A Night at the Asylum

by Jade McCahon

  So Jon had changed his mind after Tommy died. Become a believer. Or at least a considerer.

  “There’s something else,” I breathed. If I was going to tell the story, I needed to tell the whole story. “Emmett Sutter says he saw Tommy wearing his helmet that night. And he says he found it in Ead’s possession after the accident.”

  “Hold on,” Cole said. “What are you saying, Sara? What does all this mean?”

  I stared at him for a moment, formulating my answer, knowing it was going to hurt him further. “Tommy was using the board…to contact Jenny. She told him to find the necklace in Ead’s car. It’s proof that Jenny was there…” I cut off, and Cole looked down at the tiny gold chain in his hand.

  “Jenny,” he whispered.

  I opened Tommy’s notebook. “It’s all right here.” I pointed. Raymond moved closer to me, so he could see over my shoulder. Cole stood listening, looking lost. “When Ead found out what Tommy knew about Jenny’s necklace, he killed him too.” I suppressed a sob with the back of my hand.

  “Holy shit,” Cole whispered. He ran a hand back through his hair. “This is too much.”

  “His helmet…it went missing after he died,” I explained. “And Emmett told me he saw it. That he saw where his brother hid it.”

  There was a slick, wet breathing sound, and “Joey” began to speak through Jamie again. “Thomas wore the helmet because he knew he was in danger. He knew his life would be cut short.”

  “How did he know?” I asked, glaring.

  “Because I communicated it to him,” Joey answered. “But this fate could not be avoided.”

  “Are you telling me someone murdered him and it was supposed to happen?” I shouted, my anger returning full force. This thing was really getting on my nerves. I refused to refer to it as a spirit guide. Spirit guides were supposed to be all-seeing and inspiring, weren’t they? Joey was just a dick.

  “It was Thomas’ prewritten destiny that his presence in your world would be for this predetermined amount of time. This time is chosen before you are born. It is written in your cells, recorded in your Akashic Record. You have chosen this. You also choose to forget, so that you may live your life in this world without hindrance. He chose. You chose. Every human being does so. It is the purpose of the human experience.”

  “So you’re saying everyone decides before they’re born…when and how they’ll die?” Cole asked. “That my sister chose that? Are you serious, you worthless asshole?”

  I grasped his arm to stop him. I might have been curious about this crap any other time, but for now it was useless trivia. My hatred brewed uncontrollably, spilling over. It came from a selfish place. I wanted to know Tommy was with me, that nothing that had happened could be explained away anymore. I wanted validation. “What the hell are you, anyway? Pardon me if I don’t fondly accept the middle man BS.” I read from the notebook, jabbing the paper with my finger. “‘Spirits may manipulate items in the physical world, opening doors, turning on lights, or pulling aside curtains…and have been seen by several people at the same time.’ If he can do that, why does he need you?” I tossed the notebook on the table angrily. “If you’re the bridge between this world and that one then where is my brother?”

  My voice bounced off the dark walls, and Cole and Raymond both tried to shush me. I pushed their hands away. My only answer was the moronic laughter bubbling from Jamie’s lips. It was infuriating.

  “Do you hear me, you son of a bitch? If he was here, he would have come to me! Do you hear me?!” I had never been so angry in my life. Raymond and Cole leapt at me to keep me from attacking Jamie, but I shoved the spirit board and the notebook off the table, sent it crashing into the window behind me. The laughter grew louder. I plopped down in the chair like a child throwing a tantrum and covered my ears with my hands.

  The next thing I knew Raymond and Cole were shaking me. I had clamped my eyes shut and now I opened them. “Sara,” Raymond said gently. “Are you alright?”

  “I’m…I’m fine.” I sat up, letting my arms fall by my sides.

  “We thought it happened to you, too,” Cole said, exhaling.

  “That’s impossible. She’s a terrible conductor,” came Jamie’s high-pitched girly voice from across the table.

  “Jamie!” I jumped to my feet. “Is that you?” I never thought I’d be so happy to hear that annoying giddiness.

  Cole nodded. “She’s back. And I don’t know about you guys but…I’d like to get the hell out of here.”

  “Where’s Joey? He didn’t answer my question!” I demanded.

  “Sorry about him,” Jamie replied dryly. “He’s a real bastard.”

  “So we gathered,” Cole answered. He looked hyper-calm, zoned-out, like he’d just had a glimpse inside the black briefcase. “What the hell is he?”

  Jamie shrugged. “Some of us get nice, helpful spirit guides. Some of us get Joey.”

  “So this has happened to you before?” Cole asked.

  “Yeah,” Jamie admitted slowly. “Since I was a little kid.” She looked at him shyly, uncharacteristically self-conscious for a moment. “Sometimes spirits don’t know how to get through to us. So they ask the guides.”

  He grasped her hand, leaning down on one knee to look into her face. “You…are…amazing,” he said sweetly, and she giggled.

  My mind was whirring. Of course Jamie and Tommy would have the same freak of super-nature guiding them. It should have been obvious. “We have to find the helmet,” I murmured.

  “What?” Raymond asked.

  “We have to find the helmet,” I repeated. “The asylum is going to be demolished,” I reminded him.

  Jamie tried to stand up. “Ah, look out,” she called, and Raymond and Cole were at her side at once, holding her up. “All this possession crap has taken a lot out of me,” she said with an uncertain giggle. “Can you boys walk me out to my car?”

  “Yeah, come on, Sara. Let’s get her outside. We’ll come right back in.” Raymond waited for my answer. “Sara?”

  I was lost in my own thoughts, all the anger gone, leaving behind a mental exhaustion so thick I could barely think through it.

  “Sara!”

  I couldn’t leave. There was no time. I had that feeling again, that feeling that told me the final dominoes were falling. I had to oblige. It was beyond my control.

  “I’m staying here,” I said. Raymond began to protest, but I held up my hand. “Please. Don’t try to convince me otherwise. Okay? Take Jamie to your car. She’ll be safe there. Call Bonita’s father…” I wished I could tell him to check on Emmett. To do whatever he could to get him help. But I’d promised.

  “I’m not leaving you in here alone.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  Jamie was leaning on Cole now, her face pale. “I don’t think it’s a good idea either,” she murmured quietly, but without much conviction.

  “I don’t care what you guys think. Just go. I’ll be okay.”

  “I’ll get Doug,” Jamie said. “He’ll know what to do.” I assumed she was talking about Emmett. I did not ask her what she knew, because I feared the answer.

  “I’ll come back and help you,” Raymond assured me. “You have to at least agree to that.”

  “Alright.” I had no intention of waiting till he returned. But my voice stayed even.

  “Do not leave this room until I get back,” Raymond ordered.

  “I won’t. I swear.”

  We both knew I was lying. “Keep your phone on,” he said, handing me his flashlight.

  “Yes, sir.”

  After they’d left, I sat at the table in the dark. I could not comprehend all the incredible things that had happened tonight. I didn’t want to. My heart was broken. I was exhausted, hungry, my belief system had been turned on its ear and I just wanted to sleep. I sat back in the chair, not even scared of the black room, the restless spirits that no doubt lingered here. Everything was different now.

  Tommy’s gray digital voice recorder
still sat on the table, looking tiny and benign. I picked it up and pressed the power button. The little display came to life. Now the battery was full again. I pressed the back button and then PLAY. There was a little shuffling noise and then I heard my own voice. “I wish I knew…where you are…and what you want from me…” the shuffling continued. The recorder scraping against the front of my shirt, probably. And then I heard something else. I sat up with a start.

  I rewound the entry and played it again. Static noises, my words, then a voice…I had to rewind a couple more times to be sure, but it was there. A soft whisper, drawn out long and garbled with what sounded like electrical interference, but the statement was clear as day…“I’m here…I’ve been here. Just…listttttteeeeen.”

  Without a doubt I knew it was Tommy.

  I shut the recorder off, clutching it mutely in my hands. With new resolve, I picked up the board and the notebook and tucked all three back into my messenger bag. Then I threw the bag over my shoulder and started walking. Yes. I would do what Tommy asked. It was the only way I would find what I was looking for.

  I would listen.

  ****

  The storm was just getting started.

  News reporters, construction workers, protesters scattered back to their cars to seek shelter. I stared out the second story bathroom window and was surprised by the dark hue of the sky. After the rain, the destruction of this beautifully grotesque building could start on schedule.

  Soon the grass and parking lot would be cleared and all of the asylum’s secrets would be unearthed, its garish decay laid to waste.

  Laid to rest.

  ****

  I had no idea where to even begin.

  I started to notice as I walked the shadowy corridors slowly, hoping for some divine intervention, that the asylum was almost empty. There were still a few drunken stragglers here and there, a few protesters who had broken away from the chain. I even heard a police radio or two, and ducked into the corners until they passed. I walked in whatever direction I felt compelled. Was anyone pulling me this way? I didn't know. Was I supposed to be feeling something? I couldn't say I was. I sighed heavily in frustration. I had thought that with pure belief would come the ability to hear, to see. The other world was supposed to open itself up to me, wasn't it?

  Frustrated, I kicked a pile of trash across the room. I sat down on the cold, dirty floor, feeling dampness seep into the seat of my jeans, my spine sagging in on itself. I was truly the most exhausted I had ever been. Most of all, I was running out of time. I thought about crying, seriously considered it. I thought about taking the spirit board out, but I didn’t want to. I couldn’t take a step back. I had heard his voice. “Please, Tommy, help me,” I whispered, no longer feeling silly about talking aloud to someone invisible. “Just please…tell me where to go.”

  Suddenly my phone chirped as if the battery was low. “Impossible,” I murmured. “I just changed this.” As I put the phone to my ear the text chime blared. It scared me so badly I almost dropped the phone. The caller ID said “58008”. I clicked on the message.

  One word.

  Cold.

  “What?” I asked the empty lobby around me, confused. There was no answer.

  I stood and brushed my pants off, looking around. “Tommy? Is that you?”

  Somewhere far away, water was dripping, probably from a hole in the ceiling. There was a crash from down the stairs; most likely some stragglers making their way out. The sound of wings flapping overhead led my eyes to a crazy-looking owl, perched on a high window pane. But in the form of spoken words, there was only silence.

  I started to walk again. “Should I take out the recorder? Can you hear me?” I adjusted my bag on my back and stepped around a crumbling rocking chair. “I don’t know what to do.”

  My phone’s text chime played again. The reception bar said I didn’t even have a signal here. Every time a text came the battery faltered, but immediately went back to full. I opened the phone and read the text. Another one-word riddle.

  Warm.

  “Okay,” I breathed. “I think I understand…but Tommy…please…is it you? You have to let me know somehow. Please.”

  The phone chimed again. This time there was another number, and it was in the body of the message:

  07734

  I had been slowly making my way toward the Women's Ward across the lobby. I passed under the decomposing sign that indicated where I was and put one hand against the wall to steady myself. My legs were feeling weak. The chipping paint licked at the skin of my fingertips as I pushed my way further down the hall. Why did these numbers look familiar? The phone slipped from my precarious grip and I caught it mid-air, upside down, and that’s when it hit me.

  Hello. Upside down, the numbers 07734 spelled HELLO.

  My brother and I played this game often. When we were kids (and grounded from the internet) we would sit on the couch, our heads together, making words on the calculator by typing in numbers and turning it upside down. In the calculator game, if you turned the number 58008 – the number from the Caller ID – upside down, it spelled BOOBS. It never got old; we’d laugh every single time.

  “Perfect,” I said, shaking my head. Of course he couldn’t just say who he was, he had to be himself. At the same time, I realized, he was reaching out to me in a way there would be no question that it was him. “You’re even more clever as a ghost,” I said dryly, but inside, my heart was bursting. I felt a swell of affection and held the phone close to me as I continued walking.

  Amazing.

  Another text. This one was straightforward. DOWNSTRS. I found the staircase that led from the first arm of the Women’s Ward and carefully descended. This was difficult because someone had piled random chairs all over the place. Finally I reached the double doors leading to the first floor and opened them.

  COLD.

  I was momentarily confused. I had gone downstairs, just like he told me to. I went back through the double doors. The only other place to go was the basement.

  Oh, Lord, I did not want to go to the basement.

  VIEWG RM

  “What? Where the hell is that?” I asked aloud, but I knew exactly where it was. It was a room just off the morgue. There was a glass panel there, where families could safely view the bodies of their loved ones who had died from highly contagious diseases. “Nice,” I grumbled. Tommy knew how much I hated the morgue.

  The staircase was a shocking contrast to the room it branched off of, which was practically pristine. It gave the sense that the square hallway abruptly eroded into oblivion. The guard rail had crumbled completely, leaving only a skeletal iron bar amid chunks of broken stone. The three-tier window and the steps beneath it were littered with broken glass and cobwebs. An elaborate checkerboard tile pattern that wound round the bottom half of the wall had pulled away from its backing, leaving gaping wounds of grime, the painted surface above it molting like insect skin. Abandoned window frames were propped haphazardly in the corner, prickling with rusty, bent nails.

  Still, I carried on.

  HOT was the next text. I pushed open the double doors and found myself in the boiler room. The giant boiler was like a great rusting monster, and absolutely every inch of paint on it was curling upward toward the ceiling.

  Considering the circumstances I supposed it was natural to be a little spooked, but when a loud crash sounded behind me I couldn't stop myself from taking off in a sprint. I burst through the doors in front of me and was dumped into a too-white corridor with floor-to-ceiling windows its entire length. There were dark paint swipes on the glass, yielding a disorienting zigzag pattern of shadows on the opposite wall. It was as if someone had started to paint them over and had stopped, thinking better of it. As I hurried past them the swaths played spastically across my face, making me dizzy. I narrowly avoided crashing into a wheelchair and pressed myself against the wall again in an effort to force myself to a halt. It was too dangerous to run here, and nothing that was after me could take
me out faster than being oblivious to where I was going. So I closed my eyes to get the panic under control, panting and sweating as I sagged against the scored plaster, my ears alert for more sounds of a human agenda.

  The phone bleated a text alert and I looked down at it. Nothing froze my heart faster than reading that one word.

  STAY.

  I'd only just closed the phone and was slipping it back into my pocket when the door in front of me began to creak open. Five fingers encased in a black leather glove appeared, grasping the side of the door for leverage, as the metal groaned in protest at being opened. I tried to control my rapidly thumping heart.

  I knew that glove.

  And before I'd had time to consciously acknowledge it, my mind burst into another flash of memory that had been placed there, handpicked, by someone else. I saw Ead's face, his dull gray-blue eyes, slender nose, and twisted mouth. He was pacing slowly, far away at first, then instantly closer. Too close. “You think I should let you go when you won't even give me the time of day?” His voice was a snarl, his expression morphing from calm to evil in a split second's time. The image jumped, as if someone had hit fast forward. We were in the car again. Ead was tearing at my clothes and his own. All the while he kept a firm grip on my neck with only one black-gloved hand. His strength was unbelievable. Even as I struggled against him, the hate he felt for me completely overpowered any fear I could use to my advantage. I was not going to escape this, I knew. I’d seen it happen before. These were Jenny’s memories again. She was trying to warn me. She was giving me a reason to be afraid.

  As if I wasn't terrified already.

  Quick as it came, the flash was gone, and a scuffle in the other room caused the hand to withdraw from the door as well. I heard a police radio going off in the distance. That one second was all the opportunity I needed. Ead was here. He'd be looking for me. He’d be looking for Tommy’s helmet. I only hoped he had not found Emmett. The path back to the other door seemed impossibly long, though it was only a few steps. As the metal door he’d been holding scraped closed loudly after its release, I took advantage of the noise and hit the other door at the same time. My body spilled out into the hall with the spiral staircase, only this time I noticed a portal with no handle directly in front of me. It was painted the same color as the wall as if to disguise it. I pried at it with my fingers. It wouldn't budge.