I can’t say exactly when it started. I noticed… a shadow out of the corner of my eye. Just always as if something was darting away right when I looked. I’d look around, but nothing was ever there. I think that was my big mistake. Looking. If I had ignored it, I don’t think it would be what it is now. I think looking, searching for it, gave it power.
I looked up at the landlord and he shrugged.
“How long was her body here?” I waited for him to clear his throat and scratch at his belly through his white tank top.
“A week, at least, the coroner said.”
“Does this apartment have a history of complaints?”
“Sure. Nobody stays here for long.”
“Do they move out? Or do they die?”
“They move out. This tenant though, she never complained. Not once. I swear.”
I let myself sink to the cheap carpet, the suicide note crinkling between my fingers. The apartment was empty, all of Shannon’s things had been donated or discarded, I’m sure he sold anything valuable. I’ve been a spirit medium for most of my life and it’s the patient ones, the long-suffering and meek people who hate to complain who always get the worst of a haunt. What was here though, didn’t feel like a typical spirit. It felt wild, unhinged, and more importantly, impatient… or expectant. Like a tightly coiled spring.
There was a lot more to the note, written in disjointed blocks of text, some at odd angles to the rest, some written over other bits of text. Not all of it was legible, but I had to try and make sense of it. It had driven Shannon to her death, I needed to know how.
It was scratching at the walls again last night. Scraaaaatch, scraaaaaatch. Ha ha, so funny. It’s gone when I turn on the light. So turn on the light. Keep the light ON. But No! No then it starts to giggle. Light off, scratching. Light on giggling. It’s just a game. Everything is a game. Don’t turn off the light. Don’t turn on the light. Don’t don’t don’t don’t. I can see it now, it smiles like a really pretty knife’s edge and has eyes like lakes of blood.
It rode in the car with me to work today. And was there when I got back at the end of the day. Sitting in the back seat, black fur hanging limply, head bowed. I watched the rearview mirror the whole way home, expecting that smile, that gleeful, jagged smile, but it never looked up. It just laughed and laughed.
“Someone else died here?” I asked the landlord from the floor. He grunted.
“Hell if I know.”
“The spirit you have here isn’t Shanon, it’s something else.”
“Jesus, I don’t care if it’s legion, I just need to know if you can get rid of it so I can rent this place out again.”
“Not sure yet.”
The landlord grunted again. The building was historic, its foundations were old, late 1600s, likely many people had died here, I was hoping he’d have some specifics.
It follows me everywhere now, right behind me, so close I can feel its breath on my neck. Its body against mine. Step for step, matching my movements. Some kind of parasitic twin. Maybe hoping I’ll absorb it. It’s there when I shower, its shaggy black hair getting all soaked and stinking like rot. When I go out, which is rare now, it leaps on my back like some twisted idea of a child’s piggy back ride. Heavy and putrid. When I sleep, it lies next to me, staring at me with its oily blood red eyes all night long. It never stops smiling. It never stops laughing.