Zach surrendered and made the announcement to the group. After a two-hour break, tech guys were instructed to set up cameras and equipment. Others were instructed to pitch tents. A scaled-down group would tour the basement after the break.
“Are you keeping investigative partners the same as normal?” Shelly asked.
“Yes,” Zach said. “This investigation we’re putting together three teams that will explore and film. Bryce will stick with Rico, Rebecca will investigate with me, and tonight we’re going to match up Shelly with Patrizia.”
While most happily chatted about what they’d do or where they’d go during the upcoming free time, Matthew spoke to no one and the disappointment on his face was evident. Shelly didn’t look particularly pleased either. Was she disappointed at being teamed with a new investigator, or because she’d been matched up with a Demon Hunter?
Day one was just getting underway and besides feeling stretched both mentally and emotionally, Zach seemed to be alienating the members of XPI one after the next.
Chapter Eleven
“Are you asking about the ghosts?” the blond boy asked.
After gobbling down sandwiches, Zach and Sara, armed with a mini digital camera, had conducted interviews with the residents east of the asylum who lived on what was former Rosewood property. A few on camera, and a few who asked not to be identified, acknowledged ongoing paranormal activity in their homes. They described events from poltergeists opening cabinets and slamming drawers, to hearing mysterious sounds at night.
One, Mrs. Radkey, an elderly woman who Zach thought resembled a younger version of Evelyn, admitted to having seen a shadowy female figure in her kitchen after nightfall. When pressed for details, she clammed up and refused to say anything further.
After walking down one side of the street and back up the other, no one seemed willing to allow them the opportunity to investigate their property—especially after dark. They had approached the final house on the block before the empty lot—the home closest the main asylum building. The boy had been throwing a rubber baseball up against the concrete stairs of the house and fielding it as it bounced back.
“What ghosts do you mean?” Zach asked before Sara could respond and begin filming. Rosewood experience aside, if he was to be a child psychologist one day, an opportunity to interact with a boy currently undergoing a haunting would be an invaluable experience.
“The ones setting the fires?” The kid took a step back.
Zach guessed the boy to be six-years old, maybe seven. He stood with his glove-hand on his hip and wore a Chicago Cubs jersey.
“Hey, you’re a Cubs fan?” Zach asked, with enthusiasm. “So am I, but isn’t this White Sox territory?”
“My grandpa’s a Cubs fan,” he said. “Why are you one?”
“Well, maybe like you and your grandpa, I like to cheer for the underdog.”
“My grandpa is dead,” the boy said flatly.
Sara stifled a chuckle.
“My name is Zach.” He held out his hand the same way he would to an adult.
“I’m Joey.”
“Nice to meet you, Joey.” They shook. “Is your mom or dad home? I’d like to get permission to talk with you more about these ghosts.”
“My mom is home, but she don’t believe in them.”
“Well, can I—”
The front door flew open and a short, stocky woman wearing an oversized gray sweatshirt emerged from the house. Her brown hair was tied back in a ponytail and she looked none too happy.
“What’s going on out here?” She bolted down the steps and shielded Joey from them, pushing him behind her.
“Hello, ma’am. I was just asking Joey to get you so that we could—”
“Well, you should have done that even before you even asked him his name, shouldn’t you?” She crossed her arms.
“Technically, yes ma’am, I should have, but we’re just here conducting some scientific—”
“Scientific, my ass. Science isn’t conducted with video cameras.” She turned to Joey. “Go in the house, hon. I’ll be in in a minute.”
“But mom, I didn’t tell him about ‘Boy,’ yet.”
“Go in the house, Joey.”
He stood there picking imaginary dirt off his baseball glove.
“Now, young man. In.”
“Yes, mom.” He climbed the steps bouncing his mitt off his thigh the way major leaguers often did. He opened the door and before going in, turned back to Zach and waved.
“What did he mean by ‘boy?’” Zach asked.
“He didn’t mean anything. Let me be perfectly clear with you, Mister…”
“Kalusky. Zach Kalusky.” He held out his hand, but she didn’t accept it.
“Mister Kalusky, if you or your people at,” she peered at the logo on Sara’s shirt, “Sci-D TV, use any videos of Joey without my permission, I’ll have my lawyer up your network’s ass faster than you can say ‘child exploitation.’”
She headed toward the house.
“Ma’am, wait.”
He turned toward Sara and signaled her to cut the taping just as her cell phone rang. Sara answered it and backed away giving Zach some privacy. He saw an opportunity.
“Ma’am, please, off camera. We’re just person to person, now.”
She stopped in the middle of the concrete steps.
“Here’s my business card. I’m a paranormal researcher. I help people who are struggling with supernatural experiences. If anything weird happens, my cell phone is on here. I’m available day or night.”
He gingerly inched toward her with the card extended. She flashed an inkling of vulnerability. “Okay.”
He was a bit surprised that she took it.
“What’s your name?” he asked.
“Virginia Forster.” Again, she crossed her arms across her bosom.
“Virginia, off the record, what did he mean by ‘not telling us about the boy?’”
She hesitated ever so briefly. “Look, Joey’s got an imaginary friend. That’s all. It doesn’t make him crazy. Now please, get off of my property.”
With that, she stormed up the rest of the stairs and into the house. The door slammed. At the apex of Zach’s disappointment, Uncle Henry spoke to him for the first time that day.
Joey holds the key.
The key to what? Joey is just a little boy, Zach thought. How is he going to help solve the mystery of a century old haunt?
Behind him, Sara slammed her cell phone shut. “Fuck.”
“Now what?” Zach asked.
“That was Bryce. Sashza isn’t coming.”
“What? I thought he said he talked to her and she’d show.”
“Well apparently, she prayed about it and decided she can’t tolerate all the ‘lies and deception.’”
Chapter Twelve
“Are we awake?” The voice asked.
Zach had known better than to expect a ‘hello’ on the other end of the phone line.
“I don’t know. Are we…black?” Zach responded.
“Yes, we are.”
Zach could never recite this part without a chuckle. “Then we’re awake. But we’re very confused.”
The exchange of movie lines from the 1974 classic comedy, Blazing Saddles, had become a tradition for Zach and Hunter Martin. It was not only fitting since Hunter closely resembled the lead of the film, Cleavon Little, but it also mocked the stereotype that black people, at least those not practicing Voodoo in New Orleans, weren’t psychic and never dabbled in the occult.
“Hey buddy, how did you know it was me?” Zach asked.
“I’m psychic, remember?” Hunter spoke with a faint lisp.
“Yeah. You psychically looked at your caller ID.” Dealing with Hunter was always a pleasure, and with Sashza threatening to no-show, Zach was glad to call on the consultant for help.
Bringing in a professional psychic for cases had been Sci-D TV’s directive, and Zach originally had fought the idea. He didn’t like outsiders influ
encing XPI’s investigations. Hunter proved his worth on the very first case. The entire team was stumped as to why a family was hearing groans and unintelligible words from an upstairs closet. Hunter connected to the spirit—the ghost of a deaf boy who had been abused, thrown into the closet, and neglected during his short life. The lead helped Wendy identify the spirit and XPI had been able to release the ghost and successfully solve their first televised case.
There was another reason Zach liked Hunter. They enjoyed an unspoken “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in regards to each other’s abilities. Hunter had to know that there was something unusual about Zach. But Hunter clearly understood the two shared mutual oddities, and the tone of their relationship had always been light.
“Caller ID? What’s that? Zachary, is there a purpose for this call or did you just want to brag to an old man about all your technologically advanced gizmos and toys?”
“Priceless,” Zach said. “Hey, what are you doing tonight?”
“I’ve got three words for you. Murder, She Wrote.”
“Seriously.”
“Seriously? Okay, I’ve got an appointment from seven until eight o’clock and after that I’m free. Are you finally setting me up with that Rebecca?” Hunter was mildly effeminate, but he was not gay. In fact, he left no doubt about his feelings for Rebecca—and apparently for Hunter, lust was considered a feeling.
“Something better.”
“Better? Rebecca’s coming over for Murder, She Wrote?”
“Better.”
“Oh these games, Zachary. Tell me.”
“How would you like to join Rebecca, myself and some more of our friends for a psychic walkthrough of Rosewood Asylum?”
“Riiiiiiight. I’m hanging up now.”
“I’m dead serious, Hunter.”
Silence.
“Cat got yer tongue?” Zach asked.
“Wow. Gee, thanks for the advanced notice. One of the most haunted places in America and you want me there in twenty minutes? Whoever will I get on such short notice to style my hair?”
Hunter was nearly bald.
“I don’t need you in twenty minutes. Can you be here around midnight?”
“You’re there…you’re there now? What’s it like?”
Zach looked around at the tents on the lawn and the equipment vans parked in the driveway. The sky was blue; the weather was warm. Robins intermingled with sparrows in the treetops, while cardinals whistled their signature song back and forth. Even in the heat of the Indian summer day, the scent of autumn clung to the occasional breeze.
But something was just not right.
“Get here before midnight,” Zach said into the phone. “I’ll let you see for yourself.”
Patrizia’s flashlight beam bobbed and weaved ahead of them in the darkness as they descended into the basement. Already ten or fifteen degrees cooler than the lobby, the underground level smelled of humid earth and sewage. Of course that’s while Zach wasn’t bombarded by Bryce’s beer-stenched breath. Apparently, his co-host and Pierre had consumed quite the liquid lunch.
“This basement was mostly used for storage—cleaning supplies and canned foods,” Patrizia said. She waved her flashlight toward a doorway ahead of them.
Zach wondered if the underground corridor had looked any different one hundred years ago. Exposed ducts ran along the length of the ceiling which was only about seven feet high. Bryce seemed uncomfortable with the rusty pipes so close to his head. He crouched as they made their way down the tunnel-like hall. The barren concrete walls may have once bore paint, but Zach doubted the place had ever exuded an atmosphere other than brooding. Unlike the upper stories which had experienced obvious renovations, the basement had never been upgraded.
“One day in 1898,” Patrizia continued, “an orderly who was substituting for a missing coworker, discovered a woman living in one of the storage rooms. She claimed that she wasn’t insane and had been living there in hiding from her jealous husband.”
“Was she a patient?” Zach asked.
“That’s where the story gets even more interesting. No one recalled having ever seen her. There were no records of her admittance. She insisted that her ‘friend,’ an orderly had snuck her in and had taken care of her while she was there.”
“Hiding from her husband?” Rebecca asked.
“Yes. But that’s not the end of the story. The day that they found her, they also discovered the corpse of Thomas Carter, the orderly, in the stables. He’d been stabbed dozens of times.”
“She did it?” Bryce asked.
“They assumed that she did. They found bloody clothes down here. The police wanted to take her into custody, but the hospital administrator fought it since she was already committed to the institution. He withheld her identity from the official records.”
“Dr. Johansson?” Zach asked. “The one Wendy said died right before the hospital closed?”
“Yes.”
“What eventually happened to this woman?”
“Apparently, she stayed at Rosewood and was transferred to the female quarters.”
“Did she die in the fire?”
Patrizia shrugged. “This morning, Wendy stated the death toll of the fire was ‘more than a dozen.’ My research found that it was quite a bit more than a dozen. The actual number was nineteen. Nineteen women burned to death.”
The lobby was deserted when Zach and Rebecca arrived. He grabbed a bottle of water from their supplies in the lobby and handed it to her. She had been coughing and wheezing the entire trip up from the basement.
“Allergies?” he asked.
Rebecca coughed. “No. Smoke…did you smell it?”
“No.”
“I couldn’t breathe down there. I definitely think the woman from the basement died in the fire.”
“You felt a presence?”
“Something. I felt something strong.”
Shouts echoed down the north corridor that led to the infirmary. Instinctively, Zach bee lined for the commotion.
“Why don’t you fucking speak English?” Matthew’s voice rang through the cavernous hallway.
“Hey, guys. Guys!” Angel shouted.
Zach entered the infirmary. The three tech guys faced each other in a triangle. Angel looked from Pierre to Matthew.
“Look bloke, belt up. I don’t want to hear from a septic tank how to p’form my dodge and shirk!”
“You calling me a septic tank you stupid foreigner?”
“Hey!” Zach yelled. “What the hell is going on?”
All three of them spoke at once—an indistinguishable blather of words. Bryce and Sara had caught up and stood behind him. Surprisingly, she stayed quiet and waited for him to do the heavy lifting.
Zach held up his hands. “Quiet!” Their word stream tapered off. “Angel, what the hell is going on here?”
“I’m not sure, boss. These guys were laying cables and setting cameras up. I came running when I heard the shouting.”
Bryce pulled no verbal punches. “Pierre, I told you to work as a team. What the bloody hell are you doing?”
Pierre seemed as stunned as any of them at Bryce’s berating. He ran a hand through his sweaty black hair. “Listen Bryce, do me a bloody Rod Laver and don’t blame me until you take a butcher’s hook how high up this bloke wants to position the cameras.”
“I told this fucking guy to speak English!” Matthew shouted.
“Could say the same about you. You’ve the IQ of a Joe Blake.”
Matthew reached and grabbed Pierre’s polo shirt before Angel could pull him back. Sara seemed content to watch how Zach and Bryce would handle things.
Bryce charged Pierre and smothered him in a hug. “C’mon. Let’s go. We’re going for a beer you and I,” he said.
“Beer?” Zach asked. Don’t you think—”
“Trust me.” Just before exiting the infirmary, Bryce half turned and looked back. “Matthew, I’m sorry about this. Set those cameras up the way you want them.
”
Pierre cursed and muttered in unintelligible dialect and pointed back. “I’m tellin’ you—”
“Quiet. I told you that you and I are going for a drink. That’s it.” He turned again. “Zach, Sara, set up whatever work schedule you need. I’ll take care of this and let’s meet back at five o’clock?”
“Okay,” Sara responded. “Five o’clock in the main lobby.”
Once they were out of earshot, Zach tore into Matthew. “What part of work as a team do you not understand?”
“Are you kidding me?”
Angel eased into the space between Zach and Matthew.
“You know I’m not kidding. This isn’t funny.” Zach kept his tone firm and his emotions in check.
Shelly and Ray rushed up the hallway. Apparently they had heard the commotion from halfway across the property.
“No, what’s funny is that I’ve been in this from the beginning…look, it’s bad enough I’ve got to report to you two,” Matthew pointed at both Zach and Angel. “But now I’ve got to kowtow to some foreign idiot? Even the girls don’t have to put up with that many bosses.”
“Even the girls?” Shelly echoed. “What the hell do you mean by that?”
“Okay, okay.” Sara finally stepped in. “Let’s not escalate this. Matthew’s upset and he has a point.”
“Gee, ya think?” Matthew seemed hell bent on alienating everyone.
Sara glared at him. “Do you want to take the night off?”
He crossed his arms across his chest. “No. I never said I didn’t want to be a part of this.”
“Alright, then take a few hours off. In fact, take as much time as you need to calm yourself down. Ideally, I’d like you back here before sundown.”
“Fine.” He made his way down the hall alone.
“The rest of you,” Sara said, looking around. “Where is the Turk?”
“He and Rico went to check out the stables,” Angel said.
“Really?” Zach wasn’t sure if he was more upset that Turk had left without getting permission or because he’d taken off to investigate with a Demon Hunter.
“Well, spread the word,” Sara said. “We’re all meeting up at five o’clock in the lobby. We’ve got a long couple of days and nights ahead of us. Let’s pace ourselves, people.”
Ghosts of Rosewood Asylum Page 8