Every House Is Haunted (10 page)

December 21

Went back for the water this morning. Should last me another month, as long as I ration it. I’ll need to make another trip for supplies before the snow really starts coming down. It could be any day now.

Found something else when I went back to the bridge, in a station wagon packed full of camping gear. It was in a long, battered cardboard box that had seen some long years of use. I knew there was a Christmas tree inside even before I opened it. Not a real one, of course, but beggars can’t be choosers (that’s become my motto these days). I also found a box with ornaments, tinsel, and lights—no juice to power them, but they’ll still look nice on the tree. I set it up in the backyard, and it looks great!

Spent the rest of the day in the hammock, whistling Christmas carols with the Garand across my lap.

Three ramblers rambling! Ha-ha!

December 24

It’s a good thing I got my shopping done early. No milk or cookies for Santa, but I left out a can of Spam and a bottle of water. Maybe he’ll bring me that AK-47 I asked for.

December 25

No assault rifle under the tree today. But there were a couple of ramblers trying to climb the fence. I think if I had gone outside two minutes later, the backyard would have become a killing pen.

One of them had managed to pull himself to the top of the fence. I shot him in the chest and he fell into the enclosure. He landed on the patio table, flipping it over and snapping the umbrella off. That made me angry. The other rambler had dropped back to the ground on the other side of the fence. I snapped a shot at him, but he disappeared around the corner of the warehouse.

There was no sign of the third.

Dec 26

I discovered something new today. Remember the animal I heard howling in the night? The one I couldn’t decide if it was a dog or a wolf? Looks like I was wrong on both counts. Sort of.

Turns out it was a dog—or at least, it was at one time. Not quite a hound from hell or
Night of the Living Dog
, but something in between.

It was chowing down on the dead rambler, the one that broke my umbrella table. I’d tossed the carcass over the fence the other day, with the intention of moving it later on. Now this thing that looked like a dog was tearing off hunks of its putrid flesh with a horrible canvas-ripping sound. The dog thing looked up at me and seemed to hesitate before hightailing it around the corner. It’ll be back, I have no doubt. And when it does, it’s dogmeat. Ha-ha!

Dec 27

Laid a trap for
el poocho
today. Instead of disposing of the dead rambler, I dragged it closer to the fence. Then I climbed into the hammock with my Garand, covered myself with blankets, and waited. It had started to snow and I spent the next hour or so catching flakes on my tongue.

At some point I fell asleep. I woke up sometime later to the sound of canvas ripping. I didn’t move. I made sure the safety on the Garand was off, then I slowly peeled back the blankets and looked out.

The dog thing was there, by the fence. Its head was down and its jaws were working in a mad frenzy. It didn’t eat like a normal animal—it didn’t chew. It was like a machine that had caught something in its gears and was now ripping it to pieces.

I must have made some kind of sound, because it suddenly snapped its head up and glared at me. I raised the rifle, socking the butt into the crook of my shoulder, and fired. The bullet went through the dog thing’s mouth and out the back of its head.

It fell on its side, twitching. My second shot caved in its chest. There was no blood. Not even a drop.

Dec 28

The days are getting chilly. Something that tends to keep people indoors. Not me! I spend most of my days outside, in the hammock. If it weren’t the danger it is, I’d probably sleep out here.

The dog didn’t bleed
. That thought keeps coming back to haunt me. I don’t have any answers. I don’t even have theories anymore.

The tentacles found me today. They came over the railway embankment. One big one and four or five little ones. The big one stayed on the tracks. I prayed for a train to come. The little ones were farting around in the cinders at the foot of the embankment. One of them found an old rusty shopping cart and dragged it back over the tracks. Finders keepers.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the tentacles are not guided by any deep-rooted intelligence. This comes after spending the day watching them fight over the patio chairs I had tossed over the fence . . . what? A month ago? Has it been a month?

They seem to operate solely on instinct—which is why I haven’t taken any shots at them. Not until they give me a reason. They took the chairs back over the tracks and I haven’t seen them since.

Will they be back? I wonder. To which Barney would have said: Does Howdy Doody have wooden balls?

December 29

Tentacles stole my Christmas tree.

Sounds like one of those tabloid headlines, doesn’t it? Except this one is true.

Of all the post-Christmas chores, taking down the tree is the one people put off the most. Not me! I came outside this morning to do that very thing and found half a dozen tentacles (including the big one) dragging it over the fence. They didn’t even knock the angel off. Who do you call to get rid of your Christmas tree? 1-800-T-E-N-T-A-C-L-E-S!

Looks like I won’t be staying outside anymore.

December 30

Dreamed of God again last night—several of them, in fact. They were asleep in a warehouse very similar to my own, lying in row upon row of hammocks. There must have been hundreds of them. On the wall was an enormous digital alarm clock ticking that cast an eerie red glow over everything. Next to the clock was a sign that said
QUIET PLEASE
.

I gotta find a way to wake them up.

December 31

Stayed outside last night. Was curious to see if anyone would light off any fireworks. Didn’t see any.

It’s becoming harder to stay indoors. I was sitting in the hammock, staring at the stars, and they didn’t look right. I don’t know anything about constellations, but I can’t shake that feeling. They just don’t look right.

The tentacles are getting closer. They’re sliding along the outside of the warehouse right now. The sound is driving me crackers.

I’m going to try and sleep. I’ve got work to do. No snooze button for the gods. Time to roll them out of their hammocks.

January 3?

The gods are not in my dreams—they are here! I think that’s the message—what Barney would have called the real-life truth.

I know what the tentacles are. They’re not attached to anything. They’re the highways to the gods! And the ramblers are their disciples, travelling door to door and spreading the word and selling Avon products.

I will survive, I will survive, I will survive.

Was Gloria Gaynor ever an Avon Lady?

Jan 34 (?)

Soooo tired.

Hammock rejected me today. Spit me out like a watermelon seed. God, I want a watermelon. If I can only hold on until summer.

Tentacles are loud tonight. They could wake the dead, ha-ha!

I will hold on . . . for watermelon . . .

First there was darkness. Then a series of deep, ratcheting clicks and clacks, followed by a low hiss of escaping air that buffeted his face and tousled his hair. Then, slowly, the darkness not so much lifted as swung away to his left as if an enormous door were opening.

Lights sputtered to life from somewhere overhead, and he saw it
was
a door. A big one. Not quite as large as the one on a bank vault, but similar in appearance.

He stepped into a long, windowless room with five tall metal bookcases at the far end. Before him was a long table. Not the fancy kind like in an executive conference room. Just an ordinary reading table like you’d find in a library.

Was he in a library? He had an idea he was, but he didn’t know for certain. He couldn’t seem to recall exactly where he was—or how he had gotten here. There was something strange about the bookcases. It was so slight that he couldn’t tell precisely what it was, but there was definitely something odd about them.

He heard someone cough, and turned to see a tall woman standing in the doorway behind him. She was dressed entirely in black—black topcoat, black blouse, black slacks, black gloves, black pointed-toe shoes. Her face was a pallid mask that only served to make her red hair that much brighter.

“Good evening,” she said in a cool, crisp voice.

“Is it?”

“Well, it’s more of a greeting than a description.”

“No, I mean, is it the evening? I can’t seem to remember.” He looked down at himself, saw that he was dressed in a ratty plaid bathrobe and a pair of slippers. “I can’t seem to remember very much, actually.”

“I apologize for that,” the redhead said, and slipped past him into the room. Her poise and demeanour exuded an air of indifferent professionalism. As if she belonged in that executive conference room rather than this strange little library. “I realize all of this must be very unsettling. But I assure you, the alternative is much worse.”

The man in the bathrobe nodded, even though he still had no idea what was going on. “Who are you?” he asked. Then: “Who am
I
?”

“Names aren’t important.”

“Are you sure?” The man’s voice wavered. “Because I think it’s actually pretty goddamn important.”

The redhead waved her hand dismissively. “There’s a difference between knowing a thing and understanding a thing,” she said. “
Knowing
isn’t as important as
understanding
. In this instance—in regards to all of this”—she indicated the entire room—“understanding is key.”

The man gazed into her cool green eyes for a long moment. His mind felt like a newly washed chalkboard, and the redhead was the teacher about to impart some important lesson. Strangely, he found it wasn’t difficult at all to put things aside and simply go with the flow.

“First,” she began, “I will tell you something—something you don’t necessarily need to know, but maybe it will help to put you at ease.”

The man nodded mutely.

“You’re not in trouble,” she said in a voice that was both calm and firm. “I’m not with the police or any government body. Nor have you been kidnapped. Your life is not in danger.” She raised her hands again. “You’re standing in a little-known room within the Fisher Rare Book Library.” She added: “That’s at the University of Toronto.”

The man nodded even though he didn’t know where that was exactly.

“To those who know of its existence, it’s simply called the Restricted Collection. You don’t need to know
what
it is, but you need to understand
why
it is. Understanding is key. It’s very important that you’re here tonight.”

The man nodded again.

“You won’t be called in often,” the redhead went on, “but those times that you are will be extremely important. I can’t stress to you how important—and there would be little point even if I could—but I can assure you that your involvement is integral.”

She turned slightly and swept her hand across the room. “Notice anything unusual?”

“Something,” he said in a low, ruminative voice.

She motioned him to follow her, and they walked around the long table to the middle bookcase. Closer now, he could see what made these cases different from the ones he had seen before—the shelves were encased in glass. On the left side of each shelf there was a raised metal panel.

“Hermetically sealed,” the redhead explained, then startled him by slamming her gloved fist against the glass. “Shatterproof.”

“How do you open it?”

“See the pad?” She pointed at the raised panel. “Put your finger on it.”

The man in the bathrobe started to raise his hand, then hesitated.

“Go ahead,” she said. “It won’t bite you.”

He raised his hand slowly, extended his index finger, and placed it gently against the panel. There was a sharp, ratcheting click (not unlike the one he heard before entering this strange little room), and then the long glass panel rose up like a garage door and slid back into the housing in the top of the shelf.

“Abracadabra,” the redhead said.

“Did I do that?” the man asked a little timidly.

“You did that,” the redheadsaid. “Only you.”

He turned his head and looked at her. “What does that mean?”

She ignored the question and continued to stare at the line of books. “Take one out,” she said. “Any one.”

The man fidgeted. The books looked very old and delicate. “Don’t I need gloves or something?”

She shook her head. “It’s okay.”

She said that, but he couldn’t help but notice that she herself made no gesture toward the shelf, as if there was something in there that might bite. Until now she had made gestures as she spoke, at the room, at the bookcases, but now, standing in front of one of the open shelves, she kept her hands strictly behind her back.

He felt a sudden need to leave this place, to just turn around and walk out. Something made him stay. He was supposed to stay. He didn’t know why.