by J L Bryan
“Well, he can look a couple of different ways. Sometimes he looks like he did in life, a plantation owner in fancy silk clothes and fine coats. He wears his long blond hair tied back with black ribbon. He even wears a cravat, that's how hoity we're talking. And he has a look in his eyes like...”
“Like what?”
“Pure cruelty,” I said. “Like a man who enjoys torture. Which he got to do a lot, I think, as a slave owner.”
“Cold, handsome type?” she asked, as our train slowly....slowly....rounded a bend at the corner of the town green.
“I guess. Until you see his real form—everything charred and black, his flesh and clothes just a layer of ash over his skeleton. Then he looks like what he really is, a hideous monster.”
She was quiet for a minute. Her hand was warm against mine, and her heat kept me from shivering like I'd been doing since I got here.
“What kind of ghost is in the museum?” she finally asked. “The one you're dealing with now?”
“I'm still trying to narrow that down.”
“I want to help,” Melissa said. “Seriously.”
“It's too dangerous,”
“You said three kids live there. If it's safe enough for them, it's safe enough for me.”
“I never said it was safe for them.”
“Then why don't you get them out of there?”
“They don't have anywhere to go. The family can't even afford a motel room. They can't even afford to pay me.”
“Seriously?” Melissa asked. “So you're working for free?”
“I...guess.” I imagined my hotel room and other expenses piling up. Even if I resolved the case quickly, it would be hundreds of dollars I couldn't spare out of my pocket.
“You are really generous,” she said. “Come on, there must be something I can do. Just something during the day, you know, and nothing involving the ghosts...”
I shook my head. “Sorry. It's too dangerous.”
“Please? It'll be fine.”
“No. It's not a good idea.”
Melissa stared at me for a moment, then jerked her hand away from mine and turned her head away. “Yeah, that figures.”
“You're mad that I don't want you to get hurt?”
“I'm not some little kid, you know. I can handle it.”
“I just can't agree to it, Melissa.”
“That's okay. I didn't really want to help you anyway. I was just kidding.” She still hadn't looked back at me.
Abruptly, she stood up and jumped out off the train.
This wasn't as dramatic as it sounds, given that it was just a miniature train that a snail would have totally smoked in a race, but it was unexpected and startling.
Melissa ran off between a couple of glowing snowmen and disappeared into the crowd.
“Mommy, I want to jump off the train, too!” announced a kid somewhere behind us.
“Everyone stay on the train until we reach the station!” the engineer turned and shouted in response. His eyes fell on me and the missing girl who was supposed to be next to me. I shrugged. What else could I do?
When he faced forward again, I stood and jumped out of the train, too. The engineer snapped his head around and gave me a bit of the old stink-eye. But hey, he had our six bucks already, so I figured he didn't have much to complain about.
“Melissa?” I called out, my voice drowned by a flood of carols and jingling bells. The crowd was a little thinner than when we'd arrived, but not so thin that Melissa couldn't hide in it. It was hard to get a clear line of sight, anyway, with the oversized decorations and the vendor carts, some of which were shutting down for the night.
I found Michael waiting for us by the train station, still holding my hot chocolate. It was pretty much cool chocolate now, and on its way to becoming frozen chocolate, so the only option was to drink it quickly.
“Weren't you with Melissa?” he asked, looking at the tracks. “And on a train?”
“She took off,” I said. “I'm not sure where she is.”
“What?”
I recounted things quickly, while scanning the downtown area with my eyes, hoping to catch a glimpse of her.
“Maybe you could just give her something easy to do,” Michael said.
“You can't be serious.” I turned back to him, feeling shocked. “Michael! I want you to stay away from my cases so you don't get hurt. Obviously, that would go double for your little sister.”
“She's tougher than she looks.”
“Actually, she does look kind of tough. But that's not the point. I'm not going to put her in danger just because she's decided to become a ghost groupie.”
“So don't put her in danger,” Michael said. “Make her do some of that boring stuff Stacey's always complaining about. Sitting around at the library, looking through local history.”
“True, that should convince her that the job is totally boring. The library's not open for a couple of days, though.”
“I just feel like she's really opening up to you,” Michael said. “She doesn't do that much. She can be bubbly and chatty on the surface, but she keeps people at a distance. Gently. But firmly.”
“And you like the idea of her getting closer to me?”
“Of course. She needs it.”
I thought about it for a minute...then it all clicked. “Okay. There's some stuff she actually can do in the museum office for me. Daytime hours only. And you have to come, too. I think I can make all of this work. Come on, let's go find her.”
I took Michael's hand and led him into the crowd, invigorated by my new idea. And that sugary hot chocolate. But mostly my new idea.
Chapter Twenty-Two
We tracked down Melissa—she was at the cookie cart—and she agreed to help with looking through the museum records in Leydan's old office the next day. I couldn't really understand why being involved meant so much to her, but apparently it did.
“I'll call you guys in the morning,” I said, when everything was settled.
“You're not really spending the night at the museum, are you?” Michael said. “On Christmas Eve? For the customer who can't even pay you?”
“If there's a danger to the kids—”
“Then you shouldn't be confronting it by yourself.”
“Neither should they,” I said. “And so far, nobody's been physically injured. Not every ghost is a violent monster. Most of them are just lost and confused.”
“And that's what you think these are? Just lost and confused?”
“Statistically, that's more probable,” I said.
“Why does that sound like you're dodging the question?” Michael asked.
“Probably an overactive imagination on your part.”
“Right.”
“I won't do anything stupid,” I said. “I wouldn't try to confront any entity on the first night of observation, anyway. I might try some EVP stuff if the place is looking dead. But that's it.”
“It just...doesn't seem like a great way to spend Christmas Eve.”
“We just had a pretty good Christmas Eve,” I said. “Or at least I thought we did. Seriously, I'm exhausted. But I have to head to the client's and activate all the monitoring gear for the night. Once that's done, I can crash on my air mattress. Even if the place is full of ghosts, I'm sure I'll sleep right through them tonight.”
“Even if they creep up on you slowly in your sleep,” he said, moving in close to me, “And then they start to whisper—”
“Stop it!” I punched him in the gut, a little harder than I meant, definitely overreacting. I blame that sugared-up hot chocolate.
“Ow, watch the solar plexus,” Michael said, backing up.
“It wasn't funny, Michael.”
“Stay safe,” Melissa said, flashing a smile at me.
“Have a good night. Merry Christmas. Don't forget to hang your stockings over the heating vent. In case an old man wants to sneak into your hotel room to give you something while you sleep.”
“You ma
ke it sound creepy,” Michael said.
“It already is creepy. You just have to think about it long enough.”
“Merry Creepy Christmas to you, too,” Michael told me.
“What he said!” Melissa said, smiling at me, back on good terms now that I'd let her in a little. I was sure she'd get bored with the work quickly, anyway. Probably an hour of looking through stack after stack of old files would convince her that she had better ways to spend her vacation time.
That was a problem for tomorrow, anyway.
We walked together to the hotel, where they went inside, and I went to my van in the parking lot.
I drove out past the edge of town, up the steep road through the woods. The snowfall had ceased, leaving a soft cover of white over everything, but it started to sprinkle again as I ascended the mountainside. Again there was that weird feeling of driving through the stars as the tiny flakes reflected back my headlights from the pitch-black night outside. This minor road had no streetlights, and the lights of town were soon blocked out behind me by ridges and forest.
My van lurched and chugged, doing its best to deal with the snowy slope of the road. I lumbered slowly past the hidden estates along the way, getting a peek at their iced-over ponds and snow-trimmed balconies and columns.
Finally, there was the billboard featuring old Leydan in his Dr. Weirdman garb, and all the rare-to-nonexistent critters around him. It really stuck out from the otherwise all-natural environment of hundred-year-old trees and million-year-old rocks.
Floodlights were mounted all around it, too; they were off now, probably because the museum was closed to the public, but I could imagine it glowing bright when they were on, probably visible for half a mile or so downhill.
I turned off and circled around to park by the museum's loading dock. Ryan had given me a key to the door beside it.
The night was silent as I stepped out of the van and approached the door. My boots made no sound on the snow as I walked. I tried not to think about how easily it would be for someone to sneak up on me across that soft, powdery layer of ground cover, making no sound as they drew closer across the empty parking lot—
Enough. I clicked on my flashlight, widened the iris to a flood, and swept it all around. I verified that no creepers, living or dead, were within twenty yards of me in any direction.
Inside, the museum's storage area was chilly, but not more so than the night outside. I hurried to close the door behind me and shut out the cold wind.
Then I turned off my flashlight and stood in the darkness for a minute, listening. My eyes adjusted to the red gloom cast by the glowing red EXIT sign over the door.
The evidence so far indicated multiple entities inhabiting this building, but I still had few leads on how many or who they might be.
I walked out of the storage and into the main exhibit hall, where my microphone had picked up voices. The place made me extremely uncomfortable, even more than it had during the day. The oddball exhibits, preserved animals, blatant hoaxes, and assortment of possible dead human body parts had been bad enough during daylight hours. I can't say I loved being alone with them at night.
Something rustled ahead.
I raised my flashlight, ready to use it, but kept it dark. If something abnormal was about to manifest, I wanted to observe it, not run it off to keep its secrets to itself.
The rustling sounded again, closer, and the room seemed to grow colder.
I touched the nearest camera, a nightvision, to start it recording. I hadn't yet had a chance to switch everything on for the night.
Someone whispered. I thought it came from the direction of the Medical Maladies exhibit. A male voice, too low and quiet for me to hear the words.
Making as little noise as I could, I reached into my jacket, drew out my voice recorder, and activated it.
Someone else whispered, as if replying to the first. A higher voice, maybe female. There was something urgent or maybe angry in her tone.
The voices lasted only a second. Then the museum lobby, now colder than ever, fell silent.
I stood there, shivering like I was still outside and the freezing wind was roaring down on me from the mountaintop, and told myself to remain still and listen, keep my senses open, wait.
A minute passed. Then two.
There was no more action, but the room didn't exactly warm back up. That wasn't much of a surprise, given the plummeting temperatures outside. Ryan was probably keeping the heat to a minimum down here, considering his doubtful ability to actually pay the gas bill. Better to focus that energy on keeping his kids warm at night.
I was probably going to have to get used to some chilly nights down here. That would certainly make it harder to notice abnormal cold spots.
“Okay,” I said aloud, letting myself relax and take a couple of deep breaths, now that the ghosts seemed to have left the room. At least I'd learned a couple of small data points—there were two entities down here, possibly male and female. One of them might have been the same voice I'd recorded the previous night, or maybe there was a third entity.
Or maybe the entity with the higher voice was a child, I thought, remembering that Penny and Polly's ghost was a boy of about twelve. Amil.
I clicked on my light.
Two people stood before me, less than a yard away. Their skin was oyster-gray, their eyes and nostrils and mouths just dark shadows. Their clothes were tattered to rags, and I could see far too much of their bare bodies beneath.
Deep lacerations ran across their nearly-bare torsos and limbs, like they'd been hacked with a machete, or maybe lost a fight with a velociraptor.
They'd been standing there, close enough to reach out and touch me—to grab me if they wanted—the whole time I'd been catching my breath and relaxing.
Now that my light was on, they started moving again.
Their hands reached out toward my face, and both of them began muttering with their shadowy, formless mouths, moaning, seeming to implore me. I felt their clammy fingers brush against my cheeks before I backed up.
They were horrifying, and it took every bit of willpower I had not to turn and run screaming from that place.
The male, I realized, looked very much like the entity that had sprung out and nearly run me off the road.
“Who are you?” I asked, maybe trying to gather information, but mostly trying to assert some measure of control over the situation. I swung my flashlight to point at the floor, not wanting to run them off.
I kept backing up, though, not wanting them to touch me again.
“What do you want?” I asked.
One of them, the one shaped roughly like a female, spread open her shadow-mouth in an impossibly wide circle shape, so wide it distorted her pale head until it was nothing but a huge open mouth.
Then the oversized mouth-head let out a horrible bleat of a shriek, like a knife on a chalkboard. It made my guts lurch and felt like it would make my ears bleed.
It was cut short—by a deep, guttural snarl sound, like a wild animal.
The two pale figures were gone.
Something thick and dark slithered across the floor.
I bit back a scream that wanted to rise while I turned my flashlight after it.
I caught a glimpse of the tail end of an elongated dark shape as it slid out of sight around a corner.
The thing seemed to have come from the Tomb of History area, and now it was heading for the gift shop. Maybe it just wanted a Monster Museum t-shirt.
Resisting my urge to stay as far from the thing as I could, I pursued it. The only sound in the museum was my heartbeat and my panicked breathing. The two other ghosts were gone, perhaps chased away or snatched away by the one I was chasing.
I followed the dark shape around the corner, past the small gift shop full of cheap keychains and choking-hazard-sized plastic monster toys, and right to a recessed door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY. DO NOT ENTER.
I didn't catch a clear look at the entity. It appeared as a thick, moving d
arkness fairly low to the floor. I again only saw the tail end of its elongated body as it vanished through the door.
I grabbed the doorknob and twisted.
The door was locked. I shook it uselessly in its frame, then decided to try the key Ryan had given me for the outside door. Maybe it matched.
The lock resisted, at first, but finally turned with a rusty squeal.
Pushing the door open, I entered a dusty, cobwebbed stairwell, its stairs wide and sagging. The first stair groaned when I stepped on it. So did the second. This seemed to have been the main connection for employees traveling between the public first floor of the museum and the offices and work areas upstairs, yet it looked like it hadn't seen much use in years.
I wondered how long Leydan had been running the museum all alone before he'd died. From the looks of it, there definitely hadn't been a custodian anytime in the previous decade.
There was no sign of the low, dark figure I'd been tailing. I continued up the steps and paused at the second floor landing—also creaky and sagging—to listen.
I heard nothing. I could either check the offices on the second floor or continue up to the apartment.
It seemed best to err on the side of protecting my clients, so I climbed the even creakier stairs to the third floor. They felt almost soft under my feet. I hoped nobody used them too frequently. I could see why Ryan preferred the private back stairs.
Another reason became obvious when I reached the top of the final flight of stairs—the door to the private apartment had been nailed shut. Ghosts could pass through it with ease. Ghost hunters, not so much.
Sighing, I went back down to the second floor, crossed to Leydan's office with its overflowing heaps of paperwork, and parted the glass-front cupboard into two halves to reveal the narrow hidden stairs behind them.
The apartment upstairs was quiet when I arrived in the library. I clicked off my flashlight again and walked slowly through the darkness, trying to determine where the entity might have gone.
Then I heard whispering, too soft for me to decipher the words.
I tiptoed, following the small voice, until I stood outside the twins' room.
