Ghost Stories from Hell: Horror Bundle Series (Boylan House, Sherman’s Collection, Blood Contract, Hungry Ghosts)

Chapter 7: A Darkness in the House

Halloween. 2005. Meeting House Road.

It was the third time that Mason had come to Meeting House Road to stand before the Boylan House. This was the only time that he had come alone.

He sat on the tailgate of the truck. The same truck from five years ago, when Matthew had accompanied him. But Matthew was home, handing out candy while his wife and their two little ones were out trick or treating.

Rarely did anyone come down to the end of Meeting House Road anymore, and that was a good thing. No one had believed Mason’s story back in 1980. All of the adults had pawned his story off as just that, a story.

Mason knew better. His cousins had been convinced that Kevin Peacock had been snatched by someone, not some supernatural boogeyman that lived in an ancient house.

Mason was the only one who held onto what he had seen that night.

Five years had passed since the last time he stopped by, to visit his cousins. Mason would see them again in the morning. He had rented a room at a nearby motel. Tonight, though, was for the Boylan House.

Whatever was in the house—if there was something in the house, and not the creation of a frightened seven-year-old—seemed to have remembered him. Mason still had the Darth Vader mask; a none-too-subtle hint, that it knew who he was. Perhaps more than anything else, that notion bothered Mason the most. Something knew him there.

Something was playing with him.

Maybe it was the house. Maybe it was something else.

Reaching behind him, Mason took hold of the double barrel shotgun he had brought with him. It was a sawed off. Good for scaring the shit out of someone thinking that sneaking up on your porch was a good idea. Tonight, he had it packed with salt loads. Pure salt from a lick and in shell casings he had put together.

If something came at him tonight, whether human or not, it was going to get a taste of salt that would leave it feeling like hell.

Mason slid off the back of the truck and stood to look at the house.

A single lamp flickered into life in the upper left window. It moved slowly through all four of the second story windows, stopping finally at the far right.

Mason could feel his heart pounding.

But the shotgun was steady in his hands. Holding it easily, he flipped off the safety and started walking up the slight hill toward the front door. When he got about a dozen feet from the door, the light in the window vanished. Mason stopped. The old childhood fear burst up within him and threatened to send him racing back to the safety of his truck.

For the third time in his life, he encountered the abnormal and hideous silence that surrounded the house. The smell rose up around him, and every sense in his body told him that this was no place for him. That this was no place for anyone.

A creak sounded, soft and subtle, just barely audible, but there. The hackles on Mason’s neck rose up, and he stiffened.

In front of him, with only the light of the half-moon to show the door of the Boylan House, Mason saw something come down from the trap. As the item landed on the granite step, Mason moved forward with his weapon ready. He reached a shaking hand out and snatched up a burlap bag.

It was full, but light. Mason made his way back to his truck. Back to the safety of the Meeting House Road.

When he reached his truck, Mason put the safety on the shotgun, placed it on the truck bed and held up the burlap sack. He opened it and looked in. But he could hardly see anything. Drawing a deep breath, Mason put his hand in and fished around. He felt something that reminded him of old corn-silk and wrapped his fingers around it.

Taking it out slowly, Mason realized that he wasn’t holding corn-silk.

He was holding human hair. And the scalps that went along with it.

He looked closely at one.

The skin was white.

The hair was yellow.

A flicker of light caught Mason’s eye and he looked to the Boylan House. All of the windows had light shining from them and somewhere, just faintly, he could hear something laughing.

Chapter 13: Cold and Calm upon the Gauthiers

Ben Gauthier sat alone in the den watching the Raiders getting their asses kicked again. Angrily, Ben finished his Budweiser and put the empty can on the coffee table.

“Susie!” he yelled.

A moment later, his wife came into the room, popping the tab on the fresh can as she handed it to him.

“Thanks, Hon” he said.

“You’re already through a six pack, Ben,” she said, wiping her hands on a dish towel she had thrown over her shoulder. “We’ve still got to pick up Mary from the airport at midnight.”

“I’ll be fine,” he said, taking a pull from the can. “It’s only Bud.”

“Don’t be stupid, Ben,” she said, “whether it’s Bud or Natty, if you’re over the limit you’re screwed.”

“I’ll be fine,” he said again and swore as the Bengals ran another touchdown straight up the middle.

Susie shook her head and walked out of the room.

The phone rang as a commercial started, so Ben picked up the phone out of the cradle and looked at the caller id.

“Hey Ryan,” he said as he answered the call.

“Hi Dad,” Ryan replied. “Can I stay over at Bobby’s tonight?”

“It’s Thursday,” Ben said. “You guys have school tomorrow.”

“I’ll get to school,” Ryan said.

“What does he want?” Susie called from the kitchen.

“To sleep over at Bobby’s,” Ben answered.

“Bullshit.”

“Your mom says no, kid,” Ben told Ryan.

Ryan groaned. “Come on, we’re playing the new Call of Duty.”

“You can go over tomorrow after football and play it, but I want you home by ten,” Ben said. “Your mom and I have to pick up Mary and I can’t worry about you jackassing around after ten. Too much weird shit is going on lately.”

“Fine,” Ryan grumbled. “I’ll be home at ten.”

“Bye, kid.”

“Bye, Dad.”

Ben ended the call and managed to catch sight of the Bengals intercepting a pass. “Oh what the hell,” Ben spat.

The doorbell rang.

Ben looked at the clock.

It was nine.

Susie walked into the den as the doorbell rang again.

“Who the hell could that be?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Ben answered. He stood up, still holding his beer, and walked to the front door. He flipped on the exterior light switch and said through the door: “Hello?”

“Hello” came a young voice, “do you happen to have a phone I could borrow for a moment? My car’s broken down a little ways up the road, and your house was the closest one.”

Ben glanced over at Susie, who shook her head.

“No,” Ben said, “but why don’t you go wait with your car and I’ll call the police for you.”

“Oh thank you,” the voice said, sounding relieved. “I’m just up the street. It’s a black Ford.”

“You’re welcome,” Ben replied, smiling. He looked back to Susie and saw that she was smiling too, and then he watched the smile disappear in order to be replaced by an expression of horror as she opened her mouth to scream.

Ben turned around just in time to catch sight of a pale arm reaching through the door, seeming to grow out of it, before the fingers found and grabbed his sweatshirt.

A brutal cold spread out across his chest, and he wondered for the briefest of moments if he was having a heart attack, but that thought was literally driven out of his head as the arm and hand jerked backward through the door, smashing his head against the wood. Again and again the owner of the arm did it. The beer fell from his hands, and Ben felt his legs loosen, his head rolling on his neck. Susie was still screaming. Ben felt Susie’s hands on his arms, then around his waist, trying to pull him free.

Then Ben felt himself falling, blood spilling down the door and onto the tiles of the front hall.

Suddenly, Susie was beside him, and all was quiet. He felt the beating of his heart, erratic and shuddering.

He closed his eyes and felt something striking him. The blows were hard, and then they were weaker and weaker.

Ben felt his heart slowing, air more difficult to breathe in. He managed to open his eyes once more, and he saw the back of Susie’s head in front of him. Dully he realized that just beyond the tangled, bloody mess of her blond hair, he could see the gray mass of her brain.

They really are gray, Ben thought, and he closed his eyes once more.