The Haunting Season

by Michelle Muto

  …Overactive imagination…

  We’re waiting for you, Jess.

  The first voice she heard inside her head was her mother’s, the second voice her own. Except, this time, the voice didn’t sound entirely like hers. It almost sounded like a young girl.

  Jess took a step toward the woods. “If you say someone’s there, then let’s follow them.”

  “No!” Allison pulled harder now, nearly toppling Jess backward. “Never mind. It was nothing. I...I was kidding. I do that sometimes—make stuff up. Please, Jess. Let’s go. We’ll be late for supper. Mrs. Hirsch will be mad.”

  Jess gave the woods one last look. Nothing moved. If she went to investigate she would be late. The mosquitoes were voracious and beads of sweat had begun to trickle down from her breasts to her stomach. “Yeah, sure. Let’s go eat. Besides, I’m tired of being dinner for the insect population.”

  They reached the front porch and Jess opened the door, relieved they were going back inside and away from the hungry insects and humidity.

  Allison stared up at the windows, just as Jess had done a short while ago. “It’s like this house is watching us.”

  A thrill ran over Jess’s skin. Yes, she thought. If any house could be a portal for talking with the dead, Siler House was it. Sure, her excitement contained an ounce or two of fear, but the way Jess saw things, it was like rock climbing or skydiving must be. A little fear and a little risk made life all that more adventurous.

  “I suppose,” she said to Allison. “But honestly? I don’t think there’s much to worry about. Trust me a little here, all right? I’m not sensing anything to be afraid of.”

  Allison was certainly uncomfortable here. If Jess were a glass half-full kind of person, then Allison would be the kind to imagine the glass half-empty, with the remainder tasteless, poisoned water. They stepped inside, and the cool air of the Great Room greeted them along with the enticing scent of food.

  “The house has fooled you,” Allison said. “It’s fooled you into thinking it’s something it’s not.”

  “How do you know?” Jess asked, curious. “Have you seen anything here?”

  “No—”

  “Heard anything?” Jess asked, hoping that Allison had.

  “No. I just know, that’s all.”

  “Why don’t you give the place a chance? Keep an open mind until something does happen?” Jess suggested.

  The clock on the fireplace mantel told her they had barely enough time to get ready for dinner. Allison didn’t reply to her question about the house as the two of them headed up the stairs. Jess liked Allison, she really did. But, she wasn’t giving this whole experiment a chance. Could bad spirits be roaming the halls at Siler House? Sure. But until someone could prove it, Jess decided to keep a positive attitude. Why was Allison even here if she didn’t want to be part of this? Why couldn’t Allison’s family understand that rational or irrational, her fear was real? She hadn’t asked Allison her age, but maybe she was underage and had been forced to come here.

  “Sorry,” Jess said sympathetically. “But, I’m not getting the same vibes you are. I’m not uncomfortable here. In fact, to me, it’s just the opposite—Siler House seems warm and inviting.”

  “It’s in the walls and floorboards.” Allison’s expression became pinched with fear or deep concern—Jess couldn’t figure out which. If she hadn’t been so determined to keep an open mind, she would have found her words unsettling.

  “It’s everywhere,” Allison whispered. “It’s like Siler House is diseased.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  It wasn’t the girls that Gage was keen on observing from the window in his room, although they proved to be a nice distraction. It was the damn graves that had him glued to the window—the ones behind the iron fence. He took a deep breath and forced himself to unclench his fists. His parents had known about those graves. Had to. It’s why he was here and why this particular room had been chosen for him. They wanted him to have a good, long look. A constant reminder that his brother, Ben, was gone. A constant reminder of what he was expected to do during his stay here. The thought would have made most anyone else shudder. Hell, it should make him shudder. What they wanted from him wasn’t normal. But then, he wasn’t normal.

  This was his last month before college started up again. His last few weekends of parties and days to sleep in. Why had he agreed to do this study at Siler House at all? It wasn’t the money.

  It was guilt. Even the late nights, girls, daredevil sports and drinking couldn’t erase it.

  Gage recalled the night the men had come to their door. The night when he’d been asked to show them what he could do. And that, along with his parents’ desperation, had landed him here.

  Didn’t they understand his brother was dead? Not just lifeless for the time being, but dead, as in never-coming-back dead? It wasn’t Gage’s fault. He’d tried to fix it. He’d tried to make it so his little brother could rejoin the living. It just hadn’t worked. But his parents wouldn’t let it go. Stalemate. What did they think? What did they all think? That the two small bodies buried in the cemetery a few hundred yards from the house were some sort of warm up for bringing Ben back?

  No. The men wanted something else, but what? They didn’t give a rat’s ass about Ben. Something was weird about them. They weren’t simply men in suits. One was a lawyer. He had been easy to spot with his jargon and his contract. The other one might have been military, judging by the haircut and the stiff way the dude stood. Both had seemed a bit too serious for the task of signing a college student for a month’s worth of paranormal research.

  He loved his parents. He’d loved Ben, too. Hell, he still did. Why couldn’t they let him put what happened behind him? He wasn’t some sort of hero or corporation’s science experiment. He was just another college sophomore. At least, that’s all he wanted to be. But, here he was—at an old, supposedly haunted estate as part of some fucked up study on the paranormal—along with a few other freaks with abilities. Except they didn’t have a clue what this study was really about. Then again, he wasn’t positive he knew everything, either. He had no proof. His dad said he was being paranoid. Maybe he was. Or maybe not. But either way, Gage told himself he’d find out soon enough.

  The incident in the backyard with Ben’s dog had been a fluke. Maybe the dog wasn’t really dead. Sure. Miracles happened all the time, right? But, Ben wasn’t a dog or a childhood pet and his parents’ desperation to bring back their youngest son put the weight of the world on Gage’s shoulders. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right.

  What to do, though? How to do right by them and be the son they wanted him to be? He’d let them down before. He hadn’t always been completely reliable. He liked to hang out with friends until all hours of the night. And he wasn’t exactly dependable boyfriend material, either. His choice in girlfriends hadn’t thrilled his mother in particular. But when it came to helping his family, he hadn’t been able to say no. Even though he was hoping the experiment would prove to them once and for all that he didn’t have what it took. Not anymore.

  He was Gage. Just Gage. He wanted that to be good enough.

  And yet, he never stopped asking himself if he’d wasted the last of his ability on Ben’s dog instead of Ben himself. He’d have to live with that the rest of his life.

  “Checking out the girls, huh?” Bryan said as he joined Gage at the window.

  Gage didn’t reply. He’d almost forgotten about the girls. They were talking now. The prettier of the two, a dark-haired girl wearing shorts, which showed off her long legs, and a t-shirt that clung to all the right places, pointed at the gravesite with its carved monument behind the iron fence. The second girl was a bit skinny, but still had a pretty face.

  If you gotta be here, you might as well take in the sights, he thought.

  He wondered if the girls were here because they wanted to be, or because, like him, they had to be. The dark-haired girl seemed more comfortable. More at ease.

  “Jess,�
� Bryan said as he stood beside him.

  “Huh?”

  Bryan laughed. “Dude, the girl you’re checking out? Her name is Jess. In case a name matters. I don’t know who the other one is yet.”

  Gage grinned. “Jess? Well, then hello, Jess. Hey, this might be a lot more interesting than we thought, right, bro?”

  Bryan shrugged.

  “What? You don’t like the scenery?”

  “The scenery is fine. Great even,” Bryan replied. “Look, I’m just not like you.”

  “Meaning?”

  Bryan tossed his hands up in a carefree motion and laughed easily. “No offense, all right? I mean, look at you, man. You clearly work out. A lot. Me? Not so much. The girls are fine. Definitely easy on the eyes. Especially Jess.”

  Gage liked Bryan. Guys like him were easygoing and laid back. Definitely calmer and less demanding than some of the guys back home. This was good. Right now, the less stress the better.

  “Meaning,” Bryan continued to clarify, “I probably move a little slower than you do. So go for it, man. Girls dig the six-pack thing. Besides, my mind is focused on the reason we’re all here.”

  Gage sighed. He knew why he was here. His parents expected him to try to bring Ben back—as sick as that sounded. No pressure there. He turned his attention back to the window. Jess tugged at the hem of her shorts.

  “I know about reality,” he said. “But right now, I’m happy with the fantasy. Ghosts might not be the only spirits we raise around here.”

  The thin, blond-haired girl gave a frantic tug on Jess’s arm. Gage raised an eyebrow. “Afraid of the dead and buried, are you, little sister? Well, I think you’ve got something there.”

  Bryan laughed. “If she’s afraid of ghosts, then I think she’s in the wrong experiment. Or maybe she’s afraid of the perv staring out the window at her.”

  “I told you, I was looking out the window before they showed up,” Gage explained. He had been. The girls just sort of wandered into view, easing his mind off his dead brother and the heartache he saw in his mother’s face every day. There wasn’t a day that he opened his eyes, or a night he closed them, that he didn’t wonder why he hadn’t been able to fix Ben. So, a little distraction? Something to help him forget about the pain for even a moment or two? Sure. He was all over it.

  He studied the two girls. Blondie was harder to read, but if she was a believer, she didn’t seem comfortable with it. Which meant she didn’t want to be here.

  Bryan glanced over Gage’s shoulder, which was easy to do since he stood almost two inches taller. Gage had him pegged at probably six-two.

  “The blonde doesn’t want to be here, huh?” Bryan commented, unconsciously echoing Gage’s thoughts. “Too bad.”

  “Well, then she and I have that much in common. Her roomy, Jess, seems right at home with it.”

  “I guess Jess is more like me,” Bryan said, grinning and turning away from the window. “Maybe you don’t have the edge after all.”

  Great. He had more in common with Blondie, and Bryan, who seemed like the kind of guy who brought flowers and opened doors, had more in common with Jess.

  “Think you can run with the big dog?” Gage said with a grin over his shoulder. “Bring it on.”

  The girls’ attention veered suddenly from the graves to a section of the woods. Gage squinted through the glass. He could almost hear Blondie now. Her voice was rising, and he thought he made out the word please, but not much else.

  Blondie finally managed to pull Jess away, and the two girls disappeared from sight, leaving just the view of the graves again. Gage stared at the markers and the almost life-sized monument of the grave’s occupants. He wasn’t great at guessing little kids’ ages, but the girls on the monument were probably somewhere around the age Ben had been when he died. The image of Ben’s small coffin haunted him. He closed his eyes and heard his little brother’s laughter as Gage helped him with his pitching game on summer afternoons. Gage swallowed past the lump building in his throat.

  This was one of the good days. Sometimes, he couldn’t shake the image of Ben’s face as he lay lifeless in the hospital. He opened his eyes again, wishing Jess was still outside, showing off those legs of hers.

  “You gonna stare at her all day?” Bryan asked, as he opened a drawer and neatly arranged his clothes inside them.

  “The girls are gone, bro. Relax.”

  Outside the room, the floors creaked, followed by a hard rap on the door.

  “Dinner’s on the table. Don’t be lettin’ it get cold.” The voice belonged to Mrs. Hirsch, the head housekeeper or whatever she was. The woman looked constantly pissed off.

  “They’re calling us for dinner,” Bryan said. “You coming or what?”

  “Yeah. Be right there.” Gage drew in a deep breath and took one last look at the monument and graves. He thought of Ben once more. Sorry, bud. I tried. Really.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Diseased?” Jess stopped and turned mid-point on the stairs. Allison was crazy. Not crazy in a way Jess feared, but enough to make her rethink the roommate situation. Allison’s eyes lacked the glassiness of medication. Instead, they were wide and very alert.

  She’s honestly afraid. Afraid! Of Siler House!

  Jess ignored the small voice inside her that had its own reservations. A slight chill traced its way over the nape of her neck. No, this was nonsense. She was reacting to Allison’s behavior and nothing more. It was a house, not a person. Not a spirit.

  “I get it, Allison, and I’m really sorry you’ve had such bad experiences. But I didn’t have that,” Jess said, unsure of how else to handle the situation. “What would you have us do? Leave?”

  “Yes! Leave! We should all leave. Right now. We shouldn’t even pack.”

  Jess tried not to look surprised by Allison’s outburst. “Why would we do that? I mean, I understand why you might—you’re clearly afraid of ghosts and this house. But I’ve seen ghosts for years. Years! I’ve never had a problem with them. Ghosts are the reason I came here.”

  Jess had no doubt Allison’s fear was genuine, but what was she supposed to do? Freak out because Allison’s experiences had been awful while hers hadn’t? Believe her about Siler House because she said so, even though it went against Jess’s own intuition?

  Of course, she hadn’t been able to find any information on what had actually happened at Siler House. Had Allison been told something she hadn’t? Maybe Allison was reacting to some terrible tragedy that had happened here. Rationally, a tragedy didn’t necessarily mean the ghosts had to be bloodthirsty. Scary, needy, persistent, even annoying, maybe. Surely, if the place was as bad as Allison thought, Jess would have sensed something. She’d been able to sense when ghosts were in bad moods before, but so far she felt nothing but a sense of peacefulness at Siler House. Whatever lurked here, Jess needed to draw her own conclusions.

  “Then, maybe I’ll just leave you here,” Allison replied. “Leave all of you here.”

  “Dinner!” boomed a voice high above them, and both girls craned their heads back in attempt to get a better view of who had spoken. “Do not be late.”

  “Mrs. Hirsch,” Allison whispered, as the woman’s shadow loomed large and wide on the stairwell wall. The housekeeper thundered toward them, her girth nearly filling the staircase, a large hoop with keys on it clenched in her thick hand, just as Allison had described. Mrs. Hirsch wore a button-up, baby blue dress and a white apron. Wiry, gray hair hung at shoulder length.

  The girls slid over on the stairs to let her pass. Mrs. Hirsch didn’t acknowledge them further, continuing methodically down the stairs, into the Great Room and out of sight.

  “I don’t think we should be late. There’s no telling what she’ll do to us if we are,” Allison said, seemingly forgetting that she’d been ready to leave. “Let’s just follow her.”

  Jess nodded, feeling a bit better. Allison’s rat in a maze nervousness seemed more of a personality issue than a haunted house problem. The girl w
as afraid of everything, including Mrs. Hirsch. The head housekeeper was intimidating, but hardly scary.

  They went down the stairs and through the Great Room, following the scent of food and sound of other voices.

  “We weren’t supposed to dress up or anything, were we?” Allison asked.

  Jess shrugged. “I hope not, but it’s too late now.”

  Dr. Brandt was already seated when they entered the dining room. Bryan was still standing, as though he had been waiting for them to arrive. He held out Jess and Allison’s chairs.

  On top of being cute, he was downright polite. Jess smiled up at him. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome,” Bryan replied as he walked past the new guy at the end of the table, offering him what seemed to be an apologetic shrug.

  The new guy in the snug t-shirt, who, Jess couldn’t help but notice, leaned back in his chair. His eyes met Allison’s, then hers. “Hello,” he said with the faintest hint of a smile on his lips.

  Allison seemed to blush, and Jess couldn’t blame her. The new guy was hot, but extremely cocky. Jess looked away. No sense in stroking his ego any further. She was all too familiar with guys like him. Sexy, desirable. Until you got too close. She’d been burned by an ex just like him, although he hadn’t been quite as hot as this guy. Which meant she’d be smart not to let those eyes and that perfect mouth distract her.

  Once everyone was seated, Dr. Brandt tapped his knife against his water glass. “I thought we’d take a moment to introduce ourselves before we eat. Just give us your name and where you’re from. Jess, why don’t you start?”

  Jess introduced herself, followed by Allison—who Jess learned was from Kentucky. Dr. Brandt’s eyes cut to the end of the table and the new guy. He was still leaning back in his chair, still looking smug and tempting.