Ghost in the Machine

  PATRICK CARMAN’S

  GHOST

  IN THE

  MACHINE

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Sunday, September 19, After Midnight

  Sunday, September 19, 7:20 A.M.

  Sunday, September 19, 8:15 A.M.

  Sunday, September 19, 11:00 A.M.

  Sunday, September 19, 2:00 P.M.

  Sunday, September 19, 10:00 P.M.

  Monday, September 20, 6:30 A.M.

  Monday, September 20, 7:45 A.M.

  Monday, September 20, 8:15 A.M.

  Monday, September 20, 10:10 A.M.

  Monday, September 20, 4:10 P.M.

  Monday, September 20, 7:25 P.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 8:56 A.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 9:17 A.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 10:21 A.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 11:00 A.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 2:00 P.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, 10:00 P.M.

  Tuesday, September 21, Midnight

  Wednesday, September 22, 1:00 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 2:00 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 3:00 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 5:00 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 10:00 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:30 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 12:43 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 12:58 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 2:19 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 5:05 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 9:05 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:10 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:30 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:32 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:35 P.M.

  Wednesday, September 22, 11:37 P.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 12:42 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 12:43 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 1:12 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 1:31 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 7:15 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 10:00 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 10:24 A.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 12:13 P.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 4:13 P.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 8:13 P.M.

  Thursday, September 23, 10:13 P.M.

  Friday, September 24, After Midnight

  Friday, September 24, 6:15 A.M.

  Friday, September 24, 8:15 A.M.

  Friday, September 24, 8:23 A.M.

  Friday, September 24, 11:23 A.M.

  Friday, September 24, 3:15 P.M.

  Friday, September 24, 4:43 P.M.

  Friday, September 24, 9:43 P.M.

  Friday, September 24, 11:13 P.M.

  Saturday, September 25, 1:30 A.M.

  Saturday, September 25, 9:30 A.M.

  Wednesday, September 29, 4:30 P.M.

  Credits

  Copyright

  SARAHFINCHER.COM

  PASSWORD:

  LEONARDSHELBY

  Sunday, September 19, After Midnight

  Am I really doing this?

  What’s taking her so long?

  It’s cold in here.

  I can’t go down there again.

  Birdie carved in wood under the gears. Why?

  Careful now.

  You have been warned.

  Remove this Cryptix and suffer the consequence.

  When curiosity meets deadly explosive force.

  That sound again — not the steps — something else.

  Sarah’s eyes are big. She’s terrified.

  I couldn’t see it.

  I only felt it.

  Don’t make me come looking for you.

  Francis Palmer. Jordan Hooke. Wilson Boyle.

  Hector Newton. Joseph Bush. Dad.

  Gladys. The Apostle. Dr. Watts.

  Sunday, September 19, 7:20 A.M.

  How did I get back in my room?

  The last thing I remember really clearly is standing at the top of the stairs in the dredge and looking down. After that, every thing is fuzzy around the edges. Something about seeing my own bloodstain on those old floorboards sort of did me in.

  So it was shock. That’s it — I was in shock. My brain was smart enough to shut down. I was a zombie, more or less.

  I sure looked like one on that video.

  I can piece this together. Between the video and my notes from the dredge, I’m sure I can do this. Brand-new journal, brand-new memories. I’m glad I started with a blank slate. It’s like a new lease on life. This is totally going to work.

  I remember walking up the alley and there she was, standing in the headlights with her camera on. I didn’t realize how much I missed seeing her until I shuffled up on my crutches like an idiot and gave her the lamest hug ever.

  I remember getting in her car and feeling very nervous as we left the alley, like I was going to throw up. Sarah didn’t want Bonner driving around and seeing her car and maybe coming after us in the middle of the night, so we parked a long way from the trailhead. This made the endless walk through the woods seem even longer. Let me tell you, dragging a wrapped-up leg through the woods is no picnic. It’s a long hoof out there — I mean really long. By the time we got there I was thinking we’d made a big mistake.

  I’m sure that’s why I scribbled Am I really doing this? at the top of the first page of this new journal. (For obvious reasons, I didn’t want to take the old one with me and risk it being lost or, I don’t know, captured.) And those next words — What’s taking her so long? — I remember those words, too. We’d finally arrived at the dredge, and Sarah left me alone with the camera. I panned it over each of the windows in the dredge while I waited for her to come back and tell me she’d cut the lock on the door. I didn’t want to see a ghost in one of those windows, but I couldn’t stop looking for one. When Sarah came back, I followed her down the last part of the path.

  Before I knew it, we were inside.

  It’s cold in here.

  I remember thinking it was chilly. September in Skeleton Creek is preceded by a long warm summer that lulls you to sleep. Then BANG, the cold nights show up out of nowhere like a screen door in your face.

  So it was cold in the dredge, and that’s why Sarah was talking with a tiny pattern of starts and stops in her voice. It wasn’t because she was afraid. She was cold.

  I can’t go down there again.

  This is where the shock set in, I’m pretty sure. I didn’t say I couldn’t go down the stairs again, but when we reached the top, I knew I couldn’t do it. Stairs were a bad omen in every Alfred Hitchcock movie I’d ever seen, a prelude to something sinister about to happen. And what was much worse, this was the place I’d had the accident and almost died. That was it for me. It was either get out by another way or die trying. I remember how it felt to be back there, sort of like someone had cut off the oxygen to my lungs and left me for dead. I floated through the rest and then I woke up in my bed.

  I still can’t believe every thing on that video. Somehow my zombie form arrived inside the secret room. Seeing that video reminded me of something. I saw the birdie carved in wood. I remember leaning over into the gears instinctively and glancing down into the opening. There’s a memory packed in frozen storage somewhere in which I’ve done this before. I can’t crack the ice, but it’s there.

  What jolted me back to reality? It must have been seeing Sarah turning the dials at the same time I was reading the warning about the whole place exploding. It was like she had a stick of lit dynamite in her hand.

  Stop touching it!

  I screamed these words, or at least I thought I did. But watching the video, I see that I only screamed in my head. I hate that
I can’t trust what I saw and what I felt. It’s like a repeat of the night I fell, with every thing grayed out. I still can’t remember the right order or whether certain things happened or not. The scariest thing about watching Sarah’s videos is that I don’t always know what’s coming next.

  That sound again.

  Okay, this I recall perfectly. I’ve read those three words on the first page of this journal four or five times already, and every time I hear the same sounds. It’s like a soundtrack. That sound again, that sound again, that sound again. I can’t describe it, but I heard it at least twice in the video. Once when we were in the alley and once when I saw the birdie. I need to watch that video again because I can’t say for sure if the sound is really there or not. It’s like I see things — the ghost or the birdie — and I hear the sound. Am I hearing it in my head? Is there some sort of visual cue that’s making my brain create the sound? Or is the sound really there?

  I scribbled the names. All of them. But here’s the strange part: I don’t remember when I wrote the names down. It’s an awful lot to remember, all those names, but I don’t think I wrote them until later. Believe it or not, I think I woke up in the dark in my own bed and did it. I’ve actually done this before, when I was small. I used to do it all the time. I’d wake up when I was five or six years old and find that I’d drawn the words green egz ham in crayon on the wall in the middle of the night.

  “Why did you do that?” my dad would ask in the morning.

  “I was asleep. Someone else did it.”

  “We’ve told you not to write on your walls,” Dad would say, all stern like he was going to punish me.

  “I didn’t do it,” I’d insist.

  “Is that so? Then who did?”

  “Did you lock the doors last night?”

  My dad (and my mom, for that matter) knew then what they know now: I could talk them into their graves if they let me. I could go on and on about whether they locked the windows and checked every room and flushed the toilets and a hundred other things that might or might not have to do with how my walls got covered in purple crayon.

  “Stop writing on your walls.”

  That’s all my dad had the energy to say once he could see I was heading down a path that might take twenty minutes and would lead absolutely nowhere.

  Most of the time, or so it seems to me, if Dad says anything in my general direction, it’s either a warning or a reprimand. I have come to accept this fact, which technically speaking is pretty sad.

  At least he never yells at me.

  So anyway, this idea of sleepwriting like someone might sleepwalk, I think it might have revisited me last night. Because I’m just about sure I didn’t consciously write those names on the front page. Looking at the scrawled names, I’m asking myself, just like my dad used to ask: Why did you do that?

  Francis Palmer. Jordan Hooke. Wilson Boyle. Dr. Watts. Who are these people? And what about Hector Newton and The Apostle — who are they? I’ve never heard of a single one of them, so why are their names carved in stone inside a secret room on the dredge?

  And while we’re at it, why is my dad’s name hidden in that room right under Joe Bush’s name? And the local librarian?

  Sarah’s eyes are big. She’s terrified.

  I couldn’t see it.

  I only felt it.

  I’m glad I didn’t see Old Joe Bush for myself when we were trapped in the secret room. I’m glad I was wedged in there, facing the wall so I couldn’t turn around. Seeing a ghost on video is bad enough; I don’t need to see it in person.

  Later in the car — I sort of remember this conversation now — Sarah said it was the scariest thing she’d ever seen, like whatever terrible thing was out there had her trapped and wanted her dead. She said the ghost of Old Joe Bush sniffed the air, which I didn’t really get from watching the video, but that’s how she felt about it. When he leaned in, she saw his face and almost screamed. She’d wanted to scream, but Old Joe Bush was almost touching the back of my head and she was completely paralyzed with fear.

  I remember something else now, something horrible. I remember at that moment it felt extra cold, like a giant block of ice was about to touch the back of my neck.

  But I didn’t turn around. I didn’t get to see it until I watched the video a few minutes ago. The more I remember, the more I wish Sarah had never shown it to me.

  There’s a big gap now, a whole section I just don’t remember at all. I don’t remember getting out of the secret room or coming to the stairs and insisting once again that I couldn’t go down. I don’t remember racing through parts of the dredge I’d never seen before or cowering in the corner. I absolutely don’t recall getting back up and making myself hobble forward until we came to the way out.

  Don’t make me come looking for you.

  A message smeared on the door. The kind of words that say Don’t you dare tell the cops, don’t tell your parents, don’t trust anyone in this town, and, most of all, don’t ever come back into the dredge again.

  That I remember. I remember it more than anything else from last night, for the worst possible reason. I remember it because when I woke up this morning, I got out of bed and shuffled over to my desk. When I turned around, I saw that I’d scrawled those very words on the wall over my bed.

  It’s very disturbing when you come to the realization that you’ve been awake without knowing it, doing bizarre things you can’t recall.

  Then again, maybe I didn’t write the message on the wall over my bed.

  It could be someone else’s writing.

  I guess it could be my dad’s or Ranger Bonner’s.

  Or, more likely, the ghost of Old Joe Bush followed me home so he could make sure I understood him the first time.

  Sunday, September 19, 8:15 A.M.

  I just spent the last twenty minutes standing on my bed with a wet rag, scrubbing words off the wall. Ink is a lot harder to wash off than a purple crayon. It’s especially difficult because my leg is still killing me and standing on my bed without falling off is a real trick.

  For some reason the word Don’t was darker than all the other words, so it reads more like Don’t make me come looking for you. But it didn’t really matter, because twenty minutes of scrubbing did almost nothing to remove the words. What I really need is some sandpaper and a can of paint.

  I moved my Dark Side of the Moon poster to cover the message. I haven’t even noticed that poster for months and months — I think I only ever listened to Pink Floyd for about a week in the eighth grade to begin with. I have no idea why I still have it hanging in my room.

  My mom came in a few minutes later and stood over my bed, staring at the poster I’d moved.

  “I used to listen to that music when I was your age,” she said. “Did I ever tell you that?”

  She’d told me about a thousand times, so I nodded.

  “Why did you move it?” I shrugged and changed subjects, hoping she wouldn’t notice I’d pinned it up slightly crooked and try to fix it.

  “I think I’ll stay in bed a little longer. I didn’t sleep so well last night.”

  Mom was still staring at the poster, like it brought back some memory she hadn’t had in a while. Then she looked down at me.

  “Your dad wants you out of this room and doing something with your life. Back to school in only a week, remember? You’ve really got to get used to walking on that leg.”

  If only she’d known how far out of my room I’d been the night before. I gave her my tired look, which wasn’t hard because I was exhausted.

  She sighed. “I can hold him off another half hour with bacon and eggs.” Then she went to the door and turned back for one more look at the poster. “You know it’s crooked, right?”

  I closed my eyes like I was dozing off and nearly fell asleep by accident.

  When the door was shut and I was sure she was gone, I pulled my phone out from under my pillow. Sarah had said 8:30 A.M. and it was 8:30 A.M. There was a one-word text message o
n my screen, which I recognized from one of my favorite books. Does Sarah think I’m losing my grip on reality, just like Jack Torrance did? I wish I could remember every thing from last night, but I can’t. Maybe I AM going crazy and I just don’t know it. I suppose if I were losing my marbles, I’d be the last one to know.

  I deleted the password, went to my desk, and logged on to Sarah’s site.

  SARAHFINCHER.COM

  PASSWORD:

  JACKTORRANCE

  Sunday, September 19, 11:00 A.M.

  I couldn’t go back to sleep after watching Sarah’s newest video … and I was hungry besides. The breakfast smell working its way up the stairs and under my door is tough to ignore, especially on Sunday morning when we actually get a weekly paper and Mom doesn’t give me a hard time about drinking coffee. Any other morning she’s on my case, but Sunday is a free pass for reasons I don’t entirely understand.

  Have you ever looked across the table, past a plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast, and wondered if you could trust your own parents?

  I just did.

  “Where’s Henry?” I said, and then I shoved most of a piece of toast in my mouth and washed it down with coffee. Henry is my dad’s best friend, who visits from New York for a couple of weeks every year. He’s got a complicated past when it comes to the dredge.

  “Fishing,” Dad said. He was staring at the paper, which was on the table next to his plate. He glanced up at me, then back at the editorial page. “You’re going to school next week,” he went on.

  “I know.”

  “That’s not a license to talk with Sarah Fincher. You know that, right?”

  I didn’t answer him. Inside I was seething, but there was no point saying anything. I was already talking with Sarah practically every day without either of my parents knowing about it. Getting their permission had found its way to the bottom of my priority list.

  Mom piped in. “He knows, Paul. Just read your paper and let the boy eat in peace.”

  “All right, all right. But we agreed. School next week, no excuses. And no Sarah Fincher.”

  They blamed Sarah for my accident. They said she was trouble.