“Look, Lady. I don’t know if you’re just mental, drunk, or you still think prank calls are funny, but pulling this crap at three a.m. is dangerous and annoying.” One of them said. I wasn’t sure which one.
“It’s three? I could have sworn it was just after midnight when it happened.”
“It’s actually almost four now.” Said the blond one. “We’re going to go because we’ve got drunks and wife beaters to deal with. I sincerely hope no one died because you pulled this stunt. Go to bed, and don’t do this again. We’ll arrest you next time.”
I hung my head and walked back into the house. When I got back inside, the apartment had taken on that same oppressive feel that it had during the party. It was as if I’d angered something, and I could almost feel it seething around me.
It had to be my imagination. The oppressive sensation had to be a manifestation of my guilt and shame over getting drunk again. I’d drunk too much, had a nightmare, and humiliated myself.
The lump on my forehead was harder to explain away, but perhaps I had actually hit my face on the toilet. Maybe I’d slipped in my drunken stupor. All I knew was that I wanted to go to bed.
So, I made my way up the stairs and fell into bed. I was able to fall asleep, but it didn’t last long. Just before dawn, I heard a small thump at the bottom of the stairs. I brushed it off at first because I thought that I might have just startled myself awake.
Heavy footsteps started up the stairs, and I jumped out of bed. I crossed the room in a flash and slammed my bedroom door shut. I threw the lock and then dove back into my bed.
I grabbed my cell phone because I wanted to dial 911, but I couldn’t. The thud of the steps reached the upstairs landing, and I heard them turn toward my room. I thought it would break down the door and come at me, but instead, I heard it turn again and go into the spare room.
The next sound that reached my ears was one that made my blood run cold and sparked insatiable curiosity in me at the same time. I’d moved to the wall and had my ear pressed against it so I could hear what was going on in the other room. What I heard was the soft shuffle of feet and then the gentle creak of my spare bed’s springs. Someone had gotten in the bed?
I couldn’t call the police, and I also couldn’t just go back to sleep. I looked around the room for a weapon. The only thing I had was a giant nursing textbook I’d discarded on the floor next to the bed.
After picking it up, I crept to my bedroom door as quietly as I could. I turned the lock and moved out into the hallway without a sound. I could hear someone in the spare room snoring and tossing a bit as if they were trying to get comfortable.
When I stepped into the doorway and saw that the bed was completely empty, I ran back to my room, grabbed my pillow and blanket, and sprinted down the stairs as fast as I could.
I spent the rest of the early morning hours, until the sun came up, on my porch. If I was smart, I would have called my Dad and told him I was moving back in with them as soon as I knew he’d be awake, but in those twilight hours, a ravenous curiosity seized hold of me.
As terrifying as the events in my house could be, there was a mystery to solve, and I was going to get to the bottom of it. All I had to do was summon up the courage to go back into the house and take a shower.
Chapter Six
Step one in solving the mystery of Overwatch house was getting myself a trusty sidekick. No, I don’t mean a new best friend. Well, yes, that’s actually what I do mean, but not of the human variety.
A trip to the animal shelter was in order. At first, I’d thought that I wanted a dog, but then it occurred to me that with my school work and a new job, I didn’t have the type of lifestyle that a dog fits into comfortably. It would be okay for me, but I didn’t want to bring a dog home and then leave it alone all the time.
That meant my new pet would be a cat. I’d never owned a cat before, but from what I understood, they were entirely independent. Before I went to the shelter, I stopped at a pet store to get supplies. Thirty minutes and a hundred dollars later, I had everything I needed and then some.
My next stop was the animal shelter. The only place nearby was the county animal control facility. I couldn’t believe how drab and depressing the place was, but I felt better knowing I would save at least one animal from a short life of suffering.
A grumpy lady behind the counter gave me two forms to fill out, and I wondered if working here for a long time made you jaded. Once the paperwork was complete, I handed it back to her. She let out a little huff and then stood up to lead me back to the cat holding area.
“I’m the only one here, and the high school girls who come in to help out with the viewings don’t get in until after two thirty. If you find one you want, just come back up to the desk and let me know.” She said and walked away.
It was hard for me to look at them knowing I would only be able to save one. I figured I’d walk down to the end of the row and see if I could find any kittens, but I only made it halfway down the row of cages when a little orange paw shot out from a cage and grabbed my sleeve.
“Tut.” The name on the pen read.
“Like the pharaoh?” I found myself asking the skinny, underfed ginger kitty.
He meowed at me and then tugged on my sleeve to bring me closer to the cage. I leaned in, and he pressed his head against the bars of the pen. I don’t know why, but I pushed my head against it too. Tut started to purr loudly.
“I’m going to go get the lady, and I’ll be right back for you buddy.”
And that was that. I paid the fee, put Tut in the carrier I’d purchased at the pet store, and we went home. As soon as he got out of the carrier, Tut took off to explore the house. That’s when I knew that the notion about cats being completely independent was correct.
With the cat in the house, I felt better. I was less afraid, and it fortified me for the detective work I felt I had to do. While Tut poked around behind the living room furniture, I decided to use my new-found courage to explore the basement. I couldn’t understand what was going on in my house if I hadn’t been in every part of it.
I went to the coat closet and found the box of emergency supplies my dad had insisted I keep handy. There was an enormous Maglite flashlight in the bottom, and I smiled because it was both a source of light and a potential weapon.
Flashlight in hand, I made my way into the pantry. As soon as I looked at the worn wooden door in the floor, my stomach churned, and most of my courage fled. I remembered that there was some liquor stashed in my cabinet from the party the other night. I figured just one swig from the tequila bottle would give me the boost I needed to descend into the dark depths of my house.
Just like in a cheesy 80’s horror movie, the hinges on the door creaked loudly as I pulled the door open. The staircase was nothing but thin boards held together on either side by more unfinished wood, and it was steep. It didn’t look like much more than a ladder that was set at an angle. Never mind ghosts, I’d be lucky if I made it to the bottom without breaking an ankle or my neck.
I cautiously made my way down the stairs, but when I reached the bottom, the door slammed shut above me. I scrambled up the steps and tried to get out, but my exit wouldn’t open. There was no lock on the door, so I had no idea why it was stuck. I pushed as hard as I could, but it wouldn’t budge. When my elbows were so strained that it felt like my tendons would pop, I gave in.
“The only way out is through,” I mumbled to myself and descended the steps.
The basement floor felt cold under my feet even though I was wearing shoes. I shivered and hugged myself. If I’d prepared a little more, I’d have brought a sweater down into the damp, chilly basement. It was too late for that.
I shined my flashlight around looking for a way to turn on the lights in the basement. I found a bulb with a chain hanging down, and luckily, it worked. It sparsely illuminated the immediate area, but I noticed with a tinge of horror that every corner of the room was engulfed in a shadow that seemed to have a life of its own.
Had it not been for the generous gulps of alcohol I’d taken before my trip to the basement, I would have had a panic attack. As it was, I barely held my nerve.
“Nothing to do but what I came here for,” I whispered to myself.
There were stacks of boxes and a large, mahogany armoire in front of me. The wardrobe was ominous, and it appeared to be not only from another time period but of a different world as well. Not from another planet, but the piece seemed to have been ripped from a dark castle in an Eastern European country where they still believed that vampires caused crop death.
I reached out to open it because I wanted to get that portion of my investigation over with as hastily as possible. It just felt like there would be something shocking inside of the cabinet. The doors had little metal handles, and I wrapped my fingers around both of them. Before I could chicken out, I yanked them open and winced against whatever imaginary awful waited inside.
There was nothing. I breathed a sigh of relief and began going through the boxes. The only problem was that it felt like someone was watching me. It took me a while to go through all of them because I kept flicking on my flashlight and sweeping it around the dark corners of the room.
The boxes didn’t contain anything earth shaking. For the most part, they housed old cleaning supplied and batteries. Two of the boxes were full of old clothes, and one had a collection of books. I put the book box at the top of the stairs. If I could get out that way, I’d grab it on my way. If I had to get out of here another way, I’d just retrieve them from above. I could reach through the door and grab the box without coming back down here.
I tried to get out one more time as I placed the box on the top step. The door was still stuck, so I figured it was as good a time as any to start looking for another way out.
The exterminator had gotten into the other side of the house from down here. Perhaps I could go up there and then get out. I wasn’t sure how I’d relock the door, but I decided to worry about that after I freed myself from what I’d affectionately started to think of as the Overwatch dungeon.
There was nothing left to do but make my way over to the other side of the basement so I could attempt to find the door that led into the second apartment. In the center of the room was the area where the furnace, water heater, and some other mechanical looking stuff sat. There was also a narrow space that looked like it might have reached the other side of the room.
I had to turn my Maglite on again because there was no light once I was under the other apartment. I’d figured that the music shop man would use the basement for storage too, but there was nothing down there.
What was surprising was the steps and door. There was a full staircase with a railing that ended at a regular door. I could have sworn the exterminator said this side of the basement had the same setup as mine, but there wasn’t any time to dwell on that.
I don’t know how to explain what I felt other than to say that once I’d crossed over, the feeling of being watched was closer. Whereas under my apartment, it felt like something watched me from the dark corners, now it seemed like it was right behind me.
At the top of the steps, I held my breath and turned the doorknob. It occurred to me that I didn’t know if I should be relieved that I was getting out of the basement or terrified of going into the unoccupied apartment.
At first, the only thing remotely interesting about the other apartment was the sparseness. I figured the place would be stuffed to the gills with boxes and equipment, but there was very little there. Everything was also covered in a thick layer of dust that told me no one had touched anything stored there for a very long time.
I was about to start looking for a way out when I heard a clicking sound upstairs. It wasn’t unlike noise of insect pincers snapping together, and it unnerved me, to say the least. If there was one thing I hated, it was bugs.
The sound grew louder and then multiplied. From the noise of one clicking little insect to two, and then a few, and then it sounded like sounded like hundreds of them were spilling from the walls above me. But, how could I hear that? I made my way to a window when the sound changed from the clicking of beetles to the scuffing and scurrying of cockroaches. It seemed as if thousands of them were scuttling down the hall toward the stairs.
I heard what sounded like them cascading over the stairs as their exoskeletons dropped like drying leaves onto the risers of the staircase. I couldn’t help myself. I wanted to throw the window open and run, but instead, I turned around. It’s cliché, but it was like a train wreck. My body wouldn’t obey my mind, and I looked even though tears were now running down my face and soaking the top of my shirt.
Roaches would have been better. An older man was standing at the top of the stairs looking at me. At first, I thought it might have been the man who rented this side of the house. Maybe he was upstairs moving boxes around, and that’s what I’d heard.
“Oh, hello. Excuse me. I’m so sorry. I’m Samantha, and I live next door. I got locked in the basement, and I came up here hoping to find a way out.” I blathered on nervously.
It was only when I shut up that I comprehended something wasn’t right about the man who’d now taken a couple of steps down toward me. The first thing that struck me was that it wasn’t really a man. The person moving toward me was a woman with a short haircut. She wore trousers and a button-down shirt that I’d always associated with male clothing.
None of that was particularly remarkable compared to the way she looked aside from her clothes. Her skin was drawn and tan. No, not tan like from the sun. It was tanned as in preserved. Her lips were drawn into a sinister smile that was too wide for her face, and it gave her teeth a skeletal appearance.
The woman’s mouth opened and closed in a biting motion, and what emanated from her was a growling sound that made tiny hairs on my arms stand on end.
I was frozen. I didn’t know how to get out of the house other than to open the window behind me, but I didn’t want to turn around and put my back to the thing on the stairs.
My eyes darted around looking for a way to get out while putting a lot of distance between myself and the woman. Down the hall and straight ahead of me was a back door. The room would have been the mirror side of my kitchen except that this half of the house had no kitchen.
I made up my mind in a split second and sprinted for the back door. I could hear the thing pounding down the steps and then pursuing me through the hall. I wanted to throw myself through the door, but I had to stop and unlock the deadbolt. I could hear her behind me in the kitchen, and I knew I wouldn’t get the door open before she reached me. I could almost feel her as she reached out to grab my hair. Her fingertips grazed a few of the strands.
And then I was out the door. I ran through the backyard halfway to the alley before I turned back to see if she was behind me. There was no one there.
I knew I had to call Becky for two reasons. I needed her to come over and lock up the other side of the house because I couldn’t latch the deadbolt from the outside, and I wanted to know more about the woman who’d lived in my apartment before me.
I thought that if I could find out who she was, maybe I could talk to her about the house. I needed to know if she’d ever seen or heard anything like what I’d been experiencing in the apartment, but I’d forgotten the name of the retirement facility where Becky said she’d moved to before I rented the place.
Tut meowed at me when I walked through the back door of my apartment. I figured he wanted some food, but he’d have to wait a minute. I had a call to make and some manual labor to do as well.
I went over to the basement door in the pantry to investigate why it wouldn’t open, and I needed to retrieve the box I’d left at the top of the steps. I couldn’t see any reason why the door hadn’t opened for me, so I reached down to pull the handle.
It popped right open, but I wasn’t sure if the thing I’d seen was down there. So, I grabbed the box and then slammed it shut again. I used a broom wedged against the wall as a te
mporary way to keep it from opening while I searched for a hammer and nails.
I knew I had nothing in the house, but I figured it was worth a shot to check the garage. It was important that no one opened that door again. Much to my dismay, there was nothing of use in the garage. I only had one choice.
“Hello, John. I need your help.” I said when John answered the phone.
My next call was to Becky while I waited for John to show up with wood and tools. I needed the name of the retirement home that the former tenant had moved to.
“Hey, Samantha. What’s up?” She said briskly into the phone, and I could tell she didn’t have much time to talk.
“I got locked in the basement, and I had to go out through the other side of the house. I need you to come lock the other apartment. Do you have a key?”
“I don’t, but I can call the man who rents the other side. Can you keep an eye on the place until he comes to lock it up?” She asked.
“Sure. Can I ask you one more thing?”
“Go ahead, Samantha. But, make it quick. I’ve got a listing appointment in fifteen minutes.”
Chapter Seven
Becky told me the name of the retirement home the former tenant had moved to was called Crestview. She said it was in a town a few miles away called Norman. Becky also told me that the old tenant's name was Janice Lockheed and that she’d been moved to Crestview Home after a stroke. As far as Becky knew, the home was close to Janice’s family.
John arrived shortly after I got off the phone with Becky, so I’d have to wait a bit to go online and get directions to Crestview. He had wood planks, a hammer, and big nails. The only problem is that John wouldn’t seal the basement hatch without more details about what had happened. At first, I wasn’t sure how much I should tell him. Part of me thought that I might have been experiencing some sort of psychiatric breakdown.
If I was having a mental break, there was no way I’d be able to start my new job. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep my nursing license if I was diagnosed with a delusional disorder.
Devil Hour: A Samantha Hainsley Cozy Ghost Mystery (Things That Go Bump in the Night Book 1) Page 6