He would never be able to make sense of what happened or why it happened to them. What horrible twist of fate had occurred to take his baby sister and her husband away from this world? The tears threatened to well up in his eyes again but he swallowed and forced his stubborn nature to take over. He was going to be strong for his family and he was not going to let anything cause his wife and child any more heartache.
Joe had been discovered in the basement covered in stab wounds and Heather had been discovered in the living room mutilated on the couch. When he received that phone call from his parents he had lost it and he couldn’t even hold on to the phone. He had laid his head in his hands and cried like a baby. He couldn’t speak or do anything other than babble incoherently. Lilly had to take the phone from him and get the information from his parents.
They had just received the knock on the door to let them know of Heather and Joe’s death. It was beyond insane and he still was trying to make sense of it. The cops had said there were no signs of any intrusion and there was nothing missing, but there had been blood evidence in Jamie’s room.
She had blood on her shirt and she was clutching the knife that had killed both of her parents, still bloody and sticky. The blood was now all over her and it covered her bedsheets.
Jamie had made the 911 call, her voice small and frail. There was no emotion behind it. She had just said that her parents had been killed. Then she hung up the phone. The officer that investigated had come into the house—the door was not locked, which was not at all like Heather—and he had found Heather’s mutilated corpse on the couch.
Jamie had not spoken a word since then. She was in a catatonic stupor, traumatized by what had happened and by what she had done. How in the hell did his sweet little niece do this? It was like something on the news, happening in some other town to some other family.
The police ascertained that Jamie had surprised her father in the basement and tripped him. He had a gash on his nose and there was a chip on the wood floor with his blood that foretold where he had hit. Then she had overwhelmed him with a frenzy of knife wounds.
She had taken her mother out in her sleep most likely. Then she had called 911 and went back to bed. The kid might never see the light of day again. Even after years of therapy the trauma of what she had done might not bring her back.
He tried to fight the tears that threatened to burn his eyes. It was so damn tough, but he knew that if he allowed the tears to fall they might not stop for a long time and he might completely break down. He had never known tragedy or sadness that even remotely compared to this and his mind was having a terrible time trying to process everything.
He gripped the steering wheel and squeezed it slowly trying to release some of the anger and the anguish that he was feeling. He wanted to get out of the car, but he wanted them to do it as a family. He had worried about even taking Chrissy to the funeral. She was still so young to learn about death, but she had loved his sister and she loved her cousin as well. They had of course blocked her from the truth of what happened, but she knew that her Aunt Heather and Uncle Joe were gone.
He looked over at Lilly. She had been so strong through it all and he loved that he was able to rely on her, but she was also holding it together by a thin thread. She and Heather had become close, almost like best friends recently. They had really started to confide in each other about everything and now there was going to be a void in Lilly’s life for that. She was going to miss her terribly.
He managed to crack a smile at Lilly and she smiled back as she reached out and touched his hand. They nodded at each other and got out of the car. The sun was warm and it felt like an oddly peaceful day in spite of everything that had happened.
Brad went inside, walked to their bedroom, and began to change out of his clothes. He wanted so badly to sit down and just have himself a good old cry, but he knew it would be a while before he got that chance. He would have to wait until he was all alone. There was no way he was going to let his family see him break down. They needed him to be strong.
Lilly came into the bedroom after him and began to change as well. They still had not spoken since they left the funeral. It just felt like there was nothing that could be said or should be said right then. If they spoke about what happened they would both end up sobbing messes and if they spoke about anything else it was like pissing on the memories. It sounded strange, but Brad went with it. He had never been good at expressing or acknowledging deep emotions; he had too much of his dad in him. It was best to cry on the inside. He was a man and that was what they did.
The doorbell rang just then. Brad was finished changing his clothes so he went to the door to answer it. It was a UPS driver carrying a medium sized box.
“Delivery for Brad Dell?” The driver said.
“Yeah, I’m Brad Dell,” Brad replied. He signed for the package and carried it inside the house. The box was a decent size but it was not heavy by any means. He thought this was a bit strange.
The return address on the label said it was from Heather and Joe. What in the world had they sent him? He found the timing on this to be incredibly odd and it sent a dagger of pain straight to his heart. His sister had rarely sent him a package unless it was a birthday or something.
“What is that?” Lilly asked sauntering into the living room.
“I’m not sure. UPS just delivered a package from Heather and Joe,” Brad said.
“Oh,” Lilly replied, her heart sinking. She swallowed hard and he could tell she was fighting back tears.
Brad grabbed a pair of scissors out of the desk drawer and cut the tape that kept the box closed tightly. He sat the scissors down carefully as Chrissy came into the room.
“What’s that Daddy?” she asked.
“I’m not sure yet sweetheart. I’ll have it open in a jiffy and we’ll find out.”
Brad popped the last flap open on the box and pulled it back to reveal the contents.
It was the doll.
He pulled it out of the box slowly, almost as if he couldn’t believe that he was touching it. It was not a replica or another doll similar to the one they had given to Heather and Joe, but the same exact one. What the hell was it doing here? When had they even had the time to mail it to them? They had both been murdered mere hours after he dropped it off. What the hell was going on?
“What the hell is that thing doing here?” Lilly asked.
“I have no clue,” Brad replied.
“Shelly!” Chrissy exclaimed. “You came back! I knew you would!”
She lunged for the doll. Brad dropped it and backed away looking at the reunion. His mind was a bit all over the place as he tried to think about what was happening right in front of him. His whole body felt numb and flu like. His mind was oddly calm and placid, even though he was screaming at himself that this was not normal and there was something crazy going on here.
“How did Heather and Joe send that to us? This has to be a mistake.”
“I don’t know. Maybe the police found it and sent it to us?”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Lilly said.
“I know. None of this makes any damn sense,” Brad said. He was getting frustrated and he was getting angry, but the emotion of anger seemed to be deeply stunted inside of him.
“I want that thing out of our house,” Lilly said. I don’t care what you do with it, but I want it gone.”
“What’s wrong Mommy? Shelly came back!” Chrissy said.
“I know she did sweetie, but Shelly is dangerous. She is not what you think she is,” Lilly said.
“What the hell are you doing? You can’t tell her that; she will never sleep alone again,” Brad said.
“Well, this is a time for drastic measures. There is something deeply dark and terribly wrong about this doll. There is no logical reason for it to be here. None at all. You have to acknowledge that!”
“I have. I know how you feel. I’m as flabbergasted as you are.”
“Yet, you don’t seem to
o concerned. Don’t tell me that the thought hasn’t crossed your mind,” Lilly said.
“What thought?” Brad asked.
“Do I have to say it?”
“I guess. I have no idea what you are talking about.”
Lilly grabbed him by the arm and guided him to the side of the room, her eyes never leaving Chrissy and the doll.
“The doll has to be responsible for what happened to Heather and Joe.”
Brad couldn’t believe she was going there. “I don’t want to hear this shit!”
“Keep your voice down,” Lilly said.
“You are taking this haunted doll angle too far now. I just lost my sister; how could you even suggest something that stupid when we just came from her funeral?”
“I’m sorry, but you can’t tell me that thought has not crossed your mind.”
“It hasn’t. Not in a million years would I ever think that. You are sick, sweetie. I think you need some help,” Brad said.
“I am not crazy! That doll is dangerous. You don’t think it is a humongous coincidence that a few hours after you dropped that thing off at their house that your sister and brother-in-law were savagely murdered?”
Brad looked at her. She was making some valid points, but it was still crazy. There had to be some other explanation. He knew it. He just had to find it and prove it. That was all there was to it.
Was he really just fearing the truth? Was that what was going on here? He didn’t think so and he didn’t want to think about that. There was a certain beauty and comfort in rational ignorance.
“I admit that there is something strange going on here, but I can’t entertain the delusion that a doll butchered my sister and her husband. That is just beyond understanding,” Brad said.
“I think we should do some research on this. There has to be people we can talk to who know about this sort of thing,” Lilly said.
“Right, let’s just look up possessed dolls in the online phone book,” Brad said. He knew that he was being a bit of a sarcastic jerk, but he was being overwhelmed by too much shit right then.
“I’ll look into it. In the meantime let’s get that doll away from our daughter,” Lilly said.
“Where should we put it? If it is as possessed as you say it is then it will probably show up wherever it wants. It won’t stay put, will it?” Brad asked.
“I don’t know. We have to do the best we can until we find some answers.”
“Sweetie, we have to put the doll away,” Brad said.
“Why? I want her!” Chrissy said as she began to cry.
Brad forced himself to be strong and yanked the doll from his daughter’s grasp, which made her break into an outright screaming fit. He had not seen her do this in a while, but he had gotten pretty good at ignoring it over time. Generally if you let her cry herself out then she would fall asleep and wake up feeling better. That was the only way to deal with it.
“Shelly! Daddy bring her back!” Chrissy whined.
“It’s OK, honey. Shelly is sick. We have to get her fixed,” Lilly said.
It was eerie as could be to be carrying a doll that they had just been discussing as being a possessed murderer. Brad put the doll back in the guest bedroom closet and locked the closet door as well as the bedroom door. There was no reason to be careless. There was absolutely no way that Chrissy could get it. If the doll showed up somewhere then it was possessed and they were living in a world of shit that was beyond imagining and he didn’t want to even think about that.
He breathed a sigh of relief and went back to the living room to be with his family. Chrissy was still whining and throwing a tantrum. She was going to have to learn to live with some denial and if she kept it up then he would take away some privileges. Maybe she didn’t need to watch SpongeBob reruns later. Those kinds of threats always seemed to calm her right down.
“There, it’s put away,” Brad said.
“Yeah, I feel really safe now,” Lilly replied sarcastically. She went to her office and began to search online.
Brad hovered in the doorway and watched over her shoulder for a few minutes, which she totally hated. Normally he did it because he loved to stare at her ass and a lot of times she would wear tank tops at home with no bra and he would occasionally catch a little side boob action. It was the simple things in life that got you through.
“Why are you hovering there? You know how annoying that is?” Lilly asked.
“Just wondered what you are up to,” Brad said. He didn’t want to tell her that he needed a project or something to do to keep his mind off things. He thought about going in to the office, but decided it would be in poor taste. He grieved differently than a lot of people and people might have cast a few ugly looks his way.
“I’m doing some research. We have to find out what we are dealing with and see if there are accounts of other people who have dealt with it,” Lilly said. The fact that she was dead serious made him feel bad about stifling a giggle. He had to laugh at the situation; there was no way this could be remotely true.
Lilly was having a meltdown of some sort and this was just the way she was dealing with things. He was OK with it and he was content to let her do her thing if it meant that she was going to be able to work through it all.
Brad wanted to believe her, but he just couldn’t. How did you explain something so absurd and entertain it as being real? He just couldn’t fathom such a thing. He knew how she felt, though. He had racked his brain trying to figure out how all of these weird occurrences were happening and he believed her when she said she saw and heard the things she did, but there had to be a rational explanation.
Brad could not wrap his head around the idea that Lilly had come up with the idea that the doll had sprung to life and stabbed his sister and her husband both over twenty times. She would never make him believe something as ludicrous as that. He would not let himself slip that far from reality.
“Well, I hope you have some luck with that,” Brad said.
Lilly shot him a cold look. She knew that he thought she was imagining everything. He didn’t want her to feel alone and he certainly wasn’t going to let this thing drive a wedge between him and his wife, but when was she going to see that this was absurd? He took a long sigh and walked to the bedroom.
He was going to take a nap and see if he could just forget everything for a while. The day had taken its toll on him and sleep was sounding better all the time.
Maybe when he woke up everything would seem more normal.
Chapter Six
Lilly dialed the number and waited while the phone rang. She was damn nervous. This was the first time she had ever called someone like this. She kept imagining a nightmare scenario where someone picked up the phone and started laughing at her for falling for their elaborate hoax.
She was about to hang up after about the sixth ring, thinking why would this person not have voicemail? Then a voice appeared on the other end.
“Hello?”
“Oh, yes. My name is Lilly Dell. I hope I have the right number. I found it online,” Lilly said. She paused then, unsure of what to say next, despite having rehearsed it about twenty times in her head.
“Yes?”
“Is this Rachel Smith, ghost hunter?” Lilly asked.
There was a pause on the line and Lilly felt the urge to jump out the window and hide from the world under a giant rock somewhere.
“Yes, I am.”
Now it was Lilly’s turn to pause. She had practiced what to say over and over while psyching herself up to make this call. Now she had the lady on the line and she found that she was speechless. It was not the typical conversation and she wasn’t sure how to proceed. Finally she decided on the honest approach.
“I need your help,” Lilly said.
“OK, what is going on?” Rachel Smith asked.
Lilly explained from the beginning and told her everything that had happened. She even included her theory that the doll had murdered Heather and Joe. At any moment she expected
Rachel to interrupt her and tell her how foolish she was being or that she was out of her mind as Brad had constantly said, but instead Rachel just continued to ask questions and get the facts straight.
After she was done, Lilly took several deep gasps of air. She felt like she had been holding her breath for several minutes while she recited the entire story to Rachel. She was sure that she was going to get interrupted or that she was going to lose her nerve and talk herself out of it at some point, so she just continued to plow forward and tell the story to the best of her ability.
“OK and that is where we are at now?” Rachel asked.
“Yes,” Lilly replied.
“Based on everything you have told me I think that you and your family are in grave danger. It definitely sounds like a case of demonic attachment.”
“Wow, OK. What do you mean by demonic attachment?”
“Well, a demon cannot really possess an inanimate object like a doll. It becomes attached to an object like that—basically the item is said to be cursed, but it is really just a doorway that allows the spirit to gain access to our world. Most people are familiar with séances and Ouija boards, which are the traditional methods of facilitating that sort of thing, but there are also cursed objects which are like a permanent link that allow the spirt to gain access to our world whenever it wants. It will inhabit an object like a doll and even move around in it, talk as the doll, and can even kill using the doll, but really it is just using the object as a crutch to achieve mercurial form to accomplish its end goal.”
“What is the end goal?” Lilly asked, terrified of what the answer might be.
“Possession of a person.”
“Oh, my God. Who does it want to possess?”
“Well, usually it will go after the weakest and most innocent. They are easiest to manipulate and the easiest to gain control over and they are often the least likely to be perceived as a threat to anyone. They are the best camouflage.”
Thriller: Horror: Spirit Doll (Mystery Suspense Thrillers) (Haunted Paranormal Short Story) Page 5