Providence Place

by Matthew Tait

  Dillion’s camera now stood only inches from her face, and in the sudden torpor of the moment, Carolina felt no diffidence at its presence. Let it hang there, she decided.

  ‘Appetite,’ Dillion stated. ‘Are you saying that they feed … fed on human beings?’

  ‘Not on souls,’ she said. ‘Nothing so corny. More on our actions and emotions. The building itself is like something caught in a web. Their web. A web where strange creatures can be manipulated and even given a taste of their own burning appetite. They want us to suffer like they do.’

  There was more, Carolina remembered. During that brief fugue state she had also glimpsed something like a city overlapping everything … a dark yet transparent metropolis infested with black clouds. But then she had woken, and most of it had sunk into the background like a half-remembered dream. It was only later – with Maddox coming to full term – that her full experience would come crawling back, every nuance to be relived over and over again. For now, she would glide over this small detail. However, one pertinent part of her story remained …

  ‘As everybody knows, it was then I became pregnant. And yes, on that morning, I was a virgin. Nobody would date the walrus, let alone sleep with her. Even with my swimming accolades. Two weeks later, I missed my period; three weeks later, my breasts began to feel tender. I was sick as hell. About a month after that I got tested. Later, when I went to the hospital, a few local journalists followed me into the clinic. Can you believe that? The story had broken through no real fault of my own. When I was discovered floating and unconscious, I was understandably hysterical. I remember sitting in sick-bay with a towel wrapped around me, shivering, and I just spilled everything, all of it, hoping there would be some kind of rational explanation or somebody who could help me. What I didn’t count on was the story reaching the ears of everyone on the playground during the first few days. If I was mocked before because of my appearance, I was ridiculed now.’

  ‘I remember it,’ said Jeff. He no longer stared at Carolina, preferring instead to study his hands. ‘The two cleaners responsible for the gym and pool building asked to be transferred.’

  ‘And that’s what I found to be the most traumatic part of the experience in the aftermath. People made fun of me, but I knew, deep down, that most of the school believed me. Believed I saw something, anyway. Because everybody here – whether they admitted it to themselves or not – knew of this unseen world. Believe me, if you attended here every day, you just did. Most of the time it was like an annoying sound that hardly bothered you at all. But on some days it affected everyone, including those who harassed me afterward. I don’t doubt for a second the place was working through them, too. Scaring the shit out of me and knocking me up wasn’t enough. The school wanted to brutalize me.’

  ‘And you really believe that now?’ Dillion asked. Relieved, Carolina could tell this wasn’t the man, but the commentator. ‘That you were knocked up?’

  She said, ‘Eight months later little Maddox came into the world. Eight months during which I quit Providence Place altogether and decided to give interviews because I had nothing to lose. I was now a bona-fide high-school dropout. How the hell was I going to support the baby when it arrived? And sure, I hammed it up a bit for their cameras. It’s what they asked for, after all.’

  Eyes almost preternaturally accustomed to the dim light, Carolina could now see expressions far removed from those held when she’d first begun her tale. Whether it was because they had their own secrets to spill, or they were finally hearing it from the horse’s

  (walrus’s)

  mouth, the group now observed her guardedly. Even Alyssa’s bravado seemed to have abated.

  ‘Of course, the money only lasted so long. Appalled by my actions with the media, my mother disappeared. Then the rest of my family. I was all alone with a baby I never wanted.’

  She had thought herself beyond tears; thought the last of them had dried up years ago. But here they were again. It was little Maddox, of course. Memories of spending time with him were still sharp. Candid up until now, Carolina realized she had just spoken her first lie. She had wanted to keep Maddox, for what it was worth.

  She just couldn’t give him the life he deserved.

  Though she expected the next question to come from their director, Carolina was surprised when Jason finally gave it a voice.

  ‘Did you have him tested when it was born?’ he said to her. ‘You know, a paternity test?’ He paused, cleared his throat. ‘What kind of … behavior did the child exhibit?’

  ‘You mean did he start puking green soup or talking in a demonic voice?’ she asked. ‘Did he look at the world around him as if he wanted to destroy it? Nothing so dramatic, I’m afraid. And no, I never had a paternity test. Maddox was named after my great-grandfather and showed all the signs of a normal, healthy, and functioning child. I wish I could give you something else here, some kind of proper closure. But there isn’t much more to say. One-and-a-half years after he was born, I put little Maddox up for adoption and never saw him again. I have no idea who his parents are … or even if he still lives in Rhode Island.’

  ‘But how could you do that?’ Alyssa asked. ‘You thought the child was an offspring of the school and you just gave him up? How could you do that?’

  ‘We’re not here to judge, Allyssa,’ Dillion said. Pocketing his phone, he picked up one of the stuttering candles. ‘We’re here to film a movie. Which, by the way, also includes an account of your own. We need to get moving again.’

  Jason had picked up one of his own candles. ‘Something is bugging me,’ he said. ‘This … cosmic thing that Carolina mentioned. The things inside the cloud. If they fed on our actions and emotions, if they used people like puppets before the school closed, what are they feeding on now? Since arriving we’ve ascertained they’re still here, aren’t they? What have they been doing since the place turned into an urban wasteland?’

  From the pool, a sound drifted over.

  A mournful wail like the call of a loon.

  ‘Oh shit,’ Alyssa said. ‘Did everybody just hear that?’

  They turned. Although the immediate area above the pool was mired in darkness, subtle color began to peep through. First a wedge of grey, as if the windows on the other side had simply been blotted out, then different sections began to take shape.

  It’s not taking shape, Carolina thought. It’s growing.

  The wail grew even louder, and by its din rose a shape misshapen but angular, its sides perforated with bulging protuberances like parasites stuck to its hide. Though over a decade had passed since she’d last seen the cloud underwater, little had changed now it had arrived again. A black dervish, a riotous mass of form, puffing out a wake of energy like a coronal ejection.

  Candles were dropped and flashlights lit once more.

  One by one, they focused on the apparition as it drifted slowly toward them.

  ‘Jason,’ Alyssa said. ‘Why did you have to ask that question?’

  With Dillion filming again they backed up into the aisle, no one asserting which direction they should take or what moved toward them. Carolina, though lacking a writer’s vocabulary, had done more than an adequate job describing her attacker. You’ve come home, Carolina, the cloud seemed to say as it drifted closer. Come home to Daddy.

  Two at a time they navigated the stairs, Carolina resisting the temptation to take small peeks above or risk colliding into Jason ahead. Reaching the bottom tier, they built into a sprint past the conference rooms, through the labyrinthine turnstiles, then into the main foyer. The thing’s wail, which Carolina had likened to a loon, suddenly changed in pitch – a foghorn-howl like something being denied.

  Before reaching the glass doors, Dillion turned around and came to a complete stop, simple curiosity seeming to take over. So did Jeff. Then Jason. Soon they had all come to a standstill, staring up at a thing that had no right to existence in an ordinary world. Grown even larger, it loomed above them like a deity brought to life, the
many facets of its hide now displaying faces contorted in the throes of some nameless appetite.

  While Dillion kept his camera trained above, Carolina reached out and tugged his arm, fretful they could soon succumb to the same fugue state she’d fell victim to as a young girl. He seemed to get the message, at least partially.

  Exiting the building, he kept his iPhone pointed at the cloud, now grown disproportionally to the size of a swimming pool itself and moving in for the kill.

  Seven

  It was Jeff’s idea to hunker down in a small office for a while.

  ‘I cleaned this particular room myself the whole time I was here,’ he said as Dillion jimmied the lock. Loose and rusted, it came apart easily. ‘Never felt a thing. Not so much as a bad vibe.’

  Though Jason now had the overwhelming urge to leave, he understood the logic to sit still for a spell and get their bearings. The screaming had been one thing, the dog another. But staring up at a black manifestation straight from the bowels of a different world – a world they had been discussing in able tones directly before it emerged – was enough to bruise the sturdiest mind. His belief system, which up until now made room for all kinds of miracles, simply refused to grasp what the cloud had represented.

  Something evil. Something with appetite.

  Inwardly he prayed (as much as he could with these strangers present) but the words felt hollow, the entreaties meaningless. God, that stalwart of sanity his entire life, had not deigned to accompany Jason in tonight’s quest. Upon stepping into the building, his presence had seemingly retracted altogether … as if Providence Place was simply beyond God’s measure of understanding.

  ‘God,’ he muttered. ‘Has left the building.’

  The others stared at him – and by their expressions Jason realized he’d spoken out loud. Shrugging in return, he looked away.

  Though a few office chairs lay scattered around the small room, Jason’s back once again found a wall. Flashlight beams, still the only form of adequate lighting, made cell-like patterns on the walls and ceiling.

  ‘Jason’s right,’ Alyssa said. ‘I vote we leave.’

  Dillion’s camera had disappeared for the moment. He said, ‘Jason didn’t say anything about leaving.’

  ‘But that’s what you meant, right? God has certainly left the fucking building. And in his place, Carolina’s demon is chasing us around the school. Dillion, you have more than enough evidence on that puny little camera of yours. Let’s get out of here while the getting’s good.’

  ‘Oh, no you don’t,’ said Carolina. Sweat clung to her face in beaded rivulets. ‘You can’t weasel out now, Alyssa. Not without facing your own shitty demons. That’s not fair.’

  ‘Fair? I thought you of all people would understand. How can you want to stay after what we all just saw? How –’

  ‘Quiet!’ Jeff shouted. ‘All of you. Let’s not fall into the bickering trap.’

  After a sustained silence, Jason said, ‘He’s right. That’s what happens in all those dumb ghost shows – everybody starts arguing and things fall apart. Alyssa – your experience was in the theater. Let’s just go there and get it over and done with. Then we leave.’

  ‘But that thing –’

  ‘Is probably contained in the swimming center,’ Carolina said. ‘That’s the feeling I got from it. Like that’s its territory.’

  Jason could see Alyssa struggling. Carolina’s right. She’s not scared of the cloud at all. She’s trying to avoid going into the theater.

  Briefly his own sordid memories of Father Parrington’s last sermon came flooding back: Father Parrington stumbling down the altar steps, his blistered, varicose hands held out like a supplicant to his own congregation. Gifford’s head drooped down in an obscene parody of Christ’s lament, his dead and unfocused eyes fixed on the blood congealed carpet below.

  Who can blame her, he thought. Dear God, please give us strength.

  Again there was no answer from God, only the director’s assured voice cutting through the murk.

  ‘One story to go,’ he said. ‘Then we get out of here.’

  Above, cloud cover obscured the stars; a grey morass of billowed forms whose lower portions scraped the higher rooftops. Walking through another quadrangle of basketball courts, Jason discerned the theater building as a black pile of featureless brick. When they were close enough to see the doors, something else emerged from the mist.

  ‘You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me,’ Alyssa said. ‘A lone swing-set? The only thing missing with this picture is ominous music.’

  While Dillion filmed the swings, the others circumnavigated the shot. Perhaps predictably, Alyssa stopped well short before they reached the doors. Looking over at Jason as he passed, she hugged her thin frame and gave him a listless look.

  She whispered, ‘I don’t want to do this.’

  And all at once Jason felt sorry for her. Here was the real Alyssa, bereft of any mask. Everything she wore to cover it: the sarcasm, the thinly veiled hostility – all of it was just a smokescreen for this vulnerable creature. Though she may have carried a chip on her shoulder as a kid, the things in her past here, whatever they might be, had been a catalyst fire to mold the woman.

  Reassuringly, he tried to smile. But it felt bogus. So he reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder, guiding her last few steps until they reached the others.

  ‘This one is locked too,’ said Jeff. ‘Dillion, we’re probably going to need that crowbar again.’

  A small battle ensued while the door was manhandled, both men taking turns in the effort. A grunt of success came from Jeff when it finally broke loose.

  As they walked into the theater, no screams could be heard through the mist.

  And no dark cloud followed them from above.

  On the inside, posters from a different era greeted them. Encased in dust-smeared glass display cases, the pictures featured both cinema and Broadway advertisements. In what was a grim echo of the classrooms, the small foyer had all the trappings of a time capsule … or perhaps a town abandoned by nuclear fallout. The film posters sported titles such as Batman Returns and Kevin Costner’s The Bodyguard; Broadway: The Blues Brothers Show and Anna Karenina. Here was a testament not only to the early Nineties, but to a pocket of the school where the real world was put on hold and the imagination given reign. Among the Hollywood memorabilia: framed photos of the high-school kids in action, donning everything from wigs to make-up in an attempt to satirize the tragic, the comedic, and everything in between. Jeff’s world had been dirty; Alyssa’s just the opposite: a glamourous parade of the mind. Beneath the framed posters Jason spied a pile of banners, now streaked with muddy footprints, cobbled together by students handy with a pen.

  ‘Fiddler on the Roof,’ Jason said, and bent down to expose the others. ‘Lord of the Flies. Gosh, I think every school in the country still does that one.’

  Alyssa, eyeing the pictures with wonder, appeared to have forgotten her fear. ‘Would you look at this,’ she said, skating her fingers over the dust of a framed photograph. ‘I remember the day this was taken. During rehearsals for Macbeth.’

  They leaned in, Dillion already lapping up production value. Featuring about fifteen students, Alyssa’s smiling visage toward the back was unmistakable. Streaked blonde hair and the physique of a cheerleader. Eyes that emitted light. She’d been radiant, the smiling apogee of every girl-next-door type Jason had been terrified of approaching in high school. Sensing something (perhaps a list of dreams never realized), Alyssa’s smile suddenly waned.

  ‘She was sixteen when production of The Hanging began,’ Dillion blurted, speaking into his cell but keeping it pointed at the picture. ‘Sarah Knowles, head of the drama department, offered Alyssa the role without an audition. A controversial play penned by one of the seniors of the school’s aspiring playwrights, Sean Hoare, The Hanging was widely criticized by the school board and concerned parents alike for its macabre subject matter and taboo sex scenes.’

  Alyss
a turned around, began to move away.

  ‘Jesus,’ Carolina said. ‘Could you regulate that inane chatter of yours to the background? The girl is standing right here in front of you.’

  But Dillion had found his moment – perhaps one he’d been planning in advance. ‘From day one, actress Alyssa Asterious would champion the play, becoming a poster child for a production that would feature acts of witchcraft, torture, and even titular incest taking place during the seventeenth century. The local press, always on the lookout where Providence Place was concerned, followed the controversy closely. In the lead up to The Hanging’s premiere, after-hours debates often took place within the school, these involving everyone from parents to freedom of speech activists who would travel over from Brown University.’

  Alyssa had wandered away from them further, over toward the stage doors as if lost in a trace. For a minute she stood still, one hand clamped over her mouth. Then, in the same dream-like manner, she reached forward and pushed open the right-hand door.

  ‘In the end, nothing could stop the play from going ahead,’ Dillion continued, this time with no intervention from his cast. ‘The Hanging would have its premiere, mostly thanks to the tireless work of its lead actress.’

  Twelve years of inaction saw the theater door produce an awkward, complaining dirge. Though Jason almost called out (not wanting Alyssa to go in alone) he couldn’t quite bring himself to do it. He wanted to see her reaction. He wanted to observe just as Dillion’s camera observed.