Grayson Manor Haunting

by Cheryl Bradshaw

  Luke turned. “I just handed it back to you, so you know I did.”

  “Not the box—the dress. Did you touch the dress?”

  He nodded.

  “And?” she asked.

  “And what?”

  She didn’t know how to respond.

  “Addison, what is going on?”

  “Nothing. It doesn’t concern you.”

  He kept walking. “Fine.”

  She rushed after him. “You come into my house, open something that belongs to me, and I’m the one to blame?”

  He pointed at the box. “I knew those were blood stains earlier.”

  “So there’s a little blood on it. So what—who cares?”

  “It’s not a small amount of blood, Addison.”

  “The dress is decades old. I don’t even know who owned it or why it’s here.”

  “Open the box,” he demanded.

  “What—no, I won’t.”

  “Why?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “When I took it out and looked at it, I thought someone might have died in that dress,

  he said. “But I don’t think so now.”

  She wanted to ignore his insinuation—act like she didn’t care, even though she did. “What changed your mind?”

  “I turned it inside out. Some of the stains don’t go all the way through.”

  “Your point?”

  “It’s someone else’s blood,” he said.

  “Like I said, the dress is old.”

  “Yeah, but aren’t you curious?”

  “I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

  The front door slammed to a close. Apparently, neither did he.

  CHAPTER 13

  Addison sat on the bed, the box resting in between her legs. She ran her fingers over the lid, then hesitated and recoiled, sagging into the pillow behind her. She thought about punting the box across the room, the lid flying open, and the dress spilling out all over the floor. What will happen if I touch it again? Will it be different this time? She clutched the sides of the box, setting it down on the floor beside her. Maybe tomorrow, while Luke worked in a different area of the house, she’d be brave enough to try again.

  Sleep came minutes later, relieving her of the exhaustion she had felt the night before. The hours ticked by in silence, until the clock on her bedside table struck four. A frigid air stirred her from sleep. She reached down, tugging on the covers, but bringing them up past her chin made no difference; the temperature in the room had plummeted so that she felt the chill of her breath resting on her cheeks.

  Her eyes flashed open. A faint light, in the shape of a misty, white figure, faded in and out. It was soft at first, offering a pale illumination to the room. Steam from her breath floated into the open air and then dissipated in front of her as she continued to breathe in and out. She was in too much shock to notice. The shape shifted inside the light like a baby animal struggling to break free from the hardened shell that confined it.

  Addison sat straight up in bed, terror gripping her body. The light moved closer. It lingered at the edge of the bed, bobbing up and down for a few seconds before it stopped. Long, skeletal fingers punctured a hole in the light, reaching out and gently wrapping bony digits around the bed’s iron railing. Addison’s screams echoed throughout the house as the light separated, and from it, a silhouette emerged—the same sad, scared young woman Addison had seen hunched in the corner in her vision the day before. The woman wore the same pleated dress, except this time, a large portion of it was stained with blood. The blood on the dress was dry, like it had been stuck there for years, fusing together with the fabric surrounding it.

  The woman stared at Addison, never blinking, the look on her spectral face a mixture of heartbreak and longing. She didn’t speak. She just hovered there as if waiting for something. But what? Addison had never interacted with anyone in her visions before. When she’d called out to the Natalie of the future, her cries went unheard. The woman was from the past, but appeared before Addison in the present. Would it make a difference?

  Filled with a newfound confidence, Addison met the ghostly gaze. The woman meant no harm. She was sure of it. She had to be. “What’s your name?”

  The woman’s head slanted to the side, but she didn’t utter a word.

  “Why are you here?” Addison pressured.

  Again, no response.

  “Did something happen to you in this house? Is that why you’ve returned?”

  After failing for the third time, Addison mumbled, “Well, I guess you can’t communicate with me either.”

  The woman’s mouth opened a little and she uttered two words so faint, Addison barely heard them. “Help me.”

  Addison flinched, goose bumps lining the length of her arms. Is this really happening? “How can I help you?”

  A tear seeped from the corner of the woman’s eye. It trailed down her ashen cheek, dissolving once it was released into the air.

  “Isn’t there anything else you can tell me?” Addison asked. “Please. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Help me,” the woman pleaded, a second time. She released her hand from the bed post, sweeping an unstable finger through the air. Her finger steadied once it found its target and the movement stopped. Addison thought about glancing at the floor, but she didn’t have to. She knew what she’d set there hours earlier. She understood. A subtle heat burned within her, the kind that filled one’s life with meaningful purpose. She would find out everything she could about this woman: how she lived, how she died, and most importantly, who was responsible for ending her life.

  The woman’s lips parted again, and Addison remained still, poised and ready, but she wouldn’t get what she was waiting for. Not this time. The glimmering light reappeared, and the woman closed her eyes, submitting herself to it. Tiny fragments chipped away at her frame, sucking her back into the light. And then she was gone.

  CHAPTER 14

  Addison tucked her knees under her chin, her arms folded around her legs. How long have I been here? An hour? More? Her body felt heavy, like a huge, petrified rock. Outside she could hear the sound of gravelly pebbles crunching beneath the tires of Luke’s pickup truck. A minute later the front door opened and closed. Addison tried to stand. She couldn’t.

  “Addison, you up there?” Luke called.

  “I’m…here.”

  “You decent?”

  “Yes.”

  Luke entered her room saying, “Look, I’m sorry about what happened last night. I had no right to—”

  Addison managed to partially lift a hand, stopping him. She tried to stand again, but her wobbly, spaghetti-like legs couldn’t sustain her weight. “I…I want to tell…I see…I saw…”

  Luke crossed the room, grabbing hold of her arm and lifting her back to the bed again. “Whoa, hang on a second. Why don’t you sit back down first and catch your breath?”

  She leaned back, masking her eyes with a quivering hand in the hopes he wouldn’t notice the tears. He placed his hand over hers, gently pulling back.

  “Are you sick?” he asked. “I can run to the store and get you some—”

  “I see things,” she croaked.

  She glanced at him, fearing the same reaction she received as a child. His expression remained unchanged. He pulled the chair out from under a desk, flipped it around and sat down in front of her. “All right, what kinds of things?”

  “You remember that brick you asked for?”

  He nodded.

  “This would be it. I just don’t know if I—”

  He squeezed her hand. “You can.”

  She blinked away the tears and began by relating the experiences she’d had as a child. She told him what happened sometimes when she touched things. She mentioned Natalie, her childhood friend, the man on the street, and other visions she’d experienced. Luke appeared concerned and convinced at the same time. When she finished, he smiled and rubbed her hand with his finger. “I knew there was s
omething special about you, Addison Lockhart.”

  She’d told him about her past—a first step to seeing how he’d react before she told him about her present. And he’d accepted it without question, without judgment—something she’d never experienced in her life.

  “I haven’t even told you the best part yet,” she said.

  A look of excitement flashed across his eyes. “I’m ready. Shoot.”

  “What I’m about to say might sound a little crazy.”

  “Crazier than what you just told me?”

  “This is…different.”

  “Whatever it is,” he said. “You can tell me.”

  For the first time in a long time, there was no hesitation, just clarity. “I’ve experienced some weird things since I moved into this house.”

  He raised a brow. “Like what?”

  “Well, the first night I slept here, I heard this noise. It sounded like a whiny cat. At least I thought it was a cat. Then it sounded more like a woman crying. I walked around, trying to identify it.”

  “Did you?”

  She shook her head. “When I came back upstairs, I swore I saw the doorknob from the first bedroom on this floor light up.”

  “Like what?”

  “Luke—it was glowing. I felt like I was being beckoned toward it.”

  “What did you do?” he asked.

  “We tried the door before. It’s locked—remember? I was too afraid to touch it. I didn’t want to admit what I was seeing was real. I feel so childish for saying this, but I went back to my room and ducked under the covers. Then everything stopped. I thought maybe it had all been a terrible dream until the next day when the visions I had as a kid came back.”

  “You had a vision?”

  “Yes, when I touched the dress.”

  “The one in the trunk?”

  Addison nodded. “There was a woman in a room. I couldn’t tell where she was exactly, except that the walls looked familiar to me, like the ones in this house.”

  Although surprised, Luke retained his composure and kept quiet.

  “She was shriveled up in a ball in the corner of the room begging for her life.”

  “Was anyone else there with her?” he asked.

  “I could only see her at first. Then something else came into view, an object. A gun. It was aimed right at her.”

  Luke’s eyes widened. “Was it in someone’s hands? Did you see anyone?”

  “Whoever was holding it was hidden from me. The gun just dangled in the air as if it defied gravity. I stared at it, fascinated, until two shots fired—killing her.”

  “Are you saying she was murdered? In this house?”

  “I think it was here—I don’t know. The only thing I’m sure of is that she wasn’t from this time period. She wore a cocktail dress in a style not from this time.”

  “And you’re sure you didn’t see anything else?”

  Addison shut her eyes, digging deep into her memory. “There was something. A calendar was tacked to the wall behind her.”

  “Did you see the month, the date, anything?”

  She closed her eyes again, focusing on the lines and then the numbers. “The year was 1952. I’m almost positive.”

  He sat straight up, placing a hand over his chest like he was unable to draw breath. “Then she didn’t die recently. It all makes sense. No wonder you were so angry when you found out I’d touched the dress.”

  “Whatever happened to the woman I saw, the dress has something to do with it, or I wouldn’t have been able to see anything.”

  “Have you touched it since?”

  “No—but I didn’t have to. She came to me again last night. When I woke up she was standing at the edge of my bed. Well…not standing so much as hovering.”

  “Did she say anything?”

  “Two words: help me.”

  “Help me,” Luke muttered. “Hmm. I’ve always believed in spirits. I don’t know why they show themselves to some and not others, or why, but I believe when it does happen, whether they’re good or evil, there’s always a reason.”

  “I don’t understand it…I haven’t had a vision in years.”

  “Why do you think they stopped until now?”

  She shrugged. “When my parents didn’t believe me, I just tried to forget. I would have done anything to avoid seeing Doctor Death one more time.”

  “Doctor Death?”

  “It was a silly name I called my therapist as a child.”

  “So to recap…when you had the vision of Natalie falling from the swing, you believed it.”

  “And it came true.”

  “You were a child,” he said. “Children are desperate to believe in things. In a child’s world, magic exists. Your parents held you back, sending you to the shrink to make you a nonbeliever.”

  “And it worked…sort of.”

  “I think when you stopped believing or shut it out, your ability was stripped from you somehow leading you to believe what you saw wasn’t possible.”

  She felt like her head was spinning. “Do you think it made a difference?”

  “Seems like most of the time believers see things others don’t. Like those who refuse to accept what’s right in front of them aren’t gifted in the same way.”

  “But it’s not like I moved into this house and started believing again. The vision just happened. I didn’t solicit it.”

  “What if you being here solicited it? There’s something tying you to this woman and this house. The place was passed down to you—if something happened here years ago, your connection might have triggered it, brought it back to life.”

  Addison removed the covers and swung her feet over the side of the bed. “Even if you’re right, how am I supposed to help a dead woman? I don’t even know who she is.”

  “Find out. You know the year. It shouldn’t be hard for you to look it up and see if a young woman died around that time. Maybe she’s been waiting for you all along.”

  CHAPTER 15

  The Rhinebeck Bee was a small-scale newspaper established in 1930 during a time when money was tight and prohibition laws were even tighter. This fact, however, didn’t stop the paper from churning out a couple of issues a month, a determination that kept it thriving eighty years later.

  A brown-haired receptionist with paper-white skin and a starched shirt buttoned down so low anyone passing by could easily assess what a Wonderbra could do for an A cup, twisted a pen around her straight, shoulder-length hair. She didn’t notice Addison come in. She didn’t notice Addison approach the desk. She only noticed a giant of a boy with a camera slung around his neck that stood at her desk making ill-humored remarks. Addison cleared her throat but to no avail. The giggles were too loud.

  “Oh, Kirk, you’re so funny,” the girl said. “You have to stop distracting me. I have to get back to work.”

  “Doing what, Shelby? I haven’t seen you do anything since I got here.”

  “That’s because you keep pestering me,” she said, lightly poking his leg with a pen.

  “Just say the word, and I’ll stop.”

  “What if I don’t want you to?”

  He flashed a devilish grin her direction and walked away.

  “Excuse me,” Addison said.

  Shelby looked up. She wasn’t smiling now. “Yeah?”

  “Am I disturbing you?”

  “No, why?”

  “You are the receptionist, right?”

  Shelby grabbed the coffee cup sitting next to her, slurped some of it down, and combed a hand through her hair like she was afraid one of the strands might be out of place. When the ritual was complete, she said, “Uh…yeah?”

  “Who do I talk to about looking through some old newspapers?”

  “What for?”

  Addison clenched her hands into fists. This was the exact type of person she’d left Los Angeles to get away from. “Why do you need to know? Papers are public information, are they not?”

  Shelby forced a smile. “Like, how
old?”

  Before Addison could answer, Giant Camera Boy leaned his head out of his office, looked her way, and smiled. Shelby craned her neck and turned as if a third eye in the back of her head made her magically aware of his presence.

  “Look, you two can get a hotel later, but right now, I need some information.”

  Shelby’s head snapped back into place. “What did you say?”

  “You heard me.”

  “I’m married,” the girl said, flashing a sparkly, yellow diamond on her ring finger.

  “Then maybe you should start acting like it.”

  Shelby appeared too dumbfounded to respond. Tired of the girls’ foolish games, Addison marched past her into the first office on the left. A man in a striped suit wearing a Tweety Bird tie eyeballed her and said, “If you need something, the receptionist is out front.” He then attempted to wave Addison out of his office. In response, she sat down across from him, letting him know she’d gone that route already and she wasn’t going to do it again. He listened to her request while watching the seconds tick by on the wall clock. When she finished, he hastily said it was true—they did keep back issues of every paper they’d ever published, but they were on a deadline at the moment. He wouldn’t be able to let her back there, maybe for hours. Her best bet and her fastest one, he explained, was to visit the library in the city.

  CHAPTER 16

  Barry had enjoyed his position as manager of the biggest public library in New York City for the past thirty-four years. Years that had stripped him of his sportsman-like waistline, replacing it with a bowl full of fatty goo. His protruding tummy required the continual use of suspenders to ensure the top of his drawers never showed the public more than they bargained for. But he didn’t mind. He’d grown fond of the suspenders over time, especially when he discovered they came in multiple colors. Patterned colors even. Today he was donning a pair of blue and white striped ones, a gift from his ailing mother.

  ***

  Addison spotted Barry immediately, noting his suspenders had been hoisted up as high as they could go—a good two inches past his belly button. One would think it would have been the main attraction when looking at Barry, but even more prominent was the foam brace positioned around his neck.