I'm sorry for the way I ended my last update, but I had little time to spare.
My Daughter Marcy has been stuck, becoming a part of the house my husband and Stan are mortgaging now for days. First it started with her hand then it pulled her in further. It ate a priest and it retaliated when we tried to smash it apart.
I thought we had exhausted all options by this point. But I was wrong. We've been wrong this entire time. And now that I can speak with a level head I can get the story straight.
I called Tim as I raced to the house and told him what his brother was about to do.
"Jesus. You need to call the cops," Tim told me. I thought about the power that the house seemed to exert over anyone that cane close to it.
"No... we can't let this thing hurt more people. It controls anyone that steps foot inside. But I need your help. I think now I can fight it... but I’ll need you Tim, You know him better than anyone," I shouted. Tim promised he would get there as soon as possible and I mentally crossed my fingers that would be soon enough.
When I got to the house, I ran inside to see Stan was still struggling with his decision to end our daughter's life. Marcy had her eyes closed as she was still resting, and I could see little Jasper's face beginning to push its way out of the wall. i had made it.
"Stan you have to stop this before it's too late!" I said as his eyes drifted up to catch a glimpse of me at the end of the hall.
"I didn't want you to be here to see this," he said. His hands were shaky. He was pointing the gun toward our daughters head. It made me think of Noah Hunt. Had the house tried to force him to do this years ago?
"Get should of yourself! Don't you see that the house is controlling you? It's been doing that to both of us, to everyone that has come here,” I said as I took a step forward. He cocked the gun.
"Please don't come any closer. You're not going to talk me out of this," he told me.
"Listen to yourself! You want to put a bullet in our little girl's head!! Even if she was dying, there are other humane ways to do this. Why resort to violence? The house is clouding your judgment..." I told him as I took out my smartphone and added, "The same thing happened to Jasper's father. He nearly killed his son..."
As I was speaking behind Stan I could see that Jasper was still pushing his way out of the wall. Facial features were forming, and he was looking like a real boy again. "Look at him Stan! He's not dead' that's proof enough right there!! This house consumed him, and it drove his mother and father insane," I got down on my knees and I slid my phone down the hallway to where my husband stood.
"At least look at the article, please," I said. Inwardly my mind was doing tricks with itself already. It was a whirlwind of emotions when part of me was hearing a buzzing noise that was growing in my head, telling me to encourage his suicidal mission. I knew it had to be the house, it's demonic presence was working hard to sway me back to being under its control.
Stan looked down at the phone, nervous and sweaty. He kept a firm grip on his pistol as he picked it up and looked at the articles about Jasper and about his father.
I waited, knowing that the house would convince him of another lie. Behind me I heard Tim open the door. He was about to rush his brother but I held him back. The chances of either Marcy or Jasper getting hurt were too great to risk it.
"Bro, it's me. I don't know what you're thinking but this isn't the answer. There's always another way. we'll find another priest, we'll sacrifice a goat; heck we'll even bring the military to tear this place down!" Tim said.
Those words seemed to snap Stan back to reality. This time he pointed the gun toward Jasper. His eyes were closed. It was as though the house had consumed him in some kind of coma. "One has to die for the other to live... that's what... that's what the voice in my head is telling me," Stan admitted.
"Don't listen to it. They can both live. Don't let this place take you too!" I begged.
Stan was sweating even more now, looking in between the children. Then he slowly raised the gun up and pointed it at us again.
"The house needs something in return for both of their lives...”
“You’re talking crazy, give us the gun!” Tim tried to step forward. My husband let a bullet graze the floor and I stopped in my tracks to wait and see if the house would retaliate.
The way it remained silent now told me all I needed to know about what was happening. The house wanted my daughter dead.
“We can save them both,” Stan said and then smiled awkwardly, “I can save them both. ," he said.
Even as the words left his lips, I knew what he was planning to do. Tim tried to make a move too. We barely made it halfway down the hall.
Stan placed the barrel of the gun in his mouth, a tear falling down his face as he pulled the trigger.
Everything happened so fast I can't remember the finer details. Stan's skull burst from the top with blood splattering against the wall. Then the house began to absorb him almost instantly. His body slipped through the plaster and into the unknown with only his bottom part sticking out.
I screamed out his name. Tim and I ran even though it was already over. The house was pulling him in.
At the same moment, for the first time in days, my daughter was becoming whole. Stan’s sacrifice had worked somehow. I hugged her neck as Tim helped Jasper. Neither one of them were really breathing well though, I realized.
All I could do was stifle the tears as I watched my husband disappear into the house as a sacrifice for these two, and then I pulled Marcy up and started to move outside the house.
As soon as Tim and I were outside, we called the police and the hospital. This time they responded instantly. I thought of all the times the house had impeded us in its desperate attempt for us to kill ourselves. I thought about all the ways that it had controlled everyone who came close it. And in the end how my husband had to sacrifice himself for all of us to be free.
Tim and I told the first responders a different story though. How that the space between the walls was used to hold Jasper hostage for these past six years . I detested telling this story because It was a narrative that painted my husband as a child molester and a killer. But there wasn’t much alternative. They would never believe the truth. Now the house was quiet. It was satisfied with all the chaos it had brought into our lives.
But I wasn't. There was still one wrong I felt I could make right.
So I arranged for Tim to watch Marcy and went down to the correctional facility as planned. I needed to let Noah know that his son was safe.
I felt that it would make the most sense hearing it from me; someone who had dealt with the same trauma. And when I saw him being brought in behind the glass to speak with me, I knew that he had suffered for too long.
"Who are you?" he asked.
I told him and I explained how I owned the house he once lived in. That seemed to spark a little light in his eyes.
"So... who did you lose?" Noah wondered.
"That's what I came to tell you. I didn't lose anyone. I saved them! I saved my daughter... and I saved your son too. He's in the county clinic right now."
Noah frowned. He didn't seem as excited as I hoped. "That isn't possible."
"No it's true! CPS is going to put Jasper in a foster home until your sentence is commuted. I'll even speak for you at your next parole hearing, if you need," I said excitedly.
"My son is dead... I shot him myself. To save him from that house," Mister Hunt said and leaned forward as he saw confusion written on my face.
"You killed him," I repeated slowly, the words making sense. We both sat there in silence as we realized what had happened.
"And you let it out... to go to another house. To spread,” Mister Hunt said.
He laughed loudly and reared his head back. I felt an emptiness in my bones.
"It was always a trap. Always.”
---
Credits
Comments