Chapter 3
“Geez, Mom, I thought you would have been happier for me.”
Jody Watts sat by the open window in the living room of her apartment, her feet on the sill so the bloodred nail polish she’d just applied to her toenails could dry in the breeze.
She didn’t like talking on the phone all that much, and especially didn’t like answering the phone—it brought back too many painful memories—but one of the conditions of her moving out to Los Angeles was that she call her folks each week whether she wanted to or not. So far she’d never missed a call, although the calls were getting shorter and shorter.
“I am happy for you, dear, it’s just that… I don’t know, it sounds a little dangerous to me.”
“It sounds dangerous,” Jody said, dabbing some color onto a spot on her big toe she’d missed earlier. “But it’s a television show, Mom. There’s going to be all sorts of special effects to scare us and make us scream, but it’s all just a bit of harmless fun.”
“You’re going to be spending a night in a haunted house, right?”
“Yes.”
“A real haunted house, one that’s full of ghosts and spirits…” Jody’s mom’s voice trailed off, but her words were obviously intended as a question.
“That’s what the producers said, but I don’t know where the house is yet, or why it’s haunted.”
The phone line was silent, but Jody could almost feel her mother shaking her head thousands of miles away. “Oh, I don’t like the sound of that at all.”
“I’ve seen ghosts before,” Jody said, knowing she was starting to grasp at straws.
“My grandfather was a kind and gentle man,” her mother said. “He died quietly and naturally while doing something he loved… And because of that his ghost became a spirit guide, a guardian, a loving entity that would never harm anyone.”
“So, maybe this house will have the same kinds of ghosts.”
“Oh, Jody…”
The tone was unmistakable. It was the voice her mother had always used to show disappointment in her daughter. Hearing it now made Jody feel all of five years old again.
“…I’ve seen the kinds of movies those two boys make. They’re sick and depraved and I can only imagine that this television show of theirs will be just as obscene. If the house they’ve found is truly haunted, then you can be sure it’ll be haunted by all manner of wraiths and poltergeists, demons and ghouls.”
“C’mon, Mom, do you really believe that?”
“Jody, honey… you can’t believe in the ghost of your great-grandfather and not believe in other kinds of ghosts. If one kind exists, then the other kinds exist as well.”
Jody was silent. Her mother was making too much sense—if such a thing could actually be said about ghosts and the supernatural—to argue the point. It was easier simply to ignore her concerns and keep on dreaming the American dream. “It’s a TV show, Mom. The producers aren’t going to let anything bad happen to the contestants, especially not when everything will wind up on videotape and there will be a record if anything goes wrong.”
“Did they make you sign a waiver?”
Jody felt as if she’d just been busted. “Yes.”
“So if something happens to you, you’ll have no recourse. You won’t be able to sue them, or anything.”
“What’s the worst thing that could happen?”
“Well, you could get killed for one…”
Jody felt a chill run down her spine.
“Or you could hurt yourself running through a dark house and wind up falling down a flight of stairs, paralyzed for life… Or you could be so traumatized by what happens to you inside the house that you might not be able to do any kind of meaningful work for the rest of your life… Or you could pee in your pants on national television, and no one would ever take you seriously again… Or you could—”
“All right, Mom! I get the picture.”
Now it was Jody’s mother’s turn to be silent.
“I’m sorry, honey,” she said at last. “I’m just worried about you is all. You’re still my baby, you know, and it’s my job to worry about you.”
Jody smiled at that. The chill down her spine was gone, replaced by a warm and fuzzy feeling all over her body. Still, the phone felt uncomfortable cradled between her ear and shoulder. “I’ve got to go, Mom.”
“Where are you off to?”
Jody let out a sigh. Thousands of miles between them and her mother was still treating her as if she lived at home. “They gave us all a bit of money as a sort of advance so I joined the health club down the street for thirty days. I’m working out every day so I’ll be ready for the show.”
“But you don’t need to lose any weight, dear.”
“Thanks, Mom,” Jody said, knowing her mother would say the same thing no matter how much she weighed. “But it’s not so much for that… I’m just thinking that since there will probably be other girls on the show who are prettier and sexier than me, I might as well be the strongest one in the group.”
“That’s my girl!” said a third voice.
“Dad?”
“He must have been listening in on the other phone,” said her mother.
“Damn right I was,” said Jody’s dad. “Now you listen, Jo… you be ready for whatever those Hollywood boys dish out.”
“I will, Dad.”
“And when you meet up with one of them ghosts, you kick it in the ass for me, you hear!”
“I hear, Dad.”
“Bye, hon,” said her mother.
“Bye, Mom.”
“And good luck,” her mother added as she hung up.
“Thanks, Mom,” Jody whispered under her breath as she put down the receiver, glad to be off the phone. “I just might need it.”