So, a new family moved in, a father, mother, and their small child. They added a walk-out basement, the construction coming dangerously close to the wooden door that covered the entrance to his cellar. He wondered what would happen if they found his body though he didn’t get to find out. They built a wall of stone, blocking the door off, and finished the basement. It was then, due to the proximity of the entrance to his prison that the aversion spell kicked in, growing stronger every day.
It didn’t take long for him to get to know the new tenants and realize they were nothing like his old family. The father drank often, and when he did, he would yell at the mother and child. Sometimes, he would beat the woman who placed herself between the man and the kid. The little girl would run away crying and hide in the closet of her room, too scared to come out, until she fell asleep that way. The mother, her face bloody and bruised, would come in and lift the little girl out of the closet and place her in her bed.
He could only stand to watch this happen for so long before anger at the father took over. One day, when the mother and the little girl were running errands, and the father was piss-drunk in his chair in front of the television, he opened the door to the basement and caused a ruckus. The father, too sozzled to flinch at the aversion spell, went to investigate and slipped on the stairs. Head over heels he fell until his head hit the concrete at the bottom landing with a sick thud.
It was the first time he had ever, even indirectly, caused the death of another. His kind preferred the power of greed and corruption over death and destruction. The father’s spirit tried to linger, but it was no match for his power, and he sent it along to its final destination. If the screams the spirit made as tendrils of darkness drug it away was any indication, it wasn’t going to a happy place.
The mother found the body and stared at it for several minutes before turning away and calling emergency services. They steeled themselves to enter the basement, remove the body, and clean the traces it left behind, but the mother and daughter vacated the property that night. Within a week there was a ‘For Sale’ sign posted on the front lawn. Samuel hoped life turned out for the better for the mother and the little girl.
From then on there was a rash of good and bad tenants until he decided he couldn’t stand the coming and going anymore and actively worked to keep people away from the house. The most recent buyers didn’t come to live in the house but rather redecorated, painted, changed the floors, and put in all new everything before placing another sign on the front lawn. He thought the behavior was odd, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it. In his opinion, he only benefited from the changes as they brightened up his house.
Every prospective buyer left, never looking back at the property until she came. He should have tried harder to scare her away, but he admitted to himself that he was lonely. It would be fun to have someone to play with again. And, just maybe, she would have a television he could watch.
3. SARA
Sara sat with the realtor and the mortgage company’s representative in the boardroom of a posh office in downtown Salem. It was time to sign the paperwork for her new house, and she was excited about the prospects of owning the beautiful lakefront property. She talked the sellers down an extra twenty-five thousand, and she was thrilled with the negotiations. This house would turn into a substantial investment, she hoped anyway.
For the last several weeks Sara had daydreamed about the property as she worked to sell as much of her belongings as she could. Most of her things had been ruined in a house fire, but some of her more valuable possessions were salvageable.
After the inspector returned saying everything was in acceptable condition and appraisal came back for far more than the house was being sold for, she set the gears in motion for a quick buy. She took the week off of work to move and settle in. The longest part would be the drive from Texas to Massachusetts, but at least she could relax and go slow. After selling just about everything she owned, she was ready for a fresh start in a new city.
“I still can’t believe you’re buying it,” Christie muttered. One of the best things about buying this house was never having to deal with her again.
“Just think of all that commission you will make.” Sara ignored the mortgage broker as he watched them. He handed her a stack of papers and she went to work signing the bottom of each.
“You may think I’m only here for the money, but I’m honestly concerned that you aren’t taking this whole haunted house thing seriously.” Christi received an odd look from the representative as he handed yet another paper to Sara to sign.
“I’ve told you a million times, there are no such things as haunted houses.” Sara frowned at Christi as she signed and dated the new sheet.
“My family has lived here for generations since they came from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and joined the first settlers in this area,” Christi proclaimed her heritage with pride, sitting back in her chair and crossing her arms over her chest. “My grandma used to tell me and my older sister stories that have been passed down through my ancestors about the weird shit that happened out in the area surrounding this property.”
The mortgage broker sniffed in disdain and turned to Sara. “Welcome to Salem. You’ll find a few people around here that insist on propagating rumors like these. Of course, the city has a large tourist industry based around the witch trials.”
Christi huffed, the smug look on her face turning to one of ire as the mortgage broker dismissed her claims. Sara shrugged and slid the paperwork over the table to the broker, and he handed her the keys to her new life.
4. SAMUEL
Samuel watched a little rat-like creature run yipping towards the door upon the ringing of the doorbell. The annoying little thing had come along with the woman the evening before, arriving with an odd bed she filled with air, a strange box with a ton of wires and screens, and enough food to feed several households. After finding places to store all the items she had lugged into the kitchen, the woman went to work cooking food with the little imp running around her feet. She alternated between calling it 'Mama’s big boy' and 'Chikeeters'. He wasn’t sure what its name was as it seemed to respond to both.
After they ate, they hunkered down in the master bedroom, and the woman fell asleep within moments of her head hitting the pillow. The little rat watched him pace around the house for several hours before joining the woman on the bed. It unnerved him that the little creature could see him. Every time he tried to go into the bedroom to look at the woman, it would growl at him in a low, menacing tone, curling its lip until Samuel gave up and moved away.
Coming around the corner, the object of Samuel’s thoughts scooped the dog up and opened the door.
“Hi! Please come in, ignore the dog, he won’t bite.” She spoke to the man standing on the other side. Samuel perked up, watching as the stranger entered. So far, the woman’s antics had amused him, and he’d held off on contributing his own, content to sit and watch for now.
“I have a furniture delivery for Sara Smith? Where do you want it?” The man asked her, stepping through the opened door into the entryway. So that was her name. Sara. Such an old-world moniker.
“Awesome. The bedroom stuff goes in the room down the hall. The couch and tables go in the living room.” She pointed in the respective directions. “I’m going to let the dog outside while you bring them in.” The man nodded to her as she turned away, walking past him, and opening the French doors to the backyard. He watched her through the windows as she strapped a harness on the mutt and clipped it to a long leash tethered in the middle of the lawn. The little thing flopped onto its back, rolling on the grass and soaking up the sun, as she laughed and shook her head.
Samuel’s gaze turned back to the group of men carrying items into the house. One set took what looked like a large headboard and mattress towards the bedroom while two other men moved a large leather couch towards the middle of the living room. He followed the second group, admiring the plushness of the seats, and flop
ped down on it as soon as they left. Perhaps he would enjoy this new tenant in his home. He would still have to get rid of her, of course, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy himself during the process. On the upside, all the human activity in the house was feeding his strength.
Sara reentered the house and checked both rooms before signing off on the delivery with the driver. He almost didn't have enough time to roll off the couch and onto the floor when she came sailing over the back and bouncing on the cushions. It was a disconcerting feeling to have someone move through you, and Samuel tried to avoid it as much as possible.
“This couch is the best.” Sara sprawled across the long part of the sectional and stretched. She sat up, admiring the end tables when the doorbell rang again.
“Ooh, that must be the stuff I ordered online.” Standing up, she went to answer the door. Samuel wondered who she was talking to. It couldn’t be him, she didn't know he was there.
5. SARA
Just stack them behind the couch.” Sara waved her hand in that direction.
“You women sure like online shopping, don’t you?” The delivery man asked her while chuckling.
Sara raised an eyebrow in reply, holding the door open for him, and said nothing causing the man to clear his throat.
With a sheepish laugh, he walked towards the spot she indicated and left the package. “Right, I’ll just stack everything over here.”
Using a trolley, he came into the house with box after box, all marked on the side with the same logo, and stacked them where she indicated. After doing the math, Sara found it would cost almost the same amount to ship all of her old things and decided to simply buy everything new. It was refreshing to sell what she had, there would be no bad memories attached to the new items.And the last time she shipped a bunch of glassware, it was all broken by the time it reached her.
After letting Chico back into the house, Sara unboxed the new television first. It would be nice to watch TV while she opened the rest. She placed it on the stand that had come with the living room set she picked out from the furniture store, connecting the cable box that waited on the doorstep for her when she arrived.
One of the first things she had done the night before, after putting away all the groceries and cooking dinner, had been to set up her computer and rejoin the digital world. She looked towards her office with a longing gaze, thinking she would rather play video games, but continued putting the new things she ordered away. Opening new packages was always fun, as she would pretend it was Christmas.
Flicking the television on, she entered her log-in information to connect it to her home internet and started up one of her favorite streaming services. She found a suitable background show, an animated one about four kids in a small mountain town she watched often and set to unpacking the parcels one by one.
The first box contained the new sheets she purchased for the king size bed in the master bedroom. She looked forward to sprawling out in the new bed and knew she would be exhausted by the end of the day.
Going into the utility room to wash the sheets before using them, she paused outside the door to the basement. Eyeing it, a creeping sensation rolled down her spine, before she moved towards the washing machine. She was glad she’d installed that bolt lock before she moved in and tried not to think about the door or what was wrong with it. There wasn’t anything in the basement, you could see through the windows into the unfinished space, but something primal still warned her to keep away from it. She hoped she wouldn’t regret buying this house.
6. SAMUEL
Samuel alternately watched Sara unpack boxes, moving around the house to put away the contents before moving on to the next, and the show she had put onto the television. The remote lay on the arm of the chair, and he ran his thumb over it, wondering if there was anything better to watch. He was partial to sports himself.
He’d learned a little about this type of device from the last tenants he’d had. They had been avid television watchers, seeming to prefer shows that contained violence and things blowing up, detectives trying to figure out who the killer was, and shows about cars. He hoped Sara had better taste than the current one she was watching, the foul crudity of the children striking a nerve.
Finding the CH button on the remote, he used a bit of power to hit the up arrow. The channel changed to what appeared to be a news show with a man and a woman yelling at one another about government nonsense. He was about to hit the button again when he realized there was absolute silence from behind him. Looking back, he saw Sara staring that the television screen, her eyes wide and her body unmoving.
Just to see what she would do, he hit the up button again, changing the channel once more. The show it landed on this time comprised a group of people walking around in the basement of a building talking about EMF Meters, thermal cameras, and asking ghosts to give them a sign. He sniffed in disdain. No self-respecting ghost would ever show themselves to a bunch of charlatans like these.
“No fucking way.” The expletive came from behind him, causing him to turn in surprise. Sara was still staring at the television, but frowning now. She walked around the couch and picked up the remote from the arm of the chair. Looking at the remote in her hand and around the room, she shook her head. “There are no such things as haunted houses.”
She turned the television back to the show she had been watching, somehow finding the place it had left off in, and replaced the remote. Samuel waited for her to walk around the couch before going for the device again. A buzzer from the other room alerted them that the washer had finished its cycle, and she left the living room to put the sheets into the dryer.
He took advantage of her absence to change the channel back to the show about haunted houses, wondering what she would do. Sara came back into the room, and he watched her lips purse together. She once again returned to the couch to pick up the remote, this time turning on a show about four old ladies living in a house as roommates with a lot of canned laughter in the background.
“Fine, no South Park but if you change the channel again, I’m turning the parental locks on.”
Perhaps she was becoming wise to him. It was always fun to play with the emotions of the humans entering his home, and he hadn’t been this entertained in quite a while. Still, no one talked to him like that. She would have to go.
7. SARA
She was going insane. That was the only explanation for what happened because haunted houses were not real. There must have been an electrical glitch with the wiring in the cable box. Maybe someone hacked the box to change the channels on unsuspecting customers as a joke. That must be it, that explanation made way more sense. Sara found it interesting that once she changed the channel, she had no more issues with it flipping on its own.
Stretching after unpacking most of the boxes and finding the household items necessary to get through the night, she ordered pizza from a local place and played on her computer while she waited for it to arrive.
Video games helped her to relax and take her mind off the world around her. She was partial to city builders and time management games. With a few days of her vacation remaining, she resisted checking her emails to see if any of her clients needed her.
After what seemed like no time at all, the doorbell sounded, and Chico shot up, running out of the office towards the front door while barking his head off. She followed behind him, blocking him from jumping out of the house with her foot when she answered it.
“I’m surprised someone bought this place.” The kid delivering the pizza handed her a slip to sign in a black book when she stepped out, closing the door behind her to keep the dog inside. He wore the leather jacket of the local high school and looked like he was no older than seventeen. Sara assumed this was an after-school job for him. She wondered when high-schoolers started to look like kids to her. She must be getting old.
“What do you mean?” She asked.
“I live down the street,” he said, pointing over his shoulder to a house she had t
rouble making out through the thick tree line in the dark. It must be the one with the blue siding off the main road. She passed it on her way to the house earlier in the day. “And we’ve seen all the people who live here come and go. Sometimes, when we walk past here with our dogs, someone is standing in the window, but we know that no one lives here.”
“Maybe it was a squatter? This would be a great house for someone to live in if they couldn’t find anywhere else to go, especially in the winter.”
“Nah,” he snorted. “There was a guy once, but he only lasted one night before he ran out of the house screaming. My parents called the cops, but they couldn’t find him. Anyway, my parents told me when they were teenagers there used to be a house where they would film horror movies in until it burned down. They had all sorts of creepy stories about shit that would happen. Some guy even died here when he fell down the stairs into the basement.”
“Wait,” Sara responded, narrowing her eyes, “No one told me someone died here.”
The kid shrugged and took the signature book back from her, handing her the pizza box. “I gotta get to my next delivery, but if you need anything, come over to our house. My parents have no life.”
“Thanks.” Sara groaned. She pushed Chico back from the door as she reentered the house. Walking over to the couch, she threw the pizza box on the coffee table and sat, sinking into the welcoming cushions.
After several attempts, Chico jumped onto the couch and laid next to her, placing his head on her leg and looking at her with large doe-like eyes.
“Sorry buddy, pizza isn’t good for dogs.” She rubbed the top of his head and scratched behind his ears. He snorted and moved his gaze to a spot on the couch past her with the same look. He was begging the air with the same concentration he used on her. His stare was unwavering, and she looked at the place he was so intent on.
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