Open House

Jack has tried to sell this house for the better part of a year with no resolve, and that’s mostly my fault. 

Let me give credit where credit is due, he has pulled all the strings in order to place anyone in this home. I’m talking live streaming the open house, providing food and drink, and raffling off tech gear. Hell, he even hosted a local art show in the home. 

Now, I had nothing to do with the art show-shit show…except for switching the red wine with prune juice and clogging all the toilets with the ridiculous dachshund hand towels save for the half bath. Naturally, red wine at an art show, where pretentious artists who have grown so accustomed to others telling them how impressive and profound their art is- all while they go home and contemplate whether or not they are in fact a fraud- drown their second guessing with alcohol before it can bubble to the surface, and where art show enthusiasts who are impressed by dirt, rock, water, and their derivatives, would lead to quite the queue at the loo. I thought of giving them a humbling live exhibit of what I think of their art. 

I guess I lied. I did have all to do with Jack not selling the house. 

Or showing the house for the rest of the week until the smell dissipated which gave me plenty of time to devise my plans to keep any future buyers away. 

Three days ago, a young couple came to tour the home with Jack. Too bad they were devout Baptists. Piece of cake. I let them go through the whole spiel Jack likes to give–I say like because I never let him get to the end without knocking a complimentary glass of water off the counter or slamming the basement door, so, getting to the end is kind of a treat for him. 

I started softly with a gentle nudge into the woman hoping to arouse suspicion. Of course it worked as she eyed the room as a means to explain the occurrence. I felt her fear wrestle her nerves as her fight or flight response kicked in. Such a delicious reaction. It wasn’t long before they were running out the front door never to return Jack’s inquisitive follow up calls. All it took was slamming the basement door once. Humans are so silly in that way.  

Jack slumped down, defeated, onto one of the kitchen barstools. “I have to get rid of this house,” he sighed. Good luck with that, Jack. And like some fairy godmother watching over him, his phone rang with a potential buyer. 

“Yeah, you can come on down. I’ll send over the address.” 

Jack ended the call, sent the text, jumped to his feet excitedly, and went to the sink to wash up the glasses that went untouched from the previous tour. I’m not so sure why he’s excited about this tour when it’s never worked out for him before. That’s what is so annoying about this man and makes him intolerable to be around. He’s sickeningly optimistic. 

I stood in the hallway that led to the den space. It’s hardly touched by light around that time, but it’s a crucial selling point to most buyers- complete with a 1970s styled conversation pit. I planned to just hide here until the potential buyers started their tour.

Jack and I have always had a playful relationship. He’s constantly getting on my nerves by trying to sell my house and I move his keys or lock him in a closet for 10 minutes. It’s all in good fun, so I don’t know why he’s so persistent in selling this home. It’s his family heirloom. His great grandmother was the one who invited me in and I don’t intend to leave. 

~~

None of my typical tricks worked. Not the lights flickering (apparently it’s an electrical issue), not the doors slamming (apparently THAT is a foundation problem), not even the glass flying off the counter crashing into the wall (they have a dog- go figure they would blame it on him). This family was going to be tough to make leave, but I did my best to get my home back. 

They’re skeptics. They don’t believe in my kind’s existence, so my new task was to make them believe. I had to try new tactics. Harsher tactics. I paced around the kitchen island while I waited for them to return with their cardboard boxes and furniture stacked into the moving truck like a game of Tetris. That’s it! 

I waited until they were sound asleep on their air mattress in the upstairs bedroom before making my moves. I delicately placed wooden legs on granite and ornate glass on top of the whole structure, balanced so cleverly that they would have no other option than to move. I glanced quickly into one of the opened boxes and saw a framed photo of an elderly woman. Perfect. I carefully placed the frame on top of my towering structure built from chairs and glass. Whoever this woman was, she sat near the ceiling upon her throne of terror. Maybe these skeptics will believe she is haunting them or asking for them to leave. 

But wouldn’t you believe it? They had an excuse for this. 

“Honey, I know your grandmother’s passing has been really hard on you, but maybe we should go see a specialist about your sleepwalking. You easily could have hurt yourself last night,” the stupid man said, coffee cup steaming in one hand as the other aggressively rubbed the stupid woman’s shoulder as a means to lighten the mood. 

But the mood only grew darker and colder the longer they dwelled here. They didn’t know it, but the longer they stayed, the more power they gave me. And the more power I attained, the more harm I caused. 

The next night, the man was in the office room downstairs playing around with cording behind his desk. I watched him work for a while as I contemplated what my next move would be. I could mess with the wires and electrocute him, I thought. But the wife would weep at the funeral and blame it on the damn electrician or wiring or some bullshit when it was ME! Thinking about it infuriated me that before I even knew it, I pulled his hair. His head whipped around at incredible speed. I’m sure he hoped to catch the culprit, but his frenzied eyes only caught the slamming of the office door as I ran to my escape. 

I heard him yelling for the woman and then the dog and then nothing. Nothing at all. I went back to the room and the bastard was back to working on the stupid wires. I should have hung him with the wires. 

In the upstairs bathroom, the woman performed an ablution ritual consisting of tinctures and creams as I whispered horrifying deeds to be done in her ear. Adultery, murder, mutilation- I tried everything to no avail in breaking this woman’s psyche. 

These people were insufferable. The thought of my existence never crossed their minds for one moment. Where has the fear gone in people? 

In a fit of rage, I stormed down the stairs and stopped as I heard a guttural sound coming from the kitchen. I leaned forward and peered around the corner and found that damn dog glaring at me with ferocious intent in his eyes. The hair on his back raised as his growls picked up in frequency. 

At least someone in this house knows I’m here. 

I crossed towards the canine as his growls bared his teeth. I planned to release all of my fury on the dog, but unfortunately the man figured out his cable management and came racing to check on what the pooch was growling at. 

“What is it boy? What’s got you spooked?” 

He pet the dog’s head lovingly as he squatted down to eye level and tousled the dog’s ears. His cooing at the dog helped me reach my limit with this family. 

That’s it, I thought and stormed off into the den slamming all the doors on the way. 

That’s when the beginning of my end came to be. I wanted to be acknowledged more than anything. Just a glimmer of awareness. I’ve tirelessly evacuated folks from the moment they stepped foot into the house, but now I’m chalked up to a breeze or the dog or -even worse- imagination. I stood behind the den entryway sulking in my own hopelessness as I heard his quivering voice from the kitchen. 

“Hey babe, do you still have Father Matthews’ number? I think he needs to come and bless our house.” His voice shook and I could feel his fear penetrating the air. 

~~

Candles and crucifixes littered the living space as Father Matthews flung Holy Water from his aspergillum and recited ancient prayers from his book of morals. I hid in the shadows and waited for the perfect moment to enter. 

“It’s kind of shit that I never got that ‘perfect moment’ because now I’m here talking to you-” I chuckled uncomfortably hoping to elicit some sort of sympathy from the horned ghoulish creature behind the reception desk. With a permanent unsettling smile on its face, its pen hovered above a leather bound book with rough stitching and pages black as coal. “So clearly I didn’t get that moment. You can just send me back up and I’d be happy to finish what I started with the dog.” 

“No,” the ghoul hissed. “Next.” 

“Next? What do you mean next? I didn’t just tell you this whole story to get shooed away with ‘next’.” 

I turned around and behind me was a line as far as I could fathom of people waiting, all damned to an epoch of suffering in the pits of Hell. 

An idea flashed a big “get out of jail” card in my mind. “What about an apprenticeship? I know he needs more people to do his bidding.” My voice was dripping with anxious pleading- not my intention. 

The ghoul brought its pointer finger up to rest on its bottom lip as it looked up. “Hmm, come back tomorrow and we will see if there are openings.” The words slipped out of its mouth like a snake that wrapped around my chest, constricting my soul. 

I have no clue how many years I’ve been coming to this counter just to have my soul crushed by this damn ghoul.