The Ghost in Apartment 2R

by Denis Markell

  A crucible, in case you don’t know (I didn’t, though Nat did), is a container used in science to combine things at a high temperature.

  But this play isn’t about science. It’s about a town where all the elements are combined to create something that burns through the people who live there. That’s actually pretty good. I write that down as my topic sentence.

  It’s kind of based on the Salem witch trials, where these girls accused another girl of being a witch and the whole town believed them. Later, the narrator explains that it’s similar to the time the playwright Arthur something (wait, I need to know that for my paper—oh, right, Arthur Miller) was accused of being a Communist in the fifties, and he was writing about how people can be gripped by hysteria and manipulated into believing something that isn’t true. I’m not really explaining the plot all that well. There’s more to it, but this is the part I keep coming back to.

  The girls in the play aren’t really witches, but they convince people that some of them are by making up stuff.

  Is that what my parents think is going on?

  Is that what Nat thinks?

  That I’m just making this up?

  All this thinking is making me tired. Mom is right. I need a good night’s sleep.

  “Just leave me alone tonight, okay?” I hear myself saying out loud.

  My dad calls to me, faintly, from outside my room. “Did you say something?”

  The door opens and he’s standing there.

  “Uh, no,” I say, pulling off my earbuds, “I was just…singing along with some music. I guess I didn’t realize how loud I was.”

  He makes a face. “How many times have we told you to keep the volume down on those things? You don’t want to be deaf like Nana Helene, do you?”

  Nana Helene is my dad’s mother. She nods and smiles at everything you say, then pats you on the wrist and you realize she hasn’t heard a word you’ve said.

  “It’s down, it’s down,” I insist.

  My dad shakes his head. “Yikes.”

  My mom appears at the door with a towel. “Time for a shower and then bed, young man.”

  She actually said that without adding how Jake used to take a shower every night and go to bed without being told. I have to admit I’m stunned.

  The bathroom looks so empty without all of Daan’s and Luuk’s various creams and lotions. I mean, we had shampoo and conditioner and stuff for them, but I guess they didn’t use ours.

  “Should I use the unopened shampoo and conditioner?” I yell.

  “No!” my mom screams. (I told you she screams about everything.) “Save those for the next guests!”

  She opens the door a crack and hands me the shampoo and stuff from their bathroom.

  Oh, yuck. Now I’m going to smell like them?

  “And use deodorant!” she yells from the other side of the door. “You stink!”

  This is a new thing. I never used to stink.

  I realize that now my armpit is a crucible. I like this word.

  So I take my shower, and keep thinking about those horror movies where a murderer comes in and stabs you in the shower, which makes it like the shortest shower ever.

  I pad down the hallway back to my tiny room.

  I settle into bed hoping for no scary dreams or anything weird. I hear the murmur of my parents talking in the other room. There is some laughter, and I can picture them at their respective workstations.

  When I tell my friends that my parents work in the same room all day, most of them think it’s weird. They have parents who go off to jobs in offices and spend the day with other people. I’d rather be like my parents. They are like best friends who are married.

  Anyhow, I just love the sound of them in the front room talking low like this. It makes me feel so safe and protected, and it soothes me to sleep.

  * * *

  When I wake up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom, it’s quiet, except the usual street noises: the occasional car passing by downstairs, sirens in the distance.

  I yawn and get up and open my door.

  The light in Jake’s room is on. Someone is in there.

  Not again. Maybe it’s my dad. Sometimes he has trouble sleeping and will read for a while. He’ll usually do it in the front room, though.

  My parents’ room is across the hall from mine, so I tiptoe over. They leave their door open (unless we have company), so I peer in and see that they are both there. My dad is snoring softly.

  Now what? Another dream?

  I try my best to take deep breaths.

  There has to be a simple explanation. My mom could have been cleaning in there after I went to sleep, and left the light on.

  Like my mother would ever leave a light on when she left a room.

  But it’s possible.

  I want more than anything to just go into my room and close the door and pretend I saw nothing. Then in the morning my mom can yell at my dad for leaving the light on when he was in there earlier, and I’ll be fine.

  But something is pushing me down the hallway. This is not a dream. I know it’s not. It’s just a room. With a light on.

  Right?

  I reach for the doorknob and try to swallow, but I can’t because my mouth is so dry.

  I try to turn the knob, but my hands are shaking and so damp they keep slipping. Finally I grab the doorknob and yank the door open.

  Is that someone by the window?

  A girl is staring back at me.

  I want to run but force myself to look again.

  Stupid me, it’s just my reflection.

  I take a deep breath to calm myself down. And then another.

  Just look around the room, Danny….

  See? It’s empty. Nothing to be afraid of.

  I reach for the light switch to turn off the light. I see my arm and hand are shiny.

  That’s when I realize I’m drenched in sweat.

  I am so glad I used that deodorant. But I can smell the fear.

  There’s nothing here. Nothing. I mean, not like in the movies.

  No voices, no blood coming out of the walls.

  Just the same bland Ikea furniture.

  But there is something. I swear, I can feel it. Like someone is watching me. I can’t get out of here fast enough.

  I leave the room before reaching back and switching off the light. As quickly as I can, I shut the door behind me.

  I close my eyes and use my T-shirt to wipe the sweat dripping from my forehead.

  In the bathroom, I feel my heartbeat getting slower, and I turn on the sink and put my arms under the tap. The cool water is the perfect antidote to whatever I was feeling before. It’s real, and as I splash the water onto my face I can feel the fear washing off. I can just hear Nat’s voice: ridiculous.

  I leave the bathroom and head for my room.

  Then, out of the corner of my eye, I catch sight of something behind me.

  Under Jake’s door, there is a glowing light.

  * * *

  “It seems to be working fine.” Gabriel is switching the light on and off.

  It’s morning.

  There was no way I was going back into Jake’s room last night. I know, what a shocker, right?

  I just ran to my room and shut the door and climbed back into bed. Not that I slept all that much.

  Of course, in the morning, the light in Jake’s room is off. And both my parents swear they didn’t go in there to turn it off. So my dad calls Gabriel to have him check the switch.

  “Sometimes in humid weather things like this happen,” Gabriel explains. “But I’ll change the switch and see if that makes a difference.” My dad nods like he understands. My dad wants Gabriel to think he is a guy who understands how things like light switches and electricity work.
r />   I want to believe Gabriel, although nothing like this has ever happened before in all the years we’ve lived here.

  As Gabriel lets himself out, there’s an alert from Mom’s laptop and she excitedly calls us over to the table. This is our first FaceTime call with Jake since he’s gone to school.

  After a brief pause, Jake is there, looking a little bleary and unshaven.

  “Jaaake!” our parents scream together.

  He winces, then laughs. “Not so loud, okay? My roommates are still sleeping.”

  “It’s noon!” Dad says, also laughing. “Out partying last night?”

  Jake rubs his eyes and then opens them wide, like he’s just gotten up himself. “Yeah, not really a party. Just kind of a get-together.”

  “That sounds nice!” our mom says in a voice so chirpy it’s almost as creepy as last night.

  “Mom, chill out,” Jake says. “You’re talking weird.”

  Mom’s face crumples. “I’m sorry. I was just trying to, you know, take an interest.”

  “We’re a little hyped about seeing you, is all,” our dad adds, sounding ridiculously amped.

  “I know, I’m happy to see you too, but I can hear you fine if you speak normal,” Jake says. He looks past them and waves at me. “Hey, bro!”

  I wave back. “Yo.”

  This is a universal big brother–little brother greeting. We are definitely not going to make a big deal about this.

  Our parents ask him about his classes, whether he’s eating enough, if he’s made any friends. The way our mom says “friends” makes Jake crack up.

  “No, Mom, I haven’t made any ‘friends,’ ” Jake says, putting the word in air quotes.

  “I wasn’t asking about girls,” our mom says, and sniffs.

  “Riiight.” Jake catches my eye, and I laugh with him. All of a sudden his face changes expression.

  “Who is that with you guys?”

  I turn around, but there’s no one there. “What are you talking about?”

  “Stop messing with me. There’s a girl. Right behind you.”

  There’s definitely no one there. I feel a huge sense of relief. I am not crazy. My brother saw her too.

  Dad turns around. “Oh, that’s Jenny Schwartz. I’m doing her bat mitzvah video.” He’s looking at the monitor on his desk. Indeed, there is a close-up of a blond girl with braces on my dad’s screen.

  Jake looks skeptical. He peers into his phone. “Yeah…I guess that was it. I can’t really see it now, but it looked a lot bigger before. Like she was right over Danny’s shoulder.”

  “I think it’s where my laptop is,” our mom explains. “It makes things look closer than they are.”

  “Like your new girlfriend over your shoulder,” I say.

  Jake jumps like someone stuck a hot poker up his butt. He whirls around, looking off camera.

  “Psych!” I shout. I don’t usually get him like that. “But now we know you have a new girlfriend!”

  Even over FaceTime we can see Jake turning all sorts of colors. “Shut up, Danny. I just thought someone had snuck into the room.”

  “So…anything you want to tell us?” Mom asks.

  Just in case you’re wondering, I’m enjoying this so much.

  “No! I mean, she’s not my girlfriend!” Jake blurts out.

  Dad nods. “Uh, okay. So who is not your girlfriend?”

  Jake looks offscreen. In the background we hear a giggle.

  “So who’s that?” Mom sure is persistent.

  “My roommate!” Jake says quickly.

  “Your roommate giggles like a girl,” I say.

  There’s a cascade of giggles, which seems to make Jake even more anxious.

  “He giggles like a girl, okay? He’s very self-conscious about it.”

  He hits someone, and the giggling is muffled.

  “Look, I gotta go study,” he says quickly. “Love you guys! Call you next week!”

  Before our parents can answer, he clicks off his phone.

  There is general hysteria in the Kantrowitz household, and with all the talk of this mystery girl, I almost forget about everything that’s been going on.

  It feels like old times, teasing Jake about girls and seeing him get all flustered about it. Every time he went on a date in high school he would do everything he could to not tell our parents, because, let’s face it, they would ask the girl something dumb, or act all weird around her, like fake parents.

  Last summer Jake met a girl named Annie when he went to work at a summer camp in Maine. He made the mistake of posting pictures of the two of them on Facebook. Our mother somehow did not think it weird or wrong to post comments about what a lovely couple they were, and how she looked forward to meeting Annie sometime.

  You can imagine that didn’t go over too well with Jake. Especially since Annie ended up cheating on him with the swimming instructor, who was some dirtbag freshman from Williams College who was named, for real, Chad. I asked Jake if Chad popped the collar on his polo shirt, and Jake said, “You know it, bro,” and then actually laughed, for real, at something I’d said.

  This was one of the greatest moments of our brotherhood.

  “Well,” my mom says, “if he won’t tell us who she is, I guess I’ll just call her the Phantom Giggler!”

  “She strikes in the dead of the morning,” my dad riffs. “Maybe Jake’s room at college is haunted too!” Because of course he doesn’t know when to stop.

  “That’s not funny,” I say.

  Mom rubs the top of my head. “Honey, I know the apartment feels weird since Jake left, and you don’t like changes—”

  “Mom, what are you talking about?”

  “Danny, you broke out in a rash when you moved from kindergarten to first grade, remember?”

  I cannot believe this. “No, I do not remember. That was like a hundred years ago. And what does that have to do with the fact that I seem to be the only one in this apartment who is being haunted?” I practically yell.

  “It’s just that you’ve never dealt well with change…,” my dad says gently.

  “So you both think I’m just imagining all this?” I ask, walking away from them.

  “Danny…,” he starts.

  “You just think all this stuff is a coincidence?”

  Mom stands next to him. Uh-oh. A united front. “Our minds put things together sometimes and create narratives.”

  “Sammy says there are ghosts in Brooklyn,” I insist.

  “I think he was speaking about Brooklyn in kind of poetic terms,” Mom says. “You know, because this part of Brooklyn has such a rich and long history. It’s easy to imagine all the people who’ve lived here before us.”

  “He was not talking about that,” I answer. “Sammy is a lot of things, but he isn’t a poet. He meant real ghosts. Ask Nat.”

  My dad takes a swig from his mug. “Sammy’s quite the storyteller.”

  I look from one of them to the other. “So you really refuse to even consider it?”

  My mom sighs. “It’s easier to imagine this stuff when you’re thirteen, Danny.”

  There is a crashing noise from Jake’s room.

  We freeze.

  “Did I imagine that?” I demand, and we rush down the hallway to Jake’s room.

  We reach the doorway and peer in.

  The framed Ikea print has fallen off the wall and is lying on the floor, a jumble of broken wood and bits of glass.

  My mom turns. “I’ll get the broom.”

  I face my dad. He’s rubbing the back of his neck.

  “I…guess…the picture hook couldn’t bear that much weight.” He sighs. “One more thing for Gabriel to take care of before our next guest.”

  My mom has returned and is sweeping up the debris on the floor. �
��It’s a good thing that didn’t happen when anyone was staying here.”

  My dad is putting on his coat. “I’ll get a new frame at the shop on Atlantic Avenue.” He catches my mom’s look. “It’s a standard size. They’re premade. It won’t be expensive.” He turns to me. “You want to come?”

  I run to join him. Anything to get out of this apartment.

  “You live in an old apartment,” Nat says, peering at the candy arrayed in front of her. “Light switches break. Old walls don’t always hold picture hooks.”

  “And girls’ faces just pop up behind you,” Gus adds, making his selection.

  It’s Monday after school, and we’re at Harry’s.

  Harry’s is a little grocery store tucked into the bottom of an apartment building. I think it’s always been there—it was here when my dad was a kid, but back then it was owned by a Greek family. Now it’s owned by a Korean family.

  That’s the way it is in Brooklyn. Around the corner there’s a barbershop run by a Russian guy named Serge who’s been cutting everybody’s hair for as long as I can remember. Next door to him is a dry cleaners that’s owned by an Indian family. And a block away is a stationery store where everyone working there is Orthodox Jewish and talks to each other in Yiddish. I swear you can walk three blocks and hear like eight languages spoken. And that’s not counting all the tourists!

  By the way, Harry isn’t the name of the owner of the store. Nobody knows who Harry was. The guy behind the counter is Joe, the son of the guy who owns it. You’ve never met a more cheerful person in your life. He isn’t that much older than Jake, maybe in his twenties. But he’s always nice to us kids, and learns each of our names. He’s kind of amazing that way.

  It’s one of those weird warm days in autumn where you start out wearing a coat, and by lunch you’re wearing a sweater and then by the time school’s over it’s gotten so you’re down to your T-shirt.

  We stopped in at Harry’s on our way to Brooklyn Bridge Park to play some Frisbee. They’ve got all sorts of candy that costs as little as a nickel, so even if you have only fifty cents or a dollar you can get a lot.