It's Probably Haunted

Chapter 14

 There was no prize car or new furniture set waiting behind the door. Instead I found myself in a mess of assorted antiques. There were multiple grungy old grandfather clocks, mountains of lead painted toys, broken pieces of rusty bicycle frames, and a red satin pillow with a Polaroid camera resting on top. I stepped through the mess with as much caution as I could. I had to move things around and make new piles of rusty junk that I thought was going to fall on me at any second. It was like playing a game of Tetanus Tetris and I was never very good at making the blocks fit.

Eventually, I made it through unscathed and picked up the old camera. I pointed it at the pillow and pushed the button. A grayed out picture floated to the ground and I stooped to pick it up. I waved the picture around for a minute and dropped it when it came into focus.

A severed fist with its middle finger up was pointing at me in the picture. I looked to the pillow but there was nothing there. I picked up the picture and the ghostly finger was still telling me to fuck off. There was laughter behind me and I spun around to punch whoever it was. My fist went through Calvin's foggy face and I stumbled; landing on the pile of broken bikes. A jagged piece of handlebar had ripped through my shirt and scratched at the skin on my back but hadn't broken through. I yelled at Calvin and told him I would probably need a shot and thanks. He reminded me that at least I wasn't dead. I had nothing else to say really so I just watched as Calvin put his hand back in place and lit the middle finger before detaching it. He made some joke about Cuban fingers being the finest and I waved through him and left the room.

I went through the second room without looking at anything besides the door in front of me. I wanted to ignore that mystical lamp or whatever the hell it was and wasn't very keen on running into Mrs. B either. I went into the first room and looked around at the windows. They were still free from their plastic shells and the dim light was still enough to see by. I had almost stepped outside when I thought to ask Calvin about the staircase that had appeared out of nowhere. The words fumbled on the edge of my lips and I froze with a dumb look on my face as I stared at the empty corner of the room. The original windows had replaced the staircase and the ceiling had been sealed back without the faintest impression that something was missing. I walked back outside and waited for Calvin to drift after me.

The day had started to fade and the sky was turning orange. Wind rustled around and bits of gravel began to lift up into the air. I felt a few pebbles brush across my face and then watched as my feet left the porch and I was looking down at my shoes through a hole in the roof. I kept rising and soon cleared the entire house and the trees scattered along the property. There were forests of trees dancing off as far as I could see. Forests that I knew I had not driven through to get to the house. The road we came in on had been littered with livestock and fields of crops. Farming lands and desolate landscape. Not the lively sprouts of green that covered everything up to a mountain that I lived nowhere near. I don't think there is a mountain anywhere in this state, honestly, but there it was; looming above everything. It looked down on the land and I looked down at it and then I noticed Calvin looking up at me. He ascended to my level and asked how I had made it up here; not being dead and being able to float and whatnot. I told him he should be telling me; him being an all-knowing ghost ninja and whatnot. He told me I watched too much TV and then I was plummeting back to the ground.

Inches above my shoes, I hovered for a few seconds. Not knowing what else to do, I slid my right foot into my shoe and followed suit with the left. As my heel cleared the back of the left, I felt my toes touch down gently on the porch and I fell to my knees. I touched the paint chipped planks of wood to make sure they were real. I touched myself to make sure I was real and waited for Calvin to dive back down so I could ask him what it felt like to be a ghost. I just wanted to be sure that I was still alive. It was starting to seem more and more likely that I may not be. People that are alive can't fly. They can't float. They can't hover. They can't do any of the things that I had just experienced but I had and I knew there must be some reason. There was an explanation to all of the things going on and I was determined to ask that old bastard what it was.

I had almost forgotten the camera was still in my hands until Calvin appeared and asked me what it was for. I told him it was connected to everything and started taking pictures. I started with the ratty old porch, went around and snapped one of each side of the house, and then went inside. I took one from inside the dimly lit first room; highlighting the murky windows. I opened the door to the second room and took a picture of the table and ghostly lamp and then shut the door back; not wanting to take another step until I knew what was happening. Convinced that I had covered enough in the pictures, I asked Calvin for his keys and he told me he wasn't sure where he had left them. He said he thought they were on him when he died, but he wasn't sure where he had left his body either.

That's about the time I started searching the floor around the door where he had died. Not finding anything, I stood up and noticed an area above the door that hadn't been there moments before. I took a few steps back and stared at the staircase that had returned to its corner. As much as I didn't want to, I knew I had no choice. It was time to see what was upstairs. I set my stack of pictures on the floor beside the first step and started up them.