Chapter 4
Greg slowly woke up, his eyes unwilling to open. Once they did, it would be a somber confirmation that the magical night – a night with a man that could have stepped out of his dreams – was over.
Eventually his eyes yielded to reality and Greg saw sunlight streaming into the kitchen between gaps in the boards fixed across the windows. The entire place looked a lot more welcoming than it had the night before, though the air was brisk that early Monday morning.
Shifting across the floor to try and warm up, Greg hit a spot of rough wood between his shoulders. The pain was stabbing and he jerked upright.
“Ouch!” he gasped, trying to see what the damage was. His arm was unable to reach the tingling spot due the width of his back. “Hey, Ed? Babe, can you look at my back and see if there’s any bleeding? That is, any not caused by you last night.”
He chucked lightly, but there was no reply. No chuckle, no sleepy words. Nothing.
“Eddie?” Greg repeated, and he turned around.
An empty space gawked back at him, Eddie’s body gone. Greg’s hoodie was there on the floor, neatly folded like his mother would do, but there were no other clothes than his own, no other equipment than his own, and – Greg felt this weigh heavier on him than the other facts – no other soul than his own.
Greg’s emotions sank, going from high to low so fast they could have collapsed the floor and taken him down into the pits of Hell where his stomach had gone. Yanking his phone out of his jeans pocket (he was still naked), Greg didn’t see any missed calls or messages.
What the fuck, Eddie? he thought, fingers on fire as he wrote out a text message, keeping it as polite as possible.
Perhaps something happened early this morning and Eddie had to leave, Greg supposed in the lonely recess of his head. That has to be it. But then again, why would Eddie not have woken me up? Or had me go with him?
After a few tormenting minutes, there was still no reply. Greg’s heart plunged to join his stomach and the smells of the place became rank and uninviting. The sun’s formerly appealing glow now seemed to amplify the stink in its torrid columns, dust motes as large as mosquitos fluttering by in a happily mocking dance.
Feeling like he had been jabbed with a knife by some fucker playing games, Greg hurriedly got up, grabbed his dirty clothes off the floor, and got dressed. Haphazardly collecting his other stuff, he stormed off the property in a flurry of anger and upset. It would dawn on him later that week that two of his motion sensors were still upstairs. He would end up buying replacements rather than return to that place ever again.
The path that Eddie and he walked up the night before whisked by on his way down, and once he’d worked his way back through the tangle of iron and vines at the main gate, he was stopped dead in his tracks by what he saw. There on the window of his Mustang, drawn by what had to be a finger, was a loosely shaped heart. A capital letter G and E were in the center of it. Arching over that was a word, its letters dripping through the drawing like tears running down one’s cheeks.
“Sorry?” Greg muttered. “That you are, Eddie. One sorry son of a bitch.”
Greg felt like crying himself for a second, but was overcome by confusion. He pulled out his phone again, dialed Eddie’s number, and received another shock… one that threatened to keel him over with a heart attack. Third time’s a charm after all.
“We’re sorry,” said an automated voice that followed a trio of beeps, “but the number you have dialed has been disconnected or is no longer in service. If you feel you have reached this recording in error, please check the number and try again…”
The message repeated, and Greg finally wept.
Screeching to a halt right outside the fraternity, Greg stormed out of his car, uncaring that he’d driven and parked along Alpha Loop, and certainly uncaring that people were staring at him as if he’d done so under the influence of alcohol. He raced up the steps and burst in through the front door, causing Derek to leap first out of sleep then clear off the sofa.
“Dammit, G!” Derek yelled. “Next time can you be a little less macho with your entry?”
Greg didn’t say a word to him, heading straight upstairs.
Sensing something was wrong, Derek promptly followed Greg into their bedroom and closed the door.
“What’s up?” Derek said demandingly, cutting through Greg’s attempts at shielding himself. “G! Hello? What’s up? You look like someone took a shit, stepped in it, then did the same all over your face.”
Seeming to chip through Greg’s defenses, Greg spilled details on the day to Derek – from the coffee shop all the way up to where the two men made out and had sex.
“Damn boy!” Derek said proudly. “I knew the nerd had some major pull. You should bottle those pheromones and sell that shit as the G Effect; you’d make a killing. Hell, I’d buy some if it would also make me look halfway as good as you.”
Greg started to laugh, but it came out like some awkward half-cry. That’s when he told Derek that Eddie must have bolted in the middle of the night.
“So, do you have any idea what the issue was?” Derek asked. “Was your ass too loose for that massive man-cock or something?”
Greg gave Derek a look that could have cut him cleanly in two.
“Not that I know how that works between two dudes, of course,” Derek clarified, quickly raising his arms in self-defense. “Seriously, though, he just left without so much as a word?”
“Yes. Except, and this is where I get confused, I did see one of those clichéd hearts drawn on my car window when I left. Complete with our initials and everything. Plus, he had written an apology over the top.”
“Weird,” said Derek as he crossed his arms and gave his chin a quick rub, taking to messing up his hair a short second later. “Sounds to me like the boy was confused. Maybe you were his first male “experience,” and it made him uncomfortable. I’m thinking, again not that I know about such things, that he liked it way more than he expected to. Either way, it looks like he freaked out. I don’t think it had nothing to do with you.”
“You sure about that?”
“Hell no,” Derek admitted to a grimace on Greg’s face, “but it’s my best-friend guess as to what happened. It’s much easier to type things out on a keyboard than it is to act on them when faced with it. Throw in a smattering of real feelings and real-life facial expressions, and you have a recipe that must be followed precisely. Think of it like a soufflé; it can either be the perfect meal or a disaster.”
Greg sighed, doing nothing to help his mood. He was impressed that Derek even knew what a soufflé was.
“Look,” Derek continued, “I’m planning to hit up the mall in the next, oh, half hour or so. Do you want to go with me? I have to do some shopping for a soiree tonight – I don’t want to go, but Mob Boss insists – and wouldn’t mind a professional gay man’s opinion on what to wear and style my hair with.”
“Out with the stereotypes, eh?” Greg replied, pointing at his overly tight Domo tee. “Derek, have you seen the clothes I wear?”
“You sir have a very valid point,” Derek said through gritted teeth, “but it’d be great to have a bro with me nonetheless, especially one that needs a friend to help lift him out of the dumps.”
“Sure, sure. Can I get a few minutes to unpack my stuff and check a few things?”
“Take as much time as you need,” Derek responded. “I’d like to get out of here within the next half hour or so but if it’s a little later I should still be okay. I’m ready to go, so I’ll meet you downstairs when you are.”
He reached out and gave Greg a hug, pawing playfully with his shoulders.
“Yeah, and remember,” Derek said as he headed out the door, “bottle that shit so I can look halfway as good as you.”
Greg laughed and as the door closed again, he upturned his bag onto the bed. He placed the voice recorder and video camera on the desk, hooking them up to the laptop so he could review his findings – their findings – on the larger screen. Sitting on the corner of the bed, he logged into the UH message boards on his phone. Eddie’s account was still there, but disabled.
Huh, Greg thought, that’s freaky, too.
Flicking into the main chat lobby, Greg asked a moderator to message him privately. He needed help to answer a question or two about an account. A minute later, an alert popped up, and Greg swiped over to another window where the moderator was waiting.
Can we video chat? Greg typed. It’ll only take a few minutes of your time and would be much easier than typing all this out.
Sure, the mod replied, and a second later there was a request to accept an incoming video call.
Greg pressed the button and the screen flipped in a cool, animated way. He saw a heavyset man on the other end, wearing a black baseball cap and flannel shirt. There were bits of something in his beard, Greg supposed were crumbs but didn’t have time to ask.
“So, what issues do you have FuriousPanda?” the moderator asked. “Cool username by the way, Greg. My real one is Paul.”
“Thanks,” Greg replied, then proceeded to tell him about the DemonTempura account and how he had met up with Eddie over the weekend to do a ghost hunt at a local mansion.
“Well, I’m not exactly sure how that’s even possible, Greg,” Paul replied skeptically, clicking away on his keyboard as he looked up additional information. The sound was cold, dull, and unbelieving. “That account has been disabled for… gosh, five years.”
“What?” Greg said. He furrowed his eyebrows and looked hard at the screen.
“Yeah, it was deactivated in 2008,” Paul stated matter-of-factly, typing away some more. The clicking was intense and his eyes indicated that he was looking at several open windows at once. “Seems that the account owner, Eddie Smith, went missing back in early March 2006. He was on a ghost hunt in a town called Logan.”
“Yeah, that’s the same town I live in.”
“Huh. Logan, South Carolina, eh? Not much action out that way. Anyway, it says here in this newspaper report – dated Monday, May 15, 2006 – that the body of missing LU student Eddie Smith turned up outside an old house there. He was right in the middle of the street.”
Shivers tumbled down Greg’s spine like cold water trickling over rocks.
“The house is known as the Crestmore Estate and Eddie was found still wearing his backpack. It was full of ghost hunting gear and he had terrible cuts across most of his body, especially his torso and forearms, which had been split clear from the elbow to the wrists.”
Paul gulped as he continued to read the rest in silence, but Greg could tell by his face that it wasn’t pretty.
“Based on what little they’re describing,” Paul said (Greg thinking there were a lot of gory details Paul wasn’t talking about), “I would guess a wendigo got hold of him, but the other general mods here insist I don’t talk about that sort of thing since they “don’t exist.” Yet, if all this other stuff we chase is supposedly real, I don’t see why not.”
“Sure… sure…”
“Hey Greg,” Paul said curiously. “Lemme check on a couple of things and get back with you. Give me five to ten?”
Greg nodded and the call ended. He sat in silence, unable to process what he’d just discovered, looking off at his ghost hunting gear. No, past it into some great big void of nothing.
No way can what I think happened, actually have happened, he repeated over and over in his mind. There’s just no way…
His phone buzzed, then beeped. It was Paul again. Had ten minutes already gone by? Looking at the time, fifteen had. Greg answered the video call.
“Hey Greg?”
“Yes, I’m here.”
“Okay so, I spoke to some others – the board Journeymen since they do the crazier shit – and they’re saying that there’s probably a malevolent spirit in the house. From the wounds on Eddie’s body, it’s a nasty fucker. I thought maybe a shadow man, but they’re calling it a soul eater. Not sure I put much stock in that.”
Greg winced. The name sounded to-the-point and that point was sharp enough to impale you.
“Yeah, I had that same initial reaction,” said Paul. “If what they say is true, this thing feeds on a captive’s soul, inflicting pain until it’s exchanged for another. I would say you, Greg Olden, got out of there by the literal skin of your teeth. You’re lucky to be alive.”
Greg had nothing to say. He couldn't say anything due to his heart taking up residence in his throat. The words were blocked.
“Strange,” Paul added. “I just looked at the activity records and the account has been active the last week or so.”
Greg was holding back tears, shaking as if he was ill.
“T-thanks for your help, P-Paul,” Greg stammered.
“No worries,” he replied, noting the genuine fear in Greg’s eyes. “Hey, Greg, I’ll send you a friend request later, and my personal phone number, just in case you need someone in the business to talk to about all this.”
“Yeah,” Greg replied as he hung up, blown away by what he had just heard.
He had a few more minutes before he was due to meet Derek downstairs. The files were ready to be viewed on his laptop.
Rather quickly, Greg scanned the videos from that night and discovered the image became distorted every time Eddie was in the frame, and there seemed to be a shadow on his shoulder at all times. It looked like a hand… no a claw.
“Holy shit,” Greg said. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
Looking at the thermals briefly, all seemed in order, other than a persistent hot spot in the same place on Eddie’s shoulder as the shadowy claw.
Greg got up and readied himself to head downstairs, but he glanced to the transferred voice files. His gaze lingered. They beckoned for him to listen. He didn’t want to, but impulse took over, and he started the EVP session.
There was crackling where none should be, then Greg’s voice asked: “Is there anybody there?”
There was a low rumble, then a faint noise. A growl, distant like a predator from the dark cover of overgrown brush.
“If anybody’s here,” Eddie’s cracking voice continued, “what is it you want?”
Crackle.
“I…”
Crackle.
“…want… him…”
Then, Greg could make out the first knock in the distance, barely audible on the file but definitely there.
“Super cool!” his voice responded, warbling with a lot of distortion. He almost sounded sleepy. “Spirit, if that was you, please make another noise.”
Definite footsteps were caught on the recording, plus the other, much louder knock, followed by a loud growl.
That wasn’t there when we were, Greg thought, shuddering. It sounded so close, like it was right next to them.
“How long have you been here?”
Crackle.
“Forever… but… never alone,” it said.
Greg stopped the playback, gasping.
“You have ghosts on tape,” he murmured, so quietly as if to try and bury that fact from himself. “Freaking ghosts… on tape…”
“Hey Greg, you almost ready?” Derek called from downstairs. His voice was far away, Greg’s focus elsewhere. The room seemed dark.
“Y-yeah,” he replied. “Be down in a second.”
Chilled to the bone, Greg fast forwarded to the last thing he recorded, just after Eddie fell asleep.
“…I for one am glad this hunt happened, because I met you” Greg’s voice echoed from the past.
There was a loud burst of static.
“I’m glad the hunt happened too, Greg,” said Eddie’s voice, causing Greg to shake. His hands groped his hair looking for something to hold on to, to anchor him to a reality that was slipping away. He then lost his mind in grief, wonder, and fear. “I really enjoyed our time together,” Eddie continued, “and wish I could have stayed with you. But that would never be possible. So, I gave you a gift, and if you’re listening to this, you’re free. I made sure of it.”
Crackle.
“Don’t come back. Ever. It won’t be happy with me at all but thanks to you, I have new memories that will help me get through the pain of the next few years. Goodbye Greg… I truly do love you.”
The static then returned and its harsh sound filled the air, scraping away what was left of Greg’s heart.
THE END