Life in a Haunted House

by Norman Prentiss

  Now that the weekend is here, I’ve decided to take him up on his offer to entertain me. We get in his rental car—a white Ford Escort—and go for a drive.

  He asks me where we’re heading, and I say I know a shortcut to the mall in Gadsden. He lets me navigate.

  Maybe he knows all along where I’m directing us.

  “This road’s not in very good shape,” Dad says. The path has shifted from pavement to packed dirt, and it’s still wet from the heavy rain a few days ago. Bits of mud and gravel splash up as we drive through, so my dad will probably have to visit a carwash before he returns to the rental agency. “It’s a dead end.”

  “Ignore that sign. Trust me.” I point to the right, and Dad steers us onto the side road that opens up into a clearing.

  Budget House looms in the distance. I tell Dad to stop the car, and he does—mostly because he thinks we’re lost. He turns in his seat, intending to question me, but I’ve already unbuckled my seatbelt. I jump out of the car, and without bothering to shut the door, I begin a quick walk to the house.

  Part way there, I run backwards for a short stretch. My dad is out of the muddied car, and he follows at his own pace.

  I slow down, but not enough for him to catch up. He’s angry, watching and readying his words, and I’m waiting for him to see the house ahead: the ordinary two-story house with the strange mansion-style entryway.

  He doesn’t realize it yet, but I’m vindicated. I’ve brought him to the most dramatic proof available.

  I’ve been telling the truth all along, Dad. Look!

  As I draw closer to the porch, I decide to experience it through my dad’s eyes. A squint of surprise, a slow realization, and an apology catching in his throat.

  My dad’s eyes aren’t as generous as mine. An adult’s eyes, rational rather than imaginative.

  The porch is not part of a movie set. It is simply a badly painted addition to the front of an otherwise unremarkable home.

  Blink.

  Through my own eyes now, the porch appears altered. It’s the same overhanging shape as the entryway that newlyweds Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin huddled under in The Stone Stairway, or the entry to a mad scientist’s hilltop mansion in Spider House. But it’s been painted over.

  The faux marble pillars are now painted a solid beige, revealed as simple wooden supports. A coat of drab brown paint obscures the bas relief of Theseus and the Minotaur that used to decorate the mantle.

  My dad walks up behind me. “What kind of stunt are you trying to pull, Brendan?”

  “This is the house,” I tell him, although my evidence suffocates under thick coats of paint. “This is Budget House.”

  If he really tried. If he reached back into his memory of the films, his affection for his son as we watched them together, he’d know that I’m right. Look at it the way I do, Dad.

  He won’t make the effort.

  “It’s just a house,” Dad says. “Nothing like what you described to me.”

  “She changed it.” I walk up the three step on the bland, covered porch. “Look at these empty screw holes,” I tell my dad when he meets me at the front doors. “There used to be brass lion’s-head knockers attached here. These same doors, in three different movies. Remember?”

  “I thought we were done with this nonsense.” Dad puts a hand on my shoulder, intending to guide me away. Instead, I break free and pound the side of my fist against one of the doors.

  “Brendan, do you even know who lives here?”

  I pound at the door again, then wait.

  No footsteps approach, but I hear the click of a latch.

  In the movie, the door opens by itself. If that happens now, I’m going inside. I know the way into the studio, and I can lead my dad there.

  Melissa stands in the open doorway. She wears a blank expression, as if she doesn’t recognize me.

  She had refused to talk with me earlier when I’d tried to reach her by phone. I expected she’d be more reasonable in person.

  “My mother’s in a weird mood,” Melissa says. “You can’t come inside.” She blocks the way, and for a brief instant I consider knocking her over.

  “I came here to introduce you to my father. Dad, this is my friend, Melissa Preston.”

  Dad seems a bit startled, but he offers a polite greeting.

  “You’re trespassing,” Melissa says. “I’m not gonna call the police or anything, but you need to leave.”

  And she steps back and shuts the door.

  #

  “That was her,” I insist to my dad. “The daughter of Bud Preston, the movie director.”

  Dad doesn’t deny it, but he seems worn down. “Well, we have to go.”

  We step down off the porch. The passenger-side door is still open on the rental car. His arm comes around my shoulder, and the gesture seems unfamiliar. I’m taller than I was the last time he did it.

  I shrug away from him and bolt for the side of the house.

  In person, rather than on a blurry Polaroid, the tree will better resemble the title object from The Haunted Oak.

  After this week’s storm, more of the leaves have blown off the branches. They form a wet, colorful skirt around the base.

  It’s still the same tree. I run toward it.

  Dad’s calling after me, warning me that we’ve got to leave.

  Still the same tree, with the creepy face staring from the knots and burls of the trunk.

  The same tree—

  —but the face is gone.

  Someone has been at work with a saw. The face has been sliced messily away, the wound covered with black tar to help it heal.

  “They’ve butchered it,” I say to my dad as he approaches. “Melissa or her mother.” I grab his hand and put it against the wound. “Must have done it yesterday, since the tar’s still wet.”

  “It’s a tree.” Dad motions to the woods surrounding the property. “There are hundreds of trees here. None of them really have faces in them.”

  “What about the house? Look at the back of the house!”

  Dad casts a cursory glance that way, then directs all his attention to me.

  “That huge warehouse attached to the back of the house,” I tell him. “It’s the movie studio!”

  He won’t look back at it. Only at me.

  I’m the lunatic escaped from the asylum. Dad’s my psychiatrist, and he’s disappointed that I haven’t responded to treatment. Whatever I say won’t matter. He’ll only attribute it to the madness.

  My dad drags me away from Budget House.

  #

  One more attempt.

  I don’t want to go home yet, Dad. Let’s just go to Gadsden like we said.

  I’ve calmed down a bit. I don’t want you and Mom to worry about me. I’ll be fine.

  Can we do one more thing? If this doesn’t convince you, I promise I’ll drop it.

  I swear.

  I’ll never mention Budget House or those films again.

  Deal?

  I know you think I’ve been acting strange, and this is probably going to seem like the strangest request so far. You’ll have to really trust me.

  Please, Dad. It will make things good between us again.

  That’s what you want, right?

  #

  Since I’d been paying attention when I rode the bus with Melissa, it’s easy for me to give my dad directions to Evergreen.

  He hasn’t lived in Alabama, so he’s never heard rumors about the more notorious wing of the facility. I explain we’re visiting a resident in a nursing home. “I’ve been here before, with my Social Studies class.” I figure the cover story I’d used with Mom could smooth things along.

  We turn onto the cobbled road, and Dad takes a parking pass from the guy in the guard booth. We find a spot in the Visitors’ lot, then walk to the sliding glass doors at the main entrance.

  “My friend Geoff did some rehab here, when he had some trouble with his eyes.” I’m talking mainly to keep Dad from asking questions. If I stay ca
sual and act like I know what I’m doing, he’ll play along.

  Of course, I’m practically jumping out of my skin the whole time.

  As I take my dad toward the residential area, we pass the cafeteria and small lounge area. A gray-haired man in a wheelchair waits outside the door to an administrative office. The chair nearly blocks the hallway, and I’m guessing a staff member has abandoned him there and he can’t manage to wheel himself out of the general path. The old man’s head leans down, as if he’s sedated or has fallen asleep.

  I say a gentle Excuse me, and touch the back of his chair as I squeeze past.

  His hand grabs at my jacket. “Can I help you?” The old man’s grip is surprisingly strong, and he twists the fabric to tighten his hold.

  “We’re here to see Tommy.” I use the actor’s nickname to reinforce that I know him. “Tommy Hendricks. He’s—”

  “I remember you.” The man’s large glasses make his alert eyes seem impossibly wide. “You’re not here for Tommy.”

  Another twist to my jacket, and I hear the pop of a knuckle. If he twists too hard, his fingers will become trapped in the fabric. If I try to pull away, his frail bones might snap.

  “This is my dad,” I say, trying some misdirection. The old man’s grip doesn’t loosen.

  My dad, already skeptical of this visit, is ready to leave. He indicates the path behind us: “This way, Brendan.”

  “What’s your hurry?” the old man says. Giant distorted eyes blink at me as a glimmer of understanding washes over him. “What have you taken from my room?”

  “We just got here.” It’s a simultaneous alibi to the resident and plea to my dad. We just got here. We can’t leave now.

  The man tugs down on my jacket, forcing me to stoop closer to his level. “There’s one thing I can’t stand…” He hasn’t any teeth, so he puckers and spits as he struggles to form his words. “And that’s a liar and a thief.”

  My last chance is slipping away. If I can’t fix this situation quickly, Dad will step in and put a stop to the whole thing.

  It’s possible this man’s from the rumored “wrong side of Evergreen,” briefly unsupervised during a rare visit to the calmer wing of the facility. I’ve no idea what item he’s talking about, but I can guess how his paranoid mind might operate. Since I’m already close to his face, I whisper into his ear. “Your nurse took it. I saw her put it in her pocket.”

  His eyes widen, and his grip loosens on my jacket.

  I scoot past and move quickly down the hall toward Tommy Hendricks’ room. My dad negotiates around the wheelchair without interference—the old man’s head has drooped back down into calm slumber—and Dad hurries to catch up with me.

  #

  Hendricks’ undecorated door is easy to locate among his neighbors’. It’s shut, but I knock and turn the knob.

  I remember how startling it was to confront, in person, the distortions and discolorations of acromegaly. Part of me wishes Melissa had warned me before the introduction—but at the same time, there was something wondrous about the surprise as his identity dawned on me.

  My dad heard me mention the actor’s name, but I’m fairly certain he hasn’t connected it to the actor in Bud Preston’s film. I decide the introduction should be a surprise for him, too.

  He’ll slowly realize who Tommy Hendricks is. And in that same moment, he’ll realize his son has been telling the truth all along.

  I step into the bright bare room, and my dad follows. As before, a floor curtain obscures most of the bed at the back of the room, but I see the lump of Tommy’s feet beneath the blankets.

  Good. I was worried he might not be here.

  I stride past the curtain, keeping confident. Dad walks gently, practically on tiptoe. Afraid he’ll wake a sick patient. Afraid he’s doing something wrong.

  The best thing I can think to do now is recite another line from a movie. It will cast a spell, helping Tommy get into his character.

  I stand at the foot of his bed, raise a pointed finger to him and smile in greeting. “It’s the twisted face!”

  Tommy’s sitting up in bed, reading a newspaper. He stares at me through his strangely contorted wire-frame glasses. “That’s not very nice,” he says. “I have a medical condition. I can’t help the way I look.”

  I’m once again struck by incongruities: eggplant hands holding a newspaper; a swollen-smashed head purpled over with port-wine bruises; the eyes and nose and mouth melted out of symmetry, as if painted by a child who hasn’t yet learned facial anatomy. Apparently inhuman features, yet he wears pajamas and glasses, and speaks with the voice of a frail, refined gentleman.

  “It’s me. Brendan. I visited here about a week ago with Melissa Preston.”

  “Who?”

  He’s joking around, because we had such an easy, instant rapport when we first met. “Come on, Tommy. I was just quoting a line from the movie you starred in.”

  “Why would anybody put me in a movie, looking the way I do?” There’s a catch of remorse in his voice, and I almost think he’s serious.

  “A horror movie,” I tell him—to jog his memory, not to compound the insult. “The Twisted Face. And later a small part as the Antique Store Owner in The Crooked Frame.”

  “Young man, I don’t know you. I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

  My dad seems ready to slink out of the room. He’s totally humiliated on my behalf.

  Thomas Hendricks lifts one of his eggplant hands to wipe away a single tear that travels down the rough terrain of his face. I’m sorry if I’ve upset him, but I almost feel like I have more reason to cry. He was my last chance.

  “You told me the hard work was worth it.” My voice grows shrill and accusing. “You knew you were part of something important.”

  I understand a bit about dementia: older people can forget where they are, even who they are, as their past slips into a fog of mystery. It’s a tragic condition, and I feel terrible if my visit has prompted any mental anguish.

  But the explanation I find more likely is that Melissa’s mother works in this facility. She’s gotten to Tommy, told him how to behave if her daughter’s friend ever tries to visit.

  Tommy was an actor, after all.

  He acts scared now, his hands punching at the bed like he’s wearing boxing gloves, searching for a call button to signal the Duty Nurse.

  Dad pulls me out of there.

  #

  It’s a 45 minute drive from Gadsden to my current home in Graysonville, and neither of us says a word.

  At one point, “Crazy” by Willie Nelson comes over the car radio. Aside from the title’s unfortunate commentary on my recent behavior, there’s another sad context. Dad likes Willie Nelson, and I’ve never been fond of the guy’s old-man quavery voice. In the past, if a radio station played one of his songs, one of two things would usually happen: I would switch the dial to a pop station, or Dad would turn up the volume as if to annoy me further.

  Neither happens this time. Willie continues at low volume, and his mournful tone expresses an authentic sadness I’d never noticed before.

  When we arrive outside the apartment building, Dad parks the car by the curb and turns off the ignition. Neither of us makes a motion to get out.

  I dread returning home, because I know what he’ll say to Mom. I also know Dad is leaving tonight to return to his job in Cleveland, and some woman named Alicia that he cooks dinner with.

  He’ll leave Graysonville thinking he’s a failure as a father. I don’t have the words to reassure him otherwise.

  “I’m sorry, Brendan.”

  He looks at the steering wheel instead of me. I wish he wouldn’t confirm the rest of his thoughts by speaking them aloud. There’s no need: during the silent drive, I’ve already imagined the worst of what he’ll say:

  This has been too much. You’ve put such pressure on me, to be the kind of father I can’t be anymore. The distance between us isn’t just miles. We’ve both changed a great deal. We’
ve literally grown apart.

  It’s like those movies and that director you’ve built such ridiculous fantasies around. I can’t manage to recall the films with the same affection you’ve stubbornly persisted in. Any affection I felt for those movies is long gone. The past sometimes needs to stay in the past.

  Can you imagine how it feels for me to travel all this way, hopeful I can get through to you? That I can break past all those childish stories and have a meaningful, rational conversation with the son I love?

  The son I used to love?

  God, I feel so sorry for your mother. After all our differences, I still wish the best for her. A good life. But how can she have that if you keep dragging her down with worry?

  At first I thought those tall tales of yours hoped to draw me back into your life, maybe even back with your mother. Turns out, the situation is even worse. You’ve actually convinced yourself these stories are true.

  I should have left you there at Evergreen. Apparently they have a special area for people like you who’ve lost touch with reality.

  Why don’t you do us all a favor and have yourself committed?

  #

  Instead, he says: “I believe you.”

  #

  “It was him. It was really the guy from the movie.”

  Such a strange experience, to have Dad defending me to my mom.

  “I was wrong about Brendan. He’s just as sane as he ever was.” Dad’s intentional sarcasm in that last statement doesn’t undermine the first. Actually, it’s comforting because it represents the kind of joking around we used to do. We’re back on track, finally—which makes me sad that he’s leaving for the airport in about an hour.

  All three of us sit at the kitchen table and wait for our Chinese delivery order to arrive. The atmosphere’s significantly different from the previous time we were together in this room. For one thing, Mom’s without her legal pad.

  She’s smiling, too—though she’s quick to point out she’s not happy that I’ve kept so many secrets from her.