I timed it so we’d come upstairs after the sun had dropped. That gave us a few good shots of “kids being spooked by their own reflections in the darkened windows.” Most of it came from the twins. Even after we explained what they were seeing, they’d shriek with every flicker. Finally, Becky stopped the taping and had the crew close the blinds.
Becky wanted us to split up again. Eight people had been fine in the basement, where they’d followed me about like a tour group. Up here, we were all just crowded into small rooms, jostling for elbow space.
“I would suggest that Jaime take her group to the attic,” Gregor said. “I was unable to make contact there. I am hoping she will be more fortunate. We will return to the basement.”
“We’ve already seen the basement,” Wade said.
“It’s boring,” one of the twins said.
“And dirty,” her sister added with a shudder.
“Gregor’s right,” Becky said. “Let’s mix things up.”
I stepped toward Gregor. “Maybe check out that front corner room again. The one with the old carpet rolled up in the corner. I felt something in there. A sadness.” I lowered my voice to a stage whisper. “I didn’t want to spook the kids, but I thought I saw spots on the carpet. They could be …” I dropped my voice a little more. “Bloodstains.”
“Blood?” Wade perked up. He looked at Gregor. “She’s right. That room did have a vibe.”
Gregor smiled conspiratorially at me. “I think you are right. I felt something myself, but I did not want to startle anyone again.” He turned to the others. “All right. We will return to the basement. If those young women were murdered in this house, we will find the place and put their spirits to rest.”
As they trooped off, Becky said, “You guys? Attic.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I shuttled my troops from the room, then slipped back to Becky. “Um, Gregor has the script for the attic. What’s the story?”
“Beats me. Wing it.”
TWELVE
It was a walk-up attic, one that had, at some point, been finished into a third floor. The current owners had let it revert to storage, all that stuffed into one room now for the taping. Following Becky’s instructions, the kids, Sal, Frank, and I headed through the first door, into the room she’d deemed “most attic-like.” In other words, it was claustrophobic and dark, just bare walls, no dormer window, with a second door on the other side, leading to another room.
“Okay,” I said as we stepped into our room. “We’ve tried the lights, but they still don’t work. Gregor said they came on for a few seconds and then went out.”
“Just like the basement,” Rory said.
“Yes. We’ll try not to read anything into that. These old places have electrical—”
A light in the next room flicked on.
“I think someone heard you.” Cameron laughed, but there was a nervous edge to it.
“Well,” I said, “as long as that light’s working, we might as well move into—”
The light turned off. I motioned to Sal to tell Becky to cut the theatrics. It was too obvious.
“Seems we aren’t welcome in that room after all,” I said.
“Let’s go this way, then.” I started toward the next doorway. “It’s rumored that—”
The other light turned on again. I shot an off-camera glare at Sal, who gestured that the crew wasn’t doing it. Right. That’s the problem with these shows. Because I’m also part of the cast, they’re hoping to get a few startles out of me, too.
“Is that light a message from the spirits?” I said, looking up. “Telling me they’d like me in that room?”
No answer.
“Okay, but if the light goes off again, we stay out. No one likes a tease.”
Cameron gave a nervous giggle.
“We’ll move in there,” I said. “But be aware that if this is a manifestation, it may not be a friendly one. As I’ve been trying to say—”
“Run,” a voice whispered behind me.
I jumped, stumbling in my heels. Ricardo leapt forward to catch me.
“Okay?” he said.
“I just …” I took a deep breath. “I think I’m spooking myself.” I managed a smile. “Which is really not the point.”
“At least we didn’t all run screaming downstairs like some people,” Rory said.
I motioned Frank to cut the camera. Once it was off, I took a deep breath and rubbed my arms. The boys watched me, looking concerned. Rory’s gaze bore into me, her expression guarded.
“You okay?” she said. “Or is this part of the show?”
Cameron snapped, “If it was part of the show, the cameras would still be rolling.”
“I just got spooked,” I said. “It happens, even to spiritualists.”
I wanted to take a moment. Figure out whether I’d really heard that voice. But the cast and crew were waiting with growing impatience.
“Roll on,” I said.
When the camera began filming, I headed toward the lit room. “It is rumored that the man who murdered Clara, Polly, and Dawn has joined them in the spirit world, and that he departed from this very attic. After killing Dawn, he came up here and hanged himself from the rafters. Perhaps …” I stepped into the lit room and motioned up. “These very rafters.”
It was all bullshit, of course. But Becky had told me to wing it.
“The family who lived in this house never realized they had a dead monster in their attic. Years later, it’s said that someone working on the house found his mummified remains, lying on the floor, rope still around his neck. The worker raced out and called for help, but when he returned with his supervisor, the body was gone. Worried that they’d be implicated in murder, they didn’t notify the homeowners or the authorities. But they told someone. Maybe a friend, maybe a spouse. And so the story was born. But without a body, it remains just that. A story.”
As stories went, this one straddled the border between ridiculous and ludicrous. I’m a performer, not a writer. As long as I framed it as rumor, though, I’d spare the studio from lawsuits, which was really all that mattered.
“If it’s true, then what we have here is a very dangerous situation,” I said. “In the basement, the ghosts of the victims, searching for peace. In the attic, the spirit of their killer. Searching for mercy? For forgiveness? Or endlessly hunting for his victims—”
The door slammed shut. Everyone jumped.
“Th-that’s not funny,” Cameron said, his voice wavering. “Who’s out there?”
“Um, no one,” Frank said. “There was no one outside the—” Another slam. Then another. Two more in quick succession. In the basement, one of the twins started to scream.
“What the hell?” Rory crossed the room and yanked on the door. It didn’t budge.
Frank laughed nervously. “Well, you kids wanted a haunted house.” Rory strode back to him. “Bullshit. You say no one was at the door? Show me the tape.”
She seemed startled when he lifted the camera without argument. Cameron and Ricardo edged in to watch, along with Sal, who’d been standing off camera.
I walked to the door and tried the handle. No luck. I tried the other one, across the room. It had been closed when we came in. Closed and locked, as I now discovered.
I glanced at the others. They were watching the tape, saying, “Look!” and “Seriously?” and “Play that again,” and I knew what they were seeing. A door slamming with no one behind it.