Liam's Ghost Story

Liam's Ghost Story (Chapter 7)

Feet moving of their own accord, Liam took the stairs two at a time.

Pushing through the door at the top of the stairs, Liam entered the master bedroom to find Mr. Barnbies.

The man was full in the grip of insanity now, his shoulders shaking with silent laughter and his eyes squinted in concentration. Above his head was a canister of gasoline, upturned and dumping upon the wisps of his hair, dripping down his craggy old face and onto the ground. The room was a mess of detritus, newspapers were stacked in neat piles four feet high, and dusty old tomes covered every available space on the desk, bed, and dresser in the bedroom.

Liam's eyes flicked over the mess, taking in every detail. Tabloids and legitimate newspapers appeared in equal numbers, but they all had headlines that were similar. Ghost Haunts Paper mill. Strange Sightings Around Former Orphanage. Bat-Boy Captured Again! Everything in the room reeked of the occult and spiritualism. Even the old books on the bed and floor were about the same topics. Liam caught a glimpse of fiction by Clive Barker and H.P. Lovecraft were in abundance, as was fiction dressed up as non-fiction, like the Necronomicon and The Magical Revival. It appeared that Barnbies had been going crazy by degrees for some time now if we was collecting and reading this garbage. Liam looked up from the junk around the room and into the rheumy crazed eyes of Barnbies.

"She wants me so bad? Comes to my house? Comes to my dreams?" The old man giggled and dropped the canister as Liam paused, noticing the pool of gasoline already surrounding the man on the floor. The liquid had soaked into the books and newspapers on the floor near the old man, and the small room stank of petrol.

Liam looked up at the man, as he pulled out a box of matches. From here, fifteen feet away, there was no way he could get to Barnbies without trying to wrestle the old man in a pool of flammable liquid. With matches. In a very flammable room. That was not at the top of his list of things to do with the crazy man who had almost shot him moments before.

He could try to push against Barnbies mind, but he was genuinely afraid of what might happen if he did it again. Knowing now what he did, Liam was sure he would not be affected in the same way, he was confident he could hold back the insanity from flowing backwards to him, but any push on such a psychotic mind could have very unpredictable results.

Well, Liam reflected as he dashed forward, even if wrestling with the old man in a pool of flammable liquids was not at the top of his list, that did not mean it was not on the list somewhere.

Everything became crystal clear to Liam as he moved. His feet were rushing him forward, his right hand reaching out to get those matches before they could be struck against the rough outside surface of the box. Barnbies had the box halfway open and was reaching towards it with the other hand in slow motion. The petrol fumes were visible, rising up from the ground and from Barnbies clothes in noxious waves, a clear warning sign to anyone with enough sense to stay away.

And the girl. Somehow the girl was here too, clinging to Liam's right foot. Her cold dead hands rooted his foot to the ground, her blazing blue eyes locked on Mr. Barnbies. Somehow she had come with Liam, piggybacking on his mind, on his intent. She was not supposed to be able to get far from her house, the place where she had died. But here she was, using Liam as a conduit to come here, to see Mr. Barnbies - or what was left of the broken husk of a mind that had once been Mr. Barnbies - and to hurt the man. Or, Liam thought as he noticed his foot not budging where the girl held it down, at least to prevent him from keeping Barnbies from hurting himself. He looked down at the girl as the scene around him unfolded in slow motion.

The cold orbs were not without emotion now, excitement and delight danced together in the terrifying reflections of the unblinking eyes. The thin lips were parted in a small smile of delight, with the teeth behind those lips stained a dark sooty black. She lay with her stomach on the ground, her face gleefully taking in the scene in front of her. Though she held Liam's foot, all of her attention was fixed on the scene Liam was desperately trying to stop.

Without his right foot moving, Liam's body lost its balance and he went down on his hands and knees. His neck craned and he looked up to see Mr. Barnbies pull a match from the box.

"No!" Liam shouted, knowing that no one here was listening, but desperate to do anything to stop the man from doing what he was doing. "Don't listen to her!"

"She wants me to burn? She wants me to burn!" Barnbies shouted gleefully, eyes focused on the match as he brought it to the rough side of the box. "The fire will stop her! Stop the dreams! Stop the pain!"

The girl's smile widened and she nodded to Barnbies, her eyes widening in ecstasy.

Liam was not sure if Barnbies could see the girl, but the man nodded himself and struck the match.

Unlike the movies, Mr. Barnbies did not have to drop the match to ignite the gasoline, the fumes exploded immediately on contact with the match flame. Had Liam been standing, he would have been blown off of his feet. There was no time for final words or even screaming, Barnbies was consumed by the blaze hungrily , quickly, and mercilessly.

The girl was gone.

Liam rolled over and scrambled down the stairs. He pulled the wall up in his mind to separate the horror he just witnessed from the rest of his thoughts. The barrier should also serve to sever whatever link the shade of the dead girl had looped over him. Of course he would have to deal with both the horror and the girl later, but for now, he had to keep his rationality.

His left hand reached into his pocket and pulled out the gun cylinder. Quickly and efficiently, Liam cleaned the cylinder of any possible fingerprints and dropped in on the ground. He reached down and wiped to gun completely in a matter of seconds to do the same thing. Standing, he walked quickly to the back door of the house and opened it using his sleeve to escape into the back yard.

The blaze upstairs was dumping greasy smoke into the sky, painting the already grey openness with a spreading black stain. Knowing what was burning only made the smoke darker and more sinister. Fat snowflakes falling onto the house did nothing to stop the flames licking up from the roof of the late Mr. Barnbies home.

Liam turned and pulled up his hood before expertly leaping over the back fence into a neighbor's yard.

He had work to do. Again.