The List

The old grandfather clock in the parlor gave a solid ring—eight chimes to signal the start of our day. Father was already tucked away downstairs in the embalming room, but he’d mentioned last night that he would be leaving me a list of things I would need to accomplish for him today.

With heavy footsteps and a lukewarm cup of coffee in hand, I headed toward his office, humming a miserable little jingle that had been stuck in my head since I woke up. Pretty sure it was from a gum commercial I’d seen on TV a few days ago.

Upon entering the room, I dropped into his chair. The desk was cluttered with paperwork as always, but my eyes went straight to a bright yellow sticky note stuck dead center. A neon reminder of my responsibilities.

Lenny, here are your tasks:

Pick up flowers for tomorrow’s funeral.

Call the catering company and confirm the snack trays.

Call Mrs. Jenkins.

Love, Dad.

I peeled the note free, turning it between my fingers. The first two made sense. Given that we were the only mortuary in town—we got all the business, which meant flowers and food were non-negotiables when it came to hosting a proper viewing.

But call Mrs. Jenkins? That was odd.

Discussing funeral plots and other arrangements wasn’t really my forte. I was the errand runner, the setup helper, the one who carried folding chairs or fetched extra candles when the power went out. Death brought sadness and mourning, and I never did well with either. Especially tears.

My real job—my night job—was something else entirely. Paranormal investigation. No raw emotions required. No tears—well, sometimes mine. But that was besides the point.

Our jobs were what made Dad and I a strange yet useful pair: the man who buried the dead, and his daughter who tried to talk to them.

Still, Dad had put it on the list, so I’d at least try.

I dialed Mrs. Jenkins’ number. The rotary clicked with each turn, the ring buzzing in my ear.

“Hello?” A sweet soft voice echoed on the other end of the line.

“Hi, Mrs. Jenkins, this is Lenny—Mitch’s daughter, from Blackthorn Bay Funeral Home.”

“Oh, Lenny! I’m so glad your father had you call,” she bubbled, her joy spilling right through the receiver. “How are you doing, dear? How’s life been treating you?”

“It’s going good, Mrs. Jenkins. Just approaching winter—always our busy season,” I said lightly.

“Are you enjoying working with your father? Are you seeing anyone? You know, my nephew—”

I cleared my throat, maybe a little too loudly. “Mrs. Jenkins, what exactly did you need to discuss?” I asked, hoping to coax her out of the small talk.

“Well…” A pause stretched on the other end. “I’m not calling about the funeral home, dear. I wanted to talk to you about your other job.”

My hand, which had been fidgeting with a pen, stilled. “Oh?”

“I live in one of the oldest homes in town as you know, so of course it comes with its little creaks and groans. But lately…things have gotten rather strange.”

Now she had my attention. No questions about casket prices, or whether her plot would end up next to Mrs. Lincoln—who she had previously stated was quite frankly insufferable. She was hinting at ghosts.

“I was hoping you might be able to take a look. Some things have given me a bit of a fright, so I’ve been staying with my sister in Florida for the time being. But I did leave a key under the doormat.”

“I’d be happy to look into it for you. I can head over this afternoon and call you tomorrow with what I find. Does that work?”

“Oh, yes, dear. Thank you so much. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

The line went quiet, leaving me with the sticky note still crumpled in my palm—I guess my day just got a whole lot more interesting.

I gulped back the rest of my coffee, wincing at the bitter sludge at the bottom of the cup. Then, after quickly dropping off the empty mug in the sink, I trotted upstairs to collect my things.

Mrs. Jenkins lived on the far side of town, so I figured I’d head straight there. On my way back, I could swing by the florist, then call the catering company once I was home. Dad’s errands would still get done—just in reverse order.

In my room, I pulled the canvas duffel from under my bed. Regular people might’ve filled it with gym clothes or old sneakers. Mine was packed with the essentials: digital recorder, EMF reader, flashlight, spare batteries, a few sticks of chalk, and a packet of salt sealed in a ziplock bag. Ghost-hunting 101.

Once packed, I slung the bag over my shoulder, pulled on my jacket, and headed back downstairs. The grandfather clock chimed the quarter hour as I passed, the sound chasing me out the door.

Mornings in Blackthorn Bay were always heavy with fog. The air carried a chill, rolling in from the water, and the smell of brine and wet cedar seeped into everything. By afternoon, the mist would burn away, revealing the same cracked sidewalks and weathered clapboard houses as always. But in the early hours, when the fog curled low across the streets and blurred the line between land and sea, the town had a certain charm—like it was hiding its age behind a veil.

I quickly slid behind the wheel of my car—technically a retired hearse Dad had picked up cheap from a funeral supply auction. I’d like to say a car is a car and I was grateful for any means of transportation, but most people in town gave me side-eye when I rolled past. At least it kept anyone from ever asking me for a ride.

The engine coughed awake, rattling like an old smoker, and I eased down our long gravel drive onto Main Street. It was nice being out this early. The storefronts were mostly dark, their neon signs still unlit. Not a single car in sight, just rows of angled parking spots glistening with dew. The quiet was comforting. The town wasn't fully awake, and It was as if I had it all to myself.

I passed the usual landmarks on my way to Mrs. Jenkins’. O’Malley’s Bait & Tackle with its peeling red sign, still hanging crooked from the last storm. Elsie’s Bakery glowed faintly from within, the smell of bread already sneaking out into the cold air. Across the way, the thrift shop windows were crowded with Halloween decorations. Mrs. Connors swore leaving them up year-round kept business steady.

Blackthorn Bay wasn’t big—three stoplights, one hardware store, and a whole lot of gossip. But what it lacked in size, it made up for in history. The kind of place where everyone knew who lived where, who had died there, and which houses you avoided after dark. My job made me especially aware of the last two categories. A handful of early risers gave me the same polite wave as always, their eyes lingering on the hearse just a second too long. While I smile back and pretend not to notice.

The fog thickened as the town gave way to the cliffs, swallowing the road until it felt like I was driving straight into the sea.

You really would’ve thought Mrs. Jenkins’ ancestors might’ve picked a better place to live.

The rustic manor loomed out of the gray, a hulking silhouette perched at the very edge of the bluff. The siding was weathered to the color of driftwood, and the windows were shuttered tight. I pulled into the gravel drive, the tires crunching loud in the silence. Cutting the engine only made the quiet worse—the fog pressed in on all sides, and the gulls circling overhead were nothing but faint, distant cries.

Grabbing my duffel from the passenger seat, I climbed out and made my way up the sagging porch steps. The smell hit me first—straight fish. Sharp and raw. Mrs. Jenkins had probably lived with the smell so long she didn’t notice anymore. Or maybe she just didn’t care. Lucky her.

Just as promised, a key waited beneath the mat. I fished it out, its brass surface cold and damp against my fingers, and slid it into the lock. The door gave a groan so pitiful I half expected it to beg me not to come in. Weeks of disuse—or maybe it just didn’t like me. Still, it swung open, and like the idiot in every haunted house story, I stepped inside.

The air hit me first: mothballs, dust, and a sharp top note of perfume—probably Chanel, if Chanel had ever released a scent called Eau de Dead Aunt’s Closet.

A wide foyer sat just behind the front door, its corners gloomy and stale. The wallpaper peeled in curling strips, and the chandelier overhead sagged a bit too low.

I tightened my grip on the duffel and let the door thud closed behind me.

“Well,” I muttered to myself, eyeing the staircase to the left and a narrow hallway to the right, “Where should I start?”

With a deep breath, I forced myself to relax and carefully set my bag down on a stiff-backed bench resting decoratively along the wall—the kind of antique no one would actually be aloud to sit on. But for now, it would have to do.

I unzipped my duffel and pulled out the only two things I needed for a first sweep of the house: my EMF reader and a flashlight.

The flashlight was obvious—dark corners, faulty wiring, basements full of spiders. The EMF reader, though, was the real trick. A palm-sized black box with a row of lights across the top—green, yellow, red. To anyone else, it looked like a cheap gadget you’d win at a carnival. To me, it was a compass. The lights flickered when electromagnetic energy spiked, and while that could mean bad wiring or old pipes, it could also mean… something else.

I thumbed the switch, the reader humming faintly in my palm as it turned on.

“Alright,” I murmured to the empty house. “Let’s see where you want me.”

The green light glowed steady for a moment before flickering to yellow, a faint pulse.

I remained steady in my spot moving my body slightly to the left then turning slightly to the right. The EMF reader pulsed again—yellow, then green, then yellow once more—guiding me toward the hallway that stretched deeper into the house.

“Of course,” I muttered under my breath. “Straight into the creepy part.”

The wooden floors creaked beneath my boots, the house's way of adjusting itself to my weight as if a full size human hadn't walked these halls in years. A steady buzz rumbled through my palm once again, the EMF reader vibrating faintly as the lights danced higher.

Yellow. Orange. Then—red.

The device beeped frantically, a high pitched squeal that caused me to grit my teeth each time. I froze on its order and realized It stopped me in front of a door.

The basement door.

Well that's ironic.

The wood was warped and blistered, its green paint peeling in ragged lines. The knob was tarnished, and the faint smell of damp wood leaked from the cracks around the frame. The EMF continued to shriek red in my hand, as if daring me to open it.

“Why was it always the basement?” I sighed.

I’d been at this for nearly seven years—long enough to know not to freak myself out before I’d even touched the doorknob. Hell, I’d been around death most of my life. By seven I could help Dad press a suit, fold a pair of stiff hands, even paint a few dead ladies’ fingernails without gagging. Corpses didn’t bother me.

But this. This was different.

Ghost hunting had its own rules and logic, and I wasn’t naive about keeping my guard up. Most spirits wanted what everyone did—some kind of peace. Others liked making mischief, and then it was your job to figure out what they wanted. It was basically a terrible game of charades where your opponent was invisible and the prize was not pissing the wrong one off.

With one more steady breath, I wrapped my fingers around the knob and twisted. An instant rush of cold air spilled out through the gap in the door, entangling itself around my skin. Yup, this is fine.

A steep staircase fell away into the basement's darkness. At the bottom I could slightly make out one lone bulb hanging by a dangling cord. Moving down each step felt heavy, but eventually I forced myself to the bottom. Then with a few tugs at the light bulb I was soon surrounded by a dull murky light.

The space was bleak: a broad slab of concrete, a workbench strewn with rusted tools, shelves lined with jars that hadn’t held preserves in decades, and cobwebs draped everything in decorative tinsel.

There are times ghosts will cling to a house, soaked into the foundation by all the lives and deaths that have passed through the land. Other times, they were tethered to a single item—an heirloom, a trinket, something ordinary that had absorbed so much grief or longing it became a vessel for the ghost unfinished business.

With that thought in mind, I swept my flashlight across the basement in careful arcs, hunting for anything that felt out of place. Nothing screamed cursed. Nothing even whispered it. But when I shifted the light lower, the floor seemed to tell a different story.

Long, dark scuff marks curved across the concrete, as though something heavy had been dragged aside. I followed the tracks to a hulking bookcase against the far wall. It appeared a bit too polished compared to the rest of the basement, its shelves were oddly bare save for a few dusty books and the marks ended neatly at its feet.

I edged closer, the EMF blaring once again from my pocket. There was no way Mrs. Jenkins had the strength to move this monstrous bookcase on her own. And unfortunately for me, curiosity was louder than caution. I needed to know what was behind it.

Wedging the flashlight between my teeth, I pressed both hands against the wood and shoved with everything I had. The first push barely shifted it. The second earned a drawn-out groan of wood against concrete. Slowly—painfully—and with a few strained grunts, the case began to pivot. Inch by inch it swung aside, until at last the dark seam of another door revealed itself behind it.

The doorknob was mottled green from corrosion. I tugged at it, half expecting resistance, but it turned easily—too easily. I raised my flashlight, the beam cutting into the chamber beyond.

This room wasn’t like the rest of the basement. The stone walls were slick with condensation, the air thick and salty, clinging like mucus in the back of my throat. In the center of the floor, the pavement was stained dark in concentric circles. All pointing to a small iron drain that sat in the middle of the floor. Intricate markings were etched into the stone—symbols I felt as if I almost recognized. Tall pillar candles had melted straight into the floor, wax pooled and hardened into globs of white, black, and red. Large crystals of salt were scattered along each marking, as though they’d been placed deliberately and left to dissolve.

The EMF reader squealed in my pocket. I pulled it free, but before I could even study the lights, the thing died altogether. As if there was too much energy here, it was more than my small battery pack could withstand.

The heaviness came seconds later, stabbing my chest like a dull knife. My lungs clamped down, my knees buckled, and nausea twisted hard in my stomach. Every instinct screamed to leave this room. Yet my own body resisted.

A low hum began to swell through the chamber, vibrating against my teeth, my skull, my bones. I tried to lift the flashlight again, but my arms had turned to lead. Darkness pressed from all sides, blurring the edges of the symbols and the walls. My vision tunneled.

I dropped hard to the floor. The hum rose to a roar deep inside my skull. The last sound I made was a ragged gasp before blackness swallowed me whole.

—

When I came to, I was sprawled across the chalk markings, my body aching, my limbs still unbearably heavy. Every breath scraped like sandpaper. My head throbbed where it had struck the floor, and the thought of standing felt impossible. Still, I forced myself upright. I needed to get out—needed air, light, distance from whatever was in this room.

Then a voice.

“She definitely hit her head.”

It rang out across the chamber, so close it felt as though it had been whispered directly into my ear. My stomach dropped clean out of me. I froze, breath shallow, eyes straining into the dark.

And then I saw it.

A humanoid figure stood only a few feet away. Its body jagged, its outline bleeding into the stone walls. Its Red eyes burned like coals from a face half-hidden in shadow. My throat tightened until the words came out as little more than a mutter.

“Who… who are you?”

The figure tilted its head slowly, curiously, as if I were the one out of place here. Then, in a deep low growl, it answered:

“You can see me?”