Scream Test: An unforgettable and gripping psychological thriller

by Mark Gillespie

  “Yeah,” Ellie said, nodding. “I think it was a ghost telling me to get my shit together. Reminding me of what the fuck I came here for. Fuck, fuck, FUCK!”

  Fingers interlocked, she put her hands on her head.

  “What am I doing? What have I been doing here? Drinking wine, reading scripts – this is NOT how it’s supposed to be.”

  Klein barked a laugh. “There are no poltergeists in here Ellie. I promise, they wouldn’t be seen dead on the fifth floor. They’re all out in bungalow 3 snorting coke and doing speedballs with the ghost of Tommy Moreno.”

  Ellie was still staring at the laptop. The charger cable was hanging out of the side, disconnected from the power source at the wall. The image of Kane Dallas was gone, leaving only a blank screen. She scratched her head. Scratched her neck, chasing some fast-moving itch that eluded her. Christ, she’d almost given in. Fame and fortune – they almost had the stick insect from West Rouge in their claws. She felt like running into the bathroom and throwing cold water all over her face.

  Her head was clear. At long last.

  No more coffee, no more wine, and no more Tucci.

  You came all this way, she told herself. Let go of the doubts.

  Do it.

  “C’mon Ellie,” Klein said, drawing his eyebrows together. “I’ve got a lot on today sweetheart. Now I’ve taken time out of my busy schedule to do you this favor. You understand? You impressed me in Canada. Where’s that girl at right now? Let me be blunt here darling. I can do amazing things for you when it comes to your career. Your first role in an American movie will be in a Bob Tucci movie. You hear that?”

  He was talking at a hundred miles per hour. Like he’d somehow refueled on coke without Ellie noticing.

  The big shot producer, dangling the same old carrot.

  You don’t know what this is, Ellie thought. My friend is coming to get you and if you knew what she was like, you’d have run already.

  “A Tucci, for God’s sake,” Klein cried out. “That’s like being an unknown in a Coppola or a Scorsese movie back in the seventies. It’s better than that. Now, think long and hard Ellie. Think really hard about this. What do you want? Huh? Do you want to connect with Bob later this week or do you want to get back on the bus to Toronto? If you don’t want to see Bob, say so right now and stop wasting my goddamn time. All I have to do is click my fingers and I got hundreds of girls lining up in the corridor out there, begging me for this part. Hundreds, thousands. Begging me. Hand and knees, you know I’m not kidding either. Right? And here we are, I’m handing this to you on a silver platter. You came up to me that night on the red carpet, remember? I thought you wanted this. I thought you wanted to be a big star.”

  Ellie stood there, feeling lightheaded and dizzy. But in a good way.

  “Sit down on the bed,” Klein snapped.

  Ellie shook her head. “No. Actually, I’d like to step outside for a breath of fresh air. Then I’ll come back.”

  Klein’s voice was a thinly-veiled growl. “You don’t have time for a break. I want to work on the script. I want you to sit down on the bed.”

  “No.”

  “What did you say to me?”

  Ellie was surprised to feel a half-smile forming on her lips. “I said, no.”

  Klein thundered forward and Ellie backpedaled over the carpet that was still damp with shower water. Her back hit the door.

  The producer’s eyes blazed. He stopped a few feet from the door, his forehead glistening.

  Ellie, recognizing the danger she was in, shot her arm out behind her and grabbed a hold of the door handle. It was locked. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw a metal thumb lock beside the handle. She toggled the lock, heard the door rattle on its hinges but the catch wouldn’t slide free.

  “What’s wrong with the door?”

  “Those locks are tricky,” Klein said in a whisper. That whisper was more frightening than all the raised voices in the world.

  His eyes were cloudy as he took a step towards her.

  Ellie felt like she was trapped inside a coffin, listening to someone on the outside hammering the nails in.

  “Can you open it?” she asked.

  “What did you come here for?” Klein asked. “What did you mean earlier when you said you’d come for revenge? Revenge against who? Me?”

  “Open the door.”

  “I never locked it,” Klein said. “It must have been Jami. Maybe she broke it on the way out.”

  “Bullshit. What did you do to it?”

  Klein was still advancing towards her. To Ellie, he looked like a demon, black-eyed and arms spreading out to the sides, unfolding a giant wingspan.

  “I won’t let you leave Ellie.”

  “You can’t stop me.”

  Klein looked perplexed as Ellie continued to press her back up against the door. “Sweetheart, I don’t know where things went wrong here. The laptop falling off the desk really spooked you, huh? Look, I was only joking about tremors and ghosts. I hit it with my elbow. It was an accident.”

  Ellie didn’t say anything.

  “Ellie?”

  “What?”

  “Don’t waste your talent,” Klein said. “You want a piece of advice for free from someone who’s been in this business for over thirty years? Lay off the drugs baby. This town eats addicts for breakfast.”

  “You don’t know what’s happening,” Ellie said. “You don’t have a clue what’s happening. Do you?”

  “Ten minutes,” Klein said. He held up both hands, showing ten fat fingers to stress the point. “That’s all I’m asking baby doll. Sit down on the bed. Do yourself a favor. You do know that there’s only a tiny percentage of actors in the world who make a living doing this, right? You want to be one of them? You want to be up there at the top of the mountain, set for life? Or do you want to go back to Canada, wake up every morning for the rest of your life, beaten down, tired, broke, and thinking woulda-shoulda-coulda?”

  Ellie shook her head. It felt like an acid trip was dissolving inside her, removing all illusion of fame and fortune and the temptation of material things. She was back to where she started when she’d walked into Room 59.

  This was revenge. Take two. And…

  Action.

  “I can feel her,” Ellie said. “She’s coming.”

  Klein walked towards her. His naked feet scraped over the carpet, making a slow, clawing noise. “Oh boy,” he said. “I gotta admit I’ve got a thing for beautiful women who’re crazy in the head. They’re so vulnerable and I love it.”

  Ellie’s back was still up against the door. But she was no longer trying to master the lock.

  Klein rushed forward and grabbed her by the arm. The bulge was back under the towel, leading the charge. He clamped his other hand over Ellie’s mouth and for a second it covered her nostrils too and she couldn’t breathe. “We both came here for a screen test and we’re doing a fucking screen test. You fucking crazy cockteaser. This is a hotel for discreet adults. Are you an adult Ellie? Are you?”

  He pulled her away from the door. Back into the room, towards the bed.

  Ellie tried to wrestle free of his vice-like grip. Klein was too big. Far too big, too strong.

  She panicked. Saw the Shadow Man laughing every time she blinked.

  “Ten minutes,” Klein snapped, tightening his grip on her arm so that Ellie’s skin was burning hot. He finally took his hand off her mouth and Ellie grabbed a lungful of air. When she looked at Klein, his arm was cocked back, fingers curled into a massive hammer-like fist.

  “Do you want to be in a goddamn Tucci?”

  He pulled her towards the bed.

  She hit him. She kicked him. It had no effect.

  He had control of her body, but not her mind. As Ellie fell onto the bed, she fled to the running water of the Rouge River. To the call of the belted kingfisher, its loud rattling voice bringing with it a sudden calm.

  November 28th, 2009

  “Your little friend has gone crazy,
” Marian Ferguson said, putting her purse down on the table.

  As she took off her coat, she glanced around the tidy, workmanlike kitchen with disappointment in her eyes. That was kind of a routine, Ellie had noticed. Her mom would stay like that for a few moments when she got back into the house. Just looking. Everything about the room, the stainless-steel refrigerator, double sink, dull cabinetry and rough-hewn beams on the ceiling, they clearly bored her.

  Ellie jumped off the barstool. She’d been sitting at the counter eating a bowl of Cheerios and watching Saturday afternoon reruns of Dawson’s Creek when her mom had returned from the bar.

  “What are you talking about?” she said.

  It wasn’t unusual to find her mom in a strange mood after drinking with her friends or by herself all afternoon. But she’d never said anything weird like this before. Not even close. Usually, she’d walk or stagger in, pour herself another drink and then flop into her armchair in the living room in front of the TV. Ellie’s dad would be there too, slowly working his way through a bottle of Scotch and staring at some kind of sporting event. They’d make small talk. Long periods of silence. Eventually, as sure as the sun rises, they’d either fight or fuck.

  “Your little friend,” Marian said. She leaned over the table and picked up an apple from the fruit jar. Noticing an ugly bruise on the skin, she put it back down, grimacing in disgust. “Your only friend. Although you haven’t seen her in a while, have you? Shit, what’s her name again?”

  Ellie could smell the vodka on her mother’s breath. Not unusual. Marian was fanning it out across the kitchen like an AC unit. Ellie was getting dizzy. Dizzy and drunk.

  “You know what her name is. It’s Cassandra for God’s sake. What do you mean she’s gone crazy?”

  A stream of panic worked its way up Ellie’s legs. Like colored liquid rising inside a thermometer.

  “Her mom called me when I was in The Tiger Lounge,” Marian said. “What for? I’m not an answering machine, am I? And I wasn’t taking the phone outside. It’s almost December for God’s sake. Besides, she was kinda screaming and I couldn’t make out every word she said. Not when there was music playing in the bar.”

  “Mom!”

  “Don’t shout at me, Ellie. Not right now. Look, she said something about Cassandra going berserk on the front lawn this morning. Full on batshit crazy. My words, not hers. Apparently, people saw her and some of them started filming on their cellphones. Her mom was asking about you. Wondering if you had any ideas as to why Cassandra flipped her lid?”

  Ellie’s hands were on her head. “Oh my God. And she called you when? This morning?”

  “No. Lunchtime, I guess.”

  Ellie pointed to the star-shaped wall clock that had been hanging off their kitchen wall for ten years. “That’s like two or three hours ago. And you’re just telling me now? Why didn’t you call me? I have a cellphone, remember? You’re the one who gave it to me for emergencies.”

  Marian Ferguson glanced through the kitchen window, onto the quiet street outside. Her warm, alcohol-soaked brain was still back in The Tiger Lounge with a double vodka, good music, and soft lighting to buffer the near-winter sunlight outside. Although the drinking was slowly taking its toll, she was still a good-looking woman in her late-thirties and no doubt she enjoyed the attention of male admirers, especially when she was on her own. Whether or not these encounters ever led to anything, a few hours of sordid fun in a fleabag hotel room, that was anyone’s guess. She sure as hell didn’t bring them home.

  “I’m telling you now, aren’t I?” she said, spinning around to face her outraged daughter. “Anyway, it’s not an emergency. I bet you a million bucks she ran out of Doritos. She’s quite a fat girl, isn’t she?”

  “I can’t believe you didn’t call me,” Ellie said, shaking her head over and over. “My best friend’s in trouble.”

  “You haven’t seen her in weeks.”

  “What’s wrong with you? Don’t you care about anything anymore?”

  Marian shrugged. “Christ, take it easy Ellie. You kids today are so dramatic. Good thing you don’t have any wars to fight, isn’t it?”

  “Her mom called you,” Ellie said. “It’s obviously serious.”

  Marian pulled out a bag of salt and vinegar chips from the pantry. She tore them open and started shoveling them into her mouth. “Well, I don’t know. I wasn’t there, was I?”

  Ellie was pacing the kitchen floor, staring at her phone on the counter beside the abandoned bowl of Cheerios. “Why didn’t her mom call me? My number’s right there on Cassie’s phone.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she wanted to talk to an adult.”

  “Fucking hell.”

  “Don’t swear Ellie.”

  “What else did her mom say? Does she want me to go round there or what?”

  Marian put the chips down on the counter. Leaning up against the wall, she started licking the salt off her fingers.

  “I don’t know. She was hysterical and not making a lot of sense. Let me think. Cassandra had some kind of manic episode on the front lawn, I got that much. Some other kids filmed it and posted it on the Internet right away. That’s kind of a shitty thing to do, I guess. These little nerds can write their own headlines and they’re pretty much saying she’s possessed by the devil or some crap like that. Making up stories to fit the pictures. Oh yeah and guess what? The clips blew up within an hour. They got people standing outside the house who want to see the possessed girl. Believe that? And wait for it – there are even reporters, legit reporters, clearly starving for a good news story. Christ knows, Ellie. The world is just one giant freak show and we’re all playing the lead. Sounds like you’d better get over there before your little friend’s head starts spinning three-sixty and she’s spewing green vomit everywhere.”

  Ellie felt like the top of her head was about to blow off. “Is that supposed to be a joke? You think this is funny?”

  “Keep it down for God’s sake,” John Ferguson called from the living room. His voice, a low-pitched, rumbling growl was drenched in Scotch. “What’s with all the shouting?”

  “Ellie’s friend is possessed by the devil,” Marian answered.

  “That’s nice.”

  Ellie backed away from her mom, shaking her head in disbelief. She put her phone in her pocket, grabbed her coat off the rack and slipped her arms through the sleeves. She’d have to go to Cassandra’s house and see for herself what had happened. Maybe it was all a big, drunken mistake in her mom’s head.

  With her heart pounding, she slipped a beanie over her head.

  “I’m going round there,” she said, hurrying to the back door.

  “Have fun,” Marian said, taking an empty glass out of the sink and walking into the living room to join her husband. “Don’t stay out too late.”

  It was a Saturday afternoon. Fall was particularly beautiful around West Rouge and the leaves on the trees, those that still remained, had changed color from green to red or brown and copper. The November air was crisp and invigorating as a panicked Ellie ran the approximate five-hundred-meter distance from her bungalow to the Saints’ house on Maple Drive.

  She tried to call Cassandra twice. There was no answer and still hurrying, Ellie’s icy thumb punched out a brief ‘call me’ text. After that, she shoved the cellphone into her coat pocket and continued towards her the Saint house.

  She felt sick with anxiety.

  It was all a misunderstanding. Ellie’s mom had got the wrong end of the stick. Had to be.

  Ellie heard the crowd long before she saw anyone. It started off as a slight murmuring, like a small group that had gathered on the sidewalk to talk about something or other. Then she turned the corner onto Maple Drive. The sight stopped Ellie in her tracks. The street was full of people and vehicles and electronic equipment and not much space in between. Full of noise too. Jesus, even the cops were here and Ellie could see small clusters of officers monitoring the people who were inching a little too close to the Sain
ts’ house.

  Now Ellie was really scared. She’d been scared before in the kitchen and during the walk over to Maple Drive, but this new fear was bigger. Her mom wasn’t wrong and seeing all those people only confirmed it. Something had happened to Cassandra. Something bad.

  “What the hell?”

  Ellie rushed down the street. No one noticed her as she stepped into the heart of the gathering. As she looked around, so many people were busy filming and posting videos with their brand-new iPhone 3Gs, no doubt putting the clips on YouTube and wherever else they could post them. Some of the onlookers were even doing amateur news reports. Speculating. Talking about ghosts. Hell. Possession.

  Mom was right, Ellie thought. It’s a freak show.

  She stood on the sidewalk, directly opposite Cassandra’s house. There were a lot of bodies around her, adults, teenagers, little kids, and Ellie pulled the beanie towards her eyes, not wanting anyone in the neighborhood to recognize her as the girl who was always hanging around outside the Saint house.

  Where could she go? Where could she stand and digest this nightmare?

  There were news vans, trucks and other vehicles clogging up either side of the road. Engines running. Smoke spewing out of tailpipes and billowing upwards. The scent of fast food was everywhere. What was next? A helicopter swooping down for a money shot of the possessed girl dancing on the roof? Ellie could hear some of the locals complaining to the media that they couldn’t get in and out of their driveways. Most of the journalists, along with a cameraperson and the sound guys carrying the long microphone poles, paid little attention. They told the residents they’d be gone in ten minutes. Which everyone, residents included, knew was bullshit.

  Excited voices. Yelling. Whoop-whoops every five seconds.

  A man’s voice from afar, jokingly calling for a priest.

  At least Ellie hoped it was a joke.

  She tried to create a little extra space for herself in the crowd. Moving this way, that way. Desperate to breathe, to escape the constant smell of cigarette smoke. All around her, clusters of people of all ages were lost in endless chatter. Turned out most of them weren’t even talking about Cassandra and the freak show. A middle-aged man with a plaid shirt was explaining to a bored-looking woman about how his two-week vacation in Honolulu hadn’t lived up to expectations. The weather, he’d said. Lousy food, he’d said. She heard another woman boasting to her group about how well her daughter was doing at school and how she hoped the good grades would continue as the girl approached the ‘difficult teenage years’. She mouthed the last three words cautiously as if they were cursed.