Ghost Hunt 2: MORE Chilling Tales of the Unknown

by Jason Hawes

  Joe untangled his legs from the blanket and stood up. Ralph stood up, too, his tail wagging.

  “Okay, come on. Let’s go check this out.”

  Joe set off toward the hallway with Ralph at his side. The closet was just to the left of the front door. Joe reached it and stopped and stared. Then he switched on the hall light to make sure he wasn’t getting it wrong.

  Just like the last three times this had happened, the closet door was closed. Joe was sure that Ralph hadn’t opened the door and closed it again. The door opened out into the hallway, so there was absolutely no way the dog could have opened the door himself—unless he was secretly a werewolf and changed into a human. How else could Ralph use a doorknob?

  “What are you, some kind of magic dog?” Joe asked.

  Ralph thumped his tail happily.

  I don’t think so, Joe thought.

  But at least the idea made him smile. Sort of. Because the truth was, this thing with the squeaky toys was starting to get a little weird. Ralph shouldn’t have been able to get the closet door open. He should not have been able to get to those toys.

  Okay, let’s say he did, Joe thought. Suppose there was some trick to the closet door that only dogs could discover. Suppose Ralph could actually open and close the door on his own…

  That still didn’t explain one other extremely strange thing.

  Joe had bought three squeaky toys at the pet store. Three and only three.

  Now there were three plush squeaky toys lying in a heap in front of the closed closet door. And one in Joe’s hand. The soggy one Ralph had been chewing on.

  Joe shook his head. The math was too simple to get wrong. That added up to a total of four toys.

  He looked at Ralph. “Can you explain this? How on earth did you get an extra toy?”

  Ralph answered with a woof.

  Joe shrugged and dropped the plush rabbit onto the pile. Instantly, Ralph made a dive for it. He came back up with the stuffed bunny in his mouth.

  Squeeeakkkk.

  Ralph gave Joe a hopeful look—as if to ask whether it was finally playtime.

  Joe laughed. He couldn’t help it. So there were four toys. Maybe Ralph had brought an extra one home from the park or something, and Joe just hadn’t noticed. He might as well get some studying done since he was awake. But first, he decided to play with Ralph for a while. Then he would take a shower and make himself and Ralph a good breakfast. He planned to forget all about this weirdness.

  That’s what he told himself, anyhow.

  An hour or so later, Joe was in the shower. Ralph was safely outside the bathroom door. Next to squeaky toys—and food—water was Ralph’s favorite thing. Which was great when it was time to give him a bath, but not so great if Joe was the only one who was supposed to be in the shower.

  Joe turned off the water. He slid the shower curtain back and reached for the towel on the nearby rod. Scrambled eggs and bacon, he thought. Ralph loved bacon.

  Joe dried himself off and put on boxers and a T-shirt. With one hand, he hit the wall switch for the fan to help clear away the steam. With the other, he reached for his hairbrush. He glanced into the bathroom mirror.

  Joe made a strangled sound. His hand froze in midair. He stared at the mirror, not seeing his face at all, but seeing something else instead.

  The surface of the mirror was covered in small handprints. It looked like some wacky kindergarten art project.

  He blinked, wondering if he was imagining it.

  Nope, they were still there.

  This was beyond weird. Who could have covered his mirror in handprints—and why? Was it a joke?

  He blinked again. Was it possible that the prints were here yesterday and he hadn’t noticed?

  No, Joe decided. Not possible at all. The prints definitely were not there when he brushed his teeth last night.

  That meant someone made them after he fell asleep on the couch.

  An icy chill slid down Joe’s spine.

  What if someone was in the house last night? What if he, or she, opened the closet door—and gave Ralph an extra toy? And what if that same someone covered the mirror with handprints?

  Slowly, trying not to notice the way his own hand trembled, Joe reached for the towel to wipe the prints away. He rubbed at the mirror. Then he rubbed again.

  The handprints stayed right where they were. He couldn’t wipe them off. Joe looked at them more carefully. The prints looked as if they were inside the mirror.

  Joe felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand straight up. Weird didn’t describe this. This was flat-out spooky.

  Okay, calm down, he told himself. There had to be an explanation. Maybe the prints were somehow put there when the mirror was made.

  Right, he thought. So why haven’t you seen them before now?

  First a dog toy that shouldn’t have been there. And now these handprints. Was he imagining these things? Was he losing his mind?

  Slowly, carefully, as if he expected the mirror to shatter at any moment, Joe reached out. He could hear Ralph whining outside the door. Joe chose a handprint. The one in the very center. And he laid his hand on top of it.

  Well, at least that ruled out one possibility. He couldn’t have made the prints himself. There was absolutely no way.

  The hands on the mirror were way too small.

  They had to be the handprints of a little child.

  A strange, high-pitched electronic pinging sound echoed through the Hammond brothers’ kitchen.

  “Will you turn that thing down?” Mark asked his twin, Mike. “Every time your phone rings, it sounds like you’re getting a message from outer space.”

  “I like my ringtone,” Mike said. “It’s not some stupid song, and I always know it’s my phone.”

  “Well, are you gonna answer it or what?” Mark asked as the phone continued to emit the weird sound. “It’s ruining my breakfast.”

  Mike put down the cereal box and picked up the phone. The caller ID read UNKNOWN NUMBER. Mike answered anyway.

  “Hello?”

  “Hammond,” said a voice on the other end of the phone.

  “Lucky guess,” Mike said. “Which one? Whatever you want, the answer is no until you get it right.”

  “Mikey,” the voice said. “Come on, man. It’s me. I think maybe I need your help.”

  “Joe?” Mike asked. He sat down at the table with a plop. “What’s the matter?”

  There were only three people in the world who got away with calling Mike Hammond “Mikey.” The first one was his mom. The second was Aunt Mona. Since she’d been dead for about ten years, she no longer did it very often. That left just one person: Joe Hensick. He had been the twins’ best friend when they were growing up.

  Joe had been there the first time Aunt Mona had come for a visit. She pinched Mike’s cheek and told him how much he had grown, even though she had never seen him before. And then she called him Mikey. And to make it worse, she didn’t call Mark “Marky.” So Joe and Mark started calling him Mikey all the time. It made Mike furious. Finally he made them swear they would never do it again.

  “Okay,” Mark had said back then. “I promise.”

  “Me too,” Joe agreed. “There’s just one thing. I get to use the name only if I’m in real trouble. It will be a sort of secret code between us.”

  Mike had agreed to those terms, and Joe had never used the name Mikey again. Until now.

  “Where are you?” Mike asked.

  “I’m in Boston,” Joe said. “I just got settled into my new house that I’m renting. Sorry, I’ve been meaning to call.”

  “Dude,” Mike said. “You used the name. What’s going on?”

  “I think I may need you to tell me that,” Joe said. “You guys are still doing the ghost thing, right?”

  “Right,” Mike said. “Wait a minute! You’ve got a ghost?”

  “That’s what I need you to tell me,” Joe said again. “Come on, Mike. Keep up.”

  “Give me your new add
ress,” Mike said. He reached for a notebook. “Then tell me everything you know.”

  “The situation sounds unusual—and interesting,” Jason said later that morning.

  “So we can take the case?” Mike asked.

  “You can take the case,” Grant spoke up. “Jay and I are going to New York City, remember? We’re checking out a possible haunted floor in an old hotel.”

  “Right,” Mike said. “I forgot about that.”

  Grant smiled. “I don’t see any reason why you and Mark shouldn’t take the case,” he said. “Jen can go along. Lyssa’s coming with us.”

  “Okay.” Mike nodded. “I’ll call Joe and tell him we’ll be there tomorrow.”

  “Oh, man, you brought reinforcements,” Joe said. “This is awesome.”

  Joe Hensick looked nice, Jen decided. He had brown eyes and dark brown hair that he wore just a little long.

  “Come on in,” Joe said. “I’ll show you around.”

  “This is a great old place,” Jen commented as she stepped across the threshold, carrying her laptop and a video camera. The house was made of brick and had smooth wooden floors.

  “I like it,” Joe said simply. “I still can’t believe they let me have a dog.”

  “Where is he?” Jen asked.

  “Probably eating a pair of shoes somewhere,” Joe replied, then called, “Ralph! We’ve got company. Get out here, big guy.”

  A moment later, the ugliest dog Jen had ever seen bounded into the living room. There was something brown and fuzzy dangling from his mouth. Something with legs.

  “What is that?” she asked. “Or maybe I don’t want to know?”

  Joe laughed. “That’s Mr. Rabbit, his current favorite squeaky toy.” He reached down and gave one of the dangling legs a tug. Ralph backed up, tightening his grip on the plush animal to play tug-of-war.

  Squeeak.

  “O-kaay,” Jen said. “Got it.”

  Ralph took his rabbit to his doggie bed near the fireplace. He chomped on the toy, and the rabbit squeaked louder. Jen smiled. There was just something about a happy dog…

  “Any new handprints?” Mike asked.

  Joe shook his head. “Nope. They only appeared that one time.”

  “Have you ever noticed unusual activity anywhere else in the house?” Jen asked.

  Joe frowned. “I don’t think so. Just the prints on the bathroom mirror and the toys.”

  “Are they always new ones?” Mike asked.

  “Huh?”

  “The toys you find.”

  All of a sudden, Joe’s face went pale. “Yeah,” he said. “At first it was just one extra toy. But last night the ones I found were all new. I didn’t buy any of them.”

  Mike frowned. “Well, either you’ve got someone who likes Ralph so much that they sneak into your house every night to give your dog new toys or—”

  “Or there’s someone—or something—already in the house with me,” Joe finished. He took a deep breath. “This is getting very creepy.”

  Mike slapped Joe on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’re going to figure this out.”

  “He’s right.” Jen tried to sound encouraging. “That’s our job.”

  Joe looked doubtful. “You sure you don’t want me to stay?”

  “Positive,” Mark said. “We’ll work better if we’re here on our own. You’ve got somewhere to go, right?”

  Joe nodded. “Yeah. I’ll be at my friend Scott’s place. Call my cell if you need me, okay?”

  “We will,” Mike promised. “You just get a good night’s sleep.”

  Joe patted Ralph and told him to be a good boy. Then he grabbed his pack and left for the night.

  Mike turned to the TAPS team. “Okay, guys. Let’s get set up and see if we can find out who else around this place is into squeaky toys.”

  They set up quickly and were ready to get started. “And going dark in five, four, three, two… one. Kill the lights,” Mike said.

  Jen flipped down the light switch in the house’s small dining room. The room went dark.

  Still lots of outside light, though, Jen thought. The house was in the middle of Boston, after all. There was a big streetlight just outside the front door.

  “Okay,” Mike went on. “Mark and I will take the hall and bathroom. I’d like you to stay in the Command Center, Jen. This is kind of a small place. No reason for the three of us to be tripping over each other.”

  “Sounds good.” Jen nodded. “I put cameras and audio recorders in both the hall and the bathroom. Watch out for the recorders in the hall. They’re on the floor. And I’ve got a camera on the closet, just in case.”

  “Great,” Mark said. “Let’s go.”

  “This is Mike. We’re in the hallway,” Mike said. He was setting a base level for the voice recorders. He glanced at his brother. “Are you getting any kind of a reading?”

  “Nope,” Mark answered.

  Mark had an EMF detector in one hand. He held it out in front of him, moving it slowly back and forth.

  “Let’s check out the bathroom,” Mark suggested.

  “Okay.” Mike nodded.

  The two brothers walked down the short hall. The bathroom was to the right. Joe’s bedroom was straight ahead, and the door was closed.

  “The dog’s in the bedroom, right?” Mike asked.

  “Right.”

  Mark stepped into the bathroom first. Mike followed. It was kind of a tight fit. Like the other rooms in the house, the bathroom was small.

  Mike shone his flashlight onto the bathroom mirror.

  “This is Mike. We’re in the bathroom now,” he said for the recorder. “The mirror is clear. No sign of any handprints. I’m going to try and establish contact.”

  “Go for it.”

  “Hello,” Mike said. “My name is Mike, and this is my brother, Mark. Is there anybody else here with us?”

  Mike waited. He looked over at the EMF meter in Mark’s hand. The readout was holding steady; just one light was glowing.

  “If there is someone here, we’d really like to meet you,” Mike continued. “We think you like dogs. We do, too, and so does Joe, the guy who lives here. If you like dogs, can you give us a sign?”

  “Whoa!” Mark suddenly said. “Did you see that?”

  In the darkness of the bathroom, the EMF meter suddenly flared to life. All of its lights came on at once. The brothers could hear Ralph begin to bark and scratch at the bedroom door.

  Mike spun toward the sound. He stepped quickly into the hallway, sweeping the flashlight back and forth.

  “What are you reading?” he asked Mark tensely.

  Mark stared at the meter. “Nothing, now,” he said. “It’s dropped back down to level one. Anything out in the hall?”

  Ralph continued to bark. The dog sounded frantic. Let me out. Let me out. Let me out.

  “I think Ralph senses something,” Mike said.

  Mike opened the bedroom door. Ralph bounded out and ran straight into the living room. Curious, Mike followed him.

  Mark stepped out into the hall. “What is it?” he called to his brother.

  “I think you’d better take a look for yourself,” Mike said. Squeeeeak.

  “What gives?” Mark said.

  “Sorry,” Mike replied. “I couldn’t help it. They’re kind of… everywhere.”

  Mark came into the living room. He pointed his flashlight down to the floor. It was covered.

  Every square inch of the wooden floor was covered with squeaky toys.

  “And you didn’t see anyone bring the toys?” Joe asked the next morning. He and Jen and the Hammond twins were sitting in his living room. They each had a large mug of coffee.

  “No, they were just there,” Mike answered. “We didn’t see or hear any activity, but then one of our meters went crazy.”

  “Which can mean paranormal activity,” Mark explained. “And Ralph went crazy, barking at the same time.”

  “So we let him out of your room,” Mike filled in.
“And that’s when we found all the toys.”

  “Well, you did ask for a sign,” Jen reminded them.

  Joe gave them a shaky grin. “I’d say you got a pretty big one.” He gazed around the living room and shook his head. “I just counted seventeen new squeaky toys.”

  He smiled at his dog, who was chewing on a fuzzy pink pig.

  “Ralph thinks this is all great.”

  “Well, it’s not the worst haunting we’ve ever seen,” Jen admitted with a smile.

  “Did you get anything on the cameras?” Mike asked her.

  “Nothing definite,” Jen said. “I’ll show you.” She cued the laptop to play back what the digital video cameras had recorded during the investigation.

  On the screen, Mike and Mark entered the bathroom from the hall, and the lights on the EMF meter Mark carried lit up all at once.

  Jen paused the playback.

  “Okay,” she said. “You see the time?” At the bottom of the screen, a readout displayed what time the events occurred: 12:32 AM. Jen tapped on the keyboard for a moment. “Now, here’s what was going on at that same time out in the hall.”

  For the first few minutes after the brothers stepped into the bathroom, the feed from the hallway cameras showed nothing at all. Then, from out of nowhere, there was a sudden streak of something moving. But they couldn’t tell what it was. It just looked like a blurry streak.

  “Wow!” Joe exclaimed. “What is that?”

  “Good question,” Jen said. “But look at the time.”

  Once again, the bottom of the screen showed 12:32 AM, from the hall cameras this time.

  “So at the exact same time the EMF went crazy…” Mark began.

  “Exactly,” Jen finished. “That—whatever that is—was going on out in the hall. It’s too bad we didn’t have cameras set up here in the living room.”

  Mike was staring at the laptop screen. “Can you get a still image out of that?” he asked Jen. “Clean it up at all?”

  “Give me a minute,” Jen said. Her fingers worked rapidly on the keyboard.