Truth or Dare

Truth or Dare.

THE sleepover party game.

The make-or-break game of your childhood; will they, or won’t they?

For those who are unaware – truth or dare is the game where you are asked well, truth or dare. If you choose truth, you are asked a question and have to truthfully answer. If you choose dare, you are given a task and must complete that task. If you do not complete your task, there is a consequence. You won’t know the consequence until you refuse the dare. My advice: don’t refuse the dare.

Now that we are all on board, let the game begin.

It started as a regular Saturday night. My sister Maureen and I had plans to go to dinner and then meet up with some friends – see where the night takes us. We had dinner at our favorite salad bar, Ruby Tuesday, and then off to Starbucks for our daily cold brew. Coffee in hand, we headed out to the park where we planned to meet the group. We were the last to arrive. Waiting for us by the ‘witch’s cabin’ was my boyfriend, Josh, and our friends DeAngelo, Tom, and Jess.

Truth or Dare was the theme of the evening. Maureen and I chose to play as a team; we work better together. Josh was great a giving out dares, but always chose truth. DeAngelo was the shy one and this was his first attempt at our game. Finally, there was Tom and Jess – they never turned down a dare. For them, the more dangerous, the better. They once accepted a dare to base jump off of Stone Mountain. They never say no.

As we played, we rotated through people giving out silly dares and ridiculous truths.

“Josh, what is the most immature thing you still do?” asked Tom. “And Jenn, don’t say anything.” We had been dating for a long time and I never shied away from pointing out the immature things that he did.

“I wasn’t going to say anything, but if you need some help, I’m here for you, babe” I added with a smirk.

“I don’t really do immature things. I can’t think of anything.”

“Please. I have a list that’s a mile long. What did you just say earlier today when you were fixing that shelf?”

 Embarrassed, Josh put his head down and said, “Righty tighty, lefty loosey.”

“Boom! Who’s next?” I exclaimed.

It was our turn. Truth or Dare.

Maureen and I looked at each other and knew what the other was thinking. At the same time, we said it.

“Dare.”

There was no going back now. We both took a deep breath and waited for the group to tell us our fate. We live in a small town, what’s the worst they could do?

“We have made our decision…and it’s a good one” Josh said with a snarky tone. “Hit me with it” Maureen clapped back as she stepped up to Josh.

Josh looked back and forth between us and them with a slight smile that had us both a little nervous. “Your old house. No one lives there, right? We dare you to break into your old house and see if your name is still carved in the shelf in your closet. Picture or it didn’t happen.”

“Wait a minute, isn’t that like, illegal?” asked Maureen with a slight hint of apprehension.

“Only if you get caught,” smirked Josh. Maureen and I huddled together to discuss our options and decided that the risk of getting caught was minimal compared to the possible consequence of saying no. Besides how hard could it really be? We used to break into it all the time when we lived there.

Bring it on.

“Sure. No Problem. Easy” I said with an air of confidence I didn’t even know I had. We all piled into Maureen’s SUV and headed to the southside of town, notorious for being the ‘bad’ side of town. We turned onto the street and slowly made our way to the house. It was getting dark and there was an ominous feeling. It looked like something straight out of the Walking Dead. The trees were overgrown, houses in disarray, you could barely see mailboxes or addresses. The closer we got to the house the more dilapidated the neighborhood looked. It was disheartening to see.  

We hit a speedbump coming around the curve and it jolted me out of nostalgia and back into the task at hand; breaking into our childhood home.

We drove up to the house and parked in the driveway; we hadn’t been in that house in decades. The yard was overgrown, thorn bushes grew over the front steps; vines coming through the porch roof.

This neighborhood was on property that was owned by the state. One of the country’s largest mental health institutions was located a few blocks from here. These houses were where all the doctors and staff of the hospital lived so they were close to campus in case of an emergency - anything from a patient needing medical assistance to one of them finding a way to ‘escape’ and wander the grounds. In that case, a deafening alarm would sound that you would hear for miles. This happened only once when we were kids and it was terrifying. My sister and I were playing outside and all of a sudden, this blaring alarm sounded as if someone had a blow horn pointed right at you. Our mom came running out of the house and demanded we come inside. We came running in and was told to stay in the living room as she ran throughout the house locking all the doors and shutting the curtains. Her beeper kept going off and she was on and off the phone talking with other doctors trying to get ahold of the situation.

We sat on the floor in the living room for what seemed like forever before the phone rang. It was a nurse giving the all clear. Our night was pretty much over then – dinner, shower, bed was all that was left.

I’m rambling now. Back to the task.

We first checked the sliding glass door to what had once been a garage, but later covered with burnt orange carpet and renovated into a spare room – this was our dads office.

This door was obviously locked. Maureen broke a few nails trying to get it open before she gave up and decided to move to the front door. Locked.

Windows? We peered into the window of what used to be our living room. Suddenly flashes of Christmas morning, movie nights, sleepovers, and family gatherings flooded my mind. I’ll admit, I got a little teary eyed. This was our childhood.

“All the doors are locked. I guess we’ll have to come up with a new dare. Sorry Charlie. This ain’t gonna happen,” Maureen said with a sigh of relief. I could tell she really wanted to get in, but was thankful there was seemingly, no way in.

“Carport.” I said as I stared into the house.  

“What?”

“The carport. There’s a door that goes into that little room that goes into dad’s office. Remember?” I said, my words bathed in excitement.  

“To the carport!” shouted Tom, as we all began the trek down the hill towards the carport.

As I was walking past the dining room window, a shadow moved from one side of the doorway to the other. I stopped and stared into the window, expecting to see a person walk back. Nothing. “What the…?” I whispered to myself. I turned to look at the group who was well on their way down the hill.

It was probably one of their shadows, I told myself, it IS a full moon. I took one more good look into the house and saw nothing, so I began heading down.

Once in the carport, we noticed that there were tire tracks that led through the backyard to an old run-down shed. “You think someone is down there? Or someone lives there?” asked DeAngelo.

“Why don’t we go down and see!” Jess excitedly asked.

Tom hesitated. “There’s cigarette butts, a mask, trash, and a sock down here. There’s underwear and a shoe. Someone either has been here or this place has become a dumping ground.”

“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea. I mean, someone could be living here. Squatters! That’s a thing, right?” asked Josh with a nervous voice.

I debated on whether or not to mention the shadow I saw inside. I really wanted to go in and look around. If someone was in there, we would’ve seen or heard them by now, right?

“Are we checking the door, or no?” asked Maureen with an annoyed tone. “I don’t have all night.”

“Just check it and then we can go from there.”

Maureen slowly began walking up the steps towards the door as we followed behind. It was so quiet you could hear cars from the highway driving by – the quietest this group has been all night. Suddenly Maureen stopped. “It’s cracked.”

“What? We back here can’t hear you,” snickered Tom.

The door looked like it hadn’t been pulled to latch closed, but was just propped there. Why would the door be like that? It wasn’t shut and locked like the rest of the doors. Was someone actually living here? Was there a squatter? Was Josh right?

“I don’t know if this is a good idea,” pleaded Jess. Jess of all people. She never turned down a dare and now she’s thinking this is a bad idea. Deep down, I felt the same way; I had this feeling that we shouldn’t be here. That and the shadow should have been enough for me to turn around and go straight home.

Nope. Apparently, I like to torture myself.

Without mentioning the shadow, I confidently expressed my need to finish this dare. “We’ve come this far. I don’t know why the door is like that, but it’s open, right? It’s now or never. Either you come with, or I go alone. What’s it gonna be?”

“Let’s go. Let’s make it quick though. You guys coming?”

“No thanks,” blurted out DeAngelo. The rest of the group followed suit. It was just me and Maureen now. All alone.

We slowly crept into the small room that, at one point, had a deep freezer in it that would shock you whenever you touched it, unless you were wearing shoes.

We moved to the room with the burnt orange carpet. “Remember dad had his train set down here” I mentioned quietly.

Laughing, Maureen pointed out, “and we would hide in this area under the stairs.” The room looked so much smaller than I remember.

I hear Maureen’s feet on the tile floor of the laundry room. I quickly ran up the few stairs that lead to the laundry room and kitchen to see her standing in the doorway staring into the kitchen. Her eyes widen as she points to something in the kitchen. I really don’t want to look, but I look. I peer around the corner and see it. I try to focus my eyes on what I’m looking at.

A bottle of vitamins. A receipt from CVS. A loaf of bread. A jar of peanut butter.

We both freeze. Someone lives here.

Our eyes scan the room which has doorways into the dining room and the hallway. I immediately remember the shadow that I saw moving from one side of this very doorway to the other. I had seen someone. But where are they? We stand in frozen silence in the kitchen for what seems like hours, listening. Is there someone else in the house with us? What do we do?

“I think we should go,” I whisper with a shaky voice. “Yeah, I’m gonna go. I’m not dying for a picture of a shelf.” I turn around and head down the stairs. At the bottom I turn around, expecting to see Maureen, but no; she’s nowhere to be found.

Crap.

Do I wait? Do I go find her? Do I bail and adopt the ‘every man for himself’ mentality? No way Jose - I go back to find her. I slowly turn the corner into the kitchen – not there. I creep towards the counter with the items and see the date on the receipt – 3 days ago. I hear the floor creak and a footstep from the hallway. A shiver runs down my spine. This is it. This is how I go. I turn my head and see my sister sneaking by. “Are you kidding me?” I softly shout at her. She ignores me and continues on her journey down the hallway.

I want to follow her, but I find myself being pulled to the dining room. As I look around, I think back to all the family dinners we had in this room – there was a Thanksgiving where we had about 30 people crammed in here. I hear a pop of the floor and it snaps me back to reality. I move across the hall and briefly peek into the living room before making my way down the short hallway to the kitchen. Straight ahead of me is a closet with the door cracked open. This particular closet my sister and I would play in and spy on our parents. I walk towards the closet. Maureen calls me from down the hall.

“Jenn!” she shouts as a whisper. “Come look at this. They painted over my dolphin!” I roll my eyes and begin down the hallway.

Maureen had a huge dolphin painted on her wall as a child. “They painted over my dolphin. It was a masterpiece!”

“Can we please do what we are here to do so we can get the hell out of here?”

We sneak into the bedroom, which was a lot smaller than I remember. Maureen opens the closet door and lifts up the shelf.

Still there. “They paint over MY dolphin but they leave a strangers name carved into their shelf?!”

“Take the picture and let’s go, please” I plead with her.

She takes the picture and we are on our way out when we hear creaking coming from the kitchen. We freeze. Who’s that? Is there someone in here with us?

The creaking gets heavier and closer. All of a sudden Tom’s head pops around the corner from the kitchen while he eats a peanut butter sandwich.

“What the hell are you doing?! You scared the crap out of us,” I scoffed.

“You guys were taking forever, we wanted to make sure that you were still alive in here.”

“We were just getting ready to leave. We got your damn picture. Let’s go. I’m ready to get the hell out of here. Are you eating a sandwich?”

“There was bread and peanut butter on the counter. I was hungry. Ya’ll really were taking forever and I didn’t have dinner. You know I get cranky when my blood sugar is low. And it was dropping like Josh’s credit score.”

“Oh my God, that was here when we got here, we didn’t bring sandwich accoutrements with us!”

“Hey, one person’s trash is another person’s snack.”

As we were leaving, I noticed something that chilled me to the bone. On the outside of my bedroom door was a chain lock and hook for a padlock.

“Oh my God, Maureen. Look at this,” I said, my voice shaking. “There are locks on the outside of the door. The OUTSIDE of the door.”

“That’s weird. Look, they’re on the outside of all the doors.”

“All except the master. That’s not good. I don’t even want to know why those are there. We need to go. Like now. C’mon.”

We all turned around and headed out of the house as quickly as we could. Jess had driven Maureen’s car around to the carport so we bolted out of the house, slammed the door, and all piled back into the car. We drove back to the park in silence, all trying to comprehend what we had seen. Why were there locks on the outside of the doors? Who lived there? Do we need to tell someone?

We arrived at the park and all went our separate ways. It had been a long night.

***

I was just getting into bed when I got a notification on my phone from an app that I didn’t recognize. I, reluctantly, opened it. It was a video. The video was dark and grainy. There was talking, but I couldn’t make out what was being said. I turned my volume up and strained to hear what was being said. Someone walked in front of the camera, but I couldn’t see who it was.

What was this video and why did someone send it to me?

As I sat down my heart dropped into my stomach. It was a video of me. I was walking down a dark hallway. I could hear Maureen’s voice in the background talking about her dolphin as I walk past. You can hear Tom come into the house and make his sandwich. He walks by the camera. I can hear us talking about the locks on the doors. The videographers breathing got heavier and heavier. You see us all walk back and hear us leave the house.

The person taking the video crawls out of the closet; the same closet I wanted to look in, but got distracted by Maureen’s dolphin talk. They walk towards the front door and into the living room, and point the camera to shoot through the window as we drive away. The last frame of the video is a zoomed in shot of my face as I turn to look back at the house.