Life in a Haunted House Page 3

  #

  As I grab my bookbag and stand to leave the bus at Melissa’s stop, I get the sensation that everyone watches me. Geoff and his friends wonder why I exit early, maybe laugh behind their hands at New Kid’s apparent mistake. The driver says nothing, and I step down through the accordion doors.

  I risk a glance back. Nobody seems to have noticed.

  A field stretches out on one side of the road, and two kids head toward a small wooden house at the far end of the open property. They’re a brother and sister, and the girl is in my algebra class—last name something like Brickman or Brickson. I wave to her, then wait to follow Melissa’s lead.

  A dense thicket of tall trees lines the facing edge of the road and continues after the intersection. The path through the trees shifts from well-maintained blacktop to a rough packed dirt, with gravel instead of painted lines to indicate the shoulder. Melissa begins to walk in that direction, and I follow her without a word. After a bit, the gravel thins out—a cosmetic improvement begun by the county, I guess, but abandoned once the road stretched too far from the busy intersection.

  The road is wide enough to keep the trees from overwhelming the path with shadows. We’re here at a good time of the afternoon, since the sun’s angle follows the road. I’m grateful for the light, because Melissa walks quickly. When she makes an odd jump or veers to the side, I copy her movement even if I don’t perceive any obstacle in the path.

  “How far is it to your house?”

  “Probably fifteen minutes, at this rate.” Without missing a beat, she adjusts the shoulder strap to her denim backpack. “Usually takes me ten.”

  “I can go faster,” I say, but hope she doesn’t take me up on the offer.

  The sunlight catches her hair but doesn’t add a glimmer. Melissa is an interesting girl, in the way she acts, but to be brutally honest, she’s not someone who’d be described as pretty. She is slim, and loose-fitting clothes disguise any slight curves to her figure. I know the word “plain” is meant to be an insult, but it suits her. Perhaps that’s exactly the appearance she intends—to avoid standing out, to avoid being a target of attention at school.

  I study the quick motions of her feet, wondering how she keeps her tennis shoes clean despite daily walks along this sloppy road. My sneakers already show scuff marks and dustings from the path, plus a cake of mud attached to my right heel after I’d stumbled into a tire-wide trench.

  No need to watch for traffic, because there isn’t any. Time of day is a factor, since our school lets us out at 2:30, but I doubt any semblance of rush hour occurs later in the evening. We’ve passed a few side roads, but none of them have a mailbox to match some nearby home.

  We eventually approach the first road sign since the bus dropped us off. It’s a faded yellow rectangle, announcing DEAD END in black letters.

  “Almost home,” Melissa says. She stops when we get to the sign.

  I don’t see anything. The way my mind typically works, I imagine a horror-movie scenario. She’ll pull a knife from her backpack, stab me before I’ve got a chance to defend myself, and my body will fit neatly into a grave she’s prepared in advance. That’s the initial fear, but only a starting point. Next I imagine she’s opened this grave before, behind an obscuring bank of trees, and the bodies of former classmates fill the pit. She tosses me in, the blood still draining from my wound, but I haven’t died. I feel the uneasy bed of bones beneath me, and I try to wriggle away. Instead of a shovel, Melissa uses her pristine white shoes to kick dirt from the sides of the pit, slowly covering me. Perhaps she will make a villain speech: “Oh, Brendan, you were the easiest one of all. I found your weakness right away, and how simple it was to lure you to this secluded spot. You never told anyone where you were going, did you? I can see by your eyes that you didn’t—but those eyes will be covered soon. Scream if you want. You’ll only get dirt in your mouth. I suppose you’re wondering if I’m really the daughter of your favorite movie director. Well, I guess you’ll never know.” And she kicks more dirt, still more, then stamps it down, forcing it into my nostrils, tight against my face and my closed mouth. Then I wriggle again against the bones and rotting flesh beneath me, until I realize that I’m lying perfectly still. The bodies themselves are moving, and the scratch of a skeletal hand twists bony fingers around my neck.

  Then I think of something worse: a scenario I call The Ambush of Humiliation. There’s no knife. This slight girl isn’t strong enough to attack me on her own. The more plausible nightmare would involve other students. They all exited the bus at the next stop, doubled back to this location from a different direction, and now they wait to jump out, point and laugh at New Kid, the pathetic movie fan: Well, wouldn’t you know it, this girl’s only pretending. She hates you like the rest of us do. Aw, don’t cry, now. Oh look, he is. He is crying.

  “This way, Brendan.”

  Melissa’s voice pulls me out of the reverie. She motions like a crossing guard, her arm swinging to the right. The way the road ends doesn’t quite qualify as an optical illusion, but it has a similar effect. A fresh bank of trees cuts across the path fifty or so feet beyond the Dead End sign, and if your eyes follow the same stretch of road there’s nowhere left to go. But a grassy stretch leads away on the right, with well-worn lines to indicate the passage of cars.

  A strange odor like motor oil overlays the typical wooded scents, and I hear the ripple of a distant stream. The new path curves around and opens into a clearing. It’s not quite as big as the field outside the bus stop, and not nearly as well-maintained. All the effort was apparently expended years ago chopping down trees, and little had been done since—other than to keep the car path relatively clear, and to approximate a small lawn in front of an ordinary two-story house at the end of the path.

  As we get closer, the house seems less ordinary. For one thing, it’s larger than it looks. There’s a mismatched addition to one side, and possibly an extension to the back of the house, too. The front entrance is the strangest feature. Although the main facade wouldn’t be out of place along any of the country roads in this town—weather-worn brick at the base, and the top story covered with wooden siding that hasn’t seen a fresh coat of paint in years, perhaps decades—the main doors and surrounding porch fit the style of another house, another era.

  It’s a double door entry, with paneled doors of thick, cherry wood. An elaborate mantle supported by faux marble columns forms a protective overhang that casts the front doors into shadow. The mantle’s recessed triangular panel contains a carving that depicts a mythical scene: Theseus at the end of the maze, sword drawn as he encounters the Minotaur.

  In the middle of each door is a lion’s head knocker with a heavy brass ring beneath.

  Early in The Stone Stairway, newlyweds Martin and Samantha Goodwin huddle under this same overhang, seeking dry shelter after their car runs out of gas on a desolate road. Thunder booms amid the heavy downpour, while Martin wonders aloud: What’s a house like this doing way out here, in the middle of nowhere? His new wife tells him not to look a gift horse in the mouth, and nudges him to raise the brass ring and let it fall. The knock echoes heavy on the soundtrack, louder even than the thunder, and they wait. Again, try the knocker again, Martin, but he hesitates. A fresh flash of lightning highlights beads of nervous sweat and raindrops that fall down his face. He raises his hand to the door, then pauses at the sound of a deadbolt sliding back. With a loud, sustained creak, the door opens inward.

  Dry-ice fog and a simulated night-time thunderstorm help preserve the on-screen illusion. Fifteen years later, it’s clear the Minotaur bas relief is painted on the mantle, rather than being an elegant carving. The supporting pillars are painted as well, and flecks of the design have chipped off over the years.

  I follow Melissa up the porch steps. The doors themselves, once stained to a rich cherry, now look cheap and faded. Like Martin in the film, I reach for the ring beneath the lion’s-head knocker. It’s rusted, and way too light—as hollow as the chr
ome-plated ring that holds a roll of toilet paper in our downstairs bathroom.

  Melissa pauses to let me take it all in. As cheap and faded as it is, I’m standing in part of a movie set.

  To me, it’s magic. It’s a doorway Melissa passes every day, and to her it’s probably grown blandly familiar. I flatter myself that she sees it fresh through my eyes. That’s the reason she rushed us here, and why she pauses now. She couldn’t wait for me to experience it.

  If I shift my position, I can block out the normal sections of the house. As if to assist the illusion, a cloud passes over the sun. The afternoon’s still not dark enough, but I relax my eyes and the porch shifts out of focus—a blur that simulates the grain of 16mm film, transferred to video with all its flaws intact. Chips of paint are actually scratches on nitrate; instead of weather-worn decay, the front doors display wear and tear from countless feedings through the clumsy sprockets of a drive-in movie projector.

  In my mind, the cloud over the sun is heavy with rain. It bursts into a sudden downpour that rattles loud against the overhang, plashes onto the mansion’s surrounding cobblestone path, and batters like flung gravel against the bricks and window panes.

  “Sorry to bother you.” I do my best imitation of the actor’s delivery. “Our car broke down, back the road a ways.”

  “Yeah, um, I guess you can use our phone to call for a tow truck.” Melissa smiles, and it’s cool that she was ready to play along. Her local accent is actually a decent fit for many of the voices in the film, but she’s overplayed it, slipping into the accent people adopt to mock the snooty upper class.

  Besides, it’s not the right line to follow mine.

  There isn’t another line, actually. In the movie, when the deadbolt slides back from the other side and the door creaks inward, Martin delivers his explanation to a person standing in the shadowy interior. Except there isn’t anyone there.

  The door opened by itself. The house is dark and empty.

  I wonder what it would be like to live here, to experience this sense of wonder and magic every day. To spend your life in the haunted house from The Stone Stairway.

  “Let’s go in,” Melissa says. She unlocks the door and pushes it open. It moves easily, without the creak of ancient hinges.

  Sunlight through half-closed curtains brightens the disappointing interior. No marble-tiled foyer and high ceiling. No massive stone stairway leading to the darker floors. Instead, there’s a simple hallway entrance with a cable-rug doormat, a small coat closet, and an oval mirror mounted over a plant stand. If I stood on my tiptoes and stretched my arms, I’d almost be able to touch the ceiling. There’s a den to the left, with mustard-colored shag carpeting beneath a sofa set and matching chairs.

  It’s nicer than the apartment my mom’s rented for us, which is furnished with rejects from the landlord’s garage and with paint and wallpaper choices that reflect the competing tastes of previous tenants. Still, Melissa’s place seems the kind of house the Brickman/Brickson siblings would return to after school each day. I could imagine Geoff’s friends visiting him in a house like this, too, spreading out on the sofa and on the floor, passing around a bowl of popcorn while watching football and insulting each other.

  “My mother would apologize for the mess.”

  “But it’s…”

  “Spotless, I know.” Melissa brushes the top of the oval mirror with a finger to prove no dust has accumulated. “That’s how she is. Works all day, then comes home and straightens. This way.”

  She leads me through the den and down a brief hallway to the kitchen. Like the entryway and den, everything is in its place. The stove and refrigerator are olive green and look brand new; metal knobs shine on varnished wood cabinets, and bright white countertops are clear of clutter. No napkins with crumbs from the morning toast, like at my house, or a jam knife in the sink and a cereal bowl with residue of milk and soggy Quisp.

  Melissa opens the fridge. The stuff inside is organized like stock on a grocery shelf, and I get the feeling if I opened a random cabinet I’d find items similarly arranged. Possibly alphabetized.

  She offers me a soda—a generic can of Triple Cola—and we sit in padded chairs at a small Formica table with bamboo place settings. Before she pulls the soda tab, Melissa cups her hand over the top to prevent any spray from making a mess. I do the same, then take a quiet sip. Tastes just like the expensive kind, my dad would say, sometimes followed by a gagging face as if he was being poisoned.

  “Cold,” I say, for lack of a better comment. This clearly isn’t a house where you can wander from room to room with an open soda can, setting it down on a book or balancing it on the arm of a chair. I’m not here for the soda, but I don’t want to be rude by gulping it down.

  Melissa laughs, and I think maybe she feels as awkward as I do. Either that, or she’s making fun of me.

  I consider the usual conversation starters. Weather. School. Politics. I could compliment the house, or the shirt she’s wearing. Would it be too obvious if I only want to talk about movies?

  Another sip. The can feels heavy, slick at the sides as if ready to slip through my fingers and fizz carbonated stains into cracks of the linoleum floor.

  The silence of the kitchen makes me nervous. Aside from my fear that I’ll smudge some immaculate surface, there’s another odd quality to the room. I can’t quite figure out what it is.

  Maybe Melissa is the problem. She watches me as if she expects something. Is this a date—where I should reach across the table to touch her hand? Or, should I bemoan how I’ve moved from town to town, never put down roots long enough to make real friends? I’d confess that I’ve always been alone, raise an eyebrow, say: But, in you, I sense a kindred spirit.

  All ridiculous. We barely know each other.

  She comes to my rescue, tilting her head to indicate the front of the house. “That prop was a little too big for me to sneak into Art class.”

  “I still can’t believe it. I’ve seen The Stone Stairway a half-dozen times.” Closer to three dozen, but that might seem excessive. I could also mention how the same doorways indicate the governor’s mansion in Night of Shadows and the LeMott Manor in Unmarked Grave, among other film appearances—but I keep that trivia to myself. “The movie set. The actual movie set.”

  As I say it, I want to go back to the porch. I’d stood there a scant two or three minutes, and there were details I hadn’t time to savor. I feel like I have to confirm the location is as special as it seemed. What if, as we sit here in a fairly normal kitchen and drink generic sodas, make meaningless conversation—what if the magic of the place somehow leaks away?

  “I guess that was a good surprise,” Melissa says.

  “Yeah. Yeah, it really was.”

  It occurs to me that, in an ideal world, she’d be famous for her family connection. Other kids would want to visit this house with the strange and fascinating front porch. When the English teacher showed a movie in class, he should single her out: Today we’re watching Orson Welles in Macbeth. Oh, Melissa, how do you think your father would have filmed the scene with the three witches?

  “Do people at school know about your dad?”

  “Not really.” She takes the top napkin from a wicker holder and wipes at her mouth, then at the condensation on the soda can. “They wouldn’t think it was such a big deal.”

  “Wow. But it kind of is, though. Right?”

  She beams a little bit then—that pride kids always feel when somebody compliments their parents. That’s when I realize I can stop trying so hard to make casual conversation. It’s okay for me to gush about the movies her father made. She’s singled me out and brought me here because I love those films. I am the one kid who can appreciate them, the way nobody else in our peer group ever could.

  I’d been too shy to prompt her earlier, but I’m more confident now. “You said you had more stuff to show me…”

  “Yeah.”

  #

  Melissa’s room is nice, although not as meti
culously clean as the rest of the house. That’s as it should be. A teenager’s room needs to look lived in, with a bit of clutter and confusion to reflect how strange life seems during our unsettled years before adulthood. It should also serve as a sanctuary from parents: for Melissa, a place where she can spread homework papers on a desk, and needn’t worry how her mom might react if she places a book or knick-knack on the wrong shelf. Where she can throw the covers over her bed without aligning the quilt pattern with the corners and smoothing the fabric over her pillows. Where she can thumb-tack posters to the wall, instead of hanging framed art prints.

  Melissa has taken me here because it’s the one room in the house where she can relax.

  She’d initially set her school backpack in the hall closet, but now she’s brought it upstairs. She drops it beside her bed, then offers me the plastic chair at her desk. When she sits on the edge of the bed to face me, she bounces slightly as if testing the springs.

  Her bedroom has some of the things I’d expect in a girl’s room. A few stuffed animals sit and stare from different shelves of her bookcase; the wallpaper is mostly white, with a floral pattern suggested in faint blues and yellows. The bed has a frilled ruffle hiding the frame and the space beneath. In contrast, her bulky wooden desk reminds me of one I loved in my old St. Louis room: a wide and deep surface good for drawing, and a nice hutch at the back to hold books and art supplies. She has the same set of pastels I used to like, and a plastic cup filled with different-colored markers and paint brushes.

  An office file cabinet stands out-of-place in the corner beside the closet. The gray four-drawer cabinet is dented in spots, with scratches that have turned brown with rust. To help cover these flaws, Melissa has put stickers of animals and cartoon characters on the exposed side. Fuzzy white patches grow like a fungus on this side, too: an indication of previous labels or stickers, imperfectly removed.

  Of the two posters on the back wall, I like the mountainscape the best: gray sky and wispy clouds above snowy caps, reminding me a bit of the Paramount movie logo. The other picture’s a sunlit field of flowers and tall grass. A little too bright for my taste, but the image is so clear I can almost smell the flowers.