth may have been cold but my heart still blazed with the unearthly fuel of familial retribution.

  I was an Everton. This was my house. And I would see it burn to the ground before I allowed Jack Thorpe to spend one more night underneath this roof.

  Jack had removed a significant amount of my armaments, but as I surged through the entirety of my structure at once, with crystal clear awareness, I found that he had not stripped me nearly as well as either of us had thought.

  I could not budge the door to Jack’s bedroom. It was of an inferior, modern make that was alien to me. But I did not need to open it. When my presence poured through the walls of his room—nay, Jonathan Everton’s room—I saw him staring at the ceiling with a smug grin on his lips. Hearthfire ripped through me at the sight of him.

  “I felt that little tremor,” he said. “I do hope this means you decided to forfei—”

  His words were cut off as the ceiling collapsed above his head. A hundred pounds of lathe and plaster rained down upon Jack’s bed in a cloud of billowing dust. I had thrown a four foot section of myself at him, shredding my own gypsum skin and exposing the bones of my wood framing. The room was a mess of dust and I could not see Jack. When I heard nothing, my heart raced at the prospect of his death. But then he coughed, further away from me than I had expected. I felt his footsteps thudding along the upstairs hallway and found that he had rolled safely away from beneath my crushing blow.

  I left behind the haze of the bedroom, already steps ahead of that fleeing coward. He raced down the hallway in bare feet, his skin pounding against my own with every footfall. His target was the staircase at the end of the hall, fifteen feet away. I had to time my next move perfectly. One step, two steps, three…

  I rocketed a nail backwards out of my polished pine flooring and clean through Jack’s right foot, like a bullet. He folded then, falling to his right knee in an agonizing scream. Right beneath my favorite Tiffany light fixture.

  I snapped the lamp’s chain free and amid a shower of falling sparks the stained glass globe plummeted downward like a ball of lightning. It connected with Jack’s shoulder, throwing him off balance. I was a house and every single piece of my anatomy was mine to control. All this pathetic man had done was strip me of my jewelry. He had forced me into a bare-knuckled fight. And because of that I would bludgeon his body with my own until he was dead.

  I felt my rage intensify tenfold as the end drew near. Anticipation of the kill, of ridding myself of this human pestilence, coursed through me like adrenaline. Windows knocked open and shut throughout the house and billowing gusts were drawn inward.

  “Shit,” Jack spat. “You son of a bitch. I’m going to end you.”

  My mind reached for another chunk of plaster and dropped it like a bombardier. But Jack saw it coming. The three foot chunk barely clipped the heel of Jack’s bleeding foot as he bounced forward in a sprawl. He dragged himself to his feet and continued to amble along at a quickening pace.

  I fired more nails, but the next dozen shots hit nothing. His movements were erratic and I could only focus my will enough to shoot the shrapnel straight upward. Steel fasteners ricocheted off the ceiling, bouncing lamely to the floor again in Jack’s wake. He was breathing hard and I could feel his body cut through the air as he ran, buffeting a draft toward my walls.

  Within ten feet of the staircase, Jack purposefully leaped past a shut closet as fast as he could. But I was far ahead of him. I had sensed the polished panel of the door as one of my own, one of the few that he had left intact as part of his intended haunted house gimmick. I bla
sted the cherry door free of its hinges and slammed its full fifty pounds into his back.

  Jack cried out, an inhumane sound, and I wondered hopefully if I had managed to break his spine. He skidded across the last few feet of hardwood, the skin of his forearms and knees burned in an audible skid with the friction of his fall.

  “Fucking cocksucker!” he shouted. It was an obscenity I had never heard before, and I rather disliked it. It was bestial language, the sort of thing that no civilized gentleman would ever be caught uttering, even under duress. I hated him more for it. Jonathan Everton would have hated him as well. And that fact filled me with furious strength. Silvery flashes bolted upward, and somewhere beneath the collapsed door I heard Jack scream as at least one of my flooring nails hit its target.

  Jack began to crawl again. One of his arms emerged from beneath the topmost corner of the door, and then the other. The door began to shake as he made his escape and I knew that I had to act fast.

  The hallway had reached a dead end, the two walls meeting in an L-shape to Jack’s front and left. To the right lay the staircase. And his head became visible as he shrugged the door off his back and onto the floor. He laid a hand on the banister, swaying. I focused all of my will on the L-shaped walls, on not just the plaster, but the wooden beams which framed the walls behind it. The walls began to tremble, cracks running along the corners like a fracturing iceberg.

  Jack glanced back fearfully then turned to regard the looming staircase once more. He wobbled, favoring his left knee, where another of my nails had landed. There was no way he could navigate the stairs to escape. Not in time.

  I pulled harder, feeling the strain darken the corners of my perception. But I thought of my family, remembered my duty to protect their memory. And I tore a hole in my body the size of a Model-A Ford. The sound was deafening, especially within my own mind. Pain seared across my essence, momentarily blinding me. The world went black for a moment and when my senses returned, moonlight cut a clean white swath into my insides. Plaster dust and debris swirled out into the open night.