Carlton House

by B. Groves

  She opened the door to find Jordan passed out on the couch with the game controller still in his hand. This was good because sometimes when he got drunk, he’d bang on her door begging her to take him back. Screaming, hollering, crying to the point where she’d have to blockade the door so he wouldn’t enter her room.

  She shook her head in disgust and went to heat up her dinner.

  Yes, this was it. She was tired of this life.

  Chapter 2

  Where Am I?

  Lily smoothed out her skirt and jacket. She made certain the seams were neat and clean before she sat on her bed to put on her heels. The high heels were wide, but she found them in a Goodwill and after cleaning them up, they looked brand new.

  Her skirt and jacket also came from her local Goodwill. She had the business suit dry cleaned, and again, no one would have ever noticed she bought most of her clothes in second-hand stores.

  Lily was alone in the apartment. She was grateful for the peace and quiet while Jordan was at work although she needed to hurry before he arrived home and she would have to explain why she dressed up in her nice clothes.

  “You were right, the letter was an ad,” she lied to her ex that morning.

  Jordan had been hungover and didn’t remember the big envelope he grabbed out of the mailbox the day before. He waved her off, and she left for work without another word.

  She didn’t want to tell him in case this offer turned out to be a hoax.

  Her palms were sweaty as she tied her hair back in a tight bun. She didn’t know why she bothered doing this. That’s not true… she hoped this job offer was legitimate. She hoped this job would first get her out of this apartment and out of Jordan’s life forever, and maybe, just maybe, she could finish college.

  She wiped her hands on her towel and gave one last glance in the mirror. The time on her phone read 2:30 PM. Mr. Carlton stated any time between 8 AM and 5 PM. She only hoped she wouldn’t arrive at an inconvenient time. She wondered what kind of job this man had where he could interview people during the work week. Or was he one of those heirs that never lifted a finger and would yawn the whole time? She dealt with those kinds before when she worked in the casino.

  Lily picked up the binder containing her resume and the letter. She gave herself one last pep talk and left her apartment.

  The cold March wind sliced through her jacket and sent chills up her legs as she made her way to her small sedan. The car had over 200,000 miles on it but never had major issues. She appreciated that.

  After mapping Carlton House, Lily was surprised to discover the drive wasn’t over twenty-five minutes from where she and Jordan lived. That was much less driving time than where she worked in Brigantine and that meant less gas.

  Lily owned an older iPhone she bought off of Craigslist, but it worked well enough. She punched in the address on the map feature and started her car. She tried to stifle her nerves when the map came up with her drive time and put the car in drive.

  Lily gripped the steering wheel and pulled out of the parking lot, trying to keep her mind clear and her nerves relaxed.

  Route 347 otherwise known as East Mill Creek Road or New Stage Road depending on your location wasn’t a long road, but it was a spooky one, especially when driving it late at night. Lily remembered when she and her friends used to drive it to hunt down those legends. They never found the devil, the devil’s family, or the ghost woman.

  She hadn’t driven that road in a long time, so her recollections of it were fuzzy and trying to remember if there was a huge estate on the road made her draw blanks.

  Lily drove until she reached Route 347. She turned on the road and memories came flooded her mind about happier times in high school driving around with her friends.

  She smiled remembering when the guys tried to scare the girls and how she shared her first kiss with a boy named Ryan.

  Lily drove with a grin on her face but eyed her GPS while trying to maneuver around the sharp curves of the desolate road.

  There’s nothing here except forest, she thought. It’s a scam. A disgusting joke.

  Okay, now she was passing the street that had the tiny neighborhood, and later she would pass another street with a small farm and the park.

  Her grin changed to a pout. The GPS announced she was less than a mile from the entrance.

  She slowed her car and another car that had been behind her passed on the left. The man gave her a dirty look as he passed.

  “In six-hundred feet, the destination is on your right,” The GPS announced through the phone.

  “Where?” Lily asked out loud.

  “Turn right,” it announced again.

  Lily strained her neck. She didn’t spot a turnoff just a tangle of thick forest and vines and white sand creeping out onto the road.

  I knew it! She thought as anger clogged her throat. The job offer was a fake. Some kind of sick joke. She would go home, and Jordan would laugh at her when she walked through the door. His pranks were amusing in the past, but not anymore. This wasn’t funny since she’d been trying to find other employment for months.

  Lily didn’t want to cry, but her hopes deflated when she didn’t see a road to turn onto.

  Or did she? She looked to her right, and her eyes widened when the small paved road popped up out of nowhere.

  She turned the steering wheel and realized she turned too fast and almost hit a mailbox.

  The mailbox didn’t look old or rusted as she straightened her car, and the road looked newly paved.

  When she fixed her car, she identified the address on the mailbox.

  Oh my God, this is it.

  Relief and excitement replaced her doubts when she confirmed the address on the letter.

  Lily shifted her gaze down the desolate road. The trees were bare this time of the year, but the forest surrounding the road was so thick, that no light poured through the branches giving it an eerie atmosphere.

  Lily thought that was ridiculous and pressed on the gas pedal. She drove slowly not sure when the house she’d reach the house. She remembered from looking at the map that the house opened into a huge property, but she hadn’t looked at the road leading to it.

  Lily drove a series of curves before she looked up to discover a wrought-iron gate appear after the fourth curve.

  The gate sat in the middle of brick walls that disappeared into the forest and made Lily wonder if it wrapped around the whole property like a typical chain-link fence.

  The wall had to be around six feet high and looked solid.

  She stopped in front of the gate and wondered if she should open it by hand and drive through or wait for someone to greet her.

  She placed her car in park and got out to gaze around. Surely, there had to be someone here to greet her.

  She stepped up to the gate and pulled on the cold metal, but it didn’t budge. She tapped her forefinger on her lips wondering what she should do next. Mr. Carlton hadn’t left a phone number to call or any other form of communication such as an email address.

  Perhaps she’d been wrong all along. Lily turned back to the gate and peered through the bars. Her mouth opened in shock from the sheer size of the house sitting beyond the gate. It was gigantic. Lily tried counting the windows, but the intimidating size of the house made her lose count.

  The road circled around a fountain and Lily noted the huge cracks in the asphalt.

  She also noticed the neglect around the property. It was obvious the lawn hadn’t been manicured in a long time, and from her point of view, Ivy had completely taken over the left side of the house.

  She wondered if this was a prank because it seemed like no one lived here in ages.

  Lily’s hopes for a better job dwindled with each passing second. She turned around and sighed. She might as well drive home and keep looking around career website for the rest of the night. She didn’t know how she could be so stupid thinking the one letter she received in the mail would turn her life around.

  With a si
gh, Lily walked back to her car when a noise caught her attention. She stopped and looked around. It sounded like a voice.

  Her brow furrowed in confusion when she heard it again.

  “May I help you?”

  That’s when Lily saw the speaker to the left and sitting near the entrance to the gate.

  Lily walked towards the little metal box with a button beneath a speaker. She glanced up and realized there was a modern camera perched on top of the brick wall aimed at the entrance right where she stood.

  “Please hold the button while you speak,” The masculine voice said.

  Someone does live here, Lily thought with surprise.

  Shocked that someone really lived in the house, it took Lily a good thirty seconds before she pushed the button.

  “Hello. My name is Lily Evans. I’m here for an interview with Mister Michael Carlton about the housekeeping position available,” Lily said. She hoped her voice came out steady and confident as she spoke because her nerves told another story.

  Lily jumped when she heard a buzz and metal clanging against metal as the gate opened.

  “When you reach the house, please press the button on the speaker near the front door. It will be on your left,” the voice said.

  Lily listened to the instructions as the gate made loud scraping noises against the concrete.

  She pressed the button and said, “Okay. Thank you.”

  Lily hurried to her car and started the engine. She tried to keep her cool and wiped her palms on her skirt. She did a quick check; her binder with her resume and cover letter sat on the front seat next to her handbag.

  The gate was open enough for her to drive through. She placed the car in drive and inched her way inside the property as the gate opened all the way.

  Lily tried to keep her eyes forward and noticed how much worse the pavement was now that she drove on it. Her car jostled around and she prayed the damaged pavement wouldn’t do any damage because she couldn’t afford to have it fixed.

  She drove around the fountain and found the concrete cracking on the sides, and the head missing from the statue that sat in the middle. She didn’t know why, but the image made her nervous and doubts about this interview kept nagging at her.

  Lily pulled up to the front door and thought about driving around in a full circle and leaving. Something was off about this place and she couldn’t place her finger on why or understand what caused these weird feelings.

  She had this feeling that eyes watched her from a distance and it made her even more nervous.

  Maybe she should just drive off. Maybe this was a bad idea. This place needed a great deal more work than a mere housekeeper.

  She tried to reason that perhaps this house had been purchased recently and the new owner needed help with the restoration. He sounded young from what she heard over the intercom. He had a deep, smooth voice, but it didn’t sound raspy like an elderly man.

  That’s the logical answer she needed. Her reasoning made her calm down as she parked her car. She glanced in her rearview mirror and realized the gates had closed behind her. Well, she was stuck now, wasn’t she?

  She hoped this wasn’t some kind of weird trap. She might be kidnapped… or worse.

  “Stop it, Lily!” She said out loud. “Everything’s fine.”

  Her thoughts and her imagination ran wild with various possibilities. Again, she reasoned that she grew up in a small trailer before she was taken away and placed into the foster system and in her twenty-three years, she never dreamed of working in a place like this. The casino and hotel she used to work for may have contained extravagant rooms—rooms that made the apartment look like a shed—but nothing like this.

  She squared her shoulders and tried to shove her ridiculous thoughts aside, but she double checked her handbag and gripped her pepper spray. It reassured her that if she sensed danger, she had a weapon to defend herself.

  With one last deep breath, she shut off her car and grabbed her binder. She stepped out of the car and gazed around the courtyard. The house was massive.

  Why do I keep calling this a house? It’s a mansion.

  Upon more thorough inspection, there were cracks in the brick around the front door, and the windows needed washing with industrial strength cleaner.

  Her gaze turned upwards to the upper floors and her breath caught in her throat.

  She thought she saw a face staring at her through one window on the top floor.

  Her heart thumped inside her chest, and her mouth hung open from the shock. Two eyes and a pale face stared down at her.

  She stepped back and bumped into her car. She blinked several times trying to figure out if it was real or her imagination.

  Lily looked away for a few seconds and tried to catch her breath.

  Did she dare look up again? Lily never frightened easily. She grew up in harsh conditions before the state intervened and child services whisked her away into the foster system. You learned to never show fear when living in a group home.

  Lily didn’t look up again. There was no need to since it had to be a figment of her imagination. She was stressed out for this interview and her mind played nasty little tricks on her.

  There was curiosity, too. Lily’s curiosity about this mysterious house overpowered her common sense. Her common sense kept telling her to turn around and hightail her butt out of there, but her curiosity about the house won that battle. Lily soon climbed the stone steps, pressed the button on the intercom, and waited for the response of the man who greeted her at the gate.

  “Miss Evans, the door is unlocked. Please come in and turn to your right. You’ll see the entrance to the dining room. We will speak there,” The voice said through the speaker.

  So, it had been Mr. Carlton who answered her and gave her instructions. How odd that he didn’t answer the door himself. He sounded awful young through the intercom, but she could be wrong in her assumption. He may have been elderly or disabled after all.

  What if she’d been wrong on both counts? What if he attacked through the door once she entered?

  Not taking any chances, Lily slipped her pepper spray out of her purse and placed in the breast pocket of the suit. Her flight instincts swelled in her gut and she wouldn’t take any chances.

  Lily turned the knob, and the door swung open. She entered the foyer and was shocked at how huge the room was. She stepped inside but didn’t sense any other presence in the room after she closed the door.

  Her heels clicked on the wooden floor as she took another three steps inside the foyer. Her gaze turned from left to right, her jaw-dropping from the sheer opulence of her surroundings.

  She spun around, but no one appeared.

  To her left was a fireplace bigger than her car with winged back chairs and a table sitting in front of it.

  As she peered further, there were two closed doors and open double doors on her left.

  From her vantage point, the room looked like a ballroom? A parlor? She wasn’t sure.

  Directly in front of Lily was a massive staircase that led to the upper floors. She would get a good amount of exercise on those stairs she thought with a grin. To the right of the staircase was a hallway that looked dark and foreboding.

  Something occurred to her as she gazed around.

  A thick layer of dust parts of the wooden floor. She looked and saw cracks in the walls and places in the corners of the foyer where paint had peeled away. Parts of the ceiling had stains from water damage.

  She took a few more steps in and realized one of the winged back chairs in front of the fireplace had a tear on the wing and the upholstery hadn’t been cleaned in ages.

  The windows muted the outside light from dirt and grime.

  Who lives here? She thought as she placed her hand over the jacket pocket assuring herself the pepper spray was there.

  Had someone recently purchased the house? Is that why they needed help? Did they need help with renovations? Or did an old man need help to maintain the house?
/>   Again, she considered turning around and leaving the house.

  Things became stranger by the minute, and she didn’t know if she wanted to play this game.

  As she debated what to do, she heard a voice call her from the right. It startled her out of her thoughts.

  “No need to gawk, Miss Evans, you will have plenty of time for that soon,” Mr. Carlton called from the next room.

  Lily blushed and turned to walk towards the dining room, wondering what she let herself get into. This house seriously needed cleaning and repairs, and all the damage added to the cliched haunted house scenario.