Page 20 of Theoretically Straight

Theo moves down the corridor, and I can’t help but feel like he’s running away. But he eventually shrugs and says, “It’s fine.” But there’s a tightness in his voice that wasn’t there a minute ago.

I follow him into the hall, thinking quickly to change the subject. “So, what got you into Triple H? Have you always been into paranormal stuff?”

Theo peeks his light into one of the doorways. “Nah, it’s been pretty recent. One of his videos popped up on my For You page a few months back, and I got hooked. It was the one from that place in Baltimore, and he had those creepy voices on the recording.”

I hang back, keeping my distance as he leans into the room, scanning from one side to the other. He reaches up to brush a lock of dark hair from his eyes.

Stop staring, Caleb. Keep talking.

“Oh yeah, the Smythe House. That place was wild.”

“What’s really wild were the views. He had, like, ten million views on his YouTube already, and double that on the TikTok clip.”

He seems a bit obsessed with the numbers game. Is that all he’s doing this for?

“I was sort of surprised to see you here, honestly,” I say, wanting to suss out his intentions. “I didn’t know if all this paranormal stuff conflicts with your religion or whatever.”

Theo looks back at me, his brow furrowed. “Why would that matter?”

My cheeks burn as I look down at my feet like a scolded child. “Sorry if that sounded rude. I didn’t mean it–I guess I’m just curious. My family isn’t religious, so it’s kind of foreign to me.”

Theo nods, the harsh angles of his face relaxing. “Oh. Yeah, of course we believe in demons and stuff. I mean, I’ve never seen one, but they talk about them at church. The Bible asks us to believe a whole heap of stuff we can’t prove, so why not believe in spirits, you know?”

“Sure,” I reply, not really sure what else to say.

“Do you hear that?”

I freeze, holding my breath. The basement is quiet, with only the distant sound of footsteps coming from the tour group and groaning floorboards above us. I open my mouth to ask what he meant, but then I hear it.

I instinctively take a step closer to him. “What is it?”

“It sounded like a voice,” Theo whispers, raising his phone to eye level, and opening the camera once again.

We stand still, and a few seconds pass before the noise happens again, shooting chills up and down my spine.

“It’s definitely coming from in there,” Theo says, pointing to the last classroom at the end of the hall.

Neither of us moves from the doorway. With our lights shining on the door frame, I can see the charred and blackened edges of the wood as well as the darkened marks on the wall above–no doubt from the fire.

“You can go first,” I say, stepping to the side. “You know, to make sure you’ve got a clear shot of the room.”

Theo doesn’t seem thrilled, but after a deep exhale, he moves slowly into the room, his phone primed and ready to capture whatever is hiding.

I’m holding my breath, I realize, clinging to the tension in my gut as if I expect something to lunge out and snatch him. But he just does a three-sixty, pausing at the corners of the room, and just as he’s about to turn back to me, he stops.

“Hey, come look at this.”

The chills have morphed into straight-up heebie-jeebies at this point, but I enter the room as well, hurrying quickly over to Theo and shining my light in the same direction as his. There’s a chalkboard on the scorched wall, with smears of faded chalk around the edges. In the center, a cluster of strange markings and symbols fills the board, making the shape of a five-pointed star.

“Whoa,” I breathe, moving closer to the board. “What is all this?”

Theo moves beside me, shifting the direction of the light from his phone down to the floor. “Probably just kids, look there.”

A fresh box of chalk sits on the ground, the top ripped open. Two energy drink cans lay on their sides beside the box, and a small pile of cigarette butts.

“Guess we’re not the only ones that had the idea to come down here,” I say, checking the time on my phone. I’ve been gone from the group for about fifteen minutes. How much longer till they come looking for me?

Theo lets out another sigh. “Lame. For a second there, I thought we’d found something–”

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