by JL Bryan
“It’s cold,” I said, feeling the cool air as I stood in the doorway.
Alicia nodded, keeping her distance from the door after opening it.
“That’s weird for a laundry room,” Stacey said.
I felt sick and afraid as I looked into the darkness of the basement. It wasn’t just fear, it was dread, the deep certainty that something horrible was about to happen.
Something horrible already had, I supposed—the monster had returned.
I pointed my flashlight down the steps, but had no real desire to descend into the basement just yet. It might be down there...and it might remember me.
“Have you asked your landlord whether anyone else has had these experiences?” I asked. “Or if there’s any dark history to the house?” Last time, Calvin and I had been unable to determine the identity of the ghost—if it had a human identity at all. It might have been what Calvin called a demonic, a theoretical intelligent spirit that had never been born into flesh.
“Oh, I called the property manager,” Alicia said with a scowl. “I told him what was happening, and he implied it was all a mental-health issue on my end. Only he didn’t say it that nice. He called me hysterical and reminded me illegal drugs aren’t allowed in the building.” She shook her head, a little snarl forming at the corner of her lips. “I’m trying to save up enough money to move, but there’s not much to spare. The rent’s cheap, but there’s a big penalty for breaking the lease.”
“What about your neighbors? Have they seen anything?” I asked.
“I don’t know the Fieldings or Mr. Gray very much. We hardly talk,” Alicia said. “I suppose we could ask Michael and Melissa.” Alicia pointed up the staircase behind her.
“Do they have any kids?” I asked.
“I would hope not! They’re brother and sister. Melissa is seventeen, and she watches my kids sometimes. We can see if Michael’s home.”
“That would be great,” I said.
Alicia led the way up the dark hardwood stairs, the antique grain absorbing the light from the windows alongside them. We crossed a second-floor landing, where there was nothing but a single closed door. She told me it led to the Fieldings’ apartment, and they probably left it locked all the time. It looked like the area around the door had been sealed off long after the house was built—the wall was blank and white instead of paneled with wood.
Two more flights brought us up to another small landing, where there was nothing but a single door. A brass letter “C” hung beside it.
Alicia knocked. After a minute, she knocked again, then shrugged.
“He’s probably at work,” Alicia said. “He’s a firefighter and an EMT, works twelve-hour shifts at the station.”
“A fireman and a medic?” Stacey’s eyebrows raised. “Is he cute?”
“Stacey.” I shook my head.
“Hey, just asking.”
“Do you have any idea why they don’t live with their parents?” I asked.
“The parents are gone,” Alicia said. “Father ran off, mother passed away. Michael’s taken care of Melissa since then.”
“Aw, and he takes care of his little sister?” Stacey asked. “He sounds great.”
“Stacey, aren’t you dating Jacob?” I asked.
“One date. We haven’t talked exclusivity...” She glanced at Alicia and blushed. “Uh, anyway...”
“He helps us out, fixing things around our apartment. Electricity, plumbing...thank goodness, because I can barely get the property manager to return my calls when something breaks.”
“So he’s good with his hands,” Stacey said. “Wait, are you like, romantically involved with him, Alicia?”
Alicia shook her head. “Nice guy, just...not my type.”
“Next time you see Michael and Melissa, can you ask them to speak with us?” I asked.
“I certainly will.”
As we descended the stairs again, I was deep in thought, worried about how we would handle this case. It sounded like the same entity from the Wilson house had slipped over into this apartment building. It had bested us last time, so what could we do now?
I needed to talk it over with Calvin, urgently. And Stacey needed to be brought up to speed.
“Mrs. Rogers,” I said when we reached the ground floor, “I think we might have some insight into what’s happening here, but I want to do some research and get back with you. We also need to schedule an overnight observation.” Which will hopefully show that I’m wrong about all of this, I thought. “We can do it as soon as it’s convenient for you, but I recommend we get moving as soon as possible.”
“I agree with that,” Alicia said.
“We’ll have to come in and set up cameras, microphones, and other gear around your apartment,” I said.
“Do it as soon as you can,” she said. “I’m about to lose my mind here.”
“Anybody would feel that way after what you’ve been through,” I told her. “We can start tonight.”
Alicia agreed. She led us out to the front porch, and I walked to the corner and pointed to the boarded-up Wilson house. “Have you or your kids ever gone over to that house?”
“That scary old place? They better not have,” Alicia asked. “Why? Is it haunted?”
“It has a history of being haunted,” I said. “We’ve investigated it before.”
“What happened?” Alicia asked.
“The entity vanished without a trace before I could trap it,” I said.
“Wish this one would do the same,” Alicia said. “It can start vanishing anytime it likes.”
I gave her a laugh. “We’ll be in touch a little later today.”
Stacey and I left the porch and returned to the van, where I stopped and grabbed a crowbar out of the back, adding it to my toolbox. Then I continued on down the sidewalk.
“Um, where are you going?” Stacey asked. “Aren’t we leaving?”
“We’re walking to the next block. I want a closer look at the Wilson house.”
“Not that creepy tall one with the boarded-up windows?” Stacey asked.
“Exactly that one.”
“Ugh,” Stacey said. “I’d better bring a flashlight.”
Chapter Three
The next street had large antique homes as well, set back behind ornate but mildly aggressive fences that seemed to dare you to try and climb over their black iron teeth.
The boarded-up old Wilson house loomed over the neighborhood like a blind watchtower, much taller than it was wide. Its yard was a crazed jungle of weeds and wildflowers under the thick shade of the trees.
The air felt chillier as we approached it.
“What exactly happened here?” Stacey whispered.
“The Wilsons,” I said. “They experienced what Alicia was just talking about. Monsters in the closet. A shadowy crawling thing that can take the shape of your fears.”
“And you didn’t catch the ghost.”
“We couldn’t identify the ghost, so it was hard to trap. And then...”
“Yes? Still listening over here.”
“I’ll have to let Calvin tell you about that part,” I said. “But this ghost was very dangerous. Not just psychokinetic, but psychotropic. Able to induce hallucinations.”
“Sounds fun,” Stacey said, her tone sarcastic. She looked up at the tall, sealed-up house and let out a slow sigh. “What kind of hallucinations?”
“Whatever you’re afraid of.” I walked along the fence, then glanced around to see whether anyone was watching. Of course, anybody could have been peering at us through their windows, but the only person on the street was a mail lady in a white Jeep. I waited for her to continue on down the block, then I set my toolbox on the ground.
The fence was about four feet high, the gate padlocked. It wasn’t impossible to climb over—just very, very tricky, with the iron spikes all along the top. I placed the toe of my boot on the middle rail.
“Uh, Ellie? It looks like you’re about to climb over that sharp fence, ther
e. Am I seeing that wrong?” Stacey asked.
“Give me a boost,” I said. “I’ll be less likely to impale myself that way.”
Stacey helped me over the fence, then handed me my toolbox. I stood in high, tangled weeds.
“You can stay here and keep watch,” I told her.
“For what? Old ladies walking Yorkies?” Stacey handed me her camera bag, then vaulted easily over the fence.
“Show-off,” I said.
“I did gymnastics in high school.” She shrugged, then looked up at the house. “Seems even colder on this side of the fence. Probably just the extra shade, right?”
“Probably.” I brought out my Mel-Meter to check the temperature and any electromagnetic fields in the area. As I walked slowly toward the front stoop, stepping over thorny invasive plants and hidden stones on the ground, the meter ticked just a little.
“Are we finding anything?” Stacey looked over my shoulder.
“Just a milligau or so, but even that’s unusual. Considering the house looks abandoned and locked up, I’m doubting there’s any electricity flowing into it.” I glanced up at the power lines, as if that would give me some clues. It didn’t, of course.
I walked slowly around the perimeter of the old house, trying to see if the readings picked up.
“So, what happened? They just abandoned the house?” Stacey asked.
I didn’t really want to talk about it, but I had no choice. She had to know what we were up against.
“We couldn’t get rid of the ghost,” I said. “We couldn’t trap it, and it started to get very good at hiding from me...Finally the family fired us since we couldn’t help. It kept going after their kids, and I guess they couldn’t sell the house. They just packed up and left town.”
“That must have been a serious haunting,” Stacey said. “This house looks expensive.”
“Very serious,” I agreed. We walked along the side of the house, then around to the back. My Mel-Meter continued flickering, indicating some kind of activity within.
“So tell me about the ghost—hey, are you doing what I think you’re doing?”
I’d brought out my crowbar and placed the flat end against the plywood covering a small window at the back of the house.
“Yep,” I said. I pointed the end against the edge of the wood and the brick frame of the window sill, and I slapped my hand against the curved end of the bar, hammering it into place.
“So we are breaking and entering?” she asked.
“I just want a quick look around.”
After many difficult and sweaty minutes of work, during which Stacey kept glancing around with a worried look on her face waiting for somebody to bust us, the slab of wood pried away with a crack and tumbled into the weeds below the window.
“Little harder than I expected,” I said, using my shirt to wipe sweat from my face.
Stacey peered inside the open window, up on her tiptoes for a better view.
“Whoa, somebody wrecked this place,” she said.
I looked in alongside her, shining my flashlight into a bare, dusty room where the walls and ceiling had been ripped open.
“It looks like thieves stripped out wiring and pipes to sell for scrap,” I said. “That can happen when houses stand abandoned like this. I guess they boarded up the windows a little too late.”
“Yeah, those plywood sheets really provide a lot of security,” Stacey said, looking at the sheet of wood I’d just pried loose.
“Why don’t you gymnast-vault on in there and have a look around?” I asked.
“By myself?” Stacey blanched. “In an abandoned old house?”
“What, are you scared of ghosts?” I asked.
“It’s just...” She shook her head. “I never told you about the first time I ran into a ghost.”
“It wasn’t a college project thing you were shooting at Colonial Park Cemetery?” I asked. That was how Stacey had introduced herself to us, with video footage of ghosts from around the city. She’d told us that she’d caught one on camera by accident, then started intentionally pursuing them. With a regular camera, you’re lucky to get a flicker of a shadow, maybe an orb or two. The amount she’d collected, and her obsession with finding more, had impressed my boss, Calvin Eckhart, who’d been looking for someone to help me in the field.
“No...” Stacey shook her head. “That was when I started collecting ghost images. Something else happened back home, when I was a kid.”
“Tell me while we look around.” I boosted myself up onto the window sill, then into the dark old house. Stacey followed me inside. I hadn’t had any intention of sending her in alone.
“Where I grew up, right outside Montgomery, there was an old mansion like this. Well, not quite like this, not as tall, but it was a sprawling old antebellum place. Some parts of the roof had caved in, and it was so old, I can’t believe any of it was still standing.” Stacey swept her light through the dark room. We continued on into a hallway, and I watched my Mel-Meter for any increase in the electromagnetism around us. “I guess it used to be a plantation house, but most of the land around it was strip malls and stuff...but if you went deep enough into the woods, you could find it standing there, overgrown with thorns and poison ivy. A lot like this place.”
I opened a closet door, and my Mel-Meter ticked up to two milligaus. A strong residual or a weak active presence.
“I’m guessing you went inside?” I asked.
“Yeah.” Stacey stepped over a broken heap that might have been a wooden chair at some point in its existence. “Right before Halloween, what a shock. My brother was going with a couple of his friends—Kevin was thirteen, and I was eleven. Our older brother, Patrick, was in high school and busy with his own friends. Kevin didn’t want me to come either, but I threatened to tell our parents where he was going if he didn’t take me with him.”
“Bratty little sister,” I said.
“Exactly.” Stacey said it with a weak half-smile. “So we broke in there that night—well, we didn’t really have to break in, because the back door was missing. The place was all in ruins, all rotten inside. The floors creaked and groaned like it was fixing to collapse under our feet, and there were a couple of big holes where you could fall through into the foundation, or whatever was under the house. We didn’t have great flashlights like this.” She waved her heavy-duty tactical flashlight.
While Stacey talked, I continued checking the rooms of the old Wilson place, particularly the closets, where the EM activity was a little higher. I led her up the steep, winding stairs to the second floor. The place felt like some kind of network of caverns, completely lightless. The air had a stale, sour smell from being sealed inside so long.
I tried to suppress the memories that wanted to boil out at me at each turn—screaming children, the dark mass of the ghost crawling in its spidery fashion across the ceiling, and finally the blood. Blood everywhere.
“We heard something at the back of the house,” Stacey said. “Like a scratching sound, over and over again. My brother insisted we go check on it. He said it was probably just a dog or some animal trapped inside the house...I was scared, but I was even more scared to be alone. So I went with them.
“It was creepy, because there were trees growing up through the house, and moss everywhere, like it was half-house, half-forest. The scratching got louder as we advanced, room by room, trying not to fall through the old floorboards.
“Kevin walked up to this old door near the back, and he and his friends dared each other to open it. Every time the scratch sounded, the door bumped a little. There was a latch holding it closed on our side, but it was really loose, a couple of the screws had come out of the wall. I had a bad feeling about it, but if he was right and it was some kind of trapped animal, I wanted him to let it go...so I didn’t say anything. I should have.”
“Did you open it?” I led Stacey up to the third floor. Three of the Wilson children’s rooms had been up here—that meant three bedroom closets I had to check
. I walked into the nearest bedroom, where a Cookie Monster poster still hung on one wall. The folding doors to the closet were closed. I set my toolbox down beside them.
“Not me, no way,” Stacey said. “Holy cow, I was shaking so hard. My brother was the one who finally did it—lifted the latch, pulled the old door open. I’ll never forget that awful rusty squawk from the hinges.”
“What did he find?” I tensed and drew open one folding door, half-expecting my worst fears to jump out at me, maybe claw my face off, maybe kill me. Maybe leave me in a wheelchair for the rest of my life.
My heart was thumping as I jabbed the flashlight into the shallow rectangular space of the closet. It was full of cobwebs, and a few forgotten hangers dangled on the rack. More hangers lay on the floor, among abandoned stuffed animals, Barbie dolls, and a pair of very small pink Nikes.
The Mel-Meter ticked up briefly, then subsided.
“When my brother opened the door,” Stacey said, “I thought something would jump out at us, the way it was scratching and clawing on the other side. But nothing did. The door opened, the scratching stopped, and we were looking into a small, dark room, with a little moonlight leaking in from a window.
“The smell hit us a couple seconds later—a gagging, dead-thing-full-of-maggots smell. We all kind of choked, but my brother pulled his shirt over his nose and stepped in there anyway. He was always the brave one, you know. Patrick, my oldest brother, was the popular one, and he stayed out of trouble. Kevin could create trouble out of any situation, even a church barbecue.”
“What was inside the room?” I asked, while leading us into another dark bedroom. Crayon drawings adorned one wall, animals with big teeth and claws, nightmarish things drawn by a little boy. A small bed lay in one corner as if it had been shoved there haphazardly.
“A dead squirrel,” Stacey said. “And that thing had been dead for days, its eyes and guts were all eaten out—”
“I get the idea.”
“It was gross. But it definitely hadn’t been scratching and pounding on any doors anytime that night. And there was nothing else in the room. We shined our flashlights all around—well, they did. I just stayed outside the door and watched.
