by Apryl Baker
One thing’s certain: I’m completely screwed up emotionally and mentally. Maybe Dan’s right and I only convinced myself I can see ghosts. I’ve had a pretty messed-up life. The shrinks all agreed that it wouldn’t be unusual for me to make up scenarios that are beyond belief to help my mind make sense of what’s happened to me growing up. Not that I ever told them I could see ghosts, mind you, but it was something they always talked to me about. I drew some pretty creepy stuff as a kid. They told me it was my way of manifesting my fears. Maybe my seeing dead people is just an outlet for me. Maybe they aren’t real. Maybe it’s just me being crazy.
My hand comes up to my throat. The bruises are real, though. Even Dan admitted that, but he also said he had a hard time getting my hands away from my throat. Could I have done that to myself? Maybe I’d shifted my hands around enough to make the impressions bigger or something?
I can’t do this to myself. I know that ghosts are real and I’m letting Dan make me rethink everything. No. I refuse to change who I am just for him. I don’t think he’ll ever accept that I do see ghosts, and that means he’ll never be able to accept me. Okay, fine. I’ll figure out what happened to Sally and I’ll help Mary, I’ll just do it my way. I’ve never needed anyone before and I don’t need anyone now. I don’t.
I call Dan’s number and it goes straight to voice mail. Figures. “Hey, it’s me. I’ve been thinking. I don’t think we should hang out anymore, Dan. You can’t believe in me and I know it’s not your fault, but I need someone who does. I trusted you enough to tell you my secret, and I don’t trust anyone. That’s why I need you to believe me. If you can’t, I understand, but I just wanted to call and say thanks and to tell you good-bye.”
He said he’d never leave me. He promised me. I guess I’ll see if he lets me push him away. Part of me hopes he shows up and tells me I can’t get rid of him and the other part that is attuned to survival says good riddance to the pain he’s caused me. He doesn’t care as much as he says he does or he’d believe me, no questions asked. He should believe me. Tears well up and my chest hurts. It feels like I can’t breathe and I choke back a sob. I hate feeling like this.
I grab my sketch book from where I’d let it fall on the floor and start to draw. I lose myself in the images that come to mind as I put them down on paper. Pain, grief, anger, frustration, they all come out onto the pages. I look up a little later and am surprised to see that it’s almost ten o’clock. I’d been drawing for hours. Then I checked my phone. No texts or voicemails from Officer Dan. I had several from Mason, but not the one person I needed one from. I sigh and rub my eyes. They are bleary from crying and from staring at my sketchpad for so long.
Now that I’m not concentrating on my drawing, I realize my foot is still throbbing. Time to buck up and head downstairs to find the Motrin. Hopefully Mrs. O has already gone to bed and I don’t have to hear her yell until in the morning. Not that I don’t deserve it, but I’d rather it waited until in the morning when I’ll have enough time to get my walls back up. I feel a little too raw right now to deal with anything.
I wince and mutter all the way down the stairs. Mrs. O keeps all the meds not in the medicine cabinet in the bathroom, but in a small kitchen cabinet over the fridge. You have to climb on a chair to reach it. She said it was so the little kids couldn’t get into it. Makes sense, but it just irritated me at the moment because I have to drag a chair over and hop up. The phone starts to ring while I dig through the cabinet and I ignore it. The machine will pick it up. The bottle is all the way in the back. Figures. Nothing is easy today.
There it is. I pop the top and count out three pills. I know you’re only supposed to take two at a time, but between the nasty headache I’d gotten over the last hour and my ankle, I need more than two. It’s been a really long day.
I heard the beep as I jump down and then sort-of listen to the message until I actually hear what it’s saying. My mouth drops open and I almost fall flat on my face. No way. I run over to the machine and hit ‘play’.
Before I can skip all the old messages, I see something I’d given up hope of seeing again.
Sally.
She’s standing in the doorway, directly to my left, wearing the same old ratty night shirt I’d seen her in before, hands tied behind her back and gagged. The bullet hole in her head glares at me. I thought maybe she’d gone on to… well, to wherever ghosts go, but she didn’t. Instead, she’s staring at me in confusion. I don’t think she knows she’s dead. Sometimes ghosts don’t realize they died. I can’t count the times they’ve screamed at the people around them to look at them. It’s kind of sad, but freaky.
I approach slowly, not wanting to scare her, and stop about a foot away. She’s always been skittish so I figure ghost-Sally still is. Her eyes dart everywhere. They are wide with shock and horror. I can so relate right now.
“Sally?” I whisper. “Can you hear me?”
She focuses on me and nods. She tries to yank her hands loose, but it’s no use. Whoever did this used duct tape and that is not something she could break when she was alive, let alone dead.
“Do you remember what happened to you?” I ask her softly.
Her eyes close and when she opens them, they are swimming with tears. Ghosts can cry. Most people don’t realize they can, but hey, why not? Like the Doc said, it’s all about energy and perception and if Sally wants to cry, she can. She does know what happened to her, even if she doesn’t know she’s dead.
“Where are you, Sally? Can you tell me where you are so I can find you?”
She frowns at me. Ghosts can also be easily confused. This I know from experience. They are always mumbling and ranting about how they were just at one place and somehow ended up in another.
The air around us drops to freezing and I shiver. Sally looks around, her fear starting to overwhelm her. I can see ice start to form on the windows over the sink. Nails on a chalkboard start to screech in my head. Ghost Boy! Oh, no you don’t, I think. Not this time. You will not stop me from helping Sally and those kids!
“Think, Sally,” I tell her urgently. “Where did you get hurt?”
Her eyes are wild and crazy. Ghost Boy must scare her pretty bad too. “Show me,” I say. “Please, Sally, help me find you.”
She nods and disappears, only to reappear at the kitchen door and then she goes through it. I blink back tears as the screeching in my head gets worse and run for the door, ignoring the pain in my ankle as I run after Sally. She’s standing in the driveway. As soon as I get near her, she moves again, reappearing further up the road. The farther from the house I get, the less pain I feel in my head. Thank God for small miracles. I run for maybe half a mile or so, darting through a small park as I follow Sally.
We end up in the one place I never even thought of.
Hartford House.
It had shut its doors about fifteen years ago. It used to be a state group home until it was closed due to some pretty nasty things that were happening to the kids there. The building itself was three stories and the ramshackle look made it look like a haunted house straight out of a Stephen King novel. The windows are boarded up; shutters hang off their hinges and the paint has grayed and is peeling. Spookville. I so do not want to go back in there, but Sally is patiently waiting at the steps for me. I’ve come this far. I can’t let her down now.
Instead of going into the house, Sally moves from the steps and starts for the side. Where is she going? I dodge around to the back and see Sally roam over to an old shed. Her body’s stashed in a shed? It’s not locked so I pull it open, muttering because I don’t have a flashlight. There’s enough moonlight to see by, though. I swallow hard at the sight that greets me.
It’s Mary’s canary yellow bike.
My fingers run over it gently and I reach for my phone in the back pocket. I have to call Dan. He needs to get here right now. I frown as I search my pockets then slap myself. It’s still on the bed. I hadn’t put it back in my pocket after calling Dan the first time. Flipp
ing fantastic.
“Great, Mattie,” I mutter. “Now you’re going to have to go back to the house and call Officer Dan.”
“I don’t think so,” I hear the soft whispered words right before I feel the whack to my head and then it goes dark.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Pain explodes in my head the second I become aware again. The back of my skull throbs like nobody’s business. It feels like someone took a hammer and hit me as hard as they could and then decided it was not enough to hit me once, but continued to do so over and over. I groan and reach up to rub the agonizing pulse point.
But my arms won’t move.
I pull at them, hard, but they are frozen in place. Well, not exactly. I can move my fingers. I stretch them and then mold them to the surface they are lying on. Wood. It feels like the arms of a chair. I glance down to see and realize that I can’t open my eyes. Panic creeps in and I take a deep breath to calm myself, but find it doesn’t work when I can’t move my legs or stand up.
Panicking is not good, Mattie, I tell myself and try to remember what happened. Had I been in an accident? Am I lying in a hospital bed right now hooked up to tubes and wires stuck in coma-land? That would be just my luck, especially since I found Sally… oh HOLY CRAP!
Sally. She’d shown me Mary’s bike and then… then… I’d heard someone whisper and…THEY HIT ME! HOLY CRAP!
No, no, no, no, no. This can’t be happening. Had the killer nabbed me? Please not that. Not me. I try again to move, but can’t. I rotate my arms a little and feel the abrasive texture of a thick rope around my wrists. I’m literally helpless.
Don’t panic, Mattie, I tell myself. Calm down, focus. You will get out of this.
But how? A bitter laugh bubbles up. I try taking a few deep breaths and gag. The smell of mildew and stagnant water invades my mouth. Don’t throw up! For just a moment I am back in that New Orleans apartment with my Mom, fending off water and the occasional rat that floated in. I hated that place. You’re not there, I reassure myself and shove that memory to the back of my mind. I have worse things to concentrate on right now.
“Hello?” I call out, grateful that my mouth hasn’t been taped shut. I am not sure why, but then the killer hadn’t taped up Mary’s mouth either. It was only Sally I saw with tape over her mouth now that I think about it. He hadn’t taped up any of the other kid’s mouths. Strange.
Silence greets me. I expect that anyway. Psycho killers tend to play with their victims. At least they do in the TV shows I love to watch. I listen instead, but the only thing I hear is the sound of my own breathing. There’s a slight shuffling off to the right of me and I flinch. It’s a sound I know well.
Rats. I hate rats. When I was seven, my foster family decided that I needed to learn to do as I was told. They locked me in the basement for two days with no shoes or socks. It was dark, cold, and infested with those little beady-eyed monsters. For two days, I fought them off, felt them make a meal of me, crawl all over me. I’d had nightmares for years, still do sometimes. The scars on my feet are a constant reminder of them and it’s a fear I’ve never been able to shake. I can hear them now, scuttling back and forth. I can’t fight them this time if they decide I’m supper. I’m tied down to a chair and no one knows I’m here. I have never felt so helpless in my entire life.
No. You are not helpless, Mathilda Louise Hathaway. You are stronger than this. I tell myself this over and over, making myself breathe in and out slowly. I calm down and take stock of my situation. Okay, my hands and legs are tied to the chair. I lean forward and much to my amazement, find that I can lean forward. While I might have my appendages tied up, my attacker didn’t see fit to strap a rope around my upper chest. This could be good. He’d tied a rope around my chest right at elbow level only to keep my hands and arms from moving. I lean forward as far as possible. Almost! I can almost reach the ropes around my wrists. If I can get to them, I can pull at the ropes around my wrists hard enough with my teeth to loosen them – and pull one of my hands loose.
I’m mere inches away from the ropes when I hear the footsteps. They are heavy and loud, coming toward me. I sit up, not wanting him to realize what I’m up to. A door creaks open somewhere near my left and he’s in the room moving about, not saying anything and then he stops. The utter silence is deafening. I can’t even hear him breathing. Where is he? I strain my ears, trying to pick up any sound, but there is nothing. Why did he stop moving? Is he behind me? In front of me? I can’t see and I can’t hear anything. It’s driving me a little mad the longer I sit here trying to hear any sort of sound.
A thump sounds directly to my right and I jump, trying to shift in that direction. The ropes prevent me from moving very much, but I try. The silence is driving me a little insane. It’s the not knowing. That is what is terrifying me. I can’t see him or hear him. I don’t know what he is doing, or what he’s planning. Why isn’t he talking to me? Shouldn’t he be laughing or taunting me? This isn’t like the shows I watch on TV. This is scary and he’s not behaving like the psychotics on those shows I watch. He’s silent and this is a torture all its own, not knowing what he is going to do or when he’s going to do it.
“Mr. Olson?”
Maybe if I talk to him, he’ll talk to me. Anything is better than this silence.
“I know it’s you, Mr. Olson. I heard… I heard the message your friend left you on the answering machine.”
I can hear the message playing over and over in my head…
“Hey, Henry, it’s me. I need you to do me a favor. Clock in for me tomorrow like I did for you a couple weeks back. Lynn wants to meet up and the wife can’t know. Thanks, buddy.”
I hadn’t been able to get that message out of my head the entire time I followed Sally. I still can’t quite believe it. Sure, Mr. Olson is quiet, and has a temper sometimes when the kids don’t pick up their toys, but this? A cold-blooded killer? I never suspected. Then again, it’s always the quiet ones you have to worry about.
I hear something scrape across the floor behind me. What is he doing?
“Mr. Olson? Please talk to me. You’re really scaring me.”
I strain my ears and that is when I hear it. It’s so soft I would have missed it had I not been listening so hard. Just behind me and to my left, I hear a soft whimper. Mary? Could she still be alive? I hear a heavy thud and the soft whimper turns into a low muted scream. Her voice is hoarse and barely above a whisper but I can hear it. Dear God, what is he doing to her? Footsteps walk away from the whimpers and then I can hear him rifling through metal. I know its metal because I can hear the clanging. He has to be looking through his torture tools. They always have torture tools. Remembering all the dead kids that came to me the last few weeks and their mangled states, I don’t want to think about it, but I can’t stop thinking about it. Images of broken, bloody body parts keep flashing through my mind. Mirror Boy’s mangled unrecognizable face has a starring role. Is he doing that to Mary? Is he going to do that to me?
I have to get out of here. I pull futilely at the restraints holding me. They are tied very tight. He knows how to tie a knot.
More screams assault my ears and I cringe. I yank harder, but to no avail. I can’t take the screams anymore. She won’t stop. What is he doing to her?
“Stop it!” I yell. “Leave her alone!”
But it doesn’t stop. I can’t block it out. All I want to do is put my hands over my ears and cry. Her screaming is hoarse, low, and barely recognizable, but I can hear it. My ears are picking up the smallest sounds now that my eyes can’t see. I can smell the tinny fragrance of blood as well. How much more can she take? I scream in sheer rage. There is nothing I can do and it makes me furious.
“You are nothing but a coward!” I shout, anger and bitterness dripping from my voice. “Why don’t you hurt someone who can hurt you back?”
Silence. Dead silence. It’s as if all the sound has been sucked out and I’m left in a vacuum. Even Mary’s whimpers have ceased. Guess he didn’t lik
e hearing the truth. Then he moves, his footsteps carrying him behind me. I can hear the metal clanking of tools being sorted through. My throat tightens. I think I made him really, really mad. At least he stopped hurting Mary.
I feel it then, the icy cold that accompanies a ghost, only this time its magnified, the cold so deep it seeps into my bones, filing me up. I can feel them around me, whispering softly, but I can’t make it out. The temperature in the room has to have dropped a good twenty degrees or more. It’s freezing. I wonder if Mr. Olson can feel it or if it’s just me? I hope to God he can feel it and he knows it’s the ghosts of everyone he’s murdered.
He’s moving again, coming closer to me.
I tense and the cold intensifies. They can see what he’s doing and I can’t. It’s almost like they are trying to help me, to comfort me. Oh, God, what is he going to do to me?
He stops next to me and I cringe. Why can’t I learn to keep my mouth shut? I can smell the bitter scent of his sweat mingled with Mary’s blood. It makes me nauseous and I try to control my gag reflex. He runs a gloved finger down my arm and I flinch. The leather is warm against my cold flesh. The finger retraces its path back up my arm, my neck, and finally coming to rest against my lips. I move my head away, but he grabs my hair and yanks it hard, holding my head still. I can’t turn away from the exploration of his fingers against my face.
“Don’t touch me you filthy, nasty pedophile!” I scream. I can hear the fear in my voice and I hate it. I can’t stop him and I hate it.
“Shut up,” I hear the whisper. “Don’t make it worse.”
Mirror Boy? He’s here? “Eric?” I whisper.
Mr. Olson’s hands still at my whisper. His hand in my hair tightens, his grip beyond brutal.