The Unheard

     My friend, Baily, and I had just completed a haunted hayride and were walking toward my car when a clean-cut teenager approached us. He asked if we would be interested in checking out the haunted house he and his buddies created. It would be free of charge; his only request was that we spread the word if we thought it was any good.

         “Hell yeah,” I said. The hayride got my blood pumping, and I was ready for more frightening fun. Baily was just as energized as I was. The accommodating young man instructed us to follow him in our own car, so we set out.

~~~

         When I first saw the building, I was not impressed; its modern commercial design was reminiscent of a bank. The car in front of us slowed to a stop, we trundled forward beside it. Baily rolled down the passenger side window and we were told to park anywhere in the parking area. The only other vehicles around were a couple of vans near the side of the structure, not unusual considering the place wasn’t open to the public yet. As we approached the portico, a tall, Lurch-from-the-Adams Family-looking man greeted us. He explained the task that lay ahead.

          “One jack-in-the-box toy can be found in each of the five rooms throughout the house,” he said. “The puppet inside each box has two yellow, fabric stars attached to the tips of its coxcomb hat. The challenge is to collect all ten stars from all five boxes.” The man then handed me a belt bag to tuck the stars into as we accumulated them. I passed the bag to Baily, and she snapped it around her waist.

         Lurch tapped the handicapp push button on a post behind him and a high-pitched creaking sound squealed as the doors leading inside slowly opened. Baily followed me as I crossed the threshold into the vestibule and the doors screeched closed behind her. The hint of disinfectants and the gloomy atmosphere transported us to an eerie medical clinic. We were contemplating our first move when a panel slid into the wall to our left, like a pocket door. Taking a few steps forward, we peeked around the corner into the beckoning space.

          Two bald men, dressed in brown, monk robes, slumped in rocking chairs in the far corners of the room. The men lifted their heads, their eyes were glossy, and they seemed to be staring right through us. Their lips were sewn as if they were participating in a vow of silence. A spotlight shown down from the ceiling highlighting a colorful box on the floor between them, it was the first jack-in-the-box.

          Baily shoved me from behind and I stumbled into the room. I hesitated, anticipating the men to somehow prevent me from snatching the box. Shuffling closer to the vibrant cube ahead of me, I slowly reached out, aware of the men even though they appeared to be unaware of me. I grabbed the box, spun on my heels, and hustled back into the hallway. The panel slid shut.

         I passed the tin box to Baily; she hugged it close to her body with one arm while winding the lever with the other. The tinkling music sounded creepy in that environment, and when the jester popped out, I jolted upright. Two plush stars were attached to the tips of the doll’s forked hat with Velcro. I tore them off and shoved them into the pouch around Baily’s waist.

         We moved forward a few strides and a second pocket door slid into the wall to our right. The area inside the empty void was no bigger than a closet and I could see a child-like sketch of a sprung jack-in-the-box on the wall straight ahead. An arrow under the doodle pointed to the right.  

         I stepped into the cramped space, Baily hugging my waist and shambling close behind. As I neared the back wall, I could see that the arrow pointed toward a narrow hallway. When we reached the end of that hall, another arrow directed us to yet another short passageway to our left. We zigged and zagged through the claustrophobic passages as if we were trapped in a human-sized ant farm. When I saw the second jack-in-the-box, I lunged forward, breaking free from Baily’s clutch and I grabbed our prize from atop a pedestal.

         I whirled around to find Baily right behind me and I almost knocked her over. We could hear moaning and the sound of fingernails scratching from behind the wall. With my urging, Baily about faced and picked up the pace. We made our way back to the open doorway and leapt out into the foyer. I released the jester from the box and collected two more stars.

         Overhead fluorescents powered on in a domino effect down a lengthy corridor. Human limbs hung like grotesque, hunting trophies on the vintage, Toile wallpapered walls. At the end of the corridor was another jack-in-the-box atop another Corinthian column pedestal.

         As we ambled down the ghostly hallway, the limbs on the walls seemed to come alive. One arm stretched outward, and its hand grabbed Baily’s hair. I used a self-defense move, gripping the wrist and bending it backward, causing the hand to loosen its grip. We huddled together, inching our way down the center of the hall, careful to remain on the ornate runner and out of scope of the flailing limbs. We also passed three closed doors, one of which a floundering hand was futilely trying to open.

        Once we arrived at our reward, we could relax. I turned the crank on the box as it sat upon the waist high column and out sprung the jester. Two more stars. Baily ripped them off and added them to our booty. Three missions complete, two to go.

         To the right of the pedestal was a wide archway. Several yards ahead, a spotlight shown on the fourth jack-in-the-box. The entire room beyond the dividing arch was outlined with glowing orange cords. Colorful orbs of light frolicked along the parquet floor around the toy; it was so disorienting, especially after being in the well-lit corridor. We crept slowly forward, the brightness behind us diminishing with every step we took.

         I leaned against the wall for balance and strip lights lit up, framing four portraits of different men. The faces protruded from the canvases in a three-dimensional way. Their eyes were closed, and silky ascots covered their necks. While I studied the fascinating artwork before me, captivated by its realistic features, the closed eyelids undulated as if something squirmed underneath them. I recoiled and fell hard on my ass. At that point, Baily and I decided to crawl the rest of the way to the jack-in-the-box.

I reached out and pulled the box toward me. As I churned the lever, the gliding orbs appeared to be dancing to Pop Goes the Weasel, and when the jester burst forth, we collected the seventh and eighth stars and tucked them away.

         The click of a lock followed by the creaking of a door, signaled us to our next destination. I tried ignoring the disturbing portrait to the right of the door frame and shoved the door open wider.

          Upon entering the room, the sweet, woodsy smell of patchouli oil immediately assaulted my nose. The room was decorated like a child’s room and a small lamp rotated on the bedside table projecting images of cartoon ghosts on the walls. The mattress on the twin bed was sunken in the middle, as if by the weight of a body, and an indentation in the pillow created the misconception that it was supporting a head. I pensively studied the grand illusion, and when the indentation in the mattress rippled as if the invisible body was repositioning itself, I once again fell backward on my ass.

          Situated at the foot of the bed was an overstuffed toy chest, its hinged lid resting on the pile of toys inside. While Baily stood in the doorway, I knelt and tossed one stuffed plaything after another onto the floor, then I saw the fifth jack-in-the-box wedged between two teddy bears. I plucked it from its cozy nest and nudged the lid closed with my elbow. While I sat, my back against the hand-carved trunk, legs splayed out in front of me, I turned the crank and Baily sang:

         “All around the mulberry bush, the monkey chased the weasel, all around the mulberry bush, pop,” and the jester burst forth from the box.

         “Goes the weasel,” I finished, and I plucked stars nine and ten from its coxcomb hat.

          A man behind Baily cleared his throat and Baily startled, lunging at me and almost head butting me. “Follow me,” the man commanded. We composed ourselves and followed him out of the bedroom, through the room of strobe lights, and to the exit door. Mission complete.

~~~

          A few hours after I got home, Baily called me on my cell phone. She asked me to flip on the news. I heard a tremor in her voice and that made me nervous. It took me a few seconds while I fumbled with the remote. I clicked on the TV, pressed the voice command button, and said the words ‘channel 9’ into the microphone. I told Baily I was watching, disconnected the call and tossed the phone onto the coffee table.

         The picture on the television was bouncing while the photojournalist jogged across the lot to the building Baily and I had just visited. I could make out a jerky picture of an EMT removing the sutures from the lips of one of the monks. One thing that always scared me about haunted houses was the possibility that an actor would mutilate his own body for the show. That was my immediate thought about the monk.

         A police officer escorted the cameraman into the building. They filmed a rocking chair formerly occupied by one of the robed men. Leather wrist and ankle restraints laid on the seat of the chair. The camera then turned and focused on the room across the hall. Splintered particle boards were piled haphazardly, as if the previously constructed maze had collapsed like a house of cards.

         The video tape showed the heavily damaged walls of the corridor, huge holes remained where the trophies once hung. As they walked, they entered the adjoining rooms. Cold, steel beds jutted from the walls and manual respirator bags laid amongst the rubble beside them.

         The video jostled as the camera followed the police officer around the corner at the end of the hallway. The room that was lit by strobe lights and strip lights, was also riddled with holes in the plaster where portraits once hung. Two of the three adjacent rooms were furnished with high stools and equipped with mechanical respirators.

          At the time, I did not know what had happened to cause so much destruction, but I was breathing sighs of relief that Baily and I were safe. When the police showed up at my house, I was sure I was going to be accused of vandalism. Instead, I was made aware of what had happened that night:

         The building used to structure that house-of-horrors was once an emergency medical clinic owned by an anesthesiologist. The doctor, along with four other armed men, stormed a dinner party, abducted the five women and six men attending, and herded them to the reconstructed facility.

         The two men that were passed off as monks, were given muscle relaxers and their mouths sewn shut. Their heads were shaved, and they were shackled to rocking chairs with wrist and ankle restraints. One woman’s tongue was severed, and she was sealed inside the walls of the maze. Four of the women were injected with a drug that paralyzed their vocal cords to prevent them from crying out and tracheostomies were performed to prevent them from choking on their own saliva. Manual respirator bags were provided to the women to supply air if necessary. Their legs or arms had been threaded through the holes along the walls of the corridor and anchored with cement. The men from the portraits were victims of paralytic shellfish poisoning, also injected. The use of mechanical respirators and oxygen had prevented them from suffocation. These men were tethered to stools with their faces jammed tightly into holes in the walls, much like photo board cut-outs.

~~~

         After comprehending what horrors, I had not only witnessed, but also participated in, I was beyond traumatized: I ran from the sounds of a frantic woman. I literally slapped the hand of someone that pleaded for my attention. I scrutinized the face of a powerless man and neglected to help him. My nightmare come true.

End