by Michael Bray
Fortunately, it was something that he’d learned to live with over the years and, more importantly, control. He reached into the front pocket of the hoodie and touched the knife. It was his favourite. Not too long, but sharp and serrated. It would do the job nicely. He had at first planned to use the gun, to make it quick and painless. But not anymore, now he wanted them to suffer, and for that, the knife was best.
He looked across at the Samsons, and had to fight to stop himself from charging over and stabbing their eyes out in front of everybody.
Patience. That was the key.
He watched as the stupid fucking bartender, Jones, gave them the keys to his flat and ushered them upstairs with their book full of secrets. He ought to have known better. He knew how important it was to keep the town free from attention. He of all people couldn’t afford to have people sniffing around. Who knows what they would find out?
Snapshots of his past came to him.
A pained scream.
Pleading for mercy.
Blood soaking into the carpet.
There was so, so much of it that it had caught him off-guard the first time. It was a mess, literally and figuratively. However, everyone had to start somewhere, and since then he’d become good at it. Efficient.
Am I a psychopath?
He had asked himself the question before, and as always, the answer was unclear. He supposed he was. He had killed people, felt no remorse for it. In fact, he enjoyed it. But despite all that, on some level he knew it was wrong, and if he wasn’t careful, he could get caught. For a while, the fear of capture was enough, and he had managed to refrain from doing those depraved things that he so desperately wanted to do, but the rage was strong, and seven years was a long time to resist those urges. He thought he’d done a pretty good job of it, too. But whatever darkness existed in Hope House had coaxed it to the surface, telling him it wasn’t wrong to feel how he felt, that if bloodshed was his release from a twisted and cruel world, then so be it. He had listened, and he’d felt a great relief, for it was all he had.
Of course, the business was fine for what it was, but it was no more than a means to an end, a way to keep a roof over his head and food in his belly. There was no joy, no real desire to be successful. It was a sham, an empty shell. Sometimes, it got so bad that he couldn’t even bear to look himself in the mirror without seeing the broken ghost of a man.
But now was different. With his knife in his pocket and the anticipation of what he was about to do, he could be proud. Because he knew he was good, and he knew that the Samsons deserved what was coming to them.
He looked at Will, and wondered if he, too, deserved to be silenced. After all he had shown them things, told them secrets they had no right knowing.
He wondered if they’d shared their own secrets with him, more specifically, secrets about his visit to the house. Perhaps his name had come up in conversation, and if it had, who knows what could have been said. One thing he’d always done was to live by his instincts, and right now they were telling him that he couldn’t afford any loose ends.
Donovan gauged Will as an adversary. He couldn’t overpower him, that much was obvious. He was broad and strong, and in a physical confrontation Donovan would surely fail. That was okay though, there was always another way. He just had to be patient and wait for his chance.
And then, of course there was the issue of the house itself. Even though he was on his way to being drunk, it still wasn’t quite enough to fully blot out the sly, whispering nature of those voices chasing him, and as much as he hated it, the expert in that particular area was the woman who’d spawned him, and as much as he wanted to avoid any and all contact with her wherever possible, this was a unique situation that warranted a visit.
He slowly got up, sliding out from behind his table and walking to the exit, keeping his head low and his eyes on the ground.
35. TRUTH
STEVE CLOSED THE SCRAPBOOK, leaned back in his seat and exhaled. He couldn’t bear to look at Melody, not yet at least. Not until he had a grasp on things for himself. They had read the book together, and each account was depressingly similar. There had been a mixture of suicides, mysterious deaths including madness. For a short while, Steve had tried to convince himself that it was all an elaborate hoax, but the more he read, the less he could convince himself that it was anything other than truth.
It was in the way it had been written, the way it wasn’t sensationalised. It was exactly as Will had said. A written history pieced together and then collated to give a harrowing history of Hope House and the surrounding land.
“What do you think?” Melody asked him. He had a bizarre urge to laugh, because it seemed that they’d traded their cramped, overpriced, noisy city apartment for their own little slice of country hell, and as much as he hated himself for thinking it, he blamed her. She was the one so taken with the charming nature of the house. He saw the dry rot and damp for what it was, but she had seen it as ‘original features’ and then Donovan had chimed in to say that it could be a ‘restoration project’ for them to do together.
“Steve?” she repeated, and it took all of his effort to turn towards her and force a smile.
“Sorry, it’s just a hell of a lot to take in.”
“Yes. Yes, it is.”
He looked at her pained expression, and realised that at last she got it, she understood exactly what they were dealing with. Despite the pain that it was plainly causing her, part of him was glad that she could see things for what they were.
“So… what do we do now?” she asked him, and he realised that he had no idea. There was nothing that he could give by way of an answer that would give her any sense of safety or comfort, although as he contemplated, the ghost of an idea had begun to form in his mind.
“Well…” he began, carefully choosing his words. “This tells us a lot, but there are still gaps. I think we can agree now that we are dealing with something… out of the ordinary.”
“Yeah, I can’t bury my head in the sand anymore. Whatever it is, it’s supernatural in nature.”
“More than that, it seems to be hostile, and obviously doesn’t want us or anyone else on its land.”
“Agreed, but this doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“Well I do have one idea that might be worth considering.”
“What are you thinking?”
He hesitated, unsure how his suggestion might be received.
“You know the Ouija board that I bought…?”
“No. Absolutely not!” she snapped, standing and pacing around the small apartment.
He could see that she was afraid, and struggling to hold her emotions in check.
“Look, let me explain what I mean…”
“…I can’t believe you would even suggest that, especially now after everything we’ve just learned!”
“Mel, please, just calm down. Hear me out,” he stood and tried to pull her close, but her fear had turned into anger and she swatted him away.
“Don’t touch me! Why the hell are you so determined to use that god-awful thing? What do you expect to prove?”
“All I’m suggesting is that it’s worth a try. Maybe… just maybe, we can communicate with it and perform the ritual I told you about to get rid of it for good.”
“That’s your idea? Are you fucking kidding me, Steve?”
“It’s better than doing nothing! What do you suggest?”
“I don’t know! But not that!”
“Look, I know the idea frightens you, but I don’t see that we have many other options. We’re stuck in the house for the short term at least.”
“Maybe it’ll just leave us alone?”
Steve shook his head and leafed through the scrapbook on the coffee table.
“Almost every account in this book either involves children being born, or kids already in the house. Here listen to this.”
He turned to one of the later entries, written beside a list of the names and ages of everyone who had li
ved in Hope House. The text was written in an old fashioned, swirling hand and Steve read one of the entries out loud.
Although there is nothing in the way of proof to suggest that the spirits which plague Hope House are more drawn towards families with children, my research shows that those families who do, or are expecting a child, do suffer increased activity almost without question. In point of fact, it seems that the only time activity appeared to be reduced to nothing, was in those times when the inhabitants of Hope House had no children, either by choice or by design:
Edith Miller 1910 – 1914
Edward & Molly Harris 1933 – 1935
James Goodwill 1936 – 1937
Frederick & Joan Mirfield 1955 – 1962
In each instance, I find it interesting that even without children, the pattern of short-term residency in Hope House has continued.
Unfortunately, there had not been opportunity enough to speak with all of the above householders, but both Mr. & Mrs. Harris, and Mr. Goodwill stated that they never felt comfortable in Hope House, and indeed felt compelled to move on as quickly as they arrived. I wonder if the spirits had somehow managed to sour the atmosphere, in order to make the residents of the house leave. If so then that idea begs another question:
Why is the activity so sporadic?
Could it really be that children, either born or unborn, are the key?
Could the spirits of Hope House feed from the energy of the young and innocent?
As always, my investigations raise more questions than answers.
Steve glanced at Melody, who, for the time being, was silent. She sat beside Steve as he looked for another passage later on in the scrapbook.
“Then there was this. This relates to the people who lived in the house just before us.”
It has been three and a half years now since the Crofts moved in to Hope House, and I wonder if we have finally managed to contain the evil that lurks within those trees. I myself am too old, and will shortly pass this book to my son, William, in the hope that he will keep it safe, and more importantly, secret.
But I digress.
The Crofts are a polite, if subdued, couple. They always ask after my health when they come to drink in the pub, and even though I have tried to tease information out of them, they seem to be perfectly at ease in Hope House, which gives me the belief that the measures taken to protect the property have worked.
Annie Briggs, a colourful local and amateur historian who has been more than helpful during the course of my research, also professes to be some kind of ‘white witch’ who claims that although she couldn’t do anything to rid the lands of spirits, she could protect it and its future inhabitants. This would be done by way of ‘blessing’ an artefact—in this case a crucifix carved by her own hand—and placing it between the circle where the Gogoku village is said to have been located and Hope House.
Annie’s claim that this enchanted cross would form some kind of ‘spiritual barrier’ seems to hold some weight, especially in light of the Croft’s claims that they have noticed nothing unusual since it was placed at the perimeter of the Gogoku village boundary.
As eccentric as she is, perhaps she does have some kind of power. Indeed, she was quite forceful in her insistence that we keep the entire operation secret, as she claims that the barrier will only last until the cross is handled and removed from its position in the woods. I only hope that this is the end of a saga that has plagued my family since my grandfather decided to build on that land which has seen so much bloodshed.
I pray that this is the end.
Steve once again closed the book, and set it down on the table. He was desperate to know how Melody felt, but for the time being her expression remained neutral.
“This is all my fault,” she said softly.
“No, don’t say that.”
His response was automatic, but that little voice in his head affirmed Melody’s statement.
“But it is. I mean, I hardly gave you a chance to say no to buying the house in the first place, and it was me who picked up the cross from the tree…”
He wanted to tell her that it really wasn’t her fault, but that niggling voice said otherwise, and it took some effort to push it aside.
“Don’t… there’s no way you could have known.”
“But that doesn’t change things, not really.”
He pulled her close, and this time, she didn’t fight him off, and buried her head in his chest. He held her there, not quite sure why he was still so angry with her.
“Look, I know it scares you, but you need to trust me. You need to let me use the Ouija board. Let me at least try.”
“What if it makes things worse?”
“It won’t. It’s perfectly safe.”
He sounded convincing, even though his stomach knotted at the thought of what he was about to do. It was a giddy feeling, the rational part of him sure that nothing would happen and yet somewhere, deep down, another part of him knew that it would. Even so, he had to come across as calm and in control. She pulled back from him and looked him in the eye.
“Promise me that if things get weird, you’ll stop it right away.”
“I will.”
“Promise me.”
“I promise.”
“Okay, then I suppose it’s worth a try.”
He held her close to him and kissed her on the head, unsure if he was relieved or afraid. He decided it was a little of both.
“Come on,” he whispered in her ear. “Let’s go home.”
36. NO LOOSE ENDS
STUMP THE CAT WAS enjoying the soft warmth of its master’s chair when it was grabbed rudely under the belly and picked up. He voiced his disapproval, but that didn’t deter his master as she carried Stump across the clutter-filled room.
He glared up at his misshapen owner when he felt the cold air ruffle his fur, and before Stump could cling on to protest, he had been unceremoniously dumped on the doorstep.
“Go on now Mr. Stump, back before bedtime okay?”
The cat didn’t understand the strange sounds coming out of its human master, and walked gingerly into the garden, wishing that he was back inside and warm. It was contemplating its best course of action when it sensed the vibration of an approaching car.
For Stump, cars meant danger, and so it skittered across the garden and under one of the rosebushes where it would sometimes take dead birds and mice if he were lucky enough to catch them. For now, it was a safe enough haven.
Stump watched as the red sports car came to a halt outside the gate, and the other human approached his master’s home. There was something familiar about this one; it had visited before, but not for a while. Stump watched, his whiskers twitching, his tail swishing slowly in the dirt.
The human jogged up the short driveway and knocked loudly on the door. Stump watched, and the human waited. The door opened, and Stump saw his master at the threshold. The two humans conversed for a few seconds, and then both went inside, leaving Stump outside in the cold alone.
He waited for a few moments to see if they would come back to let him in, and then realising that it wasn’t going to happen, he climbed out from under the rosebush, hopped over the garden wall and into the night to do whatever cats do.
***
“That damn cat stinks,” Donovan said as he sat on the sofa opposite his mother, barely hiding his disgust.
“They keep me company,” Mrs. Briggs grumbled as she lowered herself back into her favourite seat.
“You should air the place out, and clean up some of this mess.”
“I’m sure you didn’t come here to talk about my living conditions.”
“No, no I didn’t,” Donovan said, offering an oozing smile.
“You’ve experienced something, haven’t you?”
She leaned forward as she said it, watching with wide-eyed excitement, which both repulsed and angered Donovan. He counted back from five in his head and managed to keep control.
“Yeah, you could sa
y that. Whatever is in that damned house chased me out of there. ‘Mine’ it said, over and over again.”
Donovan watched his mother, and noted that she didn’t seem at all surprised. He wondered absently how the fat bitch was still alive. Surely her arteries would be clogged with excess fat, her liver and kidneys destroyed by the daily alcohol abuse. He could imagine that as he watched he could see her edging towards her inevitable and deserved death.
“It’s not you it wants, Freddy…”
“…Donovan. How many times do I have to tell you?”
“You can call yourself whatever you want, but you will always be my Freddy.”
He was going to tell her how he didn’t seem to matter so much when she shipped him off to live with his paedophile uncle, but didn’t want to become embroiled in another argument, and so let it slide.
“Look, I need your help. I’m not going back to that damn house. Not after what happened.”
“They aren’t interested in you. They just want the woman.”
Donovan sneered and leaned back in his seat. “Oh, I see, and you know this how?”
Mrs. Briggs smiled, and it was then that any onlooker would have known they were mother and son, so similar were the expressions.
“I know more than you credit me for, son. People think I’m the crazy old woman drinking her days away, but that’s not how it is. I watch, and I listen.”
“That still doesn’t tell me anything useful.”
She reached down beside her chair, and pulled out the carved wooden cross that Steve and Melody had left there earlier. She set it on the table and looked at Donovan with a smug smile on her plump lips.
Donovan raised his eyebrows. “Am I supposed to be impressed?”