It’s kind of pathetic, seeing this. I mean, I know from being around him enough. He pretends that he’s okay even to himself. He’s not even honest with himself.
People have a tendency to project themselves onto others.
Yeah. And that’s back to the whole possession thing.
Indeed.
What happens to Brad when he can’t watch the game? He goes around the house royally pissed. He goes into the kitchen and kind of just stands there. Then he goes on his phone and tries to find the score.
But those round-by-round stat scores aren’t the same.
Phone pocketed, he runs upstairs, but there won’t be light up there.
Worse, there’ll be a stench.
That kind of symptom isn’t used as much. Probably because it can be easily made into just some kind of, I don’t know, dead animal or something.
I want Brad to really be Brad. I want to just, I don’t know, make Brad just not be fake, and be vulnerable for once. I really don’t care if I really freak him out, not like I did with Becca. Didn’t waste any time with her. She deserved it. I felt vengeful, you know? I just wanted revenge. But the way Brad can care so much about something as small as a game, I don’t know, it worries me. It kind of makes me want to stop and leave him be.
But we’re already here. It’s going. He’s on his laptop in the dark because the lights aren’t working and he’s online watching a live stream of the game. Will he notice if I stand behind him?
Will he notice if I get closer?
Will he notice if there’s a glare on the laptop screen and you can see me there, in the glare?
I said I wanted to keep me out of this. Just sort of keep it about the haunting, and not about the fact that I am haunting him. Sort of making it seem more like he maybe got a demon too.
But then Brad’s clueless.
So that means I need to go back to cold spots and the sound of heavy footsteps walking up and down the hallway.
That gets Brad’s attention. He starts listening.
The footsteps stop just before the door to his bedroom. The footsteps don’t walk past, stopping short for full effect.
Brad kind of whispers, “No way…”
He forgets all about the game until he hears the sound of crowd noise coming from one of the other rooms in the house.
The crowd noise is right out of the live stream.
Brad gets excited and it’s sad. “No way, bro, like shit, for real?”
Who is he talking to?
He talks to himself I guess.
Brad tweets, “First sign of symptoms or bro’s a haunter.”
Then he goes out into the hallway, kind of fearless, actually. Different, because most people would be weirded out. Indeed, most would interpret the activity as negative. Yeah, something that is bad. But not Brad. He’s chasing the crowd noise, but it switches locations.
He ends up back downstairs, where the TV is.
Would you like to know how Brad dies?
Eh, I guess. Sort of. But I’ll know anyway since you know, so go ahead and tell me.
Bradley Vola will graduate with a B-average in communications. Vola will continue with postgraduate studies, opting for physical therapy. He will spend much of his twenties in academia, attending parties and absorbing the fraternity/sorority subculture. Vola will continue as an instructor at the college, his career peaking as an associate professor. During his eighth year as a professor, Vola will meet a student and a relationship will form quickly. Vola will leave the college in order to retain ethical integrity; he will acquire a job at another state university. The switch between universities will result in his career stagnating at assistantship. Yet Vola will find peace with his once-student-turned-lover. Vola will leave the university at sixty and work as a freelance consultant from home. Vola will die of pneumonia at the age of eighty-one.
The TV is on, like there wasn’t really a problem.
Brad looks disappointed. The thought here is that he imagined most of it. He really wanted the haunting.
It’s kind of sad.
It’s sad, right? I’m not just doing what you say people do a lot: projecting?
No. It is indeed a little perplexing.
Brad’s tweet gets no favorites and definitely no retweets.
It’s a bust, and I’m kind of like, all of a sudden, “Maybe give the guy a helping hand? You know, just let him think that it might be possible?”
There would be no harm in that.
Yeah, so maybe the TV shuts off again. Brad knows what that might mean. Then the TV starts switching channels, stopping on everything that isn’t sports — not that he’ll really notice that part.
Brad starts laughing. “Dude, this is awesome.”
Just like him to be overanxious. I’m kind of like, “How is he in this situation? A house that looks like it’s his, no family whatsoever?”
It’s totally strange, legitimately strange.
After the TV, all the picture frames fall off the walls at once.
Gets a rise out of the guy.
Then I don’t really see anything else to be done and leave him thinking he’s lucky or something. But he thinks of demons as demons, like everyone else. And they all think it’s so cool until contact is made. After that, it’s like, “He’s doomed.” It’s kind of hypocritical.
I’m done. You ready to leave?
Whenever you’re ready.
Yeah, this is sad.
Indeed.
Sorry, Brad. No hard feelings, really. Maybe if you were more like yourself and weren’t trying so hard, you’d end up not having to pretend you’re friends with people. You could just actually be friends.
Like what we’re doing.
Indeed.
Sorry, man. Brad, you’ll be cool.
One day.
It’s crazy to think that Jon-Jon lives here. It’s a huge house, definitely worth… like a million dollars or more. I mean, look at this: the place is gated! If Jon-Jon lives here, either his parents are loaded or he’s squatting. Maybe he’s renting a room?
Either way, this is going to be good.
I’ve been wanting to mess with Jon-Jon since he made it clear that he cares only about business. He made money off me, off Nikki, off running the gauntlet, Falter, all of it. He makes money by pitting people against others; he makes money by selling to those same people. He basically messes with his clientele. Someone’s got to mess with him, but he acts all cool and stuff so that nobody really can mess with him.
I want to mess with him.
Really, really freak him out.
You have no reason to ask for my approval. Let’s begin.
This place is insane. Like, I don’t even know where to begin. Jon-Jon’s definitely living here. I don’t know if those are his parents though. The people in the kitchen?
They are indeed his parents.
That’s crazy. He’s like, what, twenty-three?
Jonathan Johnson, or “Jon-Jon,” is twenty-six years old.
No fucking way.
Would you like to know how he dies?
Do you even need to really ask? Bring it.
Jonathan Johnson will be arrested on assault and drug possession charges after an altercation with a woman who will be revealed to him later, post-arrest, as an off-duty officer. She will have caught notice of his activities via a vengeance burn — a competing dealer calling in a report. Johnson will serve three months in state prison before earning parole. Johnson will have difficulty returning to the life he had led prior to his arrest. Many competitors and former clients will have turned on him by the time he resumes social appearances. Johnson will attempt to break parole in order to avoid his competitors’ own dead pools. On the eve of his twenty-ninth birthday, via something as fickle as using another inmate’s basketball hoop without asking, Johnson will incur multiple stab wounds during work detail. His wounds will not heal.
Man, that sounds like a movie. It should be a movie.