by JL Bryan
"What were you saying about the face?" I asked.
"The what?" Mackenzie looked up, smiling.
"The face on the baby monitor."
Her smile fell, and she nodded. "Yeah. As I said, the first time I saw it was about three weeks ago. The face was pale, and it seemed like...not fully formed. Like raw dough, with holes for the eyes, nose, and mouth, almost like a soft, horrible mask. Dylan was screaming, and I looked over and saw that face on the monitor. I was all alone in the house, working late. It looked like someone had slipped into the house, into the nursery, and they were standing over the baby's crib, looking down at him. All I could see was the face.
"I ran across the hall." She pointed through the open doorway and toward a closed door on the opposite side of the upstairs hall. We'd just passed it on the way into the office. "I didn't see anyone, but the room was cold. There was no reason for it to be so cold. I took Dylan and had him sleep in my room that night...and I told myself the face wasn't real. Just my mind playing tricks.
"I kept seeing it in my mind, though. All night, while I tried to sleep. That white, doughy face. It was barely human at all." Mackenzie shivered, holding her baby close. I put a hand on her arm to sort of comfort her, hopefully.
"Have you experienced anything else since then?" I asked.
"Of course. Had it just been the once, I would have assumed it was a mental issue—maybe I'd imagined it, a few neurons misfired, not a big deal. I've been sick and a bit feverish. There's a human proclivity to see faces in random patterns, you know."
I smiled. "I'm usually the one explaining that to people."
"You are?"
"Sure. Some of our calls are from people overreacting to things in their house. They think a ghost is opening a door, but actually there's a slight problem with the latch, for instance. Architectural, plumbing, electrical—all kinds of problems can create strange phenomena."
"Can they create faces?" Mackenzie asked. "I saw it more than once. And I've felt like someone's watching me, too. I've felt that ever since Ethan left for Texas. Before I saw the thing in the nursery, I used to think it was just my imagination, that the feeling resulted from Ethan's absence. Now...I don't know. I think something's here. It becomes more present every day. Footsteps. The nursery gets cold and Dylan hates it in there. I think I heard a door slam the other night, somewhere downstairs, but nobody was here."
"This sounds disturbing," I said.
"It is, but there's no proof. I saw the face three different times, three different nights, before I started to believe it was something more than my own brain acting confused. The baby monitor can take pictures and short videos and export them via USB, so I modified that functionality and kept a computer recording continuously all night, in case the face returned. The face has not returned to the nursery since then. Dylan has been sleeping in my room, so perhaps the...well, presence has not appeared on the baby monitor because Dylan was not there."
"You kept the baby monitor watching the nursery even when your son wasn't there?" I asked.
"Yes. I had to know for myself whether the face was real or not. And, if it was, I needed proof to show Ethan. A video recording would be something objective."
"Mackenzie, do you still have these videos?"
"I erase each night's batch to save memory," she said. "Had the face shown up on the monitor, I would have saved that. All I have is last night's video. Hours of nothing."
"I'd still like to review the videos you have from last night, if you don't mind. Actually, I'll have my tech manager Stacey do it. She's not here today, but she'll be a central part of any investigation." I looked at Kara again, seeing if she wanted to register any kind of protest to that, but she kept up the strong and silent act.
"You're welcome to the video files, I'll just drop them onto a flash drive for you." She looked down at the baby as he nuzzled against her. He had a dimpled face and large, confused-looking brown eyes.
"Do you mind if we have a look at the nursery?" I asked.
"Go on." Mackenzie nodded toward the hallway. "I'll catch up in a minute."
Kara and I crossed the hall. I hesitated before the closed door. I hadn't brought much gear, just a Mel-Meter in my jacket pocket. It was a sunny afternoon outside.
A cold knot formed in my stomach as I looked at that simple wooden door.
"What's the delay?" Kara whispered.
"I can sense something."
"You do not have psychic abilities," she said. "Calvin tested you years ago. It was in his files."
"So you hurried to find any details of my life you could. Why the obsession with me?" I kept my voice low, glancing nervously at the door to the office, which the client had thankfully closed for the moment. Maybe she was feeding the baby.
"Don't be so narcissistic," Kara said. "We had to learn what sort of people we'd been stuck with when we bought your little agency."
"Why don't you go first?" I gestured toward the door. "Maybe there's something horrible in there that will claw your face off."
"You hide your fear behind your sarcasm, but not very well." Kara turned the knob and stepped into the possibly-haunted nursery.
It should have been a happy place. It really should have. The windows were large, admitting copious golden sunlight onto the pastel-blue walls, which were themselves adorned with large stick-on images of zebras, giraffes, and alphabet cubes. Stuffed animals perched on built-in bookshelves and a dresser, and more of them nested in the large white crib in the corner. A mobile of fuzzy orange tiger cubs hung above the crib, smiling with pointy little felt teeth. There was a bin of plastic squeaky toys that looked like rockets and giant key rings, a shelf of colorful board books, a jungle-themed play mat spread out on the carpet. Basically, it looked like the room of a well-funded little baby.
The feeling was not so happy to me, somehow. I looked at the toy chest, the row of built-in cabinets, and the closet door, all of them closed tight. I had the feeling that if I started opening things up, poking around in all the little hidden dark spaces of the room, I would eventually run across something horrible.
"What do you think?" I asked Kara.
"I am here to watch you," she said. "Not to do your job for you."
"Wow." I shook my head as I stepped toward the closet doors. They were white and slatted, the kind that fold open to both sides. "What did I ever do to you?"
"You forget? You made me fail at a critical assignment. I have never failed before."
"You must not be trying hard enough," I said.
"What do you mean?"
"My old swimming coach used to say that. If you never fail, it's because you never tried anything hard."
"Were you an accomplished swimmer, Ellie?" She looked amused. She'd finally removed her sunglasses, but her pale blue eyes were even colder and almost as forbidding. The room had a gloomy pall despite the big sunshiny windows and all the smiling animals. "Did you make your school proud? Your parents?"
"No. I quit." I spread open both wooden doors. Their tiny wheels squeaked as they rolled along the track overhead. "I got tired of Coach Hudson saying that kind of stuff to me."
"Was this before or after your parents died in the fire?"
She'd said it matter-of-factly, with less of a taunting tone than she'd been using with me, but I couldn't help the sudden surge of anger at her mentioning my parents at all, much less bringing up their death. The only thing that kept me from punching her waify little face was the possible embarrassment of spilling blood on the client's carpet.
"Let's go back to your quiet-observation mode," I said. "I really preferred that."
"I'm meant to watch you work. Why don't you try doing that?"
The closet held a number of little overalls and tiny jackets on hangers, as well as cubbies with tiny shoes. I checked the closet area with my Mel-Meter, but I hadn't taken enough baseline readings to tell if anything was up or down.
The room was colder than the rest of the house. The air felt stiffer and thic
ker, maybe smelled a little stale. I wanted to open the windows to let in the sunshine and fresh air.
"We'd definitely set up an observation in here overnight," I said. "Thermal, night vision, audio."
"You would look for the strange entity here, in the very room where the client has seen it? That is where you would look for it? You are indeed a clever, well-trained detective, Ellie, with quite a head for strategy," Kara said. With the client out of earshot, Kara wasn't pulling any punches.
"I assume you'll be writing that in your review of me, too," I said. "For the benefit of...well, whoever it is you really work for. Tracing the ownership of Paranormal Solutions, Inc. is actually kind of tricky, did you know that?"
"You must have tried," Kara said. "And it proved an overwhelming task for you. How sad."
"I don't suppose you want to drop a hint," I said.
"Only one," she said. "My hint is this: stop."
"Stop?"
"Stop asking that kind of question, stop this resistant attitude, and focus on the case. Behave yourself. Be professional for a change."
Rather than reply, I focused on work, opening the row of low cabinets, one after the other. They were empty, the interiors recently painted a yellow that provided a flash of bright color in the room when they opened. The last cabinet surprised me by opening onto a crawlspace that ran several feet back into the wall. I looked into the darkness back there and shivered. "Come look at this, Kara. Use your psychic abilities. If you have any. Nobody gave me a copy of your file."
"Of course not. I am your superior."
"Well, that's debatable."
"Overseeing you is my punishment for losing control of Ithaca Galloway's ghost and delaying an important research project."
"The Mortis Ocularum," I said. "An old-timey attempt to contact spirits with clockwork and electricity. Add some smoke and mirrors and a man behind the curtain and, hey, it just might have worked. If not, it still had the cool steampunk design. Something to look at." I paused, looking away from the dark crawlspace as she came to stand over me. "This is really your punishment?"
"Did you think I came here to enjoy your company?" Kara asked.
"The city is a major tourist spot, you know. And there are beaches out on the islands—"
"I do not like beaches."
"Oh, I bet you burn easily," I said. "That vampire skin of yours must crisp right up."
"He went back to sleep," Mackenzie said, speaking just above a whisper as she entered the room. "If you could keep your voices down...Did you find something?" She looked from me to the crawlspace.
"Just poking around," I said, as quietly as I could manage without whispering. I backed away from the crawlspace and stood, trying to make myself a little more presentable.
"I didn't tell you the worst of it," Mackenzie said. She dropped into a rocking chair next to the crib. She motioned for us to take a small loveseat in the corner, barely big enough for Kara and I to share. Kara and I looked at each other. Neither of us sat.
"What else happened?" I asked the client, turning my full attention back to her.
Mackenzie glanced back across the hall, then quietly closed the nursery door, as if afraid her sleeping baby would overhear what she had to say.
"Two nights ago," she began, her voice so low that Kara and I both had to lean in to hear, "Dylan was sleeping in my room, in his little portable crib, like he's been doing. The house had been quiet for a few days. I mean, not when the workers were banging around downstairs, but at night, I hadn't seen anything, no strange faces on the monitor. I was almost back to believing what rational people are supposed to believe, that it was all in my imagination, probably resulting from stress, lack of sleep, any number of factors.
"So I was in bed, with Dylan sleeping in the crib next to me. I was still awake. It was one of those nights when the wheels in your head refuse to stop turning. I was thinking about work and a million other things, and I just couldn't find the off switch for my brain. I'd keep looking over at the clock and watching the hours slide by.
"It was about three in the morning when I heard the footsteps. They were out in the hall, coming from the direction of the nursery. My bedroom door was closed, so I couldn't see who was coming, I could only hear them.
"I was so scared. There was no pretending this was in my head. In fact I didn't even think of the...strange face, the strange presence, whatever you might call it, that I had seen before. These footsteps were so obviously real that I immediately assumed it was a regular, live intruder, like a burglar, or perhaps worse.
"The footsteps kept coming closer. They moved slowly, and they stopped right outside my bedroom door. I kept telling myself to get up and do something, but I was truly frozen in fear. I'd heard of that term before, frozen in fear, but never experienced it myself. I'd assumed it was an exaggeration." Mackenzie had picked up a stuffed giraffe and was nervously twisting it back and forth in her hands, wringing the poor thing's spotted yellow neck. "The footsteps came right up to my bedroom door, which was locked, and then they just stopped.
"For a minute, maybe two or three, the whole house was silent. I barely let myself breathe. I didn't want to make a sound. Dylan let out a whimper and kicked in his sleep, and I almost wanted to hush him, but that would have just made more noise.
"Then, when I'd almost convinced myself it was over, the doorknob rattled. I mean, it rattled hard, like someone angry was trying to get into my room. It rattled a few times like that, then the door slammed against the frame, like someone had kicked against it.
"Dylan woke up screaming, and suddenly I could move again. I went right for the phone and called 911. Then I looked for a weapon, but all I could find was my tennis racket in the closet.
"The rattling and banging stopped when I called for the police, but I didn't hear any footsteps walking away. I was sure the intruder was just standing on the other side of the door, keeping quiet, like he wanted to lull me into opening that door again.
"I wasn't about to do that, of course. I went to Dylan's crib and tried to comfort him, because he was still crying, and I held the racket in one hand. After a couple of minutes of silence, I heard the voice."
Mackenzie fell silent. She was shivering, reliving the terror she'd experienced. She looked like she might collapse.
I put an arm around her shoulders, and she hugged me gratefully.
Behind her, Kara smirked, seemingly callous to the woman's fear, as if regular people should be emotionally prepared for restless spirits harassing them at night in their homes. Kara might have been a ghost professional, but I bet she would shiver and turn pale just like Mackenzie if an unseen entity harassed her when she was alone in her bed. Well, Kara would shiver, at least, but I suppose she wouldn't turn pale, since her skin is already the color of a freshly bleached polar bear.
"It's all right," I told Mackenzie, hugging her back as if determined to show Kara what kindness and empathy might look like, in case these were new concepts to her. "It can be scary, I know."
"I'm sorry." Mackenzie pulled away from me after a moment. Her eyes looked red. "It's just a relief to tell someone about it. Someone who doesn't keep interrupting and telling me how I must have been confused, or dreaming. It's nice to just have someone listen while I say it aloud and let it all out of my head for change."
"I understand," I said. "We're here to listen, Mackenzie."
Kara's eyes flicked skyward at my attempt to be soothing. I wondered if she would melt if I threw water on her.
"Thank you." Mackenzie took a deep breath. "So I heard its voice. It didn't sound altogether human, but more like text-to-speech software. Robotic and flat. But it also sounded like it was singing a lullaby, or trying to."
"Did you hear any words?" I asked. Lullaby lyrics could provide clues to when the ghost had lived.
"No words, just that rising and falling, almost mechanical. A lullaby sung with almost no emotion at all."
I nodded. The voices of the dead are often quiet and flat—l
ifeless, really, to pick an obvious term. Sometimes they sound angry or fearful, but more commonly there's a lack of inflection. It takes a lot of energy to speak across the divide between life and death.
"Mind if I take a guess?" I asked. "When the police arrived, they found nobody in the house and no sign of a break-in."
"The burglar alarm hadn't been triggered, either," Mackenzie said. "Basically, I was a crazy person jumping at shadows. Then an older cop took me aside and mentioned your detective agency."
I nodded. Calvin still had friends left on the police force. I wondered whether they would continue to funnel clients to us after he moved away. His friends were probably at or near retirement age themselves.
Calvin had never believed in heavy advertising—it drew too many calls from people without actual hauntings, people who either had some other, non-ghostly problem causing odd sounds or cold spots in their homes, or people with some kind of mental health or drug situation confusing them into seeing ghosts. People with real hauntings would find us, he said, so we didn't do much beyond listing our contact information on some paranormal websites.
"It's a good thing you called us," I said. "I think you might have a genuine paranormal disturbance here."
"But can you help?" Mackenzie asked.
"We definitely can." I hadn't checked with Kara about whether she was okay with accepting the case, and I didn't particularly care about her opinion. I wasn't rolling over and letting her take control of my work. "And we'll be happy to start as soon as you'd like. We will need to set up cameras and other equipment to monitor your house. Some of us will stay here overnight, which I've found can be a little bit of a comfort to people who've been trying to cope with a haunting. By the time people call us, things have usually gotten pretty extreme. So you can think of us as your night security team while we're here, and catch up on some sleep."