Freak House

By James Cortese

When Melodie Baine takes the elevator, why does it entirely leave the building? Why does a Wizard of Oz head keep appearing in Grace Hearthstone’s bed- room? Why would Purvis Waddell want to exorcise his teenage daughter? At New York’s most exclusive address, celebrity residents are dying in horrible ways, and soon the media is calling it Freak House.

• Language: English
• Publisher: James Cortese
• Release date: Sep 10, 2010
• ISBN: 9780982896020

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Freak House

A Novel

James Cortese

Copyright © 2012 by James Cortese

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved

ISBN 9781453767573

Library of Congress Control Number: 2010933877

This book is entirely a work of fiction. The names of real public figures and personalities, both living and dead, are used for satiric purposes, and their presence here in the form of imaginary characters is not meant to assert or infer that their portrayal bears any relation to anything they might have actually said or done.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author or publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Acknowledgement

Many thanks to Laurie Modrey, whose insightful suggestions, sage comments and continual encouragement during the early writing kept me on the right path.

For Romana

There is another form of temptation, even more fraught with danger. This is the disease of curiosity . . . It is this which drives us to try and discover the secrets of nature, those secrets which are beyond our understanding, which can avail us nothing and which man should not wish to learn. —St. Augustine, Confessions (Book X)

Also by James Cortese

After Gideon

Year of the Slug

Women of the Book

Being Zoe

The Very Last Thing

What the Owl Said

CONTENTS

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

Part Four

Epilogue

—

Appendices

PART ONE

 "I've always felt that the real horror is next door to us, that the scariest monsters are our neighbors."

—George A. Romero

HE HEARD HIMSELF SAY OH! as he snapped his head up off the desk and the makeshift pillow he’d made with his arms. His dream had been noisy and full of commotion—wind and rain and blowing trees—and a girl. No one he knew, but, entangled in his arms, she was crazy in love with him. As he was with her, his body on fire, moments away from an exquisite consummation.

He was alone. It was perfectly still. He swept back his hair from his face and adjusted his pants, an advanced state of arousal rapidly melting away. The girl, and the passion he’d felt for her, had seemed so real! They always did. Ever since he was a teenager, he’d known many such dream women. In a recently taken college psych course, the only thing he remembered was that they had a name—eidolons—and that, confected out of a squirt of excess testosterone, they routinely inhabited all male dreams.

He closed the thick textbook he had been napping on and looked at his watch—3:45 a.m.—then reached for a nearby can of Diet Coke and took a slug of what turned out to be warm soda, as a fat buzzing fly swept across the bank of video monitors. Was it the fly or had a shadow flitted across the screen of Monitor Number 5?

He brushed the fly away, and without taking his eyes off the screen, waited to see if the shadow reappeared. The Number 5 camera was positioned in a basement corridor that led from the service elevator to a series of utility rooms and the super’s office. Who could be in that corridor at this hour of the morning? The super was home in bed. And, as far as he knew, so was everyone else in the building. It had been at least an hour since he’d heard the rumble of the elevator. Not counting the twenty minutes he’d been asleep. He buzzed Julio.

Yo, wassup?

Where are you, man?

Where do you think, man? Doin’ my rounds.

Where are you right now?

I’m in the garage, man. Wussa deal?

Nothing. Just checking up.

Checking up? Whaddayu my nanny?

Sorry.

You okay?

I’m fine.

Hang in there, dude. See you in a bit.

Right.

He punched a button on the console in front of him, activating Monitor 5’s sound. Nothing. He turned up the volume. Not exactly nothing. An electronic hum, but something else. What? Moaning? Hard to tell. Then a kind of clucking sound? Or was it choking? He looked away from the monitor across the lavishly appointed and brightly lit marble lobby. At the far end, through the class entrance doors, the sparse traffic on Tenth Avenue slid silently past. He didn’t like the idea of trouble. He had taken this job because it promised a minimum of trouble—seven quiet, unsupervised hours he could devote to reading the required textbooks for the Commercial Leasing course he was taking at Manhattan Law. One year to go. Then the bar exam. Then the real deal: a lucrative career in real estate. He had no ambition to be another Donald Trump. All he wanted was to be filthy rich by the time he was thirty-five, maybe forty. He had the models of his dream car and dream boat all picked out. A very doable dream. Anything was possible in real estate if you wanted it badly enough, if you were prepared to do what you had to do, if you . . .

He hadn’t been looking directly at Monitor 5, but he did see something in his peripheral vision—another flit of a shadow. This time it had a recognizable shape, with a head and torso and a bit of an arm. Fuck. The only possible explanation was that a tenant had gone down there by the stairs. Sometimes tenants amazed you with the crazy stunts they pulled. The latest thing was sleepwalking on Ambien. No one yet here at The Promethean, but he had heard stories about tenants at other upscale buildings. Tenants with chronic insomnia popping an Ambien after a glass or two of Pinot Grigio. Next thing they know, they’re being stopped in their silk pajamas after driving their Mercedes sixty miles an hour down Fifth Avenue at four in the morning. Invariably, recognizing their faces from their TV screens, the cops very kindly escort them back home.

Eddie looked at his watch: four in the morning. Hour of the wolf. The time, Julio once told him, when the membrane between our world and eternity seems most permeable. Best not to think about those things. There had been a lot of crazy talk lately about The Promethean. Tenants seeing shadowy forms, disembodied faces. Hearing whispering voices. The air suddenly growing very cold, or very hot. One theory going around was that The Promethean had been built on an ancient Indian village, and now, according to Julio, the villagers were coming back with payback on their minds.

I don’t believe in that crap, Eddie had said. Don’t tell me you do?

I never seen nothing, man, but I talked to people that did.

Like who?

Greta Esquibel, just this week.

The domestic, the one who works for that big-shot writer, Stanley Creech?

Yeah.

The one you’re nailing on a regular basis, sometimes in the stairwells? That the one?

Yeah.

The one who thought she saw the face of the Virgin Mary in an oil stain on the floor of the garage?

Hey, kiss my ass, man.

Once again the flit of a shadow on Monitor 5. Eddie cleared his mind and focused intently on the screen. No question it was a person. No question he would have to go check it out. If some zonked-out tenant got himself injured, he would bear the responsibility. No excuses. That was why they had the monitors, that was why they had hired him as night doorman, made him take all those psychological tests, made him piss into a cup once every month. They trusted him always to do the right thing. Now it was time to do the right thing.

Just in case, he pulled out a nightstick from a drawer and hooked it on his belt. It was probably something Julio should handle, but Julio was busy, and anyway he needed to get his blood moving and the kinks out of his back. This was something he could take care of himself.

He got up from his desk, stretched, headed over to the elevator and pushed the call button. The elevator abruptly woke with a screech of complaint. He got in. The doors clattered closed. Thirty seconds passed. Then a jolt, a ping and the doors opening on the sickly fluorescence of the basement.

He picked the corridor on the right that led to the Number 5 video camera. The corridor appeared empty—all the way to the far end. Son of a bitch. Apparently whoever was down here was determined to get into as much mischief as possible.

Hey, anyone down here?

No answer. Just the hum and buzz of the fluorescents. He made his way down the corridor, his running shoes squeaking on the polished concrete floor, and tried the knobs of the doors to see if they were locked. They were. He stopped, suddenly uneasy. There was no reason, aside from the fact that he was alone in a basement at four in the morning, and his mind was beginning to spook itself. He had the distinct sensation of someone behind him. He stood frozen in place, his body suddenly flushed with adrenalin. Then he took a deep breath. This is ridiculous, he told himself. He spun around. The empty corridor stretched ahead of him.

He was a grown man. There was nothing to be afraid of. Somewhere else, maybe, you might have to worry about a burglar or a drunk or some homeless junkie getting in, but not at The Promethean, with its state-of-the-art security systems. This had to be a tenant.

He continued on down the corridor, all the way to the Number 5 video camera. None of the doors had been unlocked. There was one left to try—the one directly under the camera. He paused to think. Something wasn’t right. He hadn’t come down here very often, but he was almost certain that the corridor had doors on opposite sides all the way to the end, the last one on the right being the super’s office, but not one at the very end. And yet there it was. A gray metal door like all the others, but unlabeled.

He tried the knob. It was unlocked. He opened the door. Anybody in here?

He could see that the room was under construction: scaffolding, ladders, stacks of building materials, tools scattered everywhere. Sheets of opaque plastic hung from the ceiling. Construction: that would explain the new door, he thought. But why had no one ever mentioned it to him? There was no need to hunt for a light switch. The room, though dim, was illuminated by two, possibly three, floor lamps that had been left on.

Anyone here?

No answer. He heard the sound of scurrying. A shadow darted behind one of the plastic sheets.

You’re not supposed to be here, he said. Why don’t you come out so I can lock up?

He made his way into the room, pushing aside the sheets of plastic, tripping on things scattered over the floor: a child’s tricycle, a toilet plunger, a large black book that may have been a Bible. The room seemed enormous, as if it went on forever, and once, when he glanced upward, he thought he saw the moon and stars. He had the distinct sense of being lost: so huge a space, how would he be able to find the exit? Still, he kept up his pursuit of the darting shadow ahead of him, not daring to look right or left, where it seemed the glowing eyes of little children, or perhaps wild animals, were watching him. It’s me, Eddie Luckey, the night doorman, he said, batting away another plastic sheet, and suddenly finding right before him a woman in a white cocktail dress, her golden hair blowing in a cool gust of wind redolent with the smell of campfires.



It’s me, Eddie Luckey, the night doorman, she said in a mocking whine, as if he had uttered a monumental stupidity. Then she laughed.

She was seductively slender and blonde, her luxuriant, perfectly styled hair cascading from a middle part. He recognized her immediately. Ms. Bunting . . .

Amanda Bunting. One of The Promethean’s certified celebrities. Best-selling author. TV pundit. Syndicated columnist. Professional provocateur. But friendly and charming to him whenever she passed through the lobby. He loved the little, flirting wave she was always sure to give him. Was there a subtle message there? He had no particular opinion about her politics, though he did enjoy the way she spat out her reckless insults, inferring from this that, if she took a liking to you, she must be pretty hot in the sack. Bottom line: an attractive older woman who knew all the tricks and had a special appreciation for the virility of younger men.

Ms. Bunting, he said, you’re not supposed to be down here. You could get hurt.

I’m looking for something, she said.

Looking for something, he repeated.

A tool.

What kind of a tool? he said, suspecting a naughty code word.

I don’t exactly know, she said in a little-girl, sing-song voice.

What are you trying to do?

She gave him her widest, happiest grin. Kill someone.

He made himself laugh. A typical Bunting joke concocted out of wild exaggeration and cruelty.

The grin abruptly vanished. Why is that funny?

Oops. Now he was confused. He decided it might be best to play along with her. Sorry, he said. I thought you were joking.

I hate that, she said. People not taking me seriously.

Sorry. Who are you looking to kill?

Please stop apologizing—it’s annoying. Noah Banks, of course.

Noah Banks, another famous Promethean tenant, was her ideological opposite, the liberal yin to her conservative yang, the perfect embodiment of the left-wing traitor that she railed against in all her writing, interviews, speeches and TV appearances. A stand-up comedian with his own TV show, Banks could be devastatingly funny in a way that Bunting couldn’t possibly match. Banks’s approach was simply to make his enemies look like fools, and he was very good at it.

One of those enemies was Amanda Bunting. Banks had single-handedly managed to transform her into the butt of a national joke, a sure laugh for Leno and Letterman, a recurring sketch character on Saturday Night Live, a caricature for simpleminded slander in Doonesbury. And yet it hadn’t always been that way. At one point the two, both notoriously single, had been an inconceivable yet very hot item. Then it suddenly ended. Friends of Noah Banks said she’d mentioned the M Word. Banks would sooner convert to Scientology than marry. In the end, he dumped her—abruptly and coldly, as was his style.

Eddie perfectly understood why she would want to kill Noah Banks.

She seemed to have a different reason, though. He’s the most dangerous man in America, she said. He ridicules all that this country stands for. He needs to be taken out.

Eddie was momentarily lost for words.

You agree, don’t you? she asked.

Absolutely.

For a minute there, I wasn’t sure.

I was just wondering.

About what, Eddie?

Uh, you know—why you?

Simple. I’m the only one who can do it, she said.

The look he gave her asked why.

He’s not what you think.

"He’s not?

No, no, no.

What is he?

Spawn of the Devil, she said, and then, when she saw the skeptical look on his face, added, Literally.

You’re kidding.

"Apparently you are not acquainted with the meaning of the word literally. Besides, I don’t kid, she said. No, no, no. I never kid. People are always hoping I do, but I don’t. Sorry. Let me speak plainly. The body of the man called Noah Banks has been possessed by a demon. So you see, I’m actually doing him a huge favor—I’m saving him from himself."

He stared at her.

Not persuaded?

Just wondering how you know. I mean, how can you, like, be sure?

Like, I have an inside track, she said. Like, I have my sources. As she held open her hands, palms upward, something rose above her shoulders, rose higher, and slowly extended, unfurled outward. White, covered in feathers. Wings.

Oh, my God!

No, just one of His humble servants. Come here, she said. Don’t be afraid. This is your lucky day.

He took several tentative steps closer to her.

Your main chance, Eddie, the night doorman, she said. It doesn’t matter what you did or what you believed before this moment. How cool is that! The slate wiped clean. Even if you were a smelly, swarthy, rag-headed Muslim, even if you were a simpering, sick, godless liberal. Now you can make everything right. Give me your hands.

He extended out his hands and she took them in her own. Immediately, he felt a surge of white heat course through him—not the exalted feeling of intense piety he might have expected in the presence of God’s Messenger, but something along the lines of a frankly erotic thrill, throbbing to the slow beat of her wings.

Little taste of Heaven, she said.

His knees wobbled, he could barely contain himself.

Here’s the thing: you need to prove which side you’re on, she said. Words won’t do.

He could see where she was leading him. What she was going to ask him to do.

Don’t worry. You’ll be taken care of. You’ll be a hero.

You mean like a martyr?

No, no, no. That’s those other guys’ religion. We do things differently. Look. You’re a student. Consider this a test. An opportunity to do God’s work and make the Honor Roll.

Killing someone?

Stamping out vermin, dummy. Doing God a favor. Haven’t you read the Old Testament?

He didn’t want to admit that he hadn’t; nor had he ever bothered with the New, even though it struck him as less perplexing. Still, he was aware that the Bible had lots of loopholes; maybe this was one of them. But I’ve never killed anyone before.

It’s no big whoop. Trust me. You’re a man. All men are hard-wired for mayhem. Pick up something lying around here, something sharp or blunt, and go upstairs; use your house key to get in. Mr. Funnyman is a confirmed bachelor, as they say, so he’ll be alone. And asleep. A few good whacks, stabs, whatever. Have some fun. Make an example of him.

He barely understood what she was saying, his febrile brain chugging madly to process the fact that he was speaking to an angel. An angel who wanted him to kill someone. An angel in the form of a very hot, though older, woman, whose enormous heat was rapidly searing away any remaining vestiges of will power that he might have to raise an objection.

What about this? he said, holding up his nightstick.

That will do just fine.

I was just thinking . . .

Don’t get too carried away, now.

I mean, I was just wondering.

Sure, wonder away.

What about you?

No need to wonder. I’ll be there waiting for you after you finish the job.

And then?

And then it’s up to me to do whatever you want. I have a huge personal interest in making you happy anyway I can. How’s that? I can tell you, you won’t be disappointed. She gave him a wink.

Is that allowed?

Is what allowed?

You know, the, uh . . .

The hottest sex you’ll ever have?

Uh, yeah.

Absolutely. Now it’s up to you, champ.

She let go of his hands and folded her wings. It was as if he had been unplugged from that great dynamo of desire—the Universal Id.

Seems like a dream, he said.

In your case, Eddie Luckey, night doorman, a dream come true.



Gibbs got up from his desk, stretched, and went over to the window that looked out on Eighth Avenue, now steeped in late-afternoon shade. He liked this perch. Not quite the top of the world, but close. Nothing like working for the best newspaper in North America, in one of the newest and most stylish buildings in New York.

Dropping to the carpeted floor, he did twenty quick pushups, then rose, and, with his face flushed crimson, returned to his desk to stare intently at his computer screen and the layout of solitaire cards displayed there.

Put the seven of hearts on the eight of clubs. Gibbs turned and saw his editor, Buck Bitterman, standing in the door.

I’m stuck. Sometimes solitaire helps.

What’re you working on?

The Promethean murders, Gibbs said. Everybody wants to know why the guy did it. Eddie Luckey—this very nice, likable guy from Queens, working his way through college. No history of violence or mental illness. No brain tumors. No drugs. No connection with the victims. And yet . . .

And yet he managed to kill a sleeping A-list celebrity and the fashion-model girlfriend who happened to be spending the night with him. With a billy club. The guy who passed all The Promethean psych tests with flying colors. Mr. Normal himself.

Right. Check this out, Gibbs said, punching up a YouTube video clip from the Today show where Jolene Buckalew, a lap dancer from West Texas was telling Meredith Viera how, two days before, she had killed Eddie Luckey. So, I’m in Noah’s bathroom talking to my boyfriend, she said, making a phone with her thumb and pinky, when all of a sudden I hear these screams coming from the bedroom. And this thumping sound. Screams and thumping. I crack open the door and peek out. I’m there, ‘Omigod! What the fuck! Gotta go, sweetie. People are gittin themselves killed here!’

Viera flashed a pained look over Jolene’s inappropriate obscenity, which had been bleeped out on the video.

Oops, sorry! Jolene said, tapping her mouth. My bad! Anyway, so I drop the phone and push open the door. The guy turns, his face’s like totally blank—a mask. Creeped me out. I look, and there’s my bag on the floor and I just go for it. The guy freaks when he sees me and steps back but he trips on my clothes and falls flat on his, you know, butt. He’s like trying to stand up, but I get the lady’s snub-nose .38 out and get my arms extended just like my Daddy taught me. I can see the bed and my friend’s bashed-in face. She’s dead for sure. There’s blood everywhere. I go, ‘Hey, asshole!’ He looks at me, same creepy blank expression, and I fire."

Another bleep. How many times? Viera asked.

Four. Went for the chest and belly. I didn’t wanna miss.

That’s amazing, Viera said.

Yeah. He went down. No way he was gittin back up.

Gibbs clicked off the video. This thing has gone viral, he said. Over a million hits. So now everyone wants to know: what turned nice Eddie Luckey into a brutal psycho killer? The cops say he just snapped. But just snapped isn’t really an explanation, right? This morning the NYPD announced what they found on Eddie Luckey’s DVR—lots and lots of talk-show programs featuring Amanda Bunting.

Buck shook his head. So Eddie was obsessed with Amanda Bunting in some way—politically, sexually, or both?

Maybe.

To the point that he took it upon himself to eliminate her nemesis, the man most responsible for besmirching her reputation as a serious political analyst? Please.

Well, then, I guess it’s those Indians coming back from the dead to make life tough for the rich and famous residents of The Promethean.

Lot of people believe that, Buck said.

Well, not me. There’s gotta be some connection with Amanda Bunting.

Buck held up his index finger. But maybe only in Eddie’s sick mind.

Maybe, maybe not. Bears looking into. I’m going to give her a call, Gibbs said. See what she has to say.

What if she won’t do it?

Right, Gibbs said. When has Amanda Bunting ever turned down an opportunity for self-promotion?



Stanley L. Creech swore he had left his reading glasses on the kitchen table, but when he went back to retrieve them, they were not there. The latest New York magazine had arrived and he was eager to read the article on what everyone was calling The Promethean murders, which had taken place just one floor above his own apartment—so close that the four famous shots fired in self-defense by Jolene Buckalew had woken him out of a sound sleep. It was a story that had everything to grab and hold the public’s depraved attention: kinky sex, beautiful young women, celebrities bludgeoned in their bed, a trusted employee suddenly turned homicidal maniac. Then there was the personal connection, his own burgeoning friendship with the famous victim himself.

Topsy, he called out to his wife, who was relentlessly pounding the piano in the living room, have you seen my glasses?

They’re on the kitchen table, dear.

No, they’re not.

That’s where I saw them last, she said cheerily.

Well, that’s where I saw them last, too.

Did you try the bathroom? On top of the john? You know you always leave them there.

"Already checked. Have you noticed that inanimate objects have been behaving rather oddly lately?

How so, dear?

They seem to be moving around from place to place on their own. The photographs on the mantel fireplace downstairs always rearranging themselves. Shoes wandering off and hiding themselves in dresser drawers or a kitchen cupboard. And yesterday my cell phone taking up with the lettuce and broccoli in the fridge.

My guess is poltergeists.

You’re kidding?

Stanley was reluctant to disagree with his wife. Born and raised in England, Topsy was ten years older, a strong-willed brunette with a pretty face, who liked to wear a barrette in her hair, and who from her head to her waist appeared to be a thin woman cut in half and glued to a fat woman.

Stanley was the well-known author of several bestselling mystery and thriller novels, all dealing with the supernatural. His last book, Where Demons Fear to Tread, had sold twenty million copies in hardcover and the movie version was the highest grossing film of the year. This kind of success was impossible without Topsy, who would take his final draft and turn it into something highly marketable, but something he scarcely recognized. That was okay. He liked being rich and famous, though from time to time he would feel that perhaps he needed to put his foot down.

Not to worry, dear, Topsy said. Perfectly harmless.

So you’ve seen them?

And heard them, and smelled them and felt them. They’ll get tired of us and move on.

I’m not sure they’re so harmless, Stanley said. I don’t much mind the business with things being moved around. But if they’ve gotten into my computer and are tampering with my new novel, I’m not going to be so forbearing.

What do you mean by tampering, dear?

Change what I’ve written. Add new material. Remove material. It’s intolerable. This violation of privacy. I think we need to do something.

What do you have in mind—moving? We’ve already just done that. What a pity to have to do all over again.

No, we’re not going to be driven out of our home! There are remedies. An expert would know. One of those paranormal investigators. They come in and do a complete evaluation, and then if they find something, they get rid of it.

Like bugs.

Exactly.

Well, dear, it’s your decision. You’re the man of the house.

Stanley looked down to see his wife’s beloved pug, Dippy, sitting at his feet snorting like an asthmatic and staring at him with a look that said, I’ve got your number, pal, you fraud, you hypocrite. I’d love to sink my teeth into your miserable carcass.

He was so unnerved that he called out to his wife. Topsy, for God’s sake!

What is it, dear?

He was about to tell her about the dog, then thought better of it. No need to raise questions about his sanity—yet another thing she could throw in his face.

Dear, you keep playing that tune over and over and over.

Just trying to get it right, darling.



Amanda Bunting was clearly happy to see Gibbs when she opened the door to her apartment, which turned out to be expensively but eclectically decorated, with a Caribbean motif predominating. He remembered that she had a house on one of the islands—Jamaica? Aruba?—but could not recall which one.

She was bubbling over with cheery small talk as she led him to two comfortable Eames chairs by a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows that contained a view of the greater