Providence Place

by Matthew Tait

  ‘Like what?’

  Without a reply he turned his back to them and began investigating the bookshelves. When he was finished with them he scrutinized the corners, cupboards, and lastly the registration desk, ruffling through its many drawers like a scavenger. Finally, wearing a look of wan disappointment, he said, ‘Everything’s empty. Jeff, I believe it’s time for you to escort us to the cleaning rooms.’

  An inscrutable smile – either of contempt or smug satisfaction – surfaced on Jeff’s features. For a while he merely regarded the group, as if privy to a wealth of secrets they could only guess at.

  ‘I’ll lead the way,’ he said.

  Five

  Jeff Wolfe recalled many things about Providence Place – but one thing in particular that lingered (clinging to his consciousness like the stuff it was composed of) was how much goddamn chewing gum he’d had to peel off on a daily basis. The little brats had known how much Jeff despised the sticky stuff. So of course they had gone out of their way to make sure copious amounts of both varieties (bubble and chewing) were spread out under their desks, on their lockers, and occasionally ground into the carpet. Sometimes he’d spend over an hour removing one piece with detergent, often staying back past his allocated hours until the streetlights outside were the only source of light pervading the courtyards. To this day he still dreamed about everything his job here had entailed: vacuuming, mopping, and wiping shit off the restroom tiles. On some nights he dreamed of chewing gum so thick and viscous it blanketed the entire school in a pink and white halo of synthetic rubber.

  He’d recalled the chewing gum, yes – but he recalled the unseen world even more.

  On Jeff’s very first week as site manager, the unseen world around Providence Place had made itself known by murdering one of his workers, young Matthew Thrane. Matthew had been twenty-four years old and studying at a local university. Employed as a cleaner part-time, Matthew had committed suicide in one of the cleaner’s closets by pouring undiluted bleach down his throat, slicing an artery in his left arm with a paint scraper, and finally tying a trash bag around this head to induce asphyxiation before the bleach could properly do its work.

  Suicide had been on the death certificate.

  But Matthew Thrane had not committed suicide.

  The unseen world had induced the poor boy.

  Coming across the body at the end of his shift, Jeff had known this immediately. Although barely glimpsing so much as a shadow up until that moment, the sight of Matthew’s lifeless corpse was all the evidence he had needed. Of course, the malignancy could be felt when one merely stepped into the building, a darkness that could produce restrained nausea, but Matthew’s bulging eyes and contorted features were the final piece of the puzzle. The kid had died terrified. The kid had died against his will.

  Providence Place was alive, yet its unseen world desired all living things to suffer.

  In the aftermath of the tragedy, any sane man would have pulled up stakes then and there and made off for better employment. But Jeff would not be cowed so easily. Though the school was undoubtedly haunted, he would continue to do his work; he would face the beast head on and deal with it accordingly. Besides, it wasn’t the worst place he had ever cleaned up shit, if one could believe that.

  For the next two years, nothing much of import happened in Providence Place. Nothing with supernatural overtures, anyway.

  Not until the day Marcy Ribald joined his cleaning team.

  Blighted shadows and full night made the steps descending from the library harder to navigate, and each of them made use of the bannisters to avoid tripping as they made their way down to a small courtyard. With night the temperature had (predictably) plummeted, and Jeff offered up silent thanks he had chosen to don his old-school trench coat before leaving his one-room apartment in Alpine Estates. Insulated, the coat also contained an abundance of pockets in which to conceal things … like a pistol, for instance. The others might be scared – which was certainly healthy – but Jeff knew the school more intimately than any of them. He knew the dangers here could be maimed, and he also knew they sometimes carried a human face.

  ‘Watch the last step,’ Dillion called out. ‘There’s some kind of crap on it.’

  Alyssa, reaching the final step now, inspected her toes. ‘Ectoplasm?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he replied, and barked out a forlorn little laugh. ‘Looks more like spilled yogurt.’

  ‘Icky,’ Carolina remarked. ‘Must be a thousand years old.’

  Arriving at the bottom Jeff could ascertain yogurt was indeed the splashed element. In addition to chewing gum, yogurt had been a popular food item the kids had loved to fling around. Or simply pour into a trashcan from its container, dribbling the gruel down the sides so the cleaners would cop the brunt of it on their clothes when they emptied the trash later that night. More often than not, the garbage bags would simply break from the weight of so much discarded food, flooding the cans themselves with biscuits, sandwiches, and half-eaten apples crawling with flies. Although maintenance workers during the day were supposed to take care of such accidents, they almost never did, and the shit-scrubbers were the ones to ultimately pay the price in stained clothing and reeking hands.

  Multiple torch beams revealed the mess so Jeff and Jason could side-step it as they completed the stairway. ‘All good, Jeff?’ Dillion asked. ‘You look like you swallowed something nasty.’

  ‘I’m just recalling how foul my job sometimes was, Mr. Dillion. Truth be told, retirement was the best thing to ever happen to me.’

  ‘I’ll bet.’

  Jeff purveyed the courtyard, a small niche containing two sets of high-school lockers and some wall shrubbery more commonly known as ‘climbers’ to anyone in the know. Left unkempt, the creeping plants now covered every available inch of space, green tendrils extending their reach like a hive of fleshy coral. Peering closely at the lockers, Jeff could make out a procession of fat ants trundling toward some unknown bonanza of food. Also noticing them, Alyssa sidled up to the small army, running her torch along the convoy. Meandering in a seemingly innocuous line, the ants’ destination ended abruptly in a locker at ground level. Here, they made use of a thin gap at the bottom, entering and exiting the fissure with the hurried dexterity of passengers in a terminal. Bending over, Alyssa reached down with one hand and tentatively placed it on the handle.

  ‘Don’t,’ Jason warned her.

  Appearing almost ready to launch a tackle, Carolina said, ‘I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Alyssa, wait,’ Dillion said. Moving in closer, he alighted his camera on the locker and framed the shot. ‘Okay, go.’

  Once sporting a combination lock, the small closet had succumbed to the years and weathering, making it obsolete. With scarcely a jerk from Alyssa’s hand, the door swung wide, producing a rustic chime. As it did so a small panoply of blowflies were jettisoned out. Alyssa recoiled; Carolina made a gagging sound in the back of her throat. ‘Stand back,’ Dillion ordered them, and began filming the contents.

  Canted to one side, the severed head ended abruptly in a rough patchwork of gore and splayed tendons. Its left side – currently black with ants – had been chiseled away to reveal the bone beneath. Though some fur remained on its skull (sticking up in small islands), the potion left had simply been expunged.

  Jason asked, ‘Is it a dog?’

  ‘I think so,’ Dillion replied. He held the camera out at arm’s length, simultaneously pushing it closer and stepping back at the same time. ‘Though it could easily be a cat as well.’

  ‘Ah, now I can smell it,’ Alyssa said. ‘Gross.’

  ‘This could be what was killed in the library,’ Jason said.

  Wishful thinking, Jeff thought. We all know that wasn’t a goddamn animal.

  But no one said anything as they studied the creature, a tacit fasciation creeping in. Although observing ants devour anything was unwholesome, there was an unmistakable allure here akin to watching someone pop a pimple. They crawled
through the nose cavity and mouth; they scuttled through the ear canal. A small contingent lingered on what remained of one decaying eye.

  ‘All right, enough of this shit,’ Dillion said, and snapped off his iPhone. ‘Jeff, point the way to the cleaning closet.’

  Obliging, Jeff took the lead. Through the courtyard they walked, then past four rows of drinking fountains whose sinks and troughs were green with calcium, leaves, and lime deposits. More rubbish was piled in massive drifts along the walkway, everything from stale mattresses to more sporting equipment. Further down Jeff spotted a crate of wine, full bottles stamped with the emblem of Providence Place.

  ‘They made wine here?’ Carolina asked. ‘I don’t remember that.’

  ‘Was after your time,’ Jeff replied. ‘But, yes, the students sometimes made wine in the science building. Parents ended up causing a stink, of course, saying it promoted binge drinking amongst the youth. And they were probably right, too. The line ended up being discontinued. Surprised there’s still some of it around.’

  Jason made a beeline for the crate and pulled out a bottle, holding the label up to his light. ‘We used this wine during mass,’ he said. ‘Gosh I’d almost forgotten about it. The faculty also drank it in the teachers’ lounge after parent-teacher nights.’

  Carolina had joined him. ‘That reminds me. Dillion, why did you only seek out students and a cleaner for your film? Why not the teachers who worked here as well? Surely they have just as much to say as any of us.’

  Now filming the crate, Dillion said, ‘I tried. There are no more retired teachers living in the greater Cranston area.’

  ‘None?’

  ‘None that I could find. Jason, hand me that bottle. I might like me a souvenir.’

  Somewhat reluctantly, Jason handed the bottle over.

  He was contemplating breaking the seal and taking a sip, Jeff thought. I’ll be damned if he wasn’t.

  ‘Come one,’ Jeff urged them. ‘We haven’t got far to go.’

  Soon a decent sized basketball court greeted them, both ends minus their baskets. On the white backboards (now grey with grime) more graffiti was evident, this species lighter in tone than the library’s obscenities. MR SHAMAN SUCKS BALLS! read the left. And, no doubt penned by the same author, the right one proclaimed: GOD ISN’T REAL. ABANDON ALL HOPE.

  ‘Thar she blows,’ Jeff said, and pointed.

  The cleaning closet sat to the right, its doorway almost completely camouflaged, having been painted the same bilious green as the wall. Of course, the same pattern repeated itself all over the school: students and faculty did not like to be reminded they procured mess, let alone required underlings to dispose of it. Although not full of yuppies per se, a subtle hint of snobbish mentality had always run through the school like an unspoken edict. Walking over, Jeff became acutely aware Dillion’s camera was now focused entirely on him. This was, after all, his territory. His moment to shine.

  ‘We always had a high turnover of cleaners,’ he said, speaking loudly so the camera caught his words. ‘We had immigrants, of course, every school has them. And even though some of them could hardly speak a word of English, I always found they were the hardest of workers, those that weren’t proficient in the art of five-finger discounts, anyway. The university types were another story – every one of them had an aura of entitlement. Figured they didn’t have to do the shitty jobs like the rest of us. Toilets were off limits, and if there was an unflushed crapper somewhere, then somebody with skin darker than theirs could take care of it.’

  The cleaning closet had arrived. Anticipating it locked, Jeff was surprised to see its door handle missing. A half-inch gap gave evidence they would have unhindered access. ‘Well, what do you know. It’s open. Mr. Dillion, you won’t be needing that crowbar after all.’

  ‘I told you I was bringing one?’

  ‘You did.’ Jeff nodded. ‘Told me the night you came up to my house.’

  Alyssa said, ‘So I guess we have a weapon after all.’

  Jeff coughed, felt the small bulge of the pistol through the fabric of his trench coat.

  No need to tell them yet. Not unless you need to pull it out, anyway.

  With a quick glance at the others he raised his torch. Then, leaning in slowly, Jeff edged open the door of a cleaning room he had not entered since the event of Marcy Ribald over fifteen long years ago.

  Though a decade of water damage had reduced the room to a washed-out husk, there was a moment (as the five of them crossed the threshold), where nothing had changed at all. Mounted along the walls, vacuum cleaners clung from steel pegs and water buckets were grouped on shelves. Heaped on the floor were dozens of cardboard boxes containing everything from fresh toilet paper to garbage bags, and a multitude of mops grouped in one corner with their respective heads missing. Still with necklaces attached, keys to different sections of the school lay heaped in a ceramic bowl by the entrance. Jeff blinked, and the illusion quickly evaporated. Taking its place, the secular rot, infusing everything in the school outside.

  ‘Christ, it stinks in here,’ Alyssa said. ‘This was your staff room, Jeff?’

  Do I detect a subtle note of sarcasm, my dear?

  ‘Kind of,’ he replied. Straight ahead stood a buffing-machine encrusted with spider webs and, Jeff saw, many spiders. Fat daddy long-legs and one medium-sized black widow. ‘It’s where I kept the books; it’s where we met at the beginning of each shift in the afternoon and where we signed off at night.’

  Larger than an average cleaning closet, the space had originally been designed to house a first-aid room. The principal, far too lazy to make the journey here, had then shifted the facility closer to the staff rooms. Cleared out and refurbished, two additional wash-sinks and an array of wooden shelves were then installed. After Jeff took over duties as site-manager, the room became his home away from home; a small fortress for five days out of every week.

  Dillion slapped his duffel bag on the concrete and began rummaging around.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Jeff asked him, pointing his beam directly on the man’s scalp.

  ‘There’s no working light,’ Dillion said. ‘So I brought these. Here, each of you take one and place it on something in the corner.’

  As if pulling an object from a hat, the director produced a wad of fat white candles, at least a half-a-dozen of them tied neatly together with twine.

  ‘You’re shitting me,’ Alyssa said. ‘You couldn’t have told us about these earlier?’

  ‘There was no need for them earlier.’ Unwrapping the twine, Dillion proffered the sticks of wax. ‘If you’d be so kind to light them up please, Alyssa?’

  Alyssa accommodated, making sure one of her cigarettes were sparked up in the process.

  Five stuttering candle flames floodlit the room.

  Revealed was a smorgasbord of abandoned cleaning equipment and other objects (much like outside) that appeared to have had no rightful place in this room. On one shelf a mosaic of different-sized doll heads were arranged in neat compact lines, some of them still attached to vanilla torsos and sprouting filthy hair. Over toward the rear sat a decomposing black piano, its array of white keys like mottled human teeth.

  Jason said, ‘Do you think someone squats in here, too?’

  Near the middle of the room a dilapidated trainset covered with an assortment of children’s toys perched on a table. Stuffed teddy bears, Jeff noticed. And even what looked like a calliope jack-in-the-box with a grinning clown’s face painted on the side. Underneath, a solitary Rubik’s Cube sat atop a rubber tire the size and weight of a truck’s spare.

  Holding her candle out like a penitent, Carolina said, ‘No. There’s accumulated dust on everything here as well.’ She giggled, an almost mad sound. ‘It does look like some kid’s nest, though. Look over there.’

  Following her candle Jeff spied a small squad of child-sized BMX bicycles; some fitted for girls, others for boys. More spider-webbing covered their rusted flanks. Dillion, no doubt sensing additio
nal production value, walked over and began filming them.

  The trainset had claimed Jeff’s attention.

  With an almost languid gait, he sauntered over toward it. Of course, it wasn’t the trainset itself that fascinated him, more its position in the room. For it was the center or thereabouts where Marcy Ribald’s body had finally been discovered. Splayed out on the dirty floor within a chalk pentagram she’d drawn herself, her interest in the occult augmented and increased exponentially by the unseen world.

  Dillion had noticed his almost glazed look. ‘Are you ready, Jeff?’ he asked.

  Jeff looked at each of his companions in turn, the candlelight making serpentine shadows across their cheeks and foreheads. They stared back, expectantly, a willingness to listen but wholly unreconciled to the consequences of further reveals.

  Sliding over a nearby cardboard box, Jeff sat down on it.

  Then he began to tell his story.

  ‘She was just like any of the other youngsters when first joining our team – nervous, new to the working environment and a little shy. I don’t think I’m being politically incorrect by calling her a Goth, or an outcast, or a dye-your-hair-purple-and-black emo who was no stranger to ink on her ankles and listened to Marilyn Manson through her ear buds. Some of the older cleaners ribbed her a little during that first week – older men like Trevor Dinklage who always did a bit of hazing to see how far they could push a newbie. But that didn’t last long once they discovered how kind she was. One of the great things about cleaning, about the job, is a person can be left to their own devices for the duration of a shift. If you’re a loner by nature, it’s a great gig. It was only during the holiday cleans we came together as a team, so the chance of getting on each other’s nerves or prolonged harassment was a rare thing. We’d had one suicide, Matthew Thrane, but that boy already had a history of depression. At first I didn’t foresee I’d have any problems with Marcy.’

  ‘What year was this?’ Dillion asked.

  This was not the real Dillion asking, Jeff mused. This was the documentary maker, kicking ass and taking down names.