The House on Everley Street (Death Herself Book 2) Page 8
He frowned. “You do?”
“I've been on several overnight trips to haunted houses,” she continued, “and I've both assisted with and led attempts to establish communications with restless spirits. I have a training certificate from Marc X. Martell, have you heard of him?”
He shook his head.
“Well, I have a training certificate from his online school, which mean I know what I'm doing when it comes to this type of thing. I don't have my equipment with me, obviously, but I personally believe myself to be very well attuned to the energy of the supernatural world. If there's a ghost here, I think I'll be able to sense it.”
“Is that right?”
“If you want it to be sensed, that is.”
“I...” Pausing, he realized that the night was rapidly running away from him, and that his plan to spend a calm, quiet few hours in bed was starting to become something much more dramatic and theatrical. Still, an amateur séance seemed like as good a way as any to finish off his last night in the house and to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was no ghost. “Do your best,” he said finally, with a smile. “I've never actually been involved with anything like that before.”
“Seriously? Never?”
He shook his head.
“Well, then tonight's your lucky night,” she continued, heading past him again and making her way into the kitchen. “You're so fortunate that I'm here. Oh my God, is that a hatch on the floor?”
“It leads to the basement.”
“Can we go and look?”
“Later. Maybe I should show you the room where she died first.”
“Totally,” she continued, hurrying to the stairs and immediately starting to head up to the landing. “Don't worry, I won't tell anyone about anything that happens here tonight. It'll just be between the two of us, I won't even blog about it.”
“That's good,” he replied, taking another swig of wine before following her up. “I think I'd rather keep it that way.”
Chapter Twelve
Today
“Mind if I crash here tonight?” Alison asked, yawning as she crushed a beer can in her fist and then set it on the table with all the others. “I'm too tired to walk home. My back's killing me. Sorry to play the cripple card for sympathy, but it's true.”
“Sure,” John replied, having anticipated the question for a while – and having hoped that it would come. They'd spent the evening watching DVDs, but it was almost 4am now and they were both starting to flag. Still, it had been good to hang out with Alison again after months without seeing her, and he was starting to realize that he could be sociable after all, so long as he felt comfortable. Grabbing the remote, he switched the TV off.
“I've got to go all the way back up to Peterborough tomorrow,” she muttered, wincing slightly as she hauled herself out of the armchair. “Damn it, I feel like an old woman sometimes. I swear to God, I'm starting to get one of those weak bone diseases, whatever they're called.” Stretching her arms, she turned to him and smiled. “My boyfriend back at uni thinks I'm going to become a premature old woman. Like I'll be gray-haired and knitting by the time I'm thirty. The sad part is, I could totally see that happening.”
“I'm sure you'll be fine,” he replied, getting to his feet. “You can take my bed and I'll sleep on the sofa.”
“I'll take your grandmother's room,” she told him, turning and heading to the door before stopping and glancing back at him. “Oh. If that's okay, I mean. I don't want to step on any toes or do anything weird.”
He stared at her for a moment, before realizing that there was no reason to argue with her. “It's fine,” he said with a faint, not-entirely-successful smile. “I should find you some clean sheets, though.”
“Haven't you changed them since she died?” she asked with a laugh, before raising both eyebrows in shock. “You haven't? That's gross, John!”
“I didn't get around to it.”
“We've got to knock those weird kinks out of you,” she continued, heading to the hallway and then upstairs. “No offense, but you can change your grandmother's old sheets yourself. Unless you want to sleep in there and I'll take your bed?” She paused. “Actually, that probably wouldn't be much better.”
***
Alison, it turned out, snored like a foghorn. On his back in bed and wide awake, John listened to the sound of her snores drifting along the landing from the other bedroom, and although he was a little frustrated at being kept up, he couldn't help but feel just a little impressed. After all, Alison had a fairly small build so it was somewhat surprising that she was capable of making a sound like an angry donkey.
Besides, any sound was better than silence. Silence always made him worry about what might come next.
Unable to sleep, he began to run through the day's events in his mind, trying to work out – as usual, when it came to Alison – whether she'd been giving him any signals he might have missed. He wasn't in love with her, he knew that, but he couldn't deny that she was attractive, and he was starting to think that he needed to sleep with a girl, any girl, just to get his first time over with. Alison was a friend and would clearly never be anything more, but friends could still help each other out. He just didn't know how to bring the possibility up without risking what they had.
Suddenly, he realized that the snoring had stopped. He allowed himself a faint smile, rolled onto his side and closed his eyes, figuring that he should probably try to get to sleep during what might be a brief window. Even though the house was silent now, he was glad to know that someone else was nearby, and he couldn't help but feel grateful that she'd shown up to visit. Ever since she'd gone away to university, they'd spoken a few times by email but it hadn't really been like the old days. Now, at least, she was showing that she hadn't forgotten him. Drifting into dreams, he allowed himself to start thinking about other things.
“Hey,” he heard Alison whisper suddenly, from behind him, “do you mind if I get in?”
He opened his eyes, staring into darkness as he felt the bed creak and dip slightly. She was crawling under the duvet, and a moment later he felt her bare leg against his. He froze, terrified and hopeful at the same time, and then he felt her hand reach around and rest on his waist, while she pressed her body gently against his back. He couldn't tell whether she was naked, but he told himself that there was no way she'd get into bed with him if she didn't want something to happen. Still frozen with fear, he ran through all his possible options before reminding himself that Alison was no idiot: she had to understand that he'd start to get ideas, so he felt certain now that she was at least giving him the opportunity to make a move. All he had to do was roll to face her and do... something.
Anything.
He opened his mouth, but no words came out. Slowly he rolled onto his back, before lifting the duvet and looking down to see her arm resting on his bare waist. The sight was strangely comforting, and he couldn't help thinking that it would be nice to sleep with someone on a regular basis. After a moment, however, he realized that something seemed wrong, and as his eyes adjusted a little to the darkness he saw that her hand was wrinkled and old, with prominent, swollen veins running through the skin. A shiver passed through his chest as he realized that he recognized the hand, but he told himself he was wrong, that his mind was playing tricks on him and that all he had to do was look at her face and he'd see that everything was okay. Either that, or he was dreaming.
“Alison?” he whispered, his voice tense with fear.
He waited.
Silence.
Slowly, he turned to look at her. The room was too dark for him to see properly, and at first all he could make out was the general shape of her head on the next pillow, just ten inches or so from his face. He opened his mouth to say her name again, but gradually he began to make out her features, and as his eyes adjusted more he was able to just about discern two wide-open eyes staring straight at him, becoming more visible with each passing second.
His grandmother.
“No!” he shouted, pulling back and tumbling off the side of the bed, landing hard on the carpet but immediately rolling away until he slammed into the radiator. He heard footsteps in the darkness, and a moment later the light flickered on to reveal Alison standing in the doorway, startled and staring at him with shock in her eyes.
“What's wrong?” she asked, looking around the room. “John?”
He turned to the bed, but there was no sign of anyone. Where his grandmother had been just a moment ago, now the duvet was undisturbed.
“You scared the hell out of me.” Hurrying over to him, Alison dropped down onto her knees and took hold of him by the shoulders. “You were calling out. What happened?”
“Did you...” He stared at the bed for a moment longer, before turning to her. He could tell she had no idea what had happened, which meant he must have dreamed the whole thing. “Nothing,” he told her, getting to his feet and starting to feel like a complete fool. Try as he might to tell himself that there had been nothing with him a moment ago, however, he could still feel the touch of his grandmother's arm around his waist. “It was nothing,” he added finally, turning to Alison and trying his best to seem calm. “Really. Nothing happened.”
“And you still want to tell me that you're dealing with this okay?”
“I am!”
“Apart from waking up screaming?”
“It was just one time.”
“And what's wrong with your back?” she asked, stepping past him and grabbing his shoulder so she could get a better look. “Jesus Christ, John, where did all these burn marks come from?”
“It doesn't matter.”
“Some of them...” She paused. “John, some of these look really new, like they just happened a few minutes ago.”
He pulled away. “You don't know what you're talking about.”
She stared at him for a moment, clearly not convinced, and this time there was a hint of pity in her eyes. “John...”
“Maybe you should go.”
“What?”
“It's almost six,” he continued, “so there's not much point sleeping anymore. You said you have to go back to Peterborough today, so...” He paused, feeling a shiver pass through his body as he realized that he just wanted her to leave. “I'm fine,” he added, spotting a cigarette on the nightstand. “Everyone has nightmares, and that's all it was. You don't need to worry about me. Nothing bad is going to happen.”
Chapter Thirteen
Today
“Do you feel anything?” Hannah whispered, as they sat on the floor in the dark nursery with their backs against the wall, watching the spot where twenty years earlier John had found his grandmother's body. “Anything at all?”
He paused. “Um... No. Sorry. What about you?”
She looked around the room for a moment, wide-eyed with wonder. “Not yet.”
“So -”
“But I think it's coming.”
He frowned. “I'm sorry?”
“I think there's some kind of unusual energy in the place,” she continued, taking another sip of wine before handing the bottle back to him. She wiped a red bead from her bottom lip. “It's hard to express the feeling in words, it's more like a kind of vibration running through my body. There's nothing here now, but... There has been, I just don't know when.” She reached a hand out and swirled it through the air. “This space has been disturbed in recent times by some kind of dark energy, something that left a trace. There's been an entity here, maybe even in this very room, and it'll return soon.”
“It will, huh?” he replied. “Well, I'm not sure how you'd go about measuring or proving something like that.”
“Proof is for when you want other people to believe you,” she replied, turning to him with a smile. “I'm more interested in personal understanding. If I know something, then that's all that matters. I know other people will catch up eventually. By the way, do you have a cigarette I can nick?”
“A...” He frowned. “Um, no. Sorry.”
“I thought I saw there was a packet in your coat pocket earlier.”
He shook his head. “You must be mistaken.”
“Huh.” She stared at him for a moment longer, before turning to look at the opposite wall. “Is that where the body was?”
He nodded.
“And then you dragged her onto the bed?”
“I just thought... I don't really know why I did that.”
“Maybe you were panicking. You were all alone, right?”
He nodded again.
“That must have been hard.” She put a hand on his arm, as if to reassure him. “Then what did you do?”
“I checked to see if she was really dead.”
“And she was?”
He nodded.
“And then what?”
He swallowed hard, fully aware that her hand was still resting on his arm. “And then I called for an ambulance.”
She stared at him for a moment, her face just about visible in the darkness thanks to a patch of moonlight that had fallen across one of the walls. “And then what?”
“And then... It's all kind of a blur.”
“It must have been hard for you.”
“I was fine.”
“What kind of woman was she?”
He paused. “A tyrant,” he said finally.
“Seriously?”
“She was a bitter old woman. Vindictive, cruel... Not just to me, this isn't self-pity. She was well known for having a harsh temper, and for turning against people. She was worse at home, though. Behind closed doors, she really turned the screws. To be honest, if she hadn't died, I'd probably still be under her thumb.”
“You were a Granny's boy, huh?”
“For some reason, I just didn't have the urge to rebel.”
She stared at him for a moment. “I find that very hard to believe,” she said finally. “Very hard.”
“She told me once that I'd never be a writer. She said I didn't have that kind of mind, that I should stop dreaming and just focus on something more practical. She used to say the same thing to my mother when she was younger too, and it worked on her. She wasn't lucky like me, she didn't get to escape.”
“Your mother was a writer?”
“She wanted to be,” he continued, “but my grandmother ground her down. It was my mother who had real talent, I'm just a hack.”
“I don't think you're a hack,” she told him.
“You're biased.”
“Why?”
He turned to her. “Never mind. My mother wrote a lot of short stories. She even finished a novel, I think, but it all got lost.”
“You didn't save it?”
“My grandmother burned everything.”
“I'm sorry,” Hanna replied, watching his expression carefully for a moment. “What happened to her?”
“My mother?” He paused. “One day, when I was very young, she locked herself in the bathroom and drank half a bottle of bleach. My grandmother broke the door down when she heard the cries, but it was too late. My mother died in agonizing pain, and I...” His gaze flickered for a moment, as if the memory was too much. “I heard her screams. In some ways, I don't think I've stopped hearing them since.”
“No-one should have to hear something like that.”
“I read up on it later,” he continued. “The bleach would have burned through her gut and -”
“Maybe you don't need to think about all that.”
“It would've burned her esophagus too. All the way down into her stomach, it would have just eaten through the lining. Her stomach acid would have burst out too, spreading to the rest of her body. I've researched death a lot for my novels, in some ways I think I've been searching to find a more painful method of death, and I've come up with nothing.” He sighed. “And since my father already lived on the other side of the world by that point, I ended up living with my grandmother.”
They sat in silence for a moment.
“Sucks to be you, huh?” Hannah said
finally.
“I'm lucky,” he continued. “I'm still here.”
“You don't have a lighter, do you?”
He turned to her.
“A cigarette lighter?” she asked.
“No. Why?”
“I could just use one, that's all.” She grabbed the corkscrew she'd used on the wine bottle, and slipped it into her pocket. “Sorry, thinking several steps ahead, that's all.”
“I don't even know why I've told you all of this,” he continued. “I haven't even told my wife the whole story.”
“You should.”
He nodded.
“I'm definitely picking something up,” she added, crawling forward toward the center of the room, until she was just a couple of feet from the spot where, years ago, the stain had been left on the carpet. “Don't worry, I don't think anything's going to start banging on the doors and windows, but I definitely feel a presence. There's something in the house with us. I don't know if it's a ghost, though. It feels like some other kind of entity, but I guess I could be wrong. There's definitely something here.”
“There is, huh?”
“But it's not here. It's not in this room.”
“I'm pretty sure this room is exactly where it'd be,” he replied.
She shook her head.
“You think you know better than me?” he asked. “She died in here, right over there against that wall.”
“I still don't think the presence is focused here. I think it's elsewhere in the house. In fact, this feels like one of the least affected rooms.”
“Okay,” he replied, starting to see through her act. “If you say so.”
She smiled. “You don't believe me.”
“I believe you, I just...” Pausing, he realized that she was right: even though he wanted to believe what she was saying, he couldn't quite bring himself to accept that the house was haunted. If they'd met just twenty-four hours earlier, things might have been different, but now he felt totally at peace with the place and ready to move on. He liked Hannah, but he'd already written her off as an over-enthusiastic wannabe ghost chaser who'd spent too much time online. “Maybe it's best to leave these things alone,” he said finally. “If there's a presence here, that's okay, let it be here.”