(Based on a recent
dream rather than a true story)
So
I had it coming: I had been nagging my friends for months that this Halloween,
I wanted to be really scared. No
chainless chainsaws, no battery-operated torture chambers, no latex severed
heads – I wanted actual fear.
Without actual peril, of course; I’m not completely stupid.
To
shut me up, they found a place advertised as the scariest haunted house
in the whole world, which was saying something: the whole country, I could see
them getting away with that claim, but the whole world? Some might have words about that.
We
flew out to where the house was because we’re nerds, and on Halloween night we
joined another group for our scheduled tour.
The place looked like the Winchester Mystery House from the outside – I
saw a few doors-to-nowhere peeking out at us – and the thrills and chills made
their first tentative appearance. I sent
them back inside for the moment, reserving judgement until the main event.
It
turned out the whole thing would be a self-guided tour: one teenaged employee
looking resentful at missing out on the past-curfew tricks-or-treats handed us
all maps, told us we were on camera and would be billed for any property
damage, and emphasized the importance of us staying together and not wandering
off from the rest of the group: “For if you stray, the demon in the house will
take you, bwa-ha-ha. Any questions?”
“Yeah,
is there a bathroom?” Someone
not-one-of-my-friends asked.
“Sure.” The teen guided her to a door off the main
entrance, which opened to a modern-looking hallway – muffled rock music could
be heard from one of the rooms off of it.
“Second door on the left – I just cleaned it.” The teen turned back to the rest of us. “You all can go ahead, you know.”
We
were simultaneously befuddled. “But you
just said we shouldn’t split up,” one of my friends said.
The
teen suppressed a sigh: “There’s another group coming in at 9, guys. I’ll make sure she finds you.” Pressing a button that killed most of the
lights and set all the floorboards creaking, chains rattling, and disembodied
voices moaning, the teen slumped into a chair that faced a monitor showing 12
camera feeds: we took that as our cue to
get going.
My
friends and I went up to the second floor, having nothing invested in waiting
for a stranger to catch up like the rest of them did, and we giggled our way
through the darkened rooms. I must say,
the attention to detail was amazing: I could almost smell the blood splattered
on the walls, and once or twice we huddled together when we heard heavy
footsteps approaching us from everywhere.
The first time it was the rest of the group stumbling their way around
the place, but the second time we had no idea what. Every so often a random costumed teenager
would be waiting for us in a room, suddenly standing up from a chair or acting
all possessed on a king-sized bed; we obligingly screamed every time. I really liked reading the backstories of the
horrors that were proudly on display in each room – such imaginations!
And
that was when I became separated from the group.
I
knew they had gone on ahead because they don’t appreciate hard work put into
things as much as I do, so I let them go on to the next room while I finished
reading about the governess axing the master of the house for shorting her on
her annual bonus, after watching an in-person demonstration of the event, and I
then went to the next room in the order we had been seeing them. Except my friends weren’t there. Or in any of the rooms down the hall.
I
didn’t want to panic, but I was in a strange dark house with lots of
strangers, some of whom may want to kill me, so I used the modern lifeline of
calling my friends’ phones: they all went to voicemail, so I was back in the
pre-millennium mode of finding people when you’re lost. I had two choices: go back downstairs to the
main entrance to wait for them in safety with the teenage Big Brother and miss
out on approximately $30 worth of the remainder of the tour, or go on to the
next floor and hope that both they were up there and that I wouldn’t be
murdered. In the spirit of the season, I
chose that option; after all, how far could they have gone in less than five
minutes?
The
first thing I (barely) saw on that floor was a table in the hallway that had a
very old-fashioned-looking doll propped up on it. I was admiring the craftsmanship and
wondering how much it was worth when it said:
“Please
don’t let the demon take me.”
Fear-laughing,
I said back: “Wow, that was good.”
“I
mean it: the prophecy states that I will be taken by the demon soon. Please don’t let it take me.”
This
was really good; was it controlled by wi-fi?
“OK doll, am I supposed to hide you from the demon, or take you home with
me for the reasonable price of $49.99?”
“Please
carry me back to my room upstairs,” the doll said – was it the teenager
downstairs doing the voice? I’d have to
ask later – “but the prophecy states that the demon will take me before I get
there.”
“OK.” I wasn’t sure where this was going. “Should we even bother then, doll?”
“Baby
Doll.”
“Yes,
you’re a baby-looking doll.”
“No,
I’m a living doll.”
“A
doll that – lives?”
“Yes. I am Baby Doll.”
Kind
of creepy. “OK Baby Doll, I’ll take you up
to your room, but I’d better not get charged for supposedly damaging a
prop.” I picked it up – the tiny body
felt spookily soft as I held it in one hand, slightly away from my body, so I
could always drop it and run.
“I
am not a prop – I am a living doll!”
“Whatever
you say, Baby Doll.”
I
found the next set of stairs to the last floor, and as I climbed Baby Doll got
more and more agitated, if that was even physically possible for a puppet:
“Ooh, the demon surely will take me now!”
“No
it won’t, Baby Doll, I’ve got you.”
“It’s
not safe here! I will be taken!”
Boy,
this place sure went all out. “Which
one’s your room?”
“At
the end of the hall.”
“Of
course it is.”
“The
demon is coming! I know it will take
me!”
“Don’t
worry, Baby Doll, I’ve got you.” Don’t
worry? What would I do if there
was an actual demon here after all?!
Choke, that’s what.
“I
won’t make it!”
“It’s
OK, Baby Doll, I’ve got you.”
“The
demon is almost here!”
“It
won’t get you, Baby Doll!”
“Any
moment now!”
“I’ve
got you, Baby Doll, don’t worry – ” a demon voice came out of my mouth as I said “I’VE GOT YOU.”
I
stood in the hallway in front of the bedroom door and stared at my empty hands
for a few seconds. I then spun around a
few times thinking I would find something, then saw on my watch that I had lost
five minutes. There was only one logical
explanation.
“Son
of a gun, the demon possessed me! How am
I going to explain this to Baby Doll?!”
Where would demon-possessed me have put Baby Doll, anyway? I started opening all the doors and peeking
in the rooms. “Oh Baby Doll, you know it
wasn’t really me who spirited you away somewhere, right?”
My
reflection with demon eyes was waiting for me as I passed a hallway
mirror. I didn’t even wonder about the
mechanics of it as it spoke: “You seriously thought you could get her past me? Me?!
An actual demon?!”
I
really didn’t know how to answer that, so I went with “Huh?”
“I
feel bad for you, I really do,” Demon-Reflection went on, “here you are,
stumbling around my house, and you still insist on trying to help the
first sob story you come across even though it’s a living doll; it’s all so
sad.”
That
snapped me out of it: “Wait a minute, I’m a paying customer, I just tried to
bring a freaky doll back to her room, and you waltz right in me like you own
the place!”
Demon-Reflection
looked unconcerned. “So what are you
gonna do about it, hm? Whine?”
“I’m
gonna be-be-be very irate!” I
undramatically sputtered, then whipped out my phone. “And rate this place zero stars so no one’ll
ever come here again, ha! Foiled you,
demon!”
“That
only hurts the people who work here – I don’t care either way.”
“Gaaah!”
“Listen,
I like your spirit,” Demon-Reflection seemed ready to leave. “Tell you what: I’ll put Baby Doll back in her
room all safe and sound, I won’t possess you again, and you and your posse can
leave whenever you want. Although I
think it’s about 9, so you should probably leave now so the next group can come
through.”
“Really? I – ”
“Just
get out.”
I
ran down all three flights of stairs and found my friends waiting by the
entrance with the teenager.
“There
you are!” They laughed. “Did you have a good time?”
“What?” I couldn’t believe they weren’t worried about
me!
The
teenager shooed us out. “Thank you, glad
you had a spooktacular time, we’re so behind schedule.”
We
passed the next group coming in as we got into our rental car.
“So,
are you satisfied?” One of my friends
asked as we buckled ourselves in. “Was
this all ‘actual fear’ enough for you?”
“I
suppose.” I didn’t want to tip my hand.
“It’d
better be,” she said. “We paid extra for
that ‘Demon Possession’ gag you’re pretending didn’t happen.”
“What?!”
They
laughed at me again. “You should have
seen how intense you looked when you thought you were saving that doll! And the interactive mirror was awesome!”
“But-but-but
how could that even work?!” I was
sputtering a lot that night. “So many
things had to come together – I lost five minutes, for crying out loud!”
“I
think you just need a new watch.”
“Oh.”
In
spite of the adrenaline, I was feeling a bit bummed at the manipulation as we
drove away from the haunted house.
Still, it had been exactly what I asked for: real fear, without real
peril.
I still tried to
figure out how all those tricks had been managed as I watched the house recede,
a tiny silhouette in the third-floor window waving at us.
