by Kevin Guest
Seeds
Fletcher could not help but go over everything that had happened. First, though the note said the power was on, it wasn’t. Then the front door refused to open, then subsequently Jessie’s inability to go into the chapel. Afterwards, the voice from the chapel and loss of video feed, followed by the incident with Anderson and Mary in the shower, then the door from the morgue closing and trapping him and Amy underground— of course, the whole morgue incident, then finally the stop sign, the crash, and the screams from Mary as they tried to pry the front door open, only to find her fast asleep. He thought, There has to be a logical explanation.
The front door was old and subject to swelling, the power could have easily been an oversight by the owner, the morgue door slamming--both times--could have been a pressure differential, the stop sign could have been old bolts, and the crash could have simply been an accident.
Still, he could not rationalize breakfast or in the issues with the chapel. He lit a cigarette and looked at Anderson. “I wonder if this place is truly haunted.” He paused and exhaled. “Perhaps we’ve been subjected to a series of events that only implies a haunting.”
Anderson was pissed at the comment. He glanced over the monitors. “Would you care to clarify your observations?”
Fletcher stood. “Let us examine this, shall we? This house is over a hundred years old. True, it is used as a haunted house attraction, but how much upkeep do these Boy Scouts really do? Have they replaced the framework of the house, even inspected it? What if we destroyed the dishes at breakfast? Deception is a powerful thing; we only assumed that we did not and some other force did.”
Anderson looked at him. “You sound like a politician trying to cast doubt on the very facts he witnessed.”
“Honestly I’m not sure what I saw. It happened so fast; I am not so close-minded that I take everything at face value. True, what happened seemed to be supernatural, but we are in a commercialized haunted house.”
Anderson stood. “Go on.”
“Those plates--how much metal could have been in them? How do we know we’re not dealing with a complex set of magnets, strategically placed to cause such a scene?” He paced back and forth, stroking his beard. “Perhaps a simpler explanation, such as a pellet gun. We admired the paintings, but did we inspect them for trickery? In addition, how did the table and chairs get on the ceiling? I don’t recall anybody checking for wires. If you remember, the table was set quite elegantly. A good illusionist will draw your attention to one object while they manipulate the other. It is not out of the question to assume such tricks would be implemented in an attraction made for revenue.”
Anderson thought for a moment. Magnetic interference would explain the signal loss from the chapel, even in the wired camera.
Fletcher continued, “And though we have investigated every room in this house, how do we know we have seen every inch?”
Anderson was getting onboard with his theories. “We haven’t.” He looked upstairs. “We need to investigate the prop room.”
Together they ventured to the second floor. As they approached the room, their heartbeats quickened, ready for anything.
Slowly Fletcher opened the door. The dust slightly moved as the air was disturbed. He reached in and flipped the light switch. “This is going to take some time,” he said as he looked at the props that filled the room.
Anderson nodded. “Get the students.”
Fletcher was excited at the prospect of busting the haunting. He hurried down the stairs to fulfill Anderson’s request.
While he was up there, Anderson decided to check on Mary. He opened the door slowly and the light pierced the darkness. Her sleeping body was still, except for the rhythm of her breathing. He noticed the cold temperature of the room and that the atmosphere felt otherworldly. There was a faint sound of breathing, but not coming from Mary. He could not find the location of the sound, and it sent shivers down his spine. Slowly and carefully, he closed the door. He paused for a moment, concerned that somehow Mary was in danger.
His concentration was broken when Fletcher and the girls came up the stairs. He stood by as they cleared out the prop room. Afterwards, Anderson entered and noticed the floor, walls, and ceiling were void of decorations. He walked though, methodically examining the room for any evidence of tampering or trickery. The existence of the secret entrance downstairs indicated the house was more than it appeared. As far as he could tell, the room was sound. “Put it all back,” he said as he made his way down the stairs.
Fletcher and girls did their best to place the props in the same spots they found them. Downstairs, Anderson walked into the dining room and pulled down the paintings. He then used his cane to poke holes into each of the walls. He peeked in the holes, looking for any explanation to the breakfast incident.
As the others came downstairs, he called them in. “Take it down.”
Fletcher looked at him. “Take what down?”
“The walls and the ceiling. Leave nothing but the frame.”
Fletcher stepped closer to him. “This house is almost a museum. We cannot just tear it apart.”
Anderson looked at him. “I have bought the rights to investigate, and I intend to leave no stone unturned in the midst of a mystery.”
Jessie walked past them. “I saw tools in the snack bar.”
Once she returned, Fletcher and the girls began the demolition. The old drywall crumbled easily and gave no resistance. They actually derived a bit of pleasure from the destruction.
Once it was done, Anderson was both frustrated and elated. There was nothing but steel framing behind the walls. If something had been there, he would have instantly called off the investigation and called in the lawyers, but now the evidence pointed to a supernatural event. “Well, I think we’ve taken this to the extreme.”
He walked off and returned to his monitors. As the group went to resume their activities, he eyed them. “You cannot just go off and leave that mess.”
In unison, the group rolled their eyes and returned to the dining room. From the living room they heard, “There’s a dumpster just on the other side of the fence, off the hayride road.”
It took an hour, but the mess was cleaned up. Anderson was even more convinced this was the genuine article. The group resumed entertaining themselves and the house remained quiet, boringly unimaginative.
Hours later, Anderson was busy with his equipment. He had fully dismissed Fletcher’s theory, but he took no joy in it. The equipment that he had spent months painstakingly testing and purchasing was failing him. It was one malfunction after another, no recordings since the orb and the voice from the chapel. Without further proof, witnesses would be dismissed without merit and he would stand no chance of getting his book published. He thought to himself, Why is this so hard? Why am I made to suffer like this? All he could think about was his work and how it had to be completed. He felt as if his mind was cracking.
Jessie looked at the men, each deep in thought and deep in their own problems. She was the outcast of the group and felt so. Everyone else had a legitimate reason for being there, but not her. Anderson had his project, Fletcher was Anderson’s second opinion, Amy was a medium, and Mary was the assistant. Everyone had something to do except her. She had to get out of there before the boredom drove her mad. She looked at them. “I’ll go start dinner.”
Amy watched as she left the room. The house was quiet, not just void of sound, but void of spiritual activity. It seemed plain, ordinary, and extremely boring. Suddenly she decided to have a look in the chapel. Being a profoundly religious person, she was curious about what was in there. No one had told her; in fact, they said nothing of it.
The men were so deep in their thoughts that they failed to see her walk from the living room. Fletcher lit another cigarette and began pondering his past. He worried about where the future might lead him. Anderson was reviewing data, looking for anything useful. He was tired of watching monitors that did not change.
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nbsp; Amy stood just outside the chapel. Nervously, she placed her hand on the door handle and turned. The door opened freely. What is inside? she wondered. She pictured Jesus above the altar, ornate paintings of religious figures on the wall. Beautifully hand built pews, perhaps even an antique organ, still in working order.
The room was dark, but she sensed nothing. It was empty of spiritual activity. She felt along the wall and found the light switch. As she flipped it, her expression went from delighted to sickened. “What foulness would build such a place?” This was not a chapel, but a room of the damned. There was nothing redeeming in the room, but she did not leave. She approached the altar and stared into the pentagram. “God of Heaven and Earth, even in this place of blasphemy your presence is needed, perhaps in even greater abundance. Cleanse this room of evil; cleanse this house, I pray to you. Save the souls that have been faithful and destroy the ones who have rejected you.”
She walked from the room and turned out the light. From this point on, it was not a chapel to her, it was nothing. It was to be forgotten, ignored, and destroyed.
As she walked into the living room again, the men did not notice her. Though they seemed lost in thought, she wondered if something was afoot. She scanned them closely, but they seemed unchanged. Fletcher looked at her and smiled seductively. Though it was annoying not to sense what he was thinking, she found that the loss of her abilities led to other senses being heightened. She still did not fully realize how blind she had become to the house. Not only did the house block her senses, it blocked her ability to recognize that she had lost them, which was the true trick.
Where had the spirits gone, she wondered. In any case, she could not sit in the living room, staring at nothing. She walked through the entranceway and out the door.
Upstairs, in Mary’s bedroom, unbeknownst to everyone else, Mary was awake. She stared into the darkness. “‘A foul place, destroy those who reject you’--you have gone too far.”
Amy stood outside the house. The calm air was interrupted by sounds of distant thunder. She quickly walked to the back yard. Remembering her earlier encounter with mosquitoes, she now wore jeans. Though the little pests attacked her, they could not penetrate her clothing. She walked all the way to the back fence. To her delight, she saw flashes of lightning. As the spring storm approached, she could feel the change in the air. The wind picked up, circulating the dust from the entry road.
Birds flew across the sky opposite the storm, as to flee for their lives. Suddenly, from her back pocket she felt a vibration. She reached around and pulled out her cell phone. She had a fascination with weather and had recently purchased a weather application for her iPhone. As she read the update, she smiled.
