House Haunted by Al Sarrantonio

head not quite aligned with his blood-washed neck on which it rested. Mr. and Mrs. Harvey sat on chairs directly under the light; they had been bound together back to back, their blue-strangled faces staring sightlessly around the world at one another, tongues licking out for air that wasn't theirs. Worst of all was his mother. She was on top of a dining table, laid out neatly like a waked corpse, with three screwdrivers set into her body in a line down her chest; her hand was frozen around the sunken handle of one, vainly trying to remove it. Her mouth was an open cry, eyes pleading unseeing with the ceiling.
    â€œNo, God, no!”
    Ricky fell to his knees, burying his head in his arms. The hand on his shoulder bowed him to the floor, and he lay there, weeping.
    Suddenly, the grip on his shoulder was gone.
    Ricky looked up, and the storage area was empty, save for an open box of discarded magazines supporting the leaning handle of a sweep broom.
    Ricky slowly got to his feet. He was shivering, unable to drive what he had seen from his mind.
    From near the stairs, the voice that had whispered came to him. It didn't whisper now. There was nothing subtle about it.
    â€œGo to New York, Ricky,” the voice said. It was a woman's voice. “If you don't, I'll bring you down here again, and what you see will be real. Do you believe me?”
    â€œYes.” He shivered as if he were naked in the snow.
    â€œMaybe you'll even dance on Broadway. Would you like that, Ricky?”
    Ricky did not answer. Tears pressed at the corners of his eyes. His mouth worked a silent prayer.
    From upstairs, he heard his voice singing “Redemption Song.” He heard the muffled taps of his feet, dancing a routine he had created in the style of Ben Vereen.
    â€œLeave, Ricky.” The voice sounded amused. Upstairs, the singing and dancing ceased.
    All was quiet.
    Ricky took the stairs two at a time. Through the back door it seemed the day was bright again, but when he pulled it open, he saw that the sky was black overcast. There was a deft cut of lightning, followed by the deep booming sound of thunder, its mate. The drops of rain were large and insistent, cold against the skin.
    He ran to his bike, ramming it into life, and fled. As he passed the front of Chambers House he saw that the green shutter in the dining room window was thrown wide open.
    He sobbed, his crying mixing with cloud-tears of rain.
    He bounced down the driveway and into the road, nearly skidding into a pink Hamilton-bound bus as he made his too-quick turn. The rain and thunder made a sound, but it was not loud enough to block out what he heard behind him: his own voice singing, and a laughing voice that said, “Boo.”

5. THE ASSISTANT
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    For the first time, Gary hit traffic on the way down. He was mildly annoyed, because the Taconic State Parkway was usually one of the least traveled and most pleasant roads in New York. But today, at the start of a chilly, overcast end-of-summer weekend, which no one but the diehards would be spending at their upstate retreats—and they'd be going the other way, anyway—he'd hit a slow-moving crawl and now, suddenly, a complete backup.
    He put up with it, jamming a Miles Davis tape into the deck of the old Datsun. Twenty minutes later his patience was rewarded and annoyance abated when he passed the remains of an accident by the turnoff for the Saw Mill River Parkway. It looked like some idiot in a Volkswagen had tried to make the turnoff from the left lane. He'd been punished by having the right side of his bug torn off by a white Cadillac. The Caddy must have been moving; it looked relatively unharmed, but the Volkswagen had been totaled. From the appearance of the windshield on the passenger side and the red-speckled glass swept onto the shoulder of the highway, they'd needed an ambulance, if not a meat wagon.
    Gary glanced idly into the interior of the bug as he rubbernecked by, but whatever had been