Page 79 of The Devil and His Ghost

“My hands need a little break,” Xander announced to the crowd, and his voice drew closer as he spoke. “But this is fun. What if we all sat here and did something else? Maybe a little story telling?”

I glanced up as Xander sat beside me. He propped up one knee and rested his forearm across it while the other flexed where it rested near my hip.

“Stories?”

“I like stories.”

“What kind of stories?”

The lively chatter among the spirits was a stark contrast to our time here at Mountview so far. If I’d known music would draw the ghosts out of hiding, I would’ve had Xander perform for us a lot sooner. Their conversation was also a good distraction from what beat at my twisted heart.

“I’ve got a story.”

Everyone’s attention zeroed in on the janitor. He floated in the air and settled near Xander’s guzheng like he was now our main stage event. His neck was still deformed, bent at a horrible angle. Despite being nearly transparent, redness rimmed and clouded his eyes like the blood vessels had busted as he died.

He stared at me for a beat longer than normal. “I remember you. You were smaller before. Little. He told us to stay away from you. ‘Fraid we’d ask you for help.”

“Excuse me?” I questioned with a raised brow.

“The story!” a spirit complained.

“Tell your story!”

The shouts from the crowd made the man shake his contorted head, clearing it of the daze he’d fallen into. His ramblings became forgotten, and he cracked a lopsided smile. “My story. Right. It’s a ghost story. You guys might know it. It’s about the Monster of Mountview.”

Some of the spirits gathered around the roof grew agitated upon hearing that name, and they vanished back to wherever they typically hid. Maria remained in my lap, but she grew tense.

I held her closer and told her softly, “I’ve got you. No monsters will get you while I’m here.”

She snuggled closer and pressed her face into my chest as though to shield her eyes from anything scary that could pop out.

I chanced a look at Xander. He appeared even more tired now as he watched me hold Maria protectively. I wasn’t sure what was going through his head, but I also didn’t have time to figure it out. I refocused on the janitor as he began his eerie tale.

“Patients. Doctors. Nurses,” the dead older gentleman spoke slowly, letting his eyes roam across his audience of phantoms, a human, and a demon. “That’s not all that roams these halls. You may hear or see her from time to time. Maybe it’s when you’re about to drift to sleep but feel something playing with your hair at your back. Maybe it’s when you’re sitting alone in your room and think you see a figure watching you from the dark corner, only to find no one there when you look. Maybe you’ve seen her standing behind you in the mirror but whip around to discover you’re all alone in that big, quiet bathroom. But you’re never alone. No. She’s there, alright. The Monster of Mountview.”

The roaming ghosts floating or standing around the rooftop grew restless. Some started to subconsciously drift higher while others sank into the floor of the roof like it was a blanket they could hide behind as they listened to the janitor.

“I saw her from time to time. Still do,” the man continued. “Even before I ended up like this.” He gestured to his bent neck. “She’s the reason I’m like this, you know. I couldn’t take it. Her standing at the end of the hallway while I mopped during the nightshift or crawling along the ceiling with her dark hair hanging down like black cobwebs that tickled me as I walked under them.”

His gaze suddenly stared into the distance with some horrified memory. “Her eyes. Those eyes were what really frightened me. They were the size of my fist and totally black. I knew they would follow me for all of eternity if I didn’t end things. I didn’t want her to turn me into a madman like the patients I cleaned up after. So I hung myself to make her leave me alone, only … I can’t ever escape her now. She’s always there, watching me from the pitch black doorway, whispering things I can’t understand, twitching like she wants to reach out and grab me. She’s even here now.”

The ghosts around us yelped in alarm and quickly fizzled away to return to their hiding spots in the building. I couldn’t even be disappointed, because my own heart had begun to race while fear trickled free in my veins.

Swallowing hard, I asked, “Do you know who the Monster of Mountview is or where she came from?”

The janitor’s face stretched into a wide smile, but there was nothing friendly behind that grin. “She’s his pet. The master’s. She does his dirty work like we all do, but she actually likes it.”

“Who?” Xander demanded. He looked a little crazed himself as he narrowed his eyes on the ghostly janitor. A seriousness had replaced the lethargy that had previously bracketed his expression. “Who is the master?”

The janitor wobbled and looked around wildly with shaking shoulders. “I’d push my mop bucket, but even when I stopped moving, I’d still hear the squeak of wheels coming closer. It was a wheelchair rolling down the hall with no patient in the seat, nor anyone pushing it. No. No one was there, but I knew. I knew it was her trying to scare me. That’s what she does. It’s what we all do now. She finds what you’re afraid of and makes it real. She toys with you. She and Master both do.”

“Who is the master?” Xander implored between gritted teeth.

“She’s here. Ask her. Master will be back soon, too. I need to get back before she comes for me again. I don’t like it when she chases after me.”

With a single step forward, the janitor vanished into thin air. The handful of ghosts that had remained for the last of his deranged speech followed after him. Only Catsper and Maria remained. The little girl clung to me frightfully, and I realized with a horrible pang that I shouldn’t have let her listen to that man’s nonsense.

But it wasn’t nonsense. It wasn’t the ramblings of a lunatic or a delirious ghost too far gone from reality.