Leif liked the way the footage looked on the old machine better than any sharp images her phone could capture. They’d brought plenty of tapes for the journey, and Leif was excited to fill them up with footage. “It really is a ghost town.”

  They followed the main road through the town, taking in the eerie sights of the abandoned town. If the neighborhoods had been spooky, the downtown area was even worse. It was made up of only a handful of stores, all of which stood empty, with most of them boarded up. One store boasted that it had the newest VCR technology! The front window had a crack pattern that looked as though someone had tried to punch a hole through it. A flag hung limply from a pole, the tattered red and white design flapping weakly in the hot summer breeze. Glass scattered along the sidewalks, and the one set of traffic lights hung dark and limp from their wires. A stop sign had been graffitied to say or die under the word stop.

  “Get a shot of that sign,” Leif said. The feeling in her bones was one of excitement, not fear. What kinds of things must have happened in this town? What kinds of lives had people lived here, and what history had they left behind? And most importantly, what kinds of hauntings had been reported in each of these buildings?

  The town was frozen in the early eighties. A vintage Dairy Queen and a squat little diner still had sun faded signs up, offering food at such a low price that Leif sort of wished they were actually open. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that she hadn’t eaten since their picnic a few hours back.

  “Let’s head to the Hastings Manor,” Leif said, savoring the words as she said them. They were going to stay at the lodgings of the town mayor, the one who’d purportedly been so cursed that he’d been driven to madness and then death. That was so cool.

  Johnny turned the car westward and navigated them out of the abandoned downtown core. The roads were in worse condition as they left the main part of town, and the trees that lined the roads were so overgrown they blotted out most of the red light of the setting sun.

  The manor wasn’t in the town, but rather slightly outside on a large chunk of land, surrounded by the undeveloped forest. Mayor Hastings had reportedly liked his privacy. Leif wondered if the isolation of living right in the woods had been a factor in his death. She knew she’d likely go mad living so far away from other people.

  “We can drop our things off and get settled. Film an intro maybe, if we don’t crash right away,” Leif said.

  “Good call,” Rachel said.

  Johnny punched the address into his old GPS.

  “You have seriously got to get on the Google Maps train, buddy,” Leif teased him. “This thing is a relic.”

  “Stacey has never let me down,” Johnny said, patting the GPS. “Google, on the other hand, tracks me wherever I go. I’m not feeding it my location willingly.”

  “Because of the robot uprising,” Rachel finished for him. She giggled at the look that he threw over his shoulder at her.

  “Ha ha,” he deadpanned. “Laugh it up. I just don’t think that the weirdos at Google should feel entitled to my personal information.”

  The drive out to the manor was about half an hour, according to the glitched pixels on Stacey’s display. There was a beautiful forest that lined the edges of the Hastings Estate, majestic pines and tilted old cedar trees reaching tall into the sky like green guardians protecting the grounds. The windows were open and the breeze blew in Leif’s face. She thought that they should go on more road trips after this. She had heard good things about a hotel even farther north that had once served train passengers, and had been left to decay. She wondered if any ghostly passengers still waited for their canceled train. As they emerged over a small hill, the car went quiet as they marveled at the trees and the blurred red and orange of the sky above them.

  Masonville truly was a gorgeous place.

  They drove around a bend, and the Hastings Manor came into view in all its glory. Leif felt a jolt of excitement at seeing the beautiful manor with its brown walls and deep green roof, the turret in the front of the house looming above it all, casting a deep shadow. But it didn’t take long for Leif’s excitement to turn into confusion.

  “Um, guys?” Leif said, frowning as they drove up to the spot they’d programmed into the GPS. There were four cars parked outside, and a small group of confused looking people gathered on the porch of the Hastings Manor.

  “That’s weird, right?” Johnny asked, scanning the faces as everyone turned toward their car.

  “Oh my God, that’s Shae!” Rachel gasped. “She’s so hot! Shit, I didn’t do my hair this morning. Should I have worn a cuter outfit? Goddamn it.”

  “I guess she’s all right,” Johnny grumbled, which was cute, because his crush on Rachel wasn’t even in the realm of subtle, but also not the point right now.

  “Shae?” Leif said. “Tammy and Rhonda are here too. And…is that Psychic Rose?”

  “That’s Jess and Ivan too!” Rachel said, straining to see through the front window. “It’s everyone from the forum except for—”

  Leif saw her before Rachel could finish her sentence. Blair Wyndon walked out of the building shaking her head. She walked with the same grace that she did in her videos. Her brown hair was down, and she wore a little summer dress with roses on it that accentuated her hips and showed off her cleavage. She was beautiful. Leif hated her.

  “Wyndon,” Leif said, ducking her head low when Blair turned to look at her as though she’d heard her name. “What the hell is going on?”

  They parked in line with the other cars and looked around. There was an uneasy feeling in the car, and it felt to Leif like the eyes of the other ghost hunters were burning holes into their skulls. As much as she loved being the center of attention, this was a bit much.

  “I guess we aren’t the only ones investigating,” Rachel said. Her voice was soft and she sounded nervous. Leif could relate.

  “Let’s go find out,” Leif said, opening her door. She stepped out of the car and surveyed the group gathered there. “Hey. Did someone forget to tell me this was a meetup? I would have brought my mom’s broccoli salad if I had known.”

  “That’s what I was wondering,” the woman Leif recognized as Rhonda said. She was a pretty girl wearing shorts and a T-shirt with a little ghost printed on it. Her sister Tammy and their other investigator Shae had the same shirt on, which was downright adorable. Leif had always liked them. They went by the team name RTS and made videos about trying to help spirits move on from the earthly realm. Their stuff was fun and lighthearted, but their methods were pretty sound. “Nice to meet you all in person, by the way,” Rhonda said, “and if this was a potluck, I would have brought my Buffalo chicken dip, but I didn’t get that memo.”

  “You too,” Leif said, biting back on her urge to say except for Wyndon. She wasn’t going to be rude. Even if she really wanted to be.

  “Not that it isn’t great to meet you all,” Blair’s friend Abe said. “But do any of you have any idea why we are all here?”

  Everyone in their impromptu circle shrugged or shook their heads.

  “Right…that’s, how do you kids say it? Kinda sus. Right?” Abe said. He grinned when Leif laughed at the dumb joke. Abe had always seemed more relaxed than Wyndon, his jovial laugh behind the camera a moment of lightness in their otherwise academic videos.

  “Did everyone else get an invite from a company called Tannincorp?” The woman who spoke was cute, with a big nose, freckles, and curly brown hair. Jessica was her name, Leif remembered. She and her brother Ivan had recently started posting on SpiritScientific and had been gaining popularity fast.

  “Yeah. Abe and I got an email. Did you all speak with Dev?” Blair asked. She was avoiding Leif’s gaze. Fine. If that was how it was going to be, Leif would ignore her right back.

  “We did,” said a man who came up beside them. She could tell from the way his features matched Jessica’s that this was Ivan. “She was super strange, right?”

  “She seemed a bit off, yeah,” Leif put in. “Like she was reading off a script or something.”

  Blair nodded in agreement. Which was weirdly satisfying. Wyndon and Leif agreeing on something? The world must be ending.

  “Why don’t we call her back and ask what’s up,” Rhonda said. She rummaged through her purse to find her phone and pulled it out triumphantly, only to frown at the screen. “Okay. So, I’ve got no signal.”

  Rachel pulled out her cellphone as well.

  “No signal.”

  Johnny had wandered over to Psychic Rose and was having a spirited conversation with her, so he was no help.

  “Nada,” Abe said.

  Leif took her phone out to check, and sure enough, no signal. She and Shae made eye contact, and Leif could tell that she was worried. Shae shook her phone and shrugged, then signed something to Rhonda and Tammy. Leif had forgotten that she was deaf.

  Shae’s right, Blair signed and said. Of course, she’d somehow know sign language. It was like there was nothing she didn’t know. This is really freaky.

  “The vibrations here are of dark energy,” Psychic Rose said. She had come up behind Abe with her many colorful gemstone necklaces clacking together like windchimes. She’d made him jump, but not Blair. Leif was annoyed. The know-it-all didn’t even spook easily. Why was she so perfect? “I fear that we must be cautious here. I will give each of you an obsidian talisman to guard you.”

  Leif accidentally made eye contact with Blair, who shrugged and smiled indulgently as she took the obsidian piece Rose had pulled from her oversized bag, tucking it into her bra. Leif had expected her to argue over the validity of a talisman as protection. But she hadn’t, which surprised Leif. She also was trying very hard not to notice that Blair’s bra was surprisingly lacy. Not the practical thing she would’ve expected from her.

  Leif took one too. “How’d you know to bring so many talismans?” she asked as Rose handed out more of them.

  Rose winked at her and opened her bag so that Leif could see inside. It was chock full of crystals.

  “Okay, then,” Leif said. It was kind of impressive that Rose could carry a bag with so many stones in it. She must be strong. That also explained why she clinked gently when she walked.

  “We could all go home,” Abe suggested. “This seems a little bit too suspicious for my liking.”

  “Abe,” Blair said. “We’ve already set up camp. And we came all this way. Do you really want to go home and miss out on this opportunity?”

  Leif privately agreed with her, but was also hopeful that most of the other ghost hunters would clear out and leave her team to investigate in peace.

  “Okay. We can stick it out, for at least a night,” Abe said. Rhonda, Shae, and Tammy withdrew to a corner, talking and signing amongst themselves. “Might as well help out the young folks, I guess,” Abe continued. “Can I help you with your equipment?”

  Leif was about to say no, before she noticed that Rachel had now migrated toward Rose as well, and didn’t seem inclined to help.

  “Sure. Thank you,” she said. “It’s just in the car. The rooms are in the estate, right?”

  “Yup. We’re staying in a tent, though. We thought it might be fun to camp. Well, I did. Blair wasn’t exactly as keen,” Abe said.

  Blair shrugged, following them to the car. “I just don’t want all of our equipment getting damp. But we packed well. It should be fine. Besides, we’re just inside the tree line. If we need anything, we can always come inside.”

  Leif ignored her, figuring that didn’t really need a response. She wasn’t being rude. She was just being quiet. She opened the trunk and surveyed the luggage there. “It’s kind of a lot,” she said.

  It was an understatement. The back of the car was crammed from top to bottom with luggage, camera equipment, and ghost hunting tools. Leif was surprised that nothing had fallen out when she opened the trunk, but then again, it was all so stuffed in there that it was probably holding itself up like a well-built structure.

  “Holy Toledo. And I thought we had lots of stuff,” Abe said as he surveyed the situation. “This is going to be like a game of Tetris.”

  “There are three of us,” Blair said. “If we start from the top, it should be fine.”

  Leif grabbed a bag of snacks and a suitcase from the top of the pile and headed toward the door. Why Blair was helping was beyond her. She’d been so sure that Blair hated her. And yet here she was, being marginally friendly.

  They trudged up the stone path toward the door. The estate was gorgeous, though the weeds and tall grass gave it an air of disrepair. They’d been standing on its large porch chatting before, and Leif had barely paid the building itself any attention. The outside was covered in graffiti, but it was clear that it had been quite a grand building back in its day.

  Leif almost gasped when she walked inside. The main room was beautiful, with dark wood finishings and a huge fireplace as the centerpiece. There was even a gorgeous old chandelier hanging from the ceiling, casting dim light over the whole area. Portraits of various old men hung from the walls, their eyes blank and staring. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust. It looked like the set of a movie. It also looked haunted as hell.

  “The rooms are this way,” Blair said. She gestured to a wide staircase. The carpet leading up the stairs was a deep cream with little black designs swirled throughout. And it was huge, with a wide base that narrowed as one climbed.

  “Okay. This place is really cool, right?” Leif said.

  Blair turned and smiled at her, and for a moment Leif’s traitorous heart seemed to skip a beat.

  “So cool,” Blair said, before turning back around and continuing up the stairs.

  The room they entered had a four-poster bed in the middle, with an antique dresser across from it. The comforter on the bed was pink and green which matched the deep green of the carpet that covered the floor. Above the bed was a huge painting of a hunt, complete with dogs tearing into a fox. The blood was painted so well that Leif almost felt like she could touch it and her fingers might come away wet. It was grisly. Definitely not the kind of art she’d choose for her own bedroom.

  “No one else wanted this room,” Blair said. “It was the mayor’s. His wife died in here, and that balcony is what he threw himself off of,” she said, pointing toward the balcony doors that were hidden behind thick curtains.

  “Is that supposed to scare me?” Leif asked. She rolled her eyes, even though it was a little spooky. She didn’t need to let Blair know that she was affected.

  “No,” Blair said, sounding annoyed. “It’s just the history of the house. And I wanted you to know why you got the best room.”

  “Yeah, sure. The death room is a really cheerful place to be,” Leif said.

  “I’d trade you in a heartbeat,” Blair replied. “You can sleep in the tent, and I’ll take the room with history.”

  “Nope,” Leif said. She threw her bag down on the bed. “My room now. Enjoy the tent.”

  “Thanks,” Blair said. Her tone was dry, and she turned to leave. Leif felt a little bit bad. Sure, she and Wyndon were enemies, but maybe she’d been a little too rude.

  “Hey, uh. Thanks. For helping me with my stuff. I appreciate it.”

  Blair shrugged, her demeanor cool now. “No problem.”

  Then she was out the door.

  Leif followed her quickly, feeling uneasy about being alone in the room. She needed to get over that. Rachel was sleeping in a separate room, since she couldn’t sleep through Leif’s snoring.

  She’d be alone in the death room every night of this trip.

  Maybe her first method of coping should be to stop calling it the death room. She laughed to herself. Yeah. Maybe the fox room was better. Not much better considering what was happening to the poor fox, but a little better.

  They took three trips, but they finally managed to get all of the luggage and equipment up the stairs. Rachel even joined them to help, while Johnny was conspicuously absent. The lazy asshole.

  Abe spent the rest of the evening helping get everyone settled. Blair disappeared at some point, probably to rest in the tent or something. It wasn’t like Leif was keeping track of her or anything.

  Once it was truly dark out, the rest of the ghost hunters all split off to film on their own. Rhonda, Tammy, and Shae were outside the front door of the estate, illuminated by the glow of the porch lights. The sound of their little sign-off cheer—“This has been RTS! We’re gonna send those ghosts back to where they came from!”—made Leif smile.

  Jessica and Ivan had disappeared into the woods. Leif was pretty sure Abe and Blair had gone there too. Psychic Rose was asleep in her room.

  “So, let’s film an intro,” Rachel said, drawing Leif’s attention back to their own filming. “I think Leif and Johnny should have a conversation about this whole weird situation. Get the viewers invested.”

  “Sure,” Leif said. “Let’s do it in the creepy main hall with all the extremely cursed portraits.”

  They moved to the hall, and Leif took her place in front of the portrait of Mayor Hastings. It was weird, now that she thought about it, that this house hadn’t been broken into and graffitied over. But the portraits on the wall were all unmarred.

  “So,” she said as soon as the camera began rolling. She could almost feel the eyes of John Hastings staring down from above her. “You’ll never guess what happened…”

  * * *

  Video Recording 15

  So, every ghost hunter I know of is here in Masonville with us.

  It’s weird, right?

  Yeah. I don’t understand why Tannincorp wouldn’t have told us that they were inviting everyone.

  Including your girlfriend.

  Leif is not my girlfriend

 

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