MR. LARSON'S PIANO

FIVE

About a week after we got the piano home, it got me in major trouble with my wife. Okay, maybe I can't blame the piano entirely but still, at the end of the day had we not brought it home I wouldn't have even had the chance to do what I did, but... I digress.

In the two weeks prior to bringing the piano home I had tested positive for COVID (anyone unfortunate enough to live through 2020 remembers how much of a clusterfuck that year was) and during my ten-day isolation period, I checked something off my bucket list and watched the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe from beginning to end. That ate up about six of my ten days in solitary confinement and then I had to find something else to ease my boredom. That's when I discovered TikTok.

If, for some reason, you don't know what a TikTok is or maybe you're reading this at a time when TikTok no longer exists, it's a social media app where people share short-form videos of themselves doing stupid dances, eating food (yes, really), and trying (and mostly failing) to be funny. One of the features of said app is a collection of filters you can use on your videos to add special effects or make yourself better looking than you are in real life, but there was one that caught my attention for other reasons.

Two nights before the end of my isolation period, I was scrolling through what seemed like hundreds of videos when I came across this person who said that the filter they were using could also be used (theoretically) to show if there were ghosts around you. (I'm going somewhere with this, I promise.)

The filter in question was originally intended to pick up your movement on camera and it would add an aura of rainbow colors around you as you danced or what have you. However, people were now using this filter while filming empty rooms and catching rainbow-colored splotches (signifying movement) where there was no movement, or anyone that could be seen to be moving enough to set off the filter. Obviously, put two and two together and you can understand why they said it could be used to detect ghosts.

Fast forward three weeks and I happen to see a TikTok my oldest daughter posted using the "ghost" filter at the creepy old tire shop she worked at, and picking up some unexplained rainbow forms around a couple rocking chairs in the corner of the room. All of a sudden, my and my wife's conversation from the week before about Mr. Larson came crashing back from the recesses of my memory, and a new idea sparked in my head. I was going to use the "ghost" filter on the piano and see what happened.

Honestly, I didn't think anything would come of it. It was more out of sheer boredom that afternoon than anything else. I took my phone out, turned on the filter, and started scanning the room while recording video. There was the couch (nothing), the bookcase that houses my massive collection of Stephen King novels (again, nothing- surprisingly enough. I mean, if there's going to be something haunted in the house it would be there, right?) No colors shining around the TV, and finally I scanned toward the piano and almost dropped my goddamned phone.

Swirls of rainbow flashed all around the old piano and it startled me so badly that I jerked back, and the view on the video once again showed the couch (with no colors of any kind around it). Okay, I thought to myself, It's just a fluke. So, I tried it one more time, scanning the room. The couch, the bookcase, the TV (all nothing) and finally the piano. Once again, an explosion of color came onto the screen.

I immediately sent the video to my daughter to show her what I had "caught". Honestly, at this point I still thought it was all bullshit, so this was more out of entertainment than anything. A few minutes later, she texted back with, "OMG! Did you see the person on the bench???"

I went back to the video and watched it again. The first time the piano came into view was just a brief swirl of colors and then the camera jerks away back to the couch. But the second time the piano came into frame, not only was there a swirl of color, but, yes, for the quickest of moments there was what appeared to be the shape of a human sitting on the piano bench. I responded back to her and played into the drama just for the fun of it. But this would all come back to bite me in the ass in a few days.

That day (the day I got in trouble with Marcy) we had planned to go to her dad's house for a big family cookout. Courtney, our fourteen- year-old, was currently in the throes of her teenage angst years where her parents are the stupidest creatures to ever walk the earth and she rarely comes out of her room except to get dinner or take a shower.

The day before, I was in the living room enjoying the fact that she'd laid aside her hormones for a moment (it never lasts long) and was sitting on the couch talking to me. In the spirit of keeping her engaged in the conversation, I brought up the TikTok video I had shot of the piano, if nothing else but to give us something to talk about that she'd actually be interested in.

I guess I really didn't see the harm in it. She was fourteen by now, after all. Surely, a trendy video filter that showed "supposed" (and completely unproven) possible ghost activity wouldn't scare her or even give her the creeps, but oh how wrong I was. And oh, how I paid for it later that evening, let me tell you.

Everything was good that afternoon, and I had honestly forgotten all about showing Courtney the video. We had left around five that evening, and Courtney had stayed home, because that's what she always does, and after dinner that night, as we're all just sitting back visiting with stomachs contently full of barbecued hamburgers and potato salad, my wife gets a call.

At first, she just looked worried, then asked the person on the other end what was wrong. A few more seconds passed, and as I eyed my wife trying to determine what was going on with whoever she was on the phone with, she started glaring at me with eyes that were squinted and lips that were curling up almost into a snarl, and then I knew.

I then asked the dumbest question I'd ask all that day: "What's wrong?"

Men can be stupid as hell sometimes.

Marcy didn't even pretend to hide her sudden contempt of me, even in front of everyone else. A couple minutes passed, and she ended the call and walked out onto the front porch. The look she gave me as she stood up said she fully intended for me to follow her out there.

Like an old trained dog, I did.

"Did you tell Courtney about the piano, and that stupid shit you come up with about it being haunted?" she asked.

"No," I said. "I just showed her the video that I sent to Chelly after she posted that one from her job. Why?"

"I specifically asked you not to say anything to Courtney or Micah about ghosts or anything else," she reminded me. "Now she's sitting at home, freaked the hell out, because she thinks she heard the piano play by itself."

I laughed at that.

The look on my wife's face told me I probably shouldn't have.

"Oh, lighten up," I said almost with a sigh. "It was just a stupid video, for Christ's sake."

Marcy canopied her hand over her eyes in frustration then looked back at me. "Well, maybe so. But Jesus, if I can't just imagine this is gonna' get the shitstorm started again."

I apologized and we made up before going back inside the house to a mixture of glances ("You got in trouble, didn't you?" looks from the men, and "You had to go out there and set that bastard straight, didn't you?" looks from the women).

As we all sat there in my father-in-law's living room laughing and shooting the breeze, the thought of the piano playing by itself was so far out and almost comedic that it was quickly forgotten by both Marcy and me. What we didn't know was that Courtney really had heard what she was afraid she had heard, and it would be looked back on years later as the first real sign of what was to come.