Page 3 of Scaredy Cat
A van pulling up beside me has me glancing upward, and I read the wordsSquad Ghoulsscrawled across the side in painted, graffiti letters with an eye roll. It’s very Scooby Gang of them, but maybe that’s what they’re going for. The passenger door opens, and Blake, the only one of them I’ve met in person, hops out while waving at me, like he’s inviting me to go somewhere.
“Hey!” he comes to my open window with a grin, palms braced on the sill so I couldn’t roll it up if I wanted to. Not that I want to. Yet. “I figured you could ride with us so we can get you all prepped for tonight. I’m sure you’ve seen our livestreams before.”
He pauses, and I realize he’s waiting for a confirmation. I nod my head with a smile, not admitting that while I watched bits and pieces, I’ve never sat through one of them from beginning to end. “Yeah, that totally makes sense.” When he finally steps back, I roll up my window and turn off my car, snagging my keys and phone that I shove into the pocket of my plaid skirt. I loathe leaving my car here, but I’ve left it in sketchier places for content.
Maybe insurance will buy me a nicer one if it gets vandalized.
And maybe they’ll also pay for me to go to Hawaii.
The back of the van is spacious, with a bench seat along one side that’s definitely custom, and not terribly uncomfortable when I perch on it. From a chair bolted down in front of a computer and other monitoring equipment, a floppy haired blond boy smiles, giving me a self-conscious wave. “I’m Trevor,” he greets. “We, uh, talked on the phone last night.”
Immediately I work to pull on myScaredy Catpersona. The friendly horror nerd who likes adventure and isn’t afraidof anything. While I genuinely love horror and I really haven’t found anything to scare me since before I was legally an adult, it still is somewhat of an act for my blog. A character people can enjoy watching instead of my usual cynical, quiet self that I prefer sinking into when I’m not creating content.
The one I’m sure my subscribers wouldn’t be impressed by.
“This is really exciting,” I say enthusiastically, noticing there are no seatbelts. “I’m a fan of you guys. It’s amazing how you’ve built such a great platform in less than two years.” The girl beside me grins and launches into an explanation of her social media marketing plans, only briefly interrupting herself to introduce herself as Alice. The girl on my other side, Leah, adds in comments occasionally, but most of the twenty-minute drive through increasingly winding roads is filled with Alice’s not-so-subtle praise of her work.
When the van finally rolls to a stop, the Scooby gang immediately launches into motion, leaving me feeling awkward and a bit useless. Thanks to the setup we did over email, it’s easy for Trevor to link our streams together, leaving me free to not use my phone since we’ll be using their cameras for the experience. At last I’m handed a small GoPro with a hand strap, that actually makes it quite a bit easier to handle, and I test it by looking at the monitor on Trevor’s computer.
“So I’m all good?” I check, just to reassure myself as I clamber out of the van and into the tall, springy grass. This late in September, the fall rain has given the grass a weak second life after the brutally hot midwest summer, but I know November will crush it all with an early, just as savage frost. The grass also serves to tell me this place is definitely abandoned, and when I turn on my flashlight, I get my first look at the house on Hangman’s Road.
It’s…certainly something. And from what I know of the lore, fits the aesthetic.
“You’re all good,” Trevor replies.
“A few quick things, guys, since we have someone new on board.” Blake flashes me a charming grin that I sort of return, and Leah snorts at him, making me wonder if the happy charm is all for me. It doesn’t put a hole in his act, though, if it is one. He adjusts his grip on the camera he has, with a strap similar to mine, and checks a few other things he has.
“First thirty minutes is us introducing the place, the lore, and doing a walkthrough,” he informs me. “Not a big place, so thirty minutes should be more than enough. We’ll start out together and then we’ll start getting the viewers involved. Make sure your earbuds are on.” He taps the ones he’s wearing that’ll let him hear everyone’s audio, and Trevor. I was given a pair as well, and assured I could keep them after as a little souvenir, especially in case I want to work with them again.
“The viewers decide who goes where,” Leah explains. “Trevor will swap between our cameras and do a collage of the video feeds on the stream. If anyone has anything interesting happen, he’ll focus on them for a bit.”
“Then we pull out the Ouija board,” Alice concludes. “We’ll have a good old fashioned yap session with the ghosts—if they deign to answer—take a few more viewer questions, and that’s all. Our stream lasts three hours on a normal night, which this is.” Her smile is sweeter than Blake’s, and she meets my eyes when she grins in my direction. “Easy. Low stress. Fun as hell.”
“Hopefully scary,” I add, matching her smile with one of my own. “The vibes are great already,” I add, glancing up at the old farmhouse in front of us. Being deep in the woods makes it creepy enough, but the old, white-sided farmhouse looks like something straight out of the eighteen hundreds. Complete with mold, ivy, and a sagging roof hanging above the cracked porch. “Are we allowed to be here?” I ask thoughtfully, and when none of them answer right away, I take that as the hint I’m looking for.
Great.
“Not a dealbreaker,” I add, raising my hands in surrender. “Just curious. I’d really rather my subscribers not see me go to jail tonight, you know?” My smile turns sly, and a little sardonic.
“The county took possession of it after the last owner died,” Leah tells me. “The guy didn’t actually live here. Just owned the land. Anyway, he didn’t take care of it, as you can see.” She gestures at the formerly-white behemoth shining in the moonlight, standing out almost glaringly bright in the middle of the dark yard and woods around us. “And no one comes out here,” she adds after a moment.
“Yeah,” I agree, “I can definitely tell.”
There’s a small click in my earbuds, and then Trevor’s voice floats through my skull. “You guys ready? I have us counting down.”As it always does before a stream, my stomach twists a little and butterflies take off from their perches on my ribs. No matter how many times I do this, I can’t help but be a little anxious. Being on camera was never something I planned on doing before, and it’s hard to reconcile that it’s now a part of my job.
I give my agreement, and the countdown rushes by, with Blake the first to lift up his GoPro. He starts off with the normal greeting forSquad Ghouls,and when I hear him introduce me, I know that’s my cue to wave and look friendly as he points the camera in my direction. I do my own little spiel, welcoming my viewers and greeting theSquad Ghoulsviewers as well. This bit is over quickly enough, and I huff a little exhale and sink back on my heels.
“Hangman’s Road has a ton of lore about it,” Blake explains, maybe exaggerating a little since it’s not exactlyWaverly Hillsor anything. “There have been many reports of dead bodies hanging over the road, dripping blood onto broken down cars. Stories say that somewhere along the road there’s a swamp thatlures those wanting to end their lives.” He walks up on the porch and I follow, my camera on and hooked over my hand. This is the tour part of the show, which is easy enough since all I have to do is point my camera at something interesting and listen along.
“There are also stories about a doctor living somewhere along this road, with his wife and daughter. When they died, he became a little…” Blake draws out the word. “Unwell, I suppose you could say. He decided if he couldn’t bring them back—though he certainly gave it his best shot—he’d keep them young forever. There have been reports that on some nights, the woods smell of formaldehyde, and you can hear his begging, his pleas, and the sounds of him dragging their bodies from the barn to the house to be preserved forever. Exactly which house that is has never been confirmed.”
Due to living in the area, I’ve heard this story enough times to know he’s definitely overstating some of the details. There was never a house in that story. Or at least, not one that ever played an important role. Plus, he’s missing the part about the hook-handed servant, though maybe that would detract from the whole haunted house thing. Who am I to tell Blake what parts of Indiana folklore might interest our viewers the most?
Still, I give my own camera a grimace as he details the preservation process, hoping I don’t look stupid in the near dark. The tour continues along with the story, ending when we’re in the upstairs bedroom, surrounding a bed with a wrought iron frame and an old, moth-eaten blanket covering the lumpy, sagging mattress.
“So you get to decide, guys.” We’ve reached the end of Blake’s speech, and the start of this whole ‘game’ that the viewers get to decide on. It’s hard to believe thirty minutes have passed, but really all I’ve gotten out of the house so far is dust and creaky floorboards. The first floor was boring, with barely any furniture,and I swear I noticed a few flickers of disappointment in the looks of both Leah and Alice.
Sometimes, an old house is just an old house. Even if it is on a creepy road in the middle of nowhere.
