Chapter 5
Chapter Five
If not for the steady hum of texts from Roxie back at the K&K base of operations, aka the bookstore now, I’d have sat in that truck until morning.
There was something about Cornwall Cove.
Something sly. Something hidden in that small part of your brain that makes the fine hairs on your arm rise for no apparent reason.
Generally, that sensation was the tickling of psychic interactions that the majority of humans didn’t grasp.
So if they didn’t understand it, they feared it, and rightfully so.
Things that moved on the other side of a thin veil were to be feared at times.
“There’s something off about this place,” I murmured while still buckled, clasping my phone to the front of my thick coat as if it were a rosary and the asylum a rampaging vampire.
Right now, a bloodsucker eyeballing my jugular would be a welcome sight.
A vampire you could see and dispatch with relative ease if you had a stake.
This creeping sensation of an intelligence you couldn’t see, hear, or touch was beyond eerie.
“You mean other than the dead people floating around?” Phil slid the truck into Park.
The engine quieted, ticking softly as we sat there like two squids on a sandbar.
I had no idea if squids sat on sandbars, probably not, but my head was not fully into clever comparisons.
Every sense I had, as well as the extra paranormal one, was extended outward.
And other than the sensation of those spirits moving about the grounds, I couldn’t pick up anything solid. And yet…
“Maybe I’m just pushing my powers out too far. Being oversensitive, you know.” I glanced his way. He shook his head. “Right, well, it’s probably my imagination. Let’s get things set up. We have an hour to find the game room.”
I shoved my tingling apprehension aside and pulled up the floor plans of the hospital I’d found online.
Information about this place was plentiful if you knew where to look.
There were several blogs out there that dealt with old mental hospitals.
People were fascinated by them for some macabre reason.
I’d dug deep into the old blog posts, sifting through rumors and suppositions, to find actual data to relay to our viewers as we meandered through the first floor.
“Arch, I think this is super scary, but I am kind of pumped,” Phil admitted, then flung his door open.
A blast of cold air swirled into the cab, making me shiver.
“I remember when I was a kid, and we’d go hang out in this haunted house—well, supposedly haunted.
My buddies and I were scared totally shitless, but it was so much fun to be scared shitless. How dumb is that?”
“It’s not dumb. It’s really common.” I zipped my parka up to my chin, patted the gris-gris bag in my right pocket, and exited the safety of the truck.
Glancing back at Phil hauling bags from behind the seat, I felt my pulse ticking up.
“Don’t lock the truck,” I said and got a look of confusion.
“Just in case we have to make a hasty exit.”
His eyes flared. He glanced over his shoulder and whipped his attention to me.
“Good idea.” With that, he continued gathering equipment.
We had more than just some cameras and tripods as well as a few ghost-sensing devices Phil had picked up online.
Our budget didn’t allow for the really fancy paranormal investigating contraptions the more popular spirit hunters had.
We were tiny little minnows in a large supernatural lake.
“Do we want to set things up like we did at the lake?”
“No, I don’t think so.” I hoisted a duffel stuffed with glow party paraphernalia to my shoulder as the wind whistled through the trees, making the limbs moan and groan.
“I’m planning on being more mobile this time.
Giving the viewers a tour of the facility while telling them all about the past and what went on here.
Also, this is private property, so there is a chance we might get busted for trespassing.
But your dad can probably handle that for us.
” He stared at me blankly. “The senator. He can probably get all charges against us dropped.”
“Oh! Yeah, sure, yeah, he could. I don’t really want to push him about that, though. He’s not really cool with me doing this, you know, so if we could not get arrested that would be awesome.”
I studied him in the moonlight. “Of course, yeah, I don’t plan on getting busted, but if it happens, a phone call should handle it.”
“Do we not have a permit?”
I shook my head. “Not enough time.”
“Shit.” He blew out a breath that lingered in front of his face before whisking off on a chilly gust. “Well, let’s try not to get arrested then.”
With a nod of agreement, we adjusted our backpacks and strode toward the front doors.
Massive things that now hung off rusted hinges, the front steps were coated with dead leaves and icy moss.
The air was clear, with no scent of anything other than decaying foliage.
I paused just at the doorway, reaching out mentally.
Nothing. Good. I gave Phil a thumbs up, then held up my phone and opened the flashlight app.
Just like a wizard, the light came on and the foyer was illuminated.
Cracked marble floors with a small fountain greeted us.
The check-in desk sat on its side, dirty words spraypainted on it by past visitors.
Dead leaves crunched underfoot for the first twenty or so feet, then thinned as they had been blown into a corner.
Phil also lit a flashlight, brighter than my cell phone light, and scanned the lobby.
It was a vast area at one time, according to the faded photos I’d found, a grandiose welcoming space for the rich who came out to visit relatives or be given tours.
Yeah, tours. Like a zoo. The upper levels branched off this glorious reception area, one stairwell on either side, that led to the second and third floors.
Those were the patient wards, and we would not be venturing to those as the stairs were rotten, filled with soft boards and gaping holes.
And also because poking about in the electroshock and operating rooms where they sterilized and lobotomized people was a huge nope.
I could feel the depression already creeping in as we merely walked through the full foyer.
“This place makes me feel blue,” Phil commented while standing by the dry fountain in the center of the lobby. Two fat angels gazed up at marble images of what I assumed had been doctors or perhaps surgeons. Someone had removed the heads of the medical professionals immortalized in limestone.
“Areas with lots of trauma and pain tend to do that. The negative energy is absorbed in the stone and lumber, the heavy feelings cling to the ground, seep into it, taint it.” I turned from him to stare out at the rotted couches, rat-chewed futons, and overturned urns that once held potted plants.
“This place is two-faced. This is what the family saw when they came calling.” I motioned to the once-resplendent lobby.
“But what took place on the upper floors was something far less splendid.”
“Let’s get set up. I want to get this show done and get to the hotel on Route 28,” he softly replied. “You lead. You have the map. I’m just your pack mule.”
“Cutest mule I ever saw,” I joked, gave him a wobbly smile, and stepped out in front of him. He was so much more than just muscle. He was the raptor sitting atop the key. One half of our pretty amazing whole.
Passing through the reception area, we moved into a wide, open hallway that had at least a dozen or so doors.
The hallway was barren of any kind of medical contraptions, something I was quite pleased about.
I didn’t relish seeing bloody gurneys parked in plain view.
Administrative offices, a cafeteria, which we would tour as I had info on what the patients would have been served, a solarium, and of course, the game room, which was at the end of the corridor.
Each door was torn from the jambs or dangling from one weak hinge.
The walls that had once been pristine white were now thick with black mold, graffiti, and ivy that was slowly reclaiming the building as nature did.
The wind whistled through broken windows, channeling down the hall, gathering and then dropping dried leaves into the corners.
“If this one is popular, where do you think Roxie will send us next?” Phil asked, keeping the beam of light just ahead of us.
“The seventh ring of Hell?” I teased. He snorted.
“I don’t know. I’m sure wherever it is it will be better than this place,” I commented as I passed by an office with a placard still intact that read CLERK OF CUSTODIES—WALLACE ABERNATHY when something moved past the cracked door.
A dark shape, tall, a flash of black fog that was there and then…
simply wasn’t. I gasped as I fumbled my phone.
Phil’s light whipped in my direction, shining on the door, the tarnished nameplate glinting dully as the beam flooded the room.
Nothing. There was nothing there. Heart thundering, I blinked a few times as my adrenal glands got busy.
“What?!” Phil asked, coming up beside me, his big body a comfort as my pulse rocketed.
“I…nothing. I thought I saw a shape. A man…but it was just…nothing. Your shadow maybe, or a trick of the light.” I looked over at him. His jaw was set as he studied the doorway and empty office intently for a full minute before blowing out a shaky breath. “Sorry. I’m jumpy.”
“Nah, baby, it’s fine. Was it a ghost?” He turned to face me.
“No, they glow. This was…” I shrugged and chuckled nervously. “This was me being a twit. Seriously, it was nothing. Pay no attention to the dork in the glasses.”
“Never. I will never not pay any attention to the sexy man in the glasses.” He lowered his mouth to mine, a gentle warm kiss that was sorely needed. “I’ll give him all my attention all the time.”
“I adore you.” I stole another kiss, righted my backpack, and motioned to the end of the hall. “Let’s get to the recreation room. The sooner we get there and get set up, the sooner we can get this show on the road.”
We made our way down the corridor, stopping briefly to peek into the food prep area for the cafeteria where they fed the less violent patients.
Remnants of tables lay demolished over time, wooden chairs scattered about, and the walls showed where antique furnishings and oils had burned, leaving dark scorch marks on the marble floors.
I noticed several old wheelchairs parked along a far wall.
They were most likely used for those patients who were too deeply medicated into a near comatose state, needing assistance to return to their rooms or to be pushed around the manicured grounds for walks.
“I used to love school pizza squares,” Phil said out of the blue. I glanced over my shoulder at him. “Like, seriously, I would try to buy two lunches just for double servings, but the cafeteria lady would tell me to stop being corrupt like my father and be happy I got one meal.”
“What kind of boarding school did you attend that made cheesy pizza squares? I assumed you’d be fed pizza imported from Sicily,” I commented.
He bit down on his lip. A rat the size of a cat darted past, and all talk of school lunches died off instantly.
We booked it hard out of that area and down the hall, saying a bold “Fuck you!” to any more off-camera investigating and thundering into the game/rec room at the end of the dank corridor.
“On second thought, I think that was an opossum,” Phil huffed when we had the door to the game room soundly closed behind us. “They’re nocturnal and active in the winter.”
“Okay, good to know. I still don’t want to chill with it.
” I caught my breath, pushed off the door, and gave the room a good once-over.
Card tables lay tossed about, and the chairs were in the same condition as in the cafeteria.
The walls were coated with crude phallic designs.
Over in the far corner was a boarded-over window and a wheelchair with a suitcase sitting beside it on the floor.
“It’s a mimic,” I mumbled to Phil, who saw the old case and chuckled. We’d been known to roll for initiative on occasion. I must confess that I was curious as to what might be inside. “Maybe we’ll open it later for the viewers.”
“Yeah, that’s cool. Okay, let’s get set up and hooked up with Tray. We have about twenty minutes until the stream starts.”
“Cool, I’m ready, I think,” I replied as he knelt down to dig out his camera, a battery, and a few other techy things.
I shrugged off my backpack and unzipped it.
Glow in the dark everything waited for us to spread it about.
I blew up a few balloons, tossed snapped glowsticks around, and dug into the bottom for our T-shirts.
They were both 3-X, which was good for pulling over our coats, and had some silly penguin holding up a sign that read GLOW HARD OR GO HOME on the front.
“Here you go.” I tossed Phil one. He rushed to pull it over his Lions varsity jacket and then returned to getting us hooked up and online.
“Internet out here is weak but should be able to handle it,” he told me as he held up his trusty Canon, the green light lit. “Tray and Roxie are ready to count us down.”
I nodded, took a cleansing breath, and stared into the light of the camcorder.