Help for the Haunted(13)

I should have figured that’s what she wanted. I shook my head.

“Do it,” she insisted.

The Scream was a talent—if that’s the word for it—I had stumbled upon a few nannies before when Rose lured us into a game of indoor hide-and-seek. We were actually having fun until my sister decided to hide where neither of us could find her. After an hour of searching, we gave up and got ready for bed. When I climbed into mine and turned off the light, Rose reached out from where she had jammed herself between the wall and the mattress and grabbed my neck, which caused me to release the most bloodcurdling scream. From that night on, Rose begged me to do The Scream in all kinds of places: store parking lots, outside of church, the library. Since it felt good to have her appreciate me for a change, there were times when I gave her what she wanted. But that night with Dot locked in the bathroom, I kept shaking my head.

Still, Rose went right on whispering: “Do it. Do it. Do it.”

“If I do it, can I get my essay back and go to bed?”

“Girls? I don’t know what the bejesus you’re up to, but I don’t like it one bit.”

Rose ignored her, mulling the deal. Finally, she whispered, “Okay. Give her one good one, and I’ll take over from there.”

I knew exactly the kind of performance my sister expected, so I stood and went to the bathroom door. “Dot,” I said in my quietest voice. “It’s Sylvie. Can you hear me?”

“Yes. I mean, no. Not really. Can you speak louder?”

“Are you okay?”

“If you call freezing and dripping in the dark okay, then yeah, I guess I’m just dandy. Now what is going on? And talk louder for cripes’ sake. I can’t hear you.”

“Press your ear to the door,” Rose told her, joining me at my side.

Dot shifted around in the bathroom. “Okay. What is it?”

“I warned you about the spirits,” my sister said in a hushed voice. “Now do you believe me?’

“Not really. More likely your parents didn’t bother to pay the electric bill.”

Rose poked me with her flashlight. I took the deepest of breaths and out it came: a scream—The Scream—so sudden and shrill it would put the best horror movie actress to shame. In the silence that followed, I clutched my throat, since it always hurt afterward.

When she was done fumbling, Dot called out, “Sylvie, dear? Are you okay?”

From the tremble in her voice, I could tell she felt genuinely afraid now. I opened my mouth to let her know I was fine, but the thought of my essay being handed back to me as confetti made me close it again. Rose forked over the pages, and I stepped away from the door. Before leaving the room, I glanced back to see my sister making herself comfy on our mother’s bed. She pulled out the bible from the nightstand, flipped the thin pages and in a slow, methodical voice began reading a random passage from Revelations: “And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon . . . And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him . . .”

“Let me out of here!” Dot screamed. “Please! Let me out! Help!”

I should have helped her.

I should have shredded that essay myself and untied the rope.

Instead, as Dot kept pleading, as she kept pounding her fists against the door and Rose kept right on reading, I crossed the hall to my room. I climbed into bed, pulled a pillow over my head, and squeezed my eyes shut.



For centuries humans have believed in God, Buddha, Yahweh, and so many forms of a higher power. And yet, not one can be seen. Why do the same people who believe in those deities doubt the existence of darker spirits? I ask all of you, how can a person believe in the light but not the dark? How, when all evidence points to the basic facts of dualities? There is the light of the sun and the dark of the moon. There is the heat of summer and the cold of winter. Even a simple magnet demonstrates positive and negative energy. So when people ask for proof, I know they want stories about things my wife and I have encountered, and I can tell plenty. But first, I point out that they already have all the proof they need. Any of us here has only to observe the opposing energies of the world we live in, and it’s proven time and again: If there is good, there is bad. If you believe in one, you must accept the existence of the other.”

I opened my eyes. The house was dark, silent. My nightlight and digital clock were still dead, which meant the electricity had yet to be turned on. My pillow had fallen to the floor. I retrieved it and rolled over, staring at the wall. Those words I’d heard before coming fully awake, they had been spoken by my father. In my drowsy haze, I imagined them taking shape, drifting across the hall into my room, surrounding me in my narrow bed and filling my head. But then I remembered: my father was not home.

“There are times when people of confused faith misinterpret a psychological or medical disorder and carry out barbaric methods to rescue the sufferer. There are many such stories, but this evening I’d like to talk about a girl named Lydia Flores from a village in Mexico. When Lydia was fifteen, her mother—a widower—noticed a change in her daughter. Where she had once been affable, outgoing, she became sullen, withdrawn. Simply leaving the house became an act she resisted. According to reports, the girl’s appetite vanished; her weight loss was drastic. Nights, she spent awake in her room, thrashing in bed. Days, she slept with such stillness it disturbed her mother. As things worsened, her behavior became violent toward others and herself. She spoke of voices and the horrible things they told her to do. Now any of us might contact a psychiatrist. But Lydia’s mother lived all her life in that village, where people held antiquated beliefs about what was to be done in such a situation. Unfortunately for Lydia, her mother sought out a village priest with the same beliefs. This priest devised a plan for her treatment.”