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Authors: Dan Poblocki

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BOOK: The Ghost of Graylock
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T
HE
B
APTISTE BROTHERS LEANED THEIR BIKES
against the side of the porch. Since Bree didn’t have a bike of her own and was scared to ride on any of their handlebars, they’d all have to walk. Neil was annoyed, but at least Bree had given up her goal of keeping him from going to Graylock.

Taking a right at the end of the driveway, the small group hiked along the side of the road. The summer sunlight filtered between the tree trunks, making stripes of shadow at their feet. Cicada song rose and fell in nearly deafening waves. The beauty of the afternoon clashed with the group’s intention — a fact that was not lost on Neil, who grew increasingly excited with every step. He could almost feel the presence of the building in the woods, waiting for him. “How much farther?” he asked.

“There’s a turnoff just ahead,” said Eric. “I can’t believe how close your aunts live to this place.”

“I can’t believe Neil hadn’t heard of Graylock until I told him about it last night,” said Wesley.

“Me neither!” said Bree, skipping forward so she could walk beside Eric. “I mean, I’ve known about it for years.” After a moment of uncomfortable silence, she added, “How did you all meet?”

“Well, Wesley’s my little brother,” said Eric, with a smirk. “We go way back.”

Bree blushed. “Yeah, I got that. But where did you find Neil, Wesley?”

“The library, of course,” said Wesley.

A couple days before, when Neil and Bree had arrived at their aunts’ house, the first thing they all did together was visit the pie shop. After eating an amazingly gooey piece of shoofly pie in the shop’s cozy café, Neil thanked Claire and Anna and asked if he could stroll down Tulley Avenue, the main road running through Hedston.

He hadn’t been able to get his mother’s tearstained face out of his head.
I just need some time alone, honey
, she’d informed him only a week earlier. Her sister, Claire, had offered to take Neil and Bree for the summer. Hedston was several hours north of their home in New Jersey. Neil’s uncle, Felix, lived closer, in a studio apartment in Jersey City. But he also worked late in New York City. They would have been alone all day and most evenings, and at night, they’d have had to cramp onto a small fold-out couch.

So instead, Neil had escaped up to the country with his sister, only to find unlimited time to think about all the horrible things his brain insisted he remember. Neil now understood: You cannot escape from yourself. He also understood that his brain wasn’t so different from his mother’s.

That first day in Hedston, Neil walked up and down Tulley Avenue several times, kicking stones out of his way, plucking leaves off shrubs in front of shabby-looking cottages, humming nonsense songs to himself.

Neil had passed the library twice before he noticed a boy sitting on the top step, staring intensely off into the distance. Neil turned toward where the boy was gazing, but all he could see was a dip in the road that revealed a wooded hillside, the leaves of the far trees blowing in the breeze.

“Do you see him?” the boy asked from the top of the stairs. After a few seconds, Neil realized that the boy was talking to him.

“See who?”

“The Green Man,” said the boy, with a smile. He wore a white T-shirt with what looked like a neon-purple Popsicle stain dribbled down the front. His frizzy black hair lay half-curled like a mop on top of his head.

Neil looked back across the street, trying to find someone who might fit the description of “Green Man.” But there were only trees, hills, sky, clouds.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of a Green Man,” said the boy, waving for Neil to come up the stairs. “You can probably see him better from here.” Neil followed, sitting next to the boy on the top step. “Green Men are from Irish folklore. They’re a kind of forest spirit.”

“Forest spirit?” Neil asked. “Is that like a ghost?”

“Not really,” said the boy. “More like … an entity.”

An entity? Neil found himself amused and disturbed at the same time. The boy sounded a little crazy.

“Want me to teach you to see him?”

“Okay,” Neil said, remembering Alexi and Mark, trying to stay open-minded.

“It’s mostly a mental thing,” said the boy. “First, you’ve got to relax. Look off at the hillside. Let your vision go fuzzy.” Across the small valley was a blur of green. Trees, trees. More trees. “Now,” the boy continued, “let the lights and the darks of the leaves leap out.”

“Leap out?”

“Just try.”

A few seconds later, something strange occurred. Neil didn’t know how it happened, but just the act of staring — concentrating — put him in a different kind of place. He could feel the cold stone steps beneath him, the breeze tickling his face, but he felt … elsewhere.

“The shadow and light will blur. Look closer. Fall into it. He’s right there. In the blur. Look. A face.”

The boy was right. Where the shadows retreated into the mass of leaves on the hill, suddenly Neil noticed a pair of eyes blinking, a mouth opening and closing, as if reciting some silent song as the wind blew through the trees.

Neil gasped and then the face was gone. He turned to the boy. “Was that thing real? The Green Man?”

The boy laughed. “
You
saw him, didn’t you?” He quieted, and then peered off into the distance again. “You’d be surprised how easily you can find them. Sit and stare at
anything
for awhile … it will eventually stare back.”

Neil chuckled, pleased to meet someone who might be as weird as himself. He’d definitely seen the face in the trees. If this boy saw it too, then they were in it together. And neither of them were nuts.

The boy smiled to himself, as if the Green Man across the way had suddenly winked at him. “I’m Wesley, by the way.”

Neil knew right then that they’d be friends.

By the time Neil had made it back to the pie shop, he found himself looking around at pieces of the town — sidewalk stains, patterns in brickwork, shadows falling across concrete — trying to find hidden life inside all of it. He couldn’t help but also think of his parents — how a useful skill such as Wesley’s might have given him a clue to the secrets they had kept for so long, secrets to which he still had no satisfying answer.

 

“Here we are,” said Eric, pausing near a gravel road that led into a dense growth of pine. Next to the inconspicuous intersection, hidden by tall weeds and low-hanging branches, a small wooden sign stood atop a thick post: G
RAYLOCK
H
ALL
— S
TATE
H
OSPITAL
.

“Notice how it says nothing about crazy people,” said Eric, with a smirk. “Totally bland.”

“What would you like it to say?” Wesley asked. “‘Welcome to the Loony Bin’?”

“Where is it?” Neil asked.

“Way back through the trees,” said Eric. “You have to cross a bridge at the end of the long driveway. The main building is on a small island in Graylock Lake. The woods are state property. There’s not much else out here.” As the group stood at the edge of the path, a gust of wind released needles from high pine boughs swaying over their heads. The needles scattered at their feet. The dark scent of sticky sap hung in the air. “You sure you want to do this?”

“Is it dangerous?” Bree asked.

“Probably,” Eric answered with a slight shrug.

Bree sighed and hugged her ribs, as if protecting herself from a chill that didn’t exist, but eventually she took the first step onto the gravel road. They all walked in silence for awhile. A couple driveways turned off the thin stretch. Through the dense trees, Neil could see buildings in the distance. Old houses. He wondered if anyone still lived in them.

“You don’t really believe the hospital has ghosts in it,” Bree said eventually. “Do you?” She spoke directly to Eric; it was obvious to her how Neil and Wesley felt.

“It’s hard not to believe it when so many people claim to have seen her,” said Eric.

“Seen
who
?” Bree whispered.

“The nurse.”

Neil would have laughed if Wesley hadn’t already given him the rundown the day before. Now he listened as Eric recounted it for his sister. Though hearing it for a second time, the story again gave him chills.

“And we’re going here …
why
?” said Bree, stopping in the middle of the gravel path as Eric finished the tale.

“There’s so much to see,” said Eric. “After Graylock was closed fifteen years ago, the patients were either moved to other institutions or released. It happened in a hurry. They even left behind charts, specimens … medical records!”

Wesley skipped forward. “Tell them about the padded cells with gouge marks in the walls. Or the bloodstains streaking the hallway floors. Or the crayon graffiti drawings that decorate the spiral stairwells.”

Neil could tell that Bree was truly frightened — she’d locked her knees and shoved her hands deep into her pockets. If they weren’t careful, she might take off in the opposite direction. That would be a disaster — especially if she had the aunts drive out here to pick him up. “He’s kidding,” said Neil, rolling his eyes.

“Come on,” said Eric. He reached out and took her hand. “I might get scared without you.” Bree’s knees loosened, something sparked in her eyes, and Neil knew they were in the clear. They walked ahead.

Seconds later, Wesley whispered into Neil’s ear. “But I
wasn’t
kidding.”

A
S THE GROUP APPROACHED THE SMALL BRIDGE
, they came to an old metal fence that leaned forward, sagging and rusted. Neil noticed a small space at the bottom. Eric grabbed the chain link and pulled up. The gap opened wider. One by one, Bree, Wesley, and Neil crawled through. Eric followed carefully, pressing himself into the dirty ground so the twists of metal wouldn’t scratch.

The path continued across the small concrete bridge, over the algae-coated water where tall reeds wavered, and onto the long, narrow island. Neil marveled at the sight of the hospital grounds. Pine trees lined the road, providing the ever-present shade that Neil somehow had expected to find here. Ahead, visible between the tree trunks, stood a mass of gray stone. A gate. A wall. Neil couldn’t tell exactly what he was looking at. Whatever it was, it was covered with a moss so green it appeared poisonous.

“There she is,” said Eric. “Graylock Hall.”

They walked in silence. The road led to a circular turnaround in front of the building. On the other side of the circle was the hospital’s main entrance — a wide stone staircase that rose toward a recessed entry. Within the shadows of the portal, impenetrable black iron doors were chained shut.

The building was not wide, but each of its three stories seemed to rise taller than the last, so that the place loomed as if it were actually leaning toward them, trying to hypnotize them forward.

A small walking path circumnavigated the hospital. Opposite this trail, the land sloped quickly toward the water. It wasn’t difficult for Neil to imagine a patient wandering out into the night and tumbling into the lake. Farther from shore, unimpeded by the shade of the pines, lily pads floated in the sunlight. For a patient who couldn’t swim, who was confused or frightened in the first place, Neil imagined that it would have been difficult to escape the tangle of plant stalks and weeds out there.

Taking in the vista, Neil was overwhelmed with a sudden sadness. People had died here. And for the people who had lived, life certainly hadn’t been easy — neither inside nor outside of these walls. He had come here hoping to escape from his tangled thoughts, but found himself twisted in new ones.

Neil blinked and pulled out the digital camera, fitting its strap snugly around his wrist. He remembered how Alexi and Mark worked. They always managed to keep a critical perspective and maintain an emotional distance. They never jumped to conclusions. Neil took several pictures to make himself feel better. This was his very own ghostly investigation — a wonderful distraction.

“I think there’s a window around the side that we can crawl through,” said Eric. “That’s what my friend Jamie told me this morning anyway. He’s been here before, but I couldn’t convince him to come again. Go figure.”

“Is Jamie in your band?” Bree asked, following Eric to the left of the hospital’s main entrance.

“Nah. I’m not really talking to those guys at the moment.” The two walked on. Neil and Wesley hung back.

“Are you sure you’re ready for this?” Wesley asked. “Some people think Nurse Janet is totally real.”

“Yeah, but ghosts can’t hurt you,” said Neil.

“Where’d you get that idea?”

Neil thought for a few seconds. Had Alexi or Mark ever actually said that? “I’m not sure. Makes sense though. Ghosts don’t have bodies. So how would they be able to touch you?” Wesley said nothing. Neil worried Wesley didn’t believe him. “The Nurse Janet story is creepy, but I doubt her ghost would really be able to drag anyone down to the lake. Even if she
was
totally psycho.”

“There are other ways to hurt people.”

“Like how?”

Wesley pointed to his temple, right next to his small brown ear. “What if they can get in here somehow?”

“In your head?” asked Neil. He thought of his mother, of her crying fits, of her silences, her unrecognizing face. He ruminated upon that shadow person he imagined lurking inside himself, and his stomach clenched. Maybe it had been a mistake to come here.

A voice called out from around the stone wall. “Are you guys coming or what?” It was Eric.

“Yes!” Neil answered. Moving forward would keep the memory of his parents in the back of his mind, instead of front and center.

Neil and Wesley found Bree helping Eric into what looked like a tall basement window that met a slight depression in the ground. The glass had been smashed in. The grass at the base of the wall came up to Bree’s knees. She held Eric’s hands as he lowered himself inside. When Bree realized that the two boys were standing behind her, she blushed, looking like an accomplice to a crime.
And it is a crime
, thought Neil,
isn’t it?

“There’s a table down here!” Eric called from the darkness beyond the window. “Looks pretty sturdy.” The sound of wooden legs scraping against a gritty floor echoed out of the building. Then Eric’s face appeared inside, at the bottom of the frame. “Here.” He waved. “You can just climb on in now. The drop isn’t far.”

Bree breathed deeply, then sat down and scooted herself forward. From inside, Eric reached out and helped her. Wesley followed. Neil glanced around, making sure no one was watching them before he too crouched in the tall grass. He sat on the ledge of the window, and for the first time, he caught a glimpse of the hospital’s inside.

Dusty light revealed a wide wooden floor, a tall ceiling. Bolted high on opposite walls … were those basketball hoops? Had they found a gymnasium? Weird. And kind of cool.

Neil lowered his bag inside. Below, his sister held it for him. Then he dropped to the table. The safety of the sunlight remained outside. Inside, the world had turned to shadows and dust.

BOOK: The Ghost of Graylock
5.16Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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