She pressed her face to a glass pane. At least with dust on the windows, she was shielded from some of the distance.
Soon, she would lock the door, prise a window open a crack, and drop the keys outside. Belinda and her family were not visiting for ten days, so there was plenty of time. Because Penny’s was the face at the window. And she was a trick of the light.
WHAT HAPPENED TO ME
Joe R. Lansdale
In many of the stories in this anthology the theme has been of places haunted from within, of threats – supernatural or otherwise – found inside the places where we live. Here, however, we have something coming from the outside to make its presence known in a ramshackle Texan house. Lansdale’s story is a compelling blend of the quietly supernatural and full-blown Lovecraftian horror. There is a master at work here, and the final tale in our collection will stay with you for a long time.
I wish I had a story to tell, but I don’t.
Not like all of you, and being last to go after all those fine stories is a toughie. I can’t make things up like you people, and I’m impressed. So, all I can do is do my best, and admit right up front that this isn’t a story, and therefore may be a bit pedestrian because it’s something that actually happened to me.
I suppose you could say it’s a kind of haunted house story, except it’s not a story, and took place many years ago and ends with a not altogether satisfying explanation, if it is an explanation at all. But it does end with a death, I’m sad to say, and some of the things I saw disturb me even now, and I suppose they will do so until the end of my days.
It would be an almost classic story in a way, if it were fiction.
But it’s not. It happened, and I’m not going to add any frills, just tell it to the best of my memory, as accurately as I can, and you can judge its worth as my offering for the night.
When I was a young college student attending Stephen F. Austin University, I was poor as the proverbial church mouse. A friend of mine, Clifford, who I called Cliff, was poor too, as was another friend, William, who did not go by Bill. Always William. He was adamant about it.
We decided that the only way we could attend college was to find a place with as cheap a rent as possible, with enough room for three, and go into it together. What we all had to live on were student loans, and they were not large, and after we paid for tuition and books, there was very little to survive on for a semester.
I forget how we came about knowing of the place now, but as it happened we found a house – and get this, because it will be hard to believe in this day and time – but we found a house where the rent was thirty-five dollars a month, split three ways.
Admittedly, thirty-five dollars in those days was worth more than thirty five dollars now, but it was still very reasonable for us, split up like that.
East Texas, even in winter, is generally a warm place. But this winter I’m talking about was unusually cold, at least it was for a while, and considering the house we were about to rent was without gas heat, only fire places, it seemed even colder.
After renting the house, Cliff and I had other matters to attend to in our home town of Tyler, and couldn’t be there on the day our rent began. But William could be. His plan was to stay there and we would catch up with him the next day.
Cliff and I drove down together from Tyler in that rare and bad weather I mentioned, and by the time we arrived at the house the next afternoon, the wind was blowing sleet. As we pulled in we were surprised to see that William’s car wasn’t in the drive.
We were even more surprised to find a note tacked to the door. It was on a piece of notebook paper and said simply: I’ve decided to go to Kilgore College.
This was out of the blue, and immediately eliminated one third of our income as far as rent went, but as I said, it wasn’t a terrible rent we were expected to pay, so we could bear it. The main thing was we were surprised that he had bailed out on our plans, and had explained himself so thinly with that note.
These days, to find out more, you would pop open your cell phone and give him a call, but then there were no cell phones, and for that matter, the house didn’t have any kind of phone, and, frankly, the electricity out that far, especially during weather of the sort we were having, was iffy with all that ice hanging from the lines.
After cussing our partner, we entered the house and found that his bedroll – for there were no beds at this point, and only limited furniture – was still there, stretched out in front of the fire place. There was no fire, but we could see where there had been a recent one, built by William, no doubt, and after discovering that not only had William left his bed roll on the floor, we found he had left a number of other items, including a grocery sack of food, most of it canned goods.
But, let me jump ahead in my story a little, saying that we got over his departure quickly, and that for the first two days things were fine. We were there very little, since we began attending classes. On the weekend we went home to load furniture in a rented van to deliver to the house.
In no time at all we were settled in, and also in no time at all we began to feel uncomfortable. It was nothing radical, and I can’t say that I remember being scared, early on that is, but that I did feel discomfort. It was akin to the sensation of thinking someone was peeking in a window at you. And as there were no curtains on the windows at the time, I thought this was most likely a natural sensation of being exposed, though where we were located we could have pretty much gone naked and no one would have noticed.
There were also minor things, such as thinking we had heard sounds, but when we discussed it, we were unable to adequately describe what it was we had heard. One of the more uncomfortable places in the house was the dog run. The house was divided by a long hallway that went from the front porch to the back porch. The front porch was long and ran right and left to the door, but the back porch extended out from the back door on the same path as the dog run hall. Both porches were roofed over and were wide and solidly built, though the back porch creaked whenever you stepped on it.
The dog run hallway, however, was what was most uncomfortable. We assumed this was due to it being separate of the rest of the house, and therefore devoid of heat. Anytime we entered it, it was not only cold, it was foul, as if a dead cat were somewhere within the walls. And the first few nights, when we slept on the floor in the living room, I had the most miserable sensation that something was moving about in the hallway, though I can’t say as I remember hearing anything at all. Just this feeling that something was out there, pausing at the closed door that led to the living room. The way those old houses worked, was the front and back door were locked, but as an extra precaution, the door to the hallway could be locked as well from either side of the house; what you had was essentially two houses separated, and yet connected, by a hallway that ran between them and connected to the porches. After the first night, I took to locking the one connected to the living room.
I remember Cliff seeing me do it, and expecting him to laugh or chide me for my extra caution. But he didn’t. He merely looked away and went about his business, which gave me the impression that he had the same concerns that I had.
Now, keep in mind, because I know more about what happened later, I’m certainly overselling this aspect of the house, at least early on. I’m merely trying to explain that the two of us were a bit prickly, if not frightened, or even concerned. I thought, as I’m confident Cliff did, it was due primarily to the isolated location, the age of the house, which surely provided noises to which we were unfamiliar, and the fact that we were unaccustomed to being there.
It seemed to me that once we got curtains, odds and ends, our own rooms chosen, that things would be considerably more homey, and this proved to be the case.
At least for a time.
Now, there was another matter. I thought little of it at first, but early on, after we had assigned bedrooms, when the furniture was placed, I had begun to have uneasy dreams; a serial dream actually. You know the sort,
where you dream it each night, but it changes slightly.
I would feel myself lying in bed, slowly coming awake, and when I would awake, it would still be dark. Each night I saw a shadow at the window, like a tree limb with branches, hand-like, but much larger than a hand. I would see the shadow curl its ‘fingers,’ then flex out, as if stretching, and touch the window, and with little effort, lift it.
On one occasion the last part of the dream had been of those wooden-like fingers stalking across the floor, attached to a long branch, an arm if you will, and the fingers had taken hold of my blanket at the foot of my bed and began to pull.
And then I came awake.
This time, as before, there was no branch, and the window was shut. But the blanket that had covered my feet was on the floor in a heap.
This, of course, was easy enough to explain, and I came to the conclusion that during the dream, in fear, I had kicked at my blanket and caused it to come free of the bed and fall on the floor. It was a reasonable explanation, and I accepted it as truth without due consideration.
It seemed so logical.
I also determined that to have peace of mind, I would inspect the windows, to make sure they were fastened tight. I had checked them when we first moved in and found them stuck, as if the window frame had been painted and pushed down before drying, causing it to stick. But when I examined the window I had dreamed about, it was unlocked and no longer stuck. It lifted easily.
It is of also of importance to note there wasn’t a tree near the window, so the idea that I might have half-awakened and saw the shadow of a tree limb and its branches against the glass was immediately dismissed. I came to the conclusion that it had been less stuck than previously thought, and I had been mistaken about the lock; in other words human error.
On a day when Cliff had class and I had none, I went out to the barn behind the old house and looked for a hammer and nails to seal that window shut. I knew if I were to sleep in the room comfortably, even if I was only taking care of psychological worries, I would have to seal the window more securely.
The barn was a dusty affair and both sides of it were festooned with all manner of horse-drawn accouterments: horse collars and bridals and back bands and the like for pulling plows. The plows themselves were there, rusted over. There was a big cedar trunk as well, and I looked in there first. It was chock-full of junk, including children’s toys and a large note book that I opened. Inside it were a child’s drawings. They were of the usual thing, a house with a family. The drawing was done in what I supposed was crayon, or something like it, and it had a blue sky and yellow sun, and dark stick-like figures of a woman and a man.
There was a drawing of a child, placed somewhat at an angle between them, as if the child were falling over, and there was a shadow drawn for the child, but none for the parents. The shadow was crude, but very interestingly drawn nonetheless. There were quite a few other paintings as well, including one of the night sky and what looked like a line of crudely drawn trees. There were other paintings of trees and what I concluded was the barn I was in, and I reached the obvious conclusion that they were the drawings of a very young child. There were quite a few of these drawings, varying only in the fact that in each drawing the trees were closer to the house.
I closed up the notebook, put it back, and went rummaging about the barn looking for that hammer and nails, and finally found them. The nails were in a paper bag and they were an assortment of lengths.
Back in my bedroom, I picked through the bag until I found four, long, thin nails, and used those and my hammer to firmly nail the window shut. There was a part of me that felt idiotic about doing it, but I can say truthfully, that after I had fastened those windows down tight, I felt significantly better than before.
Early afternoon, after class, Cliff drove back to the house and announced he was going home for the weekend, hoping to borrow a bit of money from his parents. I wished him luck, but at the bottom of it all I felt abandoned, as if I had been set adrift on a stormy sea. I’ll tell you another thing. I think he too was having discomfort with the house, and had decided to get away from it for awhile. This only added to my discomfort. These concerns soon took a back seat as I decided to stay and study for a history exam.
I sat on the couch in the main room – the one we had begun to call the living room – and studied for my test. I had the books spread out beside me on the couch, and there was plenty of light through the windows, and I was deep into the American Revolution, when a shadow passed over me, darkening the room considerably, and giving me a chill that went beyond the winter weather outside.
I got up and stoked the fireplace, built up the fire, but it did little to heat me up. I pulled on my coat, returned to the couch, but the shadow had swollen to fill the room. The shadow seemed to be nothing more than a reflection of the outside weather seeping in. Clouds had moved to cover the sun. I went to the window to look out, pulled aside the curtains, and saw that it was quite dark for mid-day. I could hear thunder rumbling in the background, and saw a flash of lightning snap out over the thick forest across the road from our rental, giving the trees the brief impression of having been drawn with a piece of charcoal instead of by the hand of nature.
I went back and sat on the couch and turned on a lamp beside it, and began to study again. A short time later, I heard a scratching sound, and then I had what I can only refer to as an impression. A feeling something was on the porch. It was a primitive sensation, something I assume our prehistoric ancestors might have experienced regularly, the feeling that something predatory was near, even if it was unseen, and that it was necessary to be alert.
I glanced toward the row of windows that looked out over the porch. Curtains covered them now, and it would have been necessary for me to go over and pull them back to take a look outside. But I just couldn’t make myself do it, so sure was I that something was on the porch, and that there was something to fear about it being there. And then I heard the porch floor creak. The clouds shifted and it grew darker yet behind the curtains. They were white curtains, but thick. I couldn’t see clearly through them, but I could see enough to determine light or dark, and now I saw there was a spot, a shape that had moved in front of one of the windows, and I swear, it seemed as if it were leaning forward as if to try and peek through the windows and the curtains.
I sat there, frozen to the spot. The shadow, which was human in shape, also reminded me of a willow tree, the arms like limbs, the long fingers like branches; it was the thing from my dream, and it swayed with the wind... I must stop here, for to be honest, I can’t fully describe it. I’m uncertain how much of what I’m describing is how it actually looked, and how much of it was me having an impression of something I couldn’t really see accurately. I know no better way to explain or to describe it than how I have.
The shape moved, and I heard the boards on the porch squeak, and then... I swear to all I know to be true, the door off the front porch opened. I was certain I had locked it, as well as the door to the other end of the dog run, but I was equally certain that I heard it open.
Now I knew someone was out there. It was someone who had arrived with the rain, and not by car. And even as I thought this, I heard the screen door move, and then the screen door and the front door slammed shut in rapid succession.
I glanced toward the door that led out into the dog run hall, and without really thinking about it, I stepped quickly there and turned the latch. A moment later, as I stood at the door, I heard what can only be described as... breathing. The door was generating tremendous cold, and I felt a chill run all the way down my spine. Someone, or something, was standing just outside that door and they were causing the door to turn cold.
The door knob started to twist, very slowly.
In case you’re unclear, I will explain once again that the house was like two houses, divided by that dog run, and that meant that the only way into the house was through the doors on either end of the hallway, with the exception of a back door tha
t led out onto the back porch from the kitchen. Forgive me for repeating this, but it’s essential that you understand this so as to appreciate my situation at the time.
That thought occurred to me, about the kitchen door, and as it did, I stepped back and turned and walked gently through the living room toward that door, which was at the rear of the house on the same side as the living room.
I heard movement back in the dog run, and I knew that whoever, or whatever, was there had realized my plan and was rushing toward the kitchen door. My intent was to lock it, for I knew it to be unlocked, and if whatever was in the dog run made it through the hall, out the back door, and onto the back porch, he/she/it might beat me there.
I broke in a blind panic and ran for it. I heard the door to the back porch – general door and screen door – open and slam, in spite of it supposedly being locked.
I glanced to my right as I ran. There were a series of windows against the dining room that viewed out onto the long back porch. I had to pass through the dining room to end up in the kitchen. As I hurried, I glimpsed through those windows. The curtains were pulled back and my view was clear, and I saw the same dark, willow tree shape I had seen on the front porch. But now it was twisting and flowing in a manner that is impossible to describe. But I knew one thing for certain, even if all I had was a glimpse, whatever was out there was most certainly not human.
I made it to the back door and twisted the lock, and immediately the knob turned violently, and then the door began to shake, and there was a moaning like something big and wounded dying out there on the porch. That door shook and shook. I thought it would never end. I heard the wood screech and give a little, and I was absolutely positive that it was about to break and fall apart, that I would then be at the mercy of the thing.
And then, it was over.
The door quit shaking, and the air, which I now realized was cold throughout the house, warmed immediately. The rain was starting to come down, and I could hear thunder and lightning, but I knew as certain as I was standing there, that whatever had been out there, was now gone. It was the kind of thing you could sense.
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