Link to part 1

Any amount of courage or denial left in me evaporated. I stood there, halfway down the steps, pain in my side, staring at a porcelain doll and fearing for my life.

I climbed the stairs and sat on the top one, across from the clown. There was no way I was going to touch it, but there was no way I was going to let it out of my sight either.

The next few hours were a blur, as the store became a carnival funhouse.

I heard footsteps, music, crashing, and even sounds I couldn’t identify. But I refused to take my eyes off the clown. My bladder screamed at me, telling me I hadn’t taken my mid-shift bathroom break, but I refused to take my eyes off the clown.

When the owner unlocked the door, she found me in the same spot, sitting at the top of the stairs, staring at the clown.

“Are you alright?” she said coming over to me.

It took me a moment to realize she was real.

“Yes, I’m fine,” I said, staring at the clown. “I just wanted to buy this thing.”

She looked back and forth from me to the clown.

“I have a friend who collects these,” I said to her unasked question.

“Umm… sure,” she said. “You want to bring it over… “

“Actually, I was wondering if you could take it and gift wrap it for me,” I said my eyes glued to the clown.

“Of… course,” she said hesitantly, picking up the clown and carrying it over to the counter.

I struggled to my feet nearly falling down the stairs again as my numb legs struggled to function. I shook out the pins and needles and waited for my balance to return before walking over to the counter and paying for the doll.

“Thank you very much,” the owner said with her cashier’s smile that didn’t quite make it to her eyes. “Are you going to be ok?”

I looked at the brown wrapping paper that enveloped the clown and smiled.

“I’ll be fine, thanks.”

I stepped out into the cold air and walked to my car. The keys slipped out of my hands as I tried to unlock the door. The second time around I unlocked it and got inside, putting my parcel on the passenger seat.

I turned the key in the ignition to start the car and nothing happened.

I sat back and sighed. Then I slapped the brown paper wrapper and tried again. The car roared to life and for the first time in a while, I felt in control. I drove away from work, ending up on a dirt road I used to visit when I was a dumb teenager.

I knew the road ended at a quarry, and I wasn’t going very fast, but when I pressed the brake, nothing happened. I kept going straight toward the edge of the cliff. I tried the brakes again but still wasn’t stopping. I was slowing down because my foot wasn’t on the gas pedal, but that wasn’t going to stop me before hurtling over the edge.

There were trees lining both sides of the road so I knew if need be, I would hit a tree before careening over a cliff to my death, but I wanted to save my car if possible.

The moment of truth was approaching. I was almost to the edge. I grabbed the emergency brake and yanked up with all my strength. Dirt flew as the car slid sideways and came to a stop.

I took a deep breath, put the car in park, and turned off the engine.

I stepped out and looked down at the edge of the cliff three feet in front of me. I sighed and reached back inside the car to grab my brown package.

I unwrapped it and looked into the eyes of the clown.

“Sayonara, sucker!” I said, then threw it over the cliff and watched as it fell in slow motion hundreds of feet and shattered against the rocks.

I looked at the tiny pieces scattered among the rocks with disappointment.

‘At least I could’ve seen some evil vapors floating up or the thing burst into flame when it shattered,’ I thought. ‘I guess I’ve watched too many horror movies.’

I got back in my car, and it started on the first try. I smiled as I drove home and slept like the dead until my alarm went off and it was time to get ready to go to work.

I sang in the shower, I sang along with the radio, and I was still humming a happy tune when I got to work. It was the happiest I’d been in days.

I did my first round with a skip in my step. Even coming to the display where the clown used to be couldn’t put a damper on my spirits. The empty space on the shelf where it used to sit made me smile.

I came to the bookshelf and was happy to pick a book for the evening now that I would be able to enjoy reading again. I did my best to ignore the supernatural ramifications of the previous week as I chose a book.

I reached for the Dave Barry book again, but it wouldn’t budge. I tried another book, but it wouldn’t budge either. I reached for a horror book, and it came out in my shaking hand.

I slowly panned around, looking for anything. In the back of my mind, I half expected the clown to jump out, wielding a knife, and start chasing me. When that didn’t happen, I floundered, not knowing where to look next.

I went to my counter and sat the phone down on record.

“Where are you?” I said looking around. “What are you?”

I waited for a minute then stopped recording and listened. After I was done talking, I waited for the answer.

“Why?” said the raspy voice. “So you can do to me what you did to the clown?”

I stared at the phone with dismay as if it was whatever was saying this.

I started another recording.

“How do you know what I did to the clown?”

The voice answered with a harsh chuckle, then said a single word, “Prepare.”

I started another video and said, “Prepare for what?”

But the voice was silent.

“Prepare for what?” I said on another video, leaving more time.

No response.

‘I guess it sucks to be me,’ I thought ruefully.

I plopped down on my chair and thought about what could be worse than the last few days of living in fear. My happy mood was gone. Now all I felt was hopelessness.

The night dragged on for what felt like an eternity. There wasn’t a sound, not a hint of anything out of the ordinary. The silence drove me to the brink of insanity. I waited all night for something to happen, but nothing did.

When morning came the owner was brimming with excitement.

“Happy Halloween!” she said as though Halloween spirit was overflowing out of her.

“That’s today?” I said.

“Of course.”

“I think I might need to take tonight off.”

“On Halloween?” she said looking distressed. “When all the tricksters are out looking to do no good? Tonight’s when I need you the most.”

I looked into her pleading eyes and sighed.

“Of course, I’ll be in tonight,” I said.

Her face immediately lit up and she became brilliantly happy.

“Oh good, I’m so glad.”

I went home and tried everything I could to get some sleep. I even took a sleeping pill. But nothing could get my mind to shut down. I couldn’t stop thinking about what could possibly happen. All this trouble I’d been having, and then add on top of that, the fact that it was Halloween night was too much. I couldn’t fathom what was about to occur. In the end, I got maybe an hour of sleep.

When I got up to get ready for work, I was completely frazzled. I put my taser and flashlight on my belt, then looked in the drawer and saw my snub nose .38 sitting in its ankle holster. I picked it up and stared at it for a long time. The ramifications of taking it with me were huge. Was I prepared to face the consequences of what would happen if I used it?

After a few minutes, I made my decision.

***

That night on my way to work I passed dozens of kids in colorful costumes running cheerfully from house to house having the time of their lives. I wondered if any of them would ever have to face a moment like I was about to.

When I turned the key in the door to lock myself in my prison of antiques for the night, the click had a note of finality.

My mind had been running through a list of potential disasters that could happen that night, and ‘nothing’ had not made the list.

I started my first round upstairs and it was totally uneventful. You’d think that the silence would be comforting, but it was quite the opposite. My eyes darted back and forth searching for where the attack would come from. Once I got downstairs, I was jolted into full panic mode.

There was new merchandise that must’ve come in today. It was three life-sized mannequins that were dressed in Halloween costumes. The hairs stood on the back of my neck and my anxiety level jumped to eleven.

I stayed as far away from these things as possible. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with them. I was tempted to call the owner right then and say I quit.

I desperately wanted to take a book off the shelf and read to take my mind off of the stress, but I knew that all it would let me take was horror.

I sat at my counter after my first round was done. My leg bounced nervously and my hands sat on the counter, shaking. I didn’t know if I was heading for a heart attack or not.

I sat there, dreading my second round, waiting to hear anything unusual happened like had been for the last week but there was nothing but silence. Dreadful silence. It was like the silence of a volcano that was quietly building pressure until the eruption, and no one ever sees it coming.

That’s what I was waiting for, the eruption.

Second round came and my walk through the upstairs was disturbingly quiet.

When I got downstairs, I noticed two of the three mannequins were still where they were supposed to be, the third was missing.

‘Please can’t I just have one peaceful night?’ I thought.

As the thought rattled through my brain, I heard a rustling. I looked over to the side and the third mannequin was stepping toward me.

I froze in shock. The impossibility of what was happening seemed to ricochet off my brain. It refused to penetrate.

The mannequin took a step toward me, then another.

Finally, my mind got out of denial mode and into full red alert mode.

I pulled out my taser, put the red dot in the middle of the mannequin’s chest, and pulled the trigger. The surge of electricity didn’t phase it. It kept stepping toward me. I didn’t know what to do.

As a last resort I reached down to my ankle and pulled out the .38. The mannequin started waving wildly and making strange noises.

It terrified me beyond anything I’d ever felt before.

It was a mere half dozen steps away from me when I fired.

I hit it square in the middle of the chest. There was a small hole in the front, and something flew out the back.

The mannequin stopped as if I had just hit the pause button. It slowly toppled forward, and when it hit the floor, pieces flew off. I noticed there was clothing underneath. I also noticed the large red hole in the back of the plastic.

My curiosity overwhelmed my fear, and I stepped forward to discover what had happened.

I looked down and oozing out of the red hole was blood.

I hesitantly reached for the mannequin and rolled it over to find the face place had broken off and I was staring down into the eyes of the owner of the store.

“No!” I screamed.

She tried to say something, but blood gurgled out of her mouth, making it barely audible. I leaned closer and she spoke again.

“Just wanted to give you a little scare,” she said weakly. “Happy Halloween.”

I knelt there for a long moment before I came to my senses. I reached for her neck to feel for a pulse, but there was none. Most of her body was still covered in the mannequin plastic, but there was nothing I could do. There was no resuscitation that would work. I had shot her in the heart and there was nothing to resuscitate.

I stared at her dead body for a long time. And then I got up and went to my counter, sat, and put my head in my hands. After a few minutes, I pulled out my phone, turned on the video recorder, and said, “Are you happy now? Is this what you wanted, for me to destroy my life out of fear?”

I let it record for another minute, then turned it off and hit play. I heard the sound of my own voice desperately asking the question, then silence.

I recorded another video.

“Answer me!” I screamed. “This is what you wanted! Say something! Gloat! Do something! Anything!”

I played it back, but there was still silence, maddening silence.

I looked around in desperation, trying to see what was different when my eyes landed on an empty spot on a shelf.

The ventriloquist’s dummy was gone. Someone must’ve bought it during the day.

I stared at the empty spot in unbelief. Was that it? Was that what was causing all this grief, all this madness?

To test the theory, I went back to the bookshelves and pulled out a Dave Barry book. It slid off the shelf into my hand.

I looked down at it and realized whatever had been terrorizing me was gone.

I should’ve been relieved. I should’ve been happy.

Then I looked over and saw the arm of the dead woman with a hint of the puddle of blood beneath her.

I knew it had destroyed my life. It didn’t matter that it was no longer here.

For a fleeting moment I thought about cleaning up the mess and burying the body on the outskirts of town somewhere she would never be found.

But she didn’t deserve that. I couldn’t do that evil thing to her after all she had done for me.

I sat down and typed this out on my phone so that others would know the story. So that this woman wouldn’t have her death be a mystery. I also wanted to warn others of the dangers of unknown things.

Don’t play with these things. Don’t challenge them. Get away from them before they ruin your life as I’ve ruined mine.

After typing in this story, I realized there was still one thing left to do.

I went upstairs and broke into the office. I dug through the receipts for the day and found the one for the ventriloquist’s dummy. Fortunately, the woman who had bought it paid with a check, and the owner hadn’t had time to take it to the bank yet.

I pulled out my phone and took a picture of the check which had her home address on it. I got in my car and drove straight there. All the colorful munchkins had abandoned the streets to go home and work on their stomachaches. It was after midnight when I quietly broke into the woman’s home.

I pulled out my flashlight and searched the entrance hallway, then not finding it, moved to the parlor. There were quite a few antiques in the room. I looked around slowly trying not to miss what I came for.

Finally, I saw it sitting on a small table near the far end of the room. I went to it and picked it up. It was much heavier than I expected. I struggled to balance it so it wouldn’t fall to the floor and wake the house owner.

I turned to leave and nearly ran into an old woman standing in front of me.

“Who are you and why are you holding that?” she said in a tone that conveyed more curiosity than alarm.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I have to take this,” I said struggling to keep it in my arms.

“There are many other items in this room of greater value,” she said gesturing around. “Why that particular one?”

“I don’t really want to say, ma’am.”

“And I don’t want to be standing on the cold floor in my robe watching a stranger take my property, yet here we are.”

“Would you believe the warranty ran out and I need to take it back to the shop?”

She glared at me like a teacher I had just told the dog ate my homework.

“Ok, the truth is this thing is evil,” I said.

“Evil?” she said. “Whatever would give you that idea?”

I sighed then quickly went through the recent events, hitting the highlights.

“And you still have these recordings?” she said.

“Yes, they’re here on my phone,” I said setting the dummy down and pulling out my phone.

“Would you mind if I listened to them?”

I shrugged and played the videos one by one as she listened with such curiosity that she barely moved. When they were done, she stepped back with a pensive look.

“Interesting,” she said.

“Now do you see why I have to destroy it?”

“And you were the only person in the store when these recordings were taken?”

“Yes.”

“So it was speaking directly to you?’

“I believe so, why?”

“There are two erroneous assumptions you made about this object and myself,” she said.

“What are those?”

“First is that this object is evil,” she said in a mannerly tone with just a hint of teacher in it. “Inanimate objects are neither intrinsically good nor evil.”

“But this thing… “ I said pointing at the dummy.

“Yes, it did things that made you react a certain way, but that still doesn’t define it as evil.”

I looked dubiously from her to the dummy and back.

“The second assumption you made was that I was some poor innocent victim, That I had no idea what this thing was, or what it’s capable of,” she said with a gleam in her eye. “That I haven’t been searching for this object my entire life.”

My eyes went wide with realization.

“And now that you have it, what will you do?” I said in a voice that sounded detached and distant.

“Prepare,” she said in a low raspy voice that sounded so much like the voice on the recordings it gave me chills.

I reached down to tie my shoe, then sprung up, pistol in hand, and shot her in the forehead.

Her head snapped back then slowly drifted forward. She gave me a look of surprise that turned into sheer rage.

“You think you can… ?” she said before collapsing to the floor.

I watched as she bled out onto the ancient carpet.

‘That’s gonna leave a stain,’ I thought.

I looked down at the ventriloquist’s dummy, then looked around the room at the many other objects. Each of them looked old, just like the dummy. I felt a closeness in the air, like a pressure building. From the front hall, I heard a crash.

I felt the dummy drawing my attention. Suddenly I felt surrounded and helpless. I ran to my car, feeling better as soon as I hit the cold outside air. I stood there gasping, sucking in lungfuls of fresh air, then I turned and looked back at the house. The thought of all those things being sold at auction to unsuspecting victims was more than I could bear.

‘In for a penny, in for a pound,’ I thought digging through my glove box and finding a lighter.

I stepped back into the house, feeling stifled as soon as I did, and found as many papers as I could. There was a stack of old newspapers in the foyer. I crumpled some up and threw the rest of them in the middle of the parlor floor. I lit a handful of crumpled newspapers and threw them in the corner. Then I lit another as a large glass cabinet suddenly tipped over, nearly crushing me.

I dodged then lit some more newspaper and dropped it beside the cabinet.

Objects started flying. Small ceramic figurines darted through the air toward me. Some missed and hit the wall behind me, others hit with surprising force, cutting me, but only increased my resolve.

I continued to light bunches of paper and throw them around the room while flames climbed high licking the ceiling as they devoured the curtains.

The entire room was ablaze and in chaos. Inanimate objects became deadly missiles as the flames consumed the room.

I backed out of the disintegrating room, staring at the ventriloquist’s dummy engulfed in flame, then ran to my car and watched as the house collapsed in on itself.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I sat in my car and posted the rest of this story for everyone to know before I go away.

I hope I’ve saved at least a few innocent victims.