House of Dead Names

Often times you find that blind chance can have a greater impact on your character than careful planning and meticulous organization. It was chance alone, stinging me like scorpion venom, that made me walk into that occult bookstore in Woodbury. This would be the place where I would meet a motley assemblage of fools and kings, a place I would feel almost at home where occult lore and esoteric science met hockey, football, suped up cars, and Harleys.

But on this particular day, I was to meet a person named Norman - one who would become a good friend - for the first time. He was twitching nervously at the sight of somebody new; the sight of competition and the sound of intelligent conversation.

He was vigilant though. Appearing day after day like he himself was a ghost trapped to relive past travels and tortured emotions - and tortured he was. But I didn't know it at the time. It wasn't until his first absense that Gregg - the shop owner - dropped the ball and let out the dirt on Norman's peculiar ways and reactions.

I guess every story could go back to a tortured youth, or childhood mispent, and Norman's was no exception. But it seemed that the same things that drew Norman to a life of ghosts, haunted him in his youth much worse than any familial abuse. This made him driven to prove that he was exceptional in a field that many people were scared to even consider a reality.

At first, this determination brought forth a rather cocky attitude. And it was with this mindset that he first approached Gregg - entering Gregg's bookshop with more melodrama than a Dark Shadows episode.

Norman was freshly afield from a "brainwashing" by a Delaware Valley ghost hunter. He was given a narrow outlook causing his vision to collapse upon itself. He could no longer see the truth, only segments of the shadows that truth casts.

He blazed his way into Gregg's store pronouncing him a Satanist and claiming that he was evil. He threatened Gregg with brash words and blind ambition, claiming he was going to shut the place down. And just as quickly as he intruded upon this small store, he left, convinced in his ways, and that he had done the right thing - gleaming with stone confidence and biblical righteousness.

Norman was primed for his new career; an apprentice demonologist following on the heels of a local ghost hunter - a ghost hunter seeping off the celebrity of a well known New England case. He thought that he was prepared for anything, but preparation has a fine way of breaking apart in the face of unknown challenges. This is the realm of spontaneity, a place where Norman had scarcely visited. He was just as prepared as a newborn believes it is prepared for the world at large, until it realizes that there is more to the world than mashed carrots and gentle rattles.

They showed up at the house six deep with more equipment than a Radio Shack - Howie Long would have been proud. For some reason, their "field leader" was under the impression that because of his somewhat close relationship to two well known parapsychologists, he was suddenly qualified to eliminate a demonic presence in a house with a tortured history that almost closes in on Amityville in scale... and he brought severalnovices to assist him.

I wasn't there to witness exactly what happened. And the details are sketchy at that. What I do know is that it was a complete disaster. Somewhere during the night the group separated and became overwhelmed by whatever was living there. More and more these five novices looked like sacrificial offerings rather than paranormal investigators, and their "field leader" ran off believing that he would come back another day to finish his cleansing. What he didn't realize was how far this "presence" was willing to go to continuing tormenting them.

As creatures of language, we human beings tend to name and classify things to fit into our ordered universe. As such, we come up with words such as "demons", "ghosts", and "poltergeists" to describe what we believe to be different entities based on different events that occur in their presence. They could just as well be different names for the same thing (whether real or imaginary), but for the sake of perpetuating a world based on certain principles, we rely on these different words to build categories out of which we construct our reality.

Both poltergeists and ghosts tend to remain in a certain area that hold some significance for them - such as a place of residence. A demon on the other hand, is more likely to remain with a victim rather than an abode. Demons, in general, will latch on to the weakest individual they can find - the one whose fear and nightmares they could conceivable feed off.

Unfortunately for Norman, this description fit him all too well at this point in his life. And where he thought he was prepared for the haunted house - later understanding that he wasn't - he never thought of the possibility that something would follow him home that night.

Hitching a ride like a backseat traveler on a long road trip, whatever was in that house accompanied Norman back to his own home. For days on end, his sleep was restless, his work was faultering, and his life, in general, was looking like a glass house with every breath being enough to shatter it.

He often woke up to find a ghastly stench pervading his bedroom - or moving shadows scattering across his walls. On occasion, he would find faint red eyes following his movements from deep within his closet.

Paranoia soon set in worse than it ever had before in Norman's life. He found himself constantly looking over his shoulder and beginning to sweat every time he came home and reached for his doorknob.

The torture soon became too much for Norman to handle and he once again found himself barging down the door of Gregg's bookstore - only this time looking for help.

I don't know exactly what Gregg did, but whatever it was, it was effective. Norman's life not only regained some semblance of normality, but it started to become much better than it ever had been.

Unfortunately for Norman, Gregg's "cleansing" - or whatever you would want to call it - was a process and not an immediate cure. Norman had become a magnet for similar malevolent energies.

It was a brief few weeks after I had initially heard this story that Gregg, myself, and few others went over to Norman's apartment to take a look at the tail end of what had once been a harrowing ordeal.

There was a stench that still remained, but I'm more partial to believe it was from the dirty laundry on the floor rather than anything supernormal - yes, I speak from my own dirty laundry experiences.

You could, however, feel the very air around you change as you moved from room to room. It was like the atmosphere itself was tensing up. By the time we made it to the bedroom, our very skin became chilled and tingled.

Two of the people with us became visibly shaken. They couldn't even stand. Instead, they sat down on the bed next to each other and solemnly gazed around the room.

I'm always one to believe that every myth, legend, folklore, and backwater childhood scare tactic taunt has some basis in reality; including the childhood fear of monsters in the closet. I just never thought that I would actually see it. Something shadowy, like a black cat blending with its surroundings, danced back and forth in the darkness between seldom worn suits and overworn tee shirts. I could tell by the reactions of the others that they saw it too.

I watched as Gregg puffed out his chest in defiance and confidence. He reached in the closet like a fisherman gathering swordfish out of the sea... and pulled out nothing.

I smirked a little. I liked Gregg. He was a great philosopher, and a laid back person, but I thought that this... well, it was a little melodramatic. He must have sensed my doubt, for he turned in my direction and said: Here check this out. Gregg reached out his hands as if handing me the empty air he pulled from the closet.

I reached out and touched the emptiness... only it wasn't empty. I could feel something there - something small, but something squirming and scratching, like and animal... only this one you couldn't see.

Gregg quickly carried the thing out into the living room, mumbled a few words that I couldn't make out, and threw the creature to the ground. And just like that it was over.

The air around us lightened. I had nothing left to say. Not even a sarcastic joke. I just nodded my head in acceptance... and walked out.