by Mark Tufo
“Worry about that when we get to it. We’re not going to be able to save the granite. Let’s get these top cabinets down and we’ll work on that.”
I handed him my drill. He pressed the trigger a couple of times, something every male that ever grabs a tool is wont to do. Whirred and spun just like it was supposed to, right up until he put it inside the cabinet and against a screw. I could hear the tell-tale click as he pulled the trigger, but nothing else.
“Come on, man! You didn’t charge the batteries?”
“Did it last night.”
“Whatever.” Safe to say he didn’t believe me. “Give me the spare.”
After he switched them out, he once again tested the drill. Worked fine again, right up until he placed it in the cabinet.
“I’m telling you, I always charge them up before coming out on a job.” I left the kitchen and grabbed the DeWalt. I gave it a couple of pulls; it lit up and spun. I handed it over to BT. He checked it too, because I can’t be trusted. This time, I was right behind him, watching, seeing if he was somehow doing something wrong. But a two-year-old with decent dexterity could pull off running a drill. The guide light came on for the briefest of moments, dimmed, and then went completely out. I took note that I could now see his breath.
“Can’t even charge the things.” BT angrily put the drill on the countertop. I was getting the sneaking suspicion that even if we had electricity, an electrically powered drill wouldn’t work. Money be damned. I was thinking that maybe just forgoing this job might be the best idea. I had a couple of other small jobs lined up that could help with the bills. There was Mrs. Jonniker, who paid me twenty dollars a month to come over and change out her burnt-out light bulbs, whether she had any or not. Generally, this cost me two hours of my time as she would invariably talk my ear off, but she did make great cookies. Then there was Benny DelForte. He wanted his closets painted; so far not too strange, but this is me, so you know there’s a twist.
He wanted them brown, or a color he called “sexual chocolate.” Sure, whatever, the kicker, though, was he would pull up a chair and watch me as I worked. You can go anywhere you want with that information. Personally, I do my damnedest not to think about it. Oh, and did I fail to mention he had three parrots who, if they weren’t screeching, constantly sang It’s Raining Men. I surcharged the shit out of that job in the hopes he would not pick me to do it, but he always did. I shook my head, letting the thought slide away.
“Maybe we should just go,” I told BT.
“No way. Some other crew is going to come in here and ruin these. This stuff should be in a museum, not at the bottom of a trash heap.” He was fumbling around inside the toolbox for a screwdriver.
“Maybe forget about preserving the cabinets and think about preserving us,” I said. Seemed random enough; and I’m not entirely sure why I said it, though there was a ring of truth to the words.
“That’s dramatic even for you,” BT said as he leaned into the cabinet. “Hey, can you shine the flashlight inside here so I can see what I’m doing?”
I pulled a light off my tool belt. “This is a 3500 lumens light; can almost start a fire with how bright it is. Last night, I put four fresh, triple-A batteries in it because I knew this house had no electricity.”
“Why are you telling me this?” he asked just as I turned the portable lighthouse on.
“If this does what I think it’s going to, I want to leave.” I moved closer to the cabinet; the inside shone brightly for all of three seconds before dimming and becoming dark again.
“Real funny. I’m serious–keep the light on.”
“It’s dead.” To me, those words seemed mighty ominous. But BT wasn’t quite ready to pack it in.
“Give me that.” He swiped it from my hand. Clicked the button two, maybe three hundred times. “You break it?”
“Batteries are dead.”
“You said they were brand new.”
“I’ve watched enough ghost shows to know that spirits attempting to gather energy to manifest can sap power from batteries and it seems like we’ve brought them a portable charging station.”
“You sure are dramatic. Should have been a Theater major.”
“Yeah? What’s that then?” I was pointing to the far side of the kitchen where a pantry door had, of its own volition, opened outward. Could have blamed that on a lot of things, wind, tilted house, a door not hung correctly, all valid enough reasons. Explaining away the thick, black mist that poured forth was going to be a lot more difficult.
“This some sort of prank?” BT looked tense and held the screwdriver out in front of him like one might a knife to a threat.
“No.” There was a tremor to my voice. I think BT was confused when I didn’t protest with some measure of sarcasm. To be honest, I was too terrified. I was worried that if I tried to run I would find that my legs wouldn’t work correctly or they’d be bogged down by some invisible goo. What happened was far, far worse.
“I think we should go.” Even as BT was saying it, I was buttoning the toolbox back up. With as much adrenaline as was coursing through my system, I barely felt the weight of it.
“Ready when you are,” I told him.
It’s difficult to explain the sensation that flowed around and through me, and I’m sure BT as well, as we crossed the threshold or attempted to cross, I should say. There was a loud whooshing through my ears, like I was being thrashed around in some heavy surf. My vision darkened to the point I couldn’t see; I caught a whiff of something sickly sweet, like decaying strawberries, and my mouth tasted like I was sucking on pennies, or blood–coppery–if that makes sense.
All of my normal senses, save one: touch, were being assailed. I would bet that if I had reached out to run my hands over something, I would have felt the bracing chill of the specter passing by, thus forever altering every way I interacted with the world going forward. The more steps I took toward where I figured the door was, the louder the sound, the darker my vision, and the worse the taste in my mouth. It became a crescendo where I did not believe I would be able to take much more. Then, as suddenly as it had started, it stopped.
“What the fuck?” was all I could manage as I looked around at the kitchen I thought I had vacated.
“Bullshit!” BT said next to me. “Come on!” He grabbed at my shoulder as he made a run for the door. His hand slipped off as I did not follow, not willing to again go through what had just transpired. What happened next defies a normal explanation. For a split-second, it looked like he might escape the pull of this surrealist nightmare; then, without warning, his momentum just halted. His legs were still moving, but he was doing what looked like the perfect version of Michael Jackson’s Moonwalk. In seven steps, he was again back and next to me. I was speechless as he shook his head and looked over to me. He was breathing heavy, like he had sprinted a few hundred yards. He was looking like he was going to give it another go; I touched his shoulder and shook my head.
“Won’t work.” I knew that instinctively.
“You got me in here–you get me out.”
The only other egress from the kitchen was a door next to the fridge. You didn’t have to be a writer for a horror movie to know it led to the cellar; that was a given.
“I think we can get out that way.” I feel like I should be ashamed to admit it, but I was hoping BT would go first. When he didn’t move, I walked the few steps over and grabbed the door handle. It was simultaneously hot and cold to the touch. It turned effortlessly; again, that was to be expected. I opened the door cautiously. Dark is a word I could use as I peered down, maybe “fucking dark” would be more accurate. The walls were old foundation, made from rocks cemented together. Wooden steps descended into madness. Maybe BT was right, maybe I was too dramatic. All I know was that the final third of the staircase could not be seen as it was swallowed up by the all-encompassing blackness, and I could feel some vague presence at the bottom. BT was looking over my shoulder.
“You want to go down ther
e?”
“Want to? Not so much,” I told him.
“What about the window?” he asked as we looked back at the frosted panes residing above the sink.
“My guess is it won’t open, then we’ll try to smash it with a hammer and it will be like hitting a bank vault door. And, if by some miracle it does open, it will be much like the other exit.”
“So we just go down the stairs?”
“I’ve got a feeling that’s what we’re meant to do.”
“Yeah? What if there’s a gaggle of clowns down there?”
“First off, that’s a real shitty thing to say. And secondly, a group of clowns is called a shudder, for obvious reasons. You coming with me?”
“Twelve dollars an hour. I’m going to die making less than minimum wage in most states. You’re the crappiest friend a man could ever have.”
I was two steps down when he finished his mini-diatribe. Four, by the time he touched down on the top one. By the time I was halfway down, the shadow below was creeping up to meet me.
“That can’t be right,” BT said as he watched the phenomenon.
I was hesitant to go any further. The darkness, which held no shape, rolled over the step right below where my feet were. It pooled and swirled there, waiting expectantly for me to immerse myself in it. My labored breathing was the only thing I could hear for long seconds before BT spoke and made me jump.
“You sure about that?” he asked as my foot hovered above the step.
“I think we’re supposed to go down there.”
“Says who? The voices in your head or this house?”
“Could be the same thing.”
The swirling dark mist was piling up so that it was directly below the sole of my boot, like there was a slight magnetic attraction between it and me. I stepped down, expecting that the darkness would splash away much like fog might when disturbed. Instead, it clung like dirty water.
“Maybe this wasn’t a good idea,” I said as I tried to lift my leg and was met with resistance. I pulled free with an audible squelch. The wet mist snapped back like a rubber band, then once again began to pool up.
“First smart thing you’ve said in nearly a month.”
“I’m still going down.”
“Why? To look for the bodies of the other poor bastards that came here before us?”
“That would explain all the tools upstairs.”
“Again, valid reasoning which makes your desire to continue on this path not reasonable.”
“Agreed. This is super freaky and I’m terrified, BT, but so far nothing bad has happened. We haven’t heard some menacing spirit tell us to get out…or redrum chanted over and over,” I said, wiggling my finger like that poor kid Danny in The Shining. I, however, did not use his creepy voice, as that would have been way too scary and over the imaginary line I’d drawn.
“If you haven’t noticed, it won’t let us go. Who the hell knows why it wants us.”
“I don’t think it means us harm.”
“Forgive me for not trusting your judgment, but aren’t you the same guy that just last week told your boss that there were a series of Widespread Panic concerts coming up and you would appreciate being taken off the random drug testing roster?”
“I’m a good employee. I would like a little leeway when it comes to my recreational use of illicit substances during special occasions.”
“Mike, you know I’m a cop, right?”
“Yeah, the same cop that was over at my house last month taking bong hits with weed he confiscated.”
“Bong hits? I took two tokes off a joint. Hardly makes me…” He paused. “You.”
“Fine, but I think we need to go downstairs anyway.” I took another step down. My right leg was submerged, maybe “engulfed” is a better term, all the way up to my knee. The mist had a gravity to it, a weight I could feel pulling on my leg. Not in a cloying manner, but rather a gentle pressure, maybe akin to a swaddling. Although, just the mere thought of swaddling made me feel claustrophobic. I moved my left foot down and into the darkness; the blackness was creeping up toward my hips and waist. I can’t say I was looking forward to this spectral visitor moving any farther up. Would I be able to breathe once it covered my mouth and nose?
“Mike?” BT asked as he pointed to his boot and the mist swirling up and over it.
“Is that you?” a voice rose from deep inside the basement. Going to freely admit, I was happy it wasn’t a little girl. For some reason, small children, girls in particular, tend to make the scariest ghosts, demons, vampires, whatever. Makes sense though, because as teenagers, they can strike fear into the hearts of any father. Go on, have one. You’ll see what I mean.
“You hear that?” I asked BT.
He nodded. “Yeah, was making sure you did too before I admitted it.”
“Who are you looking for?” I shouted, much too loudly.
“Michael Talbot.” My heart skipped a beat from the answer, but it was tough to take it seriously as the voice (which was distinctively male) added a bunch of fake ghostly sounds like awhoooo and drawn out boooos. “And that other big fellah who’s usually with you.” There was a snapping of fingers like he was trying to remember names. “KP? BJ. Nope, nope…BLT! That’s it.”
“You know this fool?” BT had instantly shed his fear and was rapidly moving to anger after being called a sandwich.
“Yes. I frequent haunted houses all the time.”
“This place is haunted?” the voice drifted up.
“You live here. I would think you would know, crazy man,” BT shouted past my ear.
“I’m just visiting,” the disembodied voice informed us.
“In the basement of this house that’s being renovated? You a squatter?” I asked. I was even more hesitant to go down now that I thought there was a person there, as opposed to only whatever was in control of the peculiar happenings occurring. Getting stabbed in the neck with a broken beer bottle by a squatter was not high on my bucket list items.
“I’ve squatted from time to time, you know, when the mood strikes and you have to go but you find yourself at a music festival with far too few plastic poo potties. A bit of advice, if you decide to eat seven bean burritos in the morning, make sure you remove your pants from at least one leg when you go or you’re liable to leave yourself a stinky present or two in your underwear, and let me tell you, it’s no fun when you pull your pants back up.”
“What is this crazy person talking about? Do you think the house did this to him?”
Logical thinking on BT’s part. Now I was left wondering if we should keep descending; it was anyone’s guess how far we would go.
“I’m still alive…we’re still alive,” he corrected himself.
“Who are you?” was all I could think to ask.
“What world is this?”
“Mike.” I was sure BT was going to haul me out of there and make another stab at the front entrance; instead, he was pointing to the mist, which was now halfway up my chest, though I had not taken another step.
“I wouldn’t stay in that stuff too long,” our host offered.
“Then why are you here?” I was watching in fascinated horror as the inky mist crawled up my shirt with a mind of its own.
“Ponch, I tried. I tried to save them all.”
Chapter 15
Fade to a semi-awakening
The dream was savagely real to me, and the duality of it was conflicting. The Mike swathed in darkness had no idea who the voice was or what he was saying, but the sleeping voyeur knew exactly what was happening, and even asleep I could feel the sob building deep in my chest. “Trip? You’re alive?” This I said aloud; Tracy bore witness to it, sleeping next to me as I’d awakened her with my calling out.
“Ponch? Is that you?” I nearly started awake. I was no longer watching from a safe vantage point, I was an active participant. The BT in the dream had heard something and was looking around. The strata of strangeness going on at this very moment was overwhel
ming. Dream Mike and dream BT were in very real danger; I could not be sure if it was happening right this very moment or already had, and truth be told, what the hell was I going to do about it? He’d already broken the cardinal rule of every horror movie everywhere by going downstairs, I thought I had taught him better. At least he went with a friend.
“Where are you, Trip?”
“I’m not sure; I was pretty wasted last night while Stephanie drove the tour bus. I do know it snew last night.”
“Snew? What the fuck is a snew, Trip?”
“Middle English dialectal, past tense for snow.”
“Wha…?” I was shaking my head in my dream. I had gone from overseer to first-person shooter perspective. I was in the basement; luckily, I was not dealing with the mist. I was staring at a shimmering doorway; it was slightly better than a glass privacy door in a shower, but not by much. I was thankful that Trip appeared clothed; with him, nothing was a certainty. My heart surged with the idea that some of them had made it…including the crazy bastard.
“Stephanie says we’re out West somewhere; our paths will cross soon. Be careful, man. We have company.” And just like that, the doorway began to lose its translucence. “BYE, Bye, bye, b….” Trip had not moved; he was just saying each word softer and softer to give the effect that he was backing away.
“Still here, Trip.”
“I was going for flare, Ponch.”
“I think showing up in my dream was enough flare.”
“Just remember Payne….”
“Wait, what about her!?” Of course, this was when he really did fade out. Had a conversation about snew, but couldn’t be bothered to tell me about Payne, a vicious vampire.
“And Iggy!” drifted back.
“The gorilla?” I let barely escape my lips after pondering the name for a minute.
“What gorilla?” BT, on the stairs, asked.
“What are you talking about?” other Mike asked.
This was going far past the realm of delusion, I don’t know what the word for that would be, but I was living it. I had every intention of pinching myself and extracting my consciousness from whatever this was. That was right up until I saw the three men against the far wall in the basement. They were all in heaps near each other but not touching. They were unmoving in that particular way; I knew they were dead, and that wasn’t the worst part. There were deep scratches in the rock and cement behind them that were outlined in crimson. On closer inspection, I would have been able to tell without a doubt that they had been attempting to claw their way out and had died from the effort. This Mike and BT were very much in danger; what kind of shadowy presence would I be if I didn’t help them?
