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“You wanna go ghost hunting, dude?”
Jawn looked up from his phone and raised an eyebrow. “What?”
“You heard me,” said Awsten, sitting up from where he was lying on his bed. “I heard there's this abandoned mansion a half hour drive from here that's like super haunted.”
“And let me guess, you've wanted to visit it for weeks.”
“Well duh.” Awsten stood up. “You didn’t answer the question, though.”
Jawn rolled his eyes. “Do you wanna go right now or what?”
“Well, not this second, no. It's like six PM, dude, everybody knows ghosts only appear after midnight. But I do want to go tonight and don't try to come up with any excuses, I know you're free.”
“It sounds like I don’t have a choice in the matter, so I might as well,” said Jawn, looking back down at his phone.
Awsten grinned brightly. “Fuck yeah! You're the best!” he shouted enthusiastically. He really had been wanting to go for a while, just, well, not by himself. A ghost was still a ghost, and when it comes to them, rule number one is that you never go alone. Rule number two is... Honestly he just came up with that, but it never goes well when someone goes to haunted places alone in horror movies, so it might as well be an actual rule.
He spent the rest of the evening pacing around his room, to the annoyance of Jawn. But Awsten was coming up with solutions to worst-case scenarios, it was important! He'd never actually seen a ghost before, but there were some really good tips on the forums he'd been looking through. Around eleven they started packing things. They didn’t need too much, just some flashlights, and two bottles of water. And a bag of salt, just in case. Awsten kinda wished he'd bought one of those spirit radio things, but he did at least manage to convince Jawn to take one of his cameras. By the time the clock hit 11:30 they were on their way.
By the time the place came into view, Awsten was nearly vibrating out of his skin. He was starting to get nervous. The mansion didn’t look like those overly creepy, commercial haunted buildings, it was just a big, slightly worn down house, but the darkness surrounding it still made it seem intimidating. The closest neighbors were around two miles away, and the only things illuminating their surroundings were their car's headlights. They parked it in the spacious driveway.
“Are you sure it's a good idea to park out in the open like this? Aren't we technically trespassing?” asked Jawn.
Awsten scoffed. “Come on, nobody’s gonna call the cops on us out here.” He got out of the car and got their bags from the backseat, throwing one of them to his friend.
“I can’t believe I agreed to this,” grumbled Jawn, scanning the house with his eyes.
Awsten walked up beside him and bumped his shoulder against his friend's. “Don’t be such a wuss, dude. I've got a good feeling about this.” With that he turned his flashlight on and walked towards the front door, Jawn following closely behind. The hinges creaked hauntingly as he pushed it open.
The front room was more spacious than Awsten had expected. And also a whole lot more empty. It seemed like the last owners had taken most of their belongings with them. The broken chandelier hanging from the tall ceiling and the thick layer of dust covering everything made it all the more eerie.
“Woah… This place looks so much bigger on the inside,” said Jawn as he looked around the room. “So, what do we do now? Do we split up?”
Awsten looked at him disbelievingly. “Dude, have you ever seen a horror movie? There's no way we're splitting up. C'mon, follow me!” He took a breath of the stale, musty air and made his way deeper into the dark house.
The building was silent sans the sound of their steps. Awsten could make out footprints on the dirty floor – presumably from earlier visitors. The mansion really wasn’t that big, just two floors, but, well, it was still a mansion, and the darkness didn’t exactly make it easier to navigate. Awsten felt like he was walking by the same old coffee table for the fourth time when he felt a hand on his shoulder. His heart stopped for a second, but it was just Jawn.
“Jesus Christ, Jawn, you scared the shit out of me!” he whisper-yelled.
Jawn ducked his head. “Sorry, it's just… I think we're lost. I've definitely seen this room before. And I don’t know about you, but I haven’t seen any ghosts yet.”
Awsten crossed his arms. “Well maybe they're shy, I don’t know! We've only been here, what, fifteen minutes?”
“Socially awkward ghosts?” Jawn scoffed. “Yeah, sure.”
“Hey, if you were dead, would you wanna hang out with living people? I don’t think so. Let's just keep walking around, I'm sure we'll find something eventually.” With that Awsten took off without waiting for an answer.
A little while later, as he entered something that seemed like it had been previously used as a bedroom, his flashlight started flickering. Shit, he probably should have brought extra batteries. Maybe Jawn had some on him, having brought a camera as well.
“Hey, you got any double A batteries on you?” he said behind his shoulder. But he didn’t get an answer. He turned around to look back at the corridor he had come from. It was empty. “Son of a bitch!” he swore under his breath. That asshole probably thought he had a better sense of direction and went off on his own.
Just as he finished that thought his flashlight gave one last dying flicker as it died completely. Great. He walked back out of the room into the hallway, which was completely shrouded in darkness. He shivered. Had it been this cold the whole time?
“Jawn?” he shouted. “Where the hell are you? I told you we should stay together!” He started trudging down the corridor, rubbing his arms. Maybe it was just the sudden lack of light, but it felt like the house was suddenly freezing. The building was eerily quiet. That is until he let out a yelp as he bumped into something and promptly fell on his ass. Except that something had also made a sound. Awsten breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed like the temperature had gone back to normal as well, so it must have been his mind playing tricks on him.
“God, Jawn, I thought you'd bailed on me, dude.”
“Uhh,” replied a voice. “I don’t think I'm the person you think I am.”
Awsten’s breath hitched. “Oh.” He stood back up, his thoughts racing. Who the hell was this guy? Holy crap, was he a ghost? Awsten couldn't really see him beyond a basic outline, so he might as well be.
The guy cleared his throat. “Sorry, um, for knocking you over, by the way. I'm Otto. I was looking for my friend, Geoff.”
Awsten raised his eyebrows. “In total darkness?”
The guy, Otto apparently, seemed to rub the back of his neck. “Yeah, it's… I lost a bet, and I had to spend half an hour here without any lights. Geoff offered to come with me, but now I can’t find him.”
Awsten found that story oddly endearing. “Oh. I thought you were one of the ghosts for a second there,” he blurted out.
Otto chuckled. “That’s fair. I kinda thought the same thing about you, honestly.”
Awsten laughed. “Nah, I'm just a regular old human. Oh, and I'm Awsten, by the way.”
“Oh, really? A guy with a name like that went missing her a few years ago, are you sure you're not a ghost?” Otto's tone was teasing.
Awsten ran a hand through his hair. “I'm pretty sure I'd know if I were dead. Besides, if I became a ghost, I wouldn’t be so chill about it. Well, I think so, anyway.” He took a deep breath. “Getting back to the more important stuff, we should stick together and find our friends, then get the hell outta here. I thought this would be fun, but I've been feeling off about this place for a while now.”
“Yeah, that sounds like a great idea. Way too many people have died here already, I really don't wanna be the next one. We should try to get back to the entrance, and if they’re not there we at least have a starting point,” said Otto thoughtfully.
Awsten let out an affirming hum, but his thoughts were stuck on what Otto had said about dead people. Was it common knowledge? Well, you'd assume that if a house was haunted people probably died there, but was it really that many? Before he could dwell on it any more, he was snapped out of his thoughts by a warm hand touching his arm. He jerked away instinctively.
“Oh, um. Sorry!” Otto said. “I should have warned you about that, I just thought it'd be better to make sure we didn’t get separated, but if you're uncomfortable with it it's-“ Before Otto could finish, Awsten grabbed his hand, and thanked the universe that it was so dark, because he definitely wouldn’t have been able to hide his blush.
“Are you always this nervous, dude?” he asked in a tone he hoped sounded confident.
“No, only when I'm in haunted houses with strangers. Also, your hand is so cold, what the hell?”
Awsten shrugged. “Bad circulation, probably. Come on, let's get going!” With that, he started walking in what he hoped was the right direction, dragging Otto behind him. He must have dropped his dead flashlight, because he definitely would have felt it in his free hand otherwise, but there was no way he was going back for it now.
“So, do you know where we're going?” Otto asked suddenly.
“Nope! But do you have any better guesses?”
Awsten heard Otto let out a resigned sigh. So, he had a point, then. They walked next to each other, asking small steps to make sure they didn’t trip on anything. The room at the end of the hallway seemed somewhat brighter, probably benefitting from the presence of windows, so that seemed like their best bet.
Awsten felt uneasy in their brief period of silence. “So, what did you mean when you said a lot of people died here? Is there like a specific story to this place?”
“Oh, you didn’t know?” Otto sounded surprised. “This one guy suddenly died here about two years ago when he was exploring, and ever since then a bunch of other people who came here started getting killed, too.”
Awsten drew his eyebrows together. “Shit, I wouldn’t have come here if I knew that. Also, what kind of friends send you to a place where you could literally die for a bet? No offense, dude, but you need better friends.”
Otto chuckled. “What, like you?”
Awsten scratched the back of his neck, his face heating up again. “I uh, I don’t know, maybe?” He honestly didn’t know what it was about this guy that kept making him so flustered. Maybe it was all the adrenaline. Yeah, sure, he'll blame it on that.
As they finally reached the brighter area, Awsten couldn’t keep his curiosity at bay, so he turned his head to look at Otto, only to find him looking right back at him. They held eye contact for a fraction of second, then Otto quickly looked down, embarrassed at having been caught staring. In the limited light, Awsten could see chin-length dark, curly hair, and – yep. Awsten was definitely holding hands with a cute guy. Who knew he could meet new people at haunted houses? He should definitely ask him out once they got out of here. Otto peeked back at his, and Awsten smiled in return.
“Like what you see?” he asked teasingly.
“Maybe…” replied Otto shyly.
The moment was broken by a voice coming from somewhere nearby.
“Otto? Are you okay? I told you if you’re not back when time is up, I'm looking for you!” Ah, that's gotta be Otto's friend, Geoff, if Awsten remembered correctly.
Otto didn’t waste any time in shouting back. “Hey, I'm fine! I'm here in the…” he looked around the room to take in his surroundings. “In the salon!”
In less than a minute a guy appeared in one of the doorways, flashlight in hand. “Thank god, I thought – oh. Hello?” Right. He didn’t know about Awsten.
“Oh, um, yeah. I found someone. I bumped into him in the dark. Wait, actually.” Otto turned to Awsten. “Why didn’t you have a light with you?”
“My flashlight burned out. And then I dropped it when we met.”
Geoff furrowed his brows. “So, that's why you were late?” he asked.
Otto rubbed the back of his neck. “I… May have gotten lost.”
Geoff sighed. “I knew you should have memorized the layout better! I knew I would have been better off going lightless.” Wait, what?
“Uhh, didn’t you come here because of a bet?” asked Awsten, turning towards Otto.
Otto laughed awkwardly. “Well, actually that was a cover story of sorts. It's just. Kind of embarrassing, but we're technically amateur paranormal investigators.”
“What? That’s not embarrassing at all, I think that’s really cool!” Awsten said excitedly.
Geoff cleared his throat. “Sorry to cut this short, but we've got more important stuff to worry about. The front door and the windows are locked.” Well, that didn’t sound good.
“Shit, this ghost's gotta be really strong if it can lock down the whole building,” swore Otto.
“I haven’t checked the second floor, maybe those will open. It's not that high up and if I remember right there are bushes on all sides.”
“Guys, wait a second!” Awsten said. “Can one of you explain what the hell is going on?”
Otto nodded. “Sorry! Ghosts can sometimes lock exits if they don’t want you to leave. This one seems to be really angry for some reason, and that makes it really powerful.”
“Actually, we a have a theory about what’s happening,” Geoff continued. “The first guy who died two years ago was probably killed in an accident, falling floorboards, tripping on the stairs, something like that. The house was rumored to be haunted before that too, and we think he holds resentment towards ghost hunting, because that's what got him dead.”
“This is fascinating and all, but we really should look for my friend Jawn before we find a way out.” Awsten said. He really would have found the story interesting if he wasn’t worried about his best friend being alone in a house where something could literally kill him.
Geoff frowned. “Sorry to break it to you, but I don’t think there's anyone else in here. We thought we were alone when we arrived, and I don’t know how you got here, because there weren't any vehicles outside.
Now Awsten was confused. “What? No, I parked right outside the house, on the driveway! And Jawn wouldn’t have just bailed on me like that! When did you guys even get here?”
“A little after midnight, but… Wait, hold on!” Geoff suddenly shone his light right on Awsten's face. Awsten covered his eyes with his arm.
“Dude, what the hell!” he complained. But Geoff seemed distracted.
“Is your name Awsten, by any chance? Spelled with a W?” he asked, his voice oddly shaky.
Awsten looked at him suspiciously. “Umm, yeah? How did you know that?”
Geoff glanced at Otto, who was staring at Awsten with wide eyes, like he had seen a ghost. Now Awsten was really starting to worry.
“What? What is it? Please, just tell me what the hell is going on!”
Otto spoke up softly. “Awsten… Don't take this the wrong way, but we're pretty sure you’re dead.”
“Wh- no fucking way, don’t be ridiculous!” Awsten shouted. No, that’s- He couldn’t be, he was still… Here barely even had time to do anything with his life, it couldn’t just be- No, no way in hell!
“Awsten, just calm down, please!” he heard someone say.
“Calm down? Calm down?! How do you expect me to calm down when you’re telling me that I’m-“
Awsten was really starting to get bored now. This place was a total joke. They were walking down some bland hallway, looking inside the rooms. Suddenly, as Awsten opened up one of the doors, Jawn froze.
“What is it?” asked Awsten.
Jawn's eyebrows were drawn together. “I don’t know, it's just, this room's giving me a weird vibe. There's no way I'm going in there!”
Awsten rolled his eyes. “Well I am. Stay out if you want, just don’t wander too far.” With that he pushed the handle down and went inside.
He let out a disappointed sigh as he took in the surroundings. It was just like all of the other rooms. But then, something caught his eye. It was in one of the corners, and it reflected the light he had shone on it. He walked closer to pick it up. It was a silver locket. Now this was something. Not much, but better than nothing. It took a few tries, but he managed to pry it open. He immediately regretted it. Inside was a picture of a young woman, her face seemingly melted. Awsten felt his stomach fill with a strange sense of dread. He dropped it almost immediately, and it landed on the floor with a muted clink. He backed away from it slowly. Just looking at it made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. But just as he crossed over the threshold of the room, he changed his mind. He should probably close it and hide it somewhere so no one else can make the same mistake.
But just as he stepped back inside the room, which now that he thought about it kind of looked like a bedroom, his flashlight started flickering. Shit, great timing. He probably should have brought extra batteries. But maybe Jawn had some on him.
“Hey, you got any double A batteries on you?” he said behind his shoulder. But he didn’t get an answer. He turned around to look back at the corridor he had come from. It was empty. “Son of a bitch!” he swore under his breath. That asshole probably felt the weird energy of the locket and bailed.
Just as he finished that thought his flashlight gave one last dying flicker as it died completely. Great. He walked back out of the room into the hallway, which was completely shrouded in darkness. He shivered. Had it been this cold the whole time?
“Jawn?” he shouted. “Where the hell are you? I told you we should stay together!” He started trudging down the corridor, rubbing his arms. Maybe it was just the sudden lack of light, but it felt like the house was suddenly freezing. The building was eerily quiet. And then, suddenly, it wasn’t. He heard an ear-piercing shriek behind him, and the last the saw before a hand was shoved inside his chest was a pair of blood red eyes.
“Oh god. I remember,” Awsten said, his voice shaking. “I remember what happened.”
Otto stepped closer to him, and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
Awsten covered Otto's hand with his own and gave him a sad smile.
“But that throws a spanner in our theory,” said Geoff suddenly. Otto looked at him disapprovingly.
“Come on, man, you really think that's the more important thing here? How would you feel if you found out you've been dead two years?”
Geoff rubbed at the back of his neck. “Sorry, it's just… If it's not him that's been killing all those people, then who is? At least, I'm assuming it's not you.” He looked at Awsten.
Awsten shrugged. “I’m not exactly feeling bloodthirsty, so I don’t think so. But I think I do know what it is.”
That seemed to have piqued both the guys' interest. They both stared at Awsten intently.
“When I was here, I found this fucked-up looking locket. The picture in it was all distorted and I d… I died right after I opened it.” He drew his eyebrows together. “Wait, actually, now that I think about it, when I met Otto, it was like… The same thing happened as right before the ghost-demon-whatever killed me, except instead of that I ran into Otto. That's weird, right?”
Geoff looked deep in thought for a few seconds, then his eyes lit up in revelation. “I think you might have been a death echo.”
Awsten looked at him questioningly. “What’s that?”
“A death echo is a ghost that's stuck replaying its own death over and over again,” explained Otto. “I guess that could be it, it would explain why Awsten didn’t remember dying, but was running into me really enough to snap him out of it? It's really hard to get death echoes out of their loop.”
Awsten chuckled to himself quietly. Maybe he just saw a guy so hot it rebooted his brain. Suddenly Otto was looking at him with wide eyes, and Geoff snorted. Awsten blushed. “Did I say that out loud?”
Otto nodded, flustered. Great. Awsten was such a dumbass. Geoff cleared his throat.
“So, if opening the locket set this thing free, maybe closing it will lock it away again,” he said.
Awsten sighed. “I’ll do it. This whole thing started with me, it's also gotta be me who ends it. Besides, I'm the only one not at risk of dying.”
Geoff squinted at him. “Are you sure? I mean, as a ghost, can you even touch things?”
Otto answered him before Awsten could. “He probably can, I mean, he seems mostly corporeal. I held his hand earlier, and I hadn’t noticed anything was off.”
Geoff raised an eyebrow, smirking. “Why did you hold his hand?” he asked.
Otto looked down at his shoes bashfully. “It was dark, okay?”
“Don’t we have more important things to do than talk about this? Like, oh I don’t know, getting rid of the homicidal ghost?” Awsten said exasperatedly, not wanting to hear any more of that conversation. His ears were burning already.
Geoff gave in surprisingly easily. “Alright, you're right. So, that's it then?”
Awsten nodded. “Yeah. I'll go, I'll close that thing and hide it somewhere, and if it doesn’t work, we'll figure something else out.”
“Okay. Good luck then!” said Geoff, trying, and failing, to sound reassuring.
“Hey,” said Otto suddenly, looking into Awsten's eyes and smiling in a way that made butterflies take off in Awsten's stomach. “Thank you.”
“Yeah, it's… You're welcome,” Awsten replied.
He took a deep breath. Okay, he could do this. It's not like he could die twice, right? Right? He turned towards the hallway, but then changed his mind. Who knew what the hell would happen once he leaves the safety of this room, and hell, you only live… Actually that doesn’t really apply to his situation. But fuck it anyway. He turned back around, and after taking a step closer to Otto he cupped his face with both of his hands and pulled him into a kiss. Otto let out a surprised yelp, but seemed to quickly realize what was happening, and started kissing Awsten back. They both pulled away after only a couple seconds.
“If I was still alive, I'd totally ask you out right now,” Awsten said suddenly.
Otto chuckled. “If you did, I'd totally say yes.”
Awsten grinned back at him, and before he could do anything dumb, like kiss Otto again, he booted towards the hallway. The corridor was just as dark as the previous time. He didn’t have to remember which room the locket was in, he could feel it, like a magnet pulling him to the right place. When he got to the right door, he took a deep breath. Okay, he could do this. Before he has time to think more about it, he washed in, locked up the open locket and snapped it shut. He looked around quickly, and seeing a broken lane of the room's window, he threw it out, and watched as it landed in the middle of a large bush. He immediately felt lighter. Huh, so… That was it. Kind of anticlimactic, but life never did work like horror movies. He decided to head back to Geoff and Otto.
But when he got back to the salon, it was empty.
Awsten groaned. Great, these assholes just left him there. He rolled his eyes and headed towards the exit. This house may not actually be haunted, but it was still creepy. Once he got out, he saw all three of his friends standing by one of the cars, Jawn leaning against it. “You guys are such dicks!” he shouted. They all burst out laughing. Awsten crossed his arms as he approached them. “You were supposed to be waiting for me, and then me and Otto would have our big, romantic reunion!” When he got to the car, Otto put his arm around Awsten's shoulder.
Geoff sighed. “Sorry, but that place was creepy as hell, I wasn’t gonna stay there any longer than I had to. And Otto was going to go back after he walked me out, but you finished too quick. I can’t believe I even let you guys talk me into taking part in your weird role-play thing.”
Otto pressed a kiss to Awsten's cheek. “We can still have our ‘big, romantic reunion' here, sweetheart.”
Awsten huffed, leaning his head on his boyfriend's shoulder. “It’s just not the same.”
Otto started running his fingers through Awsten's hair, which was really unfairly nice and distracting in Awsten's opinion. “We’ll make up for it when we get home, don’t worry,” he said with a smirk.
Jawn groaned. “You guys are so gross and sappy.”
“You should have seen them in character, it was even worse than usual. When they kissed it looked like a scene straight out of some terrible rom-com,” said Geoff.
Awsten rolled his eyes. “I don’t see what's so bad about me being in love with my boyfriend. Besides, at least I stayed fully in character the whole time unlike a certain someone. You were all pissy the whole time and you didn’t even mention why Otto didn’t have a flashlight! The whole point was that the ghost only manifested in total darkness!”
Geoff took a deep breath. “I know, Awsten. We all know that. Including you.”
“Well, yeah, I know, but character-me didn’t. Do you even know how role-play works?” Awsten couldn’t help but giggle as he said that.
Geoff shook his head fondly. “I just have no idea what you find so fun about this. But honestly, as long as I don’t have to see what happens afterwards… I guess if you need extra characters again, I can help out. We should get going, though. I'm going with Jawn because I don’t want to listen to either of you complain about how much you miss each other for thirty minutes straight.” With that he walked away towards the other car, parked by one of the trees. Jawn just shrugged and he went after him.
“I love you too, Geoff!” Awsten shouted his way.
Otto chuckled. “Leave him alone, you know how grumpy he gets when he's tired.”
“I do, I just love fucking with him.” Awsten lifted his head to look at his boyfriend. He started twirling a strand of Otto's hair. “I liked this one a lot, you played the flustered ghost hunter well.”
Otto grinned, pecking Awsten on the lips briefly. “Glad you enjoyed my performance. And I gotta agree, this one was good, I liked the ambiance of the place. Still not as good as the sorcerer one.” He winked.
“Oh yeah, that one was memorable alright.” Awsten yawned. He hadn’t even noticed how sleepy he was. “Come on, let's go home now, I'm fucking exhausted.”
Otto kissed him one more time. “That sounds like an excellent idea.”