Fourth Post

I went back a few days later and tried to apologize to Kayla. I attempted to explain to her that I had acted in a flash of anger. I was stupid, and I hadn't been thinking about what I was doing.

'Yeah, right,' she said. 'I guess that's the excuse for why you're always treating me like crap, huh? You're not thinking clearly.' She laughed humourlessly.

Despite myself, I felt frustration bubbling up in me again. 'Kayla', I said, 'You've stolen my stuff, you've lied about me, you're constantly trying to embarrass and make fun of me. And you've never even tried to apologize for any of it.'

'And what, you haven't done worse?', she demanded. 'I got my bad side all from you! Nothing I've done to you even compares to the way you've treated me. I still remember when you used to break my toys when I offered to play with you. And when you would refuse to speak to me for weeks after I didn't do something you wanted. I remember when you yelled and screamed horrible things at me whenever you got upset about anything!'

'That was years ago,' I protested. 'I was a different person back then.'

'Yeah, really?', she snapped. 'It sure doesn't look like you've changed much.' She raised her hand and pointed at the bruise on her face, an ugly reminder of our recent fight.

I tried to reach out to her. 'I'm sorry, okay? I know I used to be hard to deal with. I guess maybe I haven't changed as much as I thought, too. It may not feel like it, but I'm really trying to be better - '

'Too little, and too late,' Kayla responded. 'Look, I don't care, anyway. You don't need to waste your time pretending to give a crap about me. Just stay away from me, okay? It'll be easier for both of us that way.'

I didn't know how to respond. My own sister didn't want me anywhere near her. The worst part was, the expression on her face was more scared than angry. I was all the more convinced of what an awful sister I must have been to make her look at me like that.

With everything else going wrong in my life, I dedicated more of my attention to continuing my investigation. It became just as much about an obsession with proving I wasn't crazy as it was to prove the house was haunted. I needed to show that this wasn't all in my head.

The only real lead I had to go on was David. After a little more asking around, I managed to find the mental asylum he'd stayed at since the murders happened.

My neighbour said David initially told the police that he was innocent. No one believed him, but I hoped maybe I could get an explanation out of him. The laughing my neighbour said he heard indicated someone, or perhaps something, visited David the night of the murders. The theory, as crazy as it was, led me to hope if I talked to David, I might get more insight into what was haunting the house - what I now suspected was haunting me.

Of course it wasn't likely there was any way I was going to be able to talk to David directly, considering where he was. I did try. I contacted the asylum and made up some story about being a relative who wanted to speak to him. The person I was on the phone with said David refused to talk to most people and it was highly unlikely he would say anything to me, but she did mention one man who came in to visit him from time to time, and I managed to get his name and number from her.

His name was Patrick. I called his number immediately after. I made up another lie and told him I was a journalist and I wanted to write an article about the murders and all the people who had gone crazy while living in the house. I was keen to hear David's side of the story, in particular, the part which led to him being taken to an asylum to begin with.

Initially I was hoping he might find me an opportunity to talk to David himself; even if it was as simple as a phone call between us. When I asked, He said it wasn't likely David would be willing to say anything to me but David told him everything he thought happened the night of the murders - before he confessed. I asked whether he would be willing to talk to me himself and discuss David's story.

Patrick seemed somewhat hesitant - and sceptical, but I must have been persuasive enough for him, because I managed to get him to meet me at a nearby coffee shop to talk.

I wasn't entirely sure how to dress like a journalist. I ended up borrowing some of my mom's business clothes and using those, since I couldn't find anything suitable enough in my wardrobe to wear. I was a convincing actor when I needed to be, so I thought I could probably fool him if I put my mind to it, and I already had a story prepared if he asked. I even went as far as to take the time to set up a simple website and asked a friend to answer a fake business number, if he requested further proof of my legitimacy.

Patrick arrived a little late, looking around self consciously before taking a seat opposite me.

I started the conversation by asking a couple of questions about David I already knew the answers to, to get the both of us comfortable. After that, I veered the discussion to what David claimed happened the night the house burned down.

He sighed. For a long moment, he stared down at the table before looking up at me again.

'Look, I'll tell you what I can, but you have to understand, it sounds crazy. Even to me. There's a reason why no one believed him, why he ended up in an asylum. I do think there could be some truth to some of his story, because -' he hesitated 'I was there when it all started.'

He added, 'for any of this to make sense I'm going to have to explain some things about David's past. It ties in closely with any explanation I offer you.'

I nodded, and he continued. 'There was a man who inserted himself into David's life around five years ago. Called himself Angel. He worked in marketing for some big company and made quite a lot of money. He was a charming, charismatic, and likable enough man. Perhaps a little too likable, but no one was going to complain about that. He helped David get out of a very difficult situation with his business after his main product range lost popularity to competitors. He rescued David's business from risk of bankruptcy. His actions weren't driven purely by generosity; he profited off the venture too, but Angel definitely did go out of his way to help David's business through a hard time. From outward appearances when I met him, Angel seemed like an all round good guy. The side he chose to show to the rest of us was nearly impossible not to like.'

'Terry, a good friend of David's, tried to warn David about Angel. Though I don't think it's possible to blame anyone for not believing him, his warning was at least a red flag, since there was no reason for him to lie to us about him.

He said some really crazy stuff. Said Angel was some kind of demon or something, that he had finally 'gotten rid of him, but now the demon was going to destroy his life, too.' Whatever the hell that meant. We thought he was insane, of course, but as it turned out, unfortunately, that wasn't entirely true.'

When it came down to it, David defended Angel - we all did. His charms influenced every one of us close to him. Terry ended up alienating himself and turning David against him, and after a while, he stopped talking to Terry entirely.

A hint of regret entered his voice. 'Angel took a liking to David's sister Franny very soon after meeting her. He quickly started getting close to her and her daughter, Bella. She had a daughter from a previous marriage, see. In the space of a few months, Franny, Angel and Franny's daughter became like a small family of their own. Within five months Franny and Angel were engaged. It was so fast. Too fast. A second red flag, no doubt.'

He ran a hand through his hair. 'The whole time I remember thinking there was something off putting about how Angel acted around them. Like it was fake, somehow. But like the other warning signs, I incorrectly dismissed it. I refused to believe it could mean anything. I just couldn't see Angel as capable of being evil.'

I, of course, had no idea what any of this had to do with David's murders. When I asked him about it, he responded briefly, 'don't worry, we'll get to that soon enough.'

Following this, he continued on with David's story: 'Over the next few months, everyone started to notice some changes in Bella. She had always struggled with issues; bipolar, anxiety, and a range of illnesses, but up until then, she'd shown incredible strength managing to stay on top of them. But after Angel got married to Franny, she slowly changed. She got more quiet. She didn't talk to her friends as much. She spent a lot of time with Angel, who showed the same concern everyone else did. He took her to see a new psychiatrist. It didn't help. In fact, Bella got worse. She started eating less, missed days at school, and was sick all the time. She went on medication, then went to the hospital. No one was able to help her. Bella became almost completely shut off from the outside world.'

'Things kept steadily going downhill with her, despite everyone reaching out to try to help. Within six months of Franny's marriage to Angel, Bella committed suicide.'

'That hit both David and Franny very hard. Franny was devastated. Angel acted equally horrified.

No one understood what had made Bella do it. There were a thousand theories to what caused her downward spiral. None of them seemed to fully add up.'

He paused to take a sip of water.

'Angel promised Franny he would get to the bottom of what caused her to take her own life. He took charge to find a proper explanation.'

'It was a mystery for the first few weeks. Until one day when Franny went to visit Bella's room looking for closure. She searched the room for a while, going through Bella's things. She eventually stumbled across her diary. She hoped it might provide some clues to what caused her downward spiral. And it did. She discovered a number of very disturbing entries written over the course of four or so months.'

'In them, Bella described Angel abusing her. She hadn't said anything because Angel promised her he would kill everyone she cared about if she tried to. Bella wrote she believed him because she knew she wasn't human, and he was capable of terrible things. She wrote that Angel would take her into a basement and there he sometimes transformed into something else, something from right out of her nightmares. She described it as some sort of insect-like creature, far larger than a human, with countless arms and legs. Most of the time he was with her, he remained in his 'human form', unless she made him angry enough.

She went through all kinds of hell every single day for hours, including physical torture and sexual abuse, staying silent the whole time out of fear. The journal described all of it. Extensively.'

When she found the diary and read what it said, Franny did a bit of investigating of her own, since Angel wasn't home and wouldn't be for a few hours. She found the hidden area of the basement Bella wrote about in her entries, and some of the remains of what appeared to be her clothes inside.

She didn't believe Angel was a literal monster, but she did believe he was the equivalent of one, after these discoveries.

She went straight to the police and then to talk to David. She spent the whole night at his house crying as she told him everything. It was just the two of them there, because his wife Tracy was out on a work trip.

David spent most of the night with his sister and was nearly as devastated as she was. It was a massive shock to both of them. They discussed it for hours, wondering if they had missed something, anything, that might have hinted to them the kind of person Angel really was and what he was doing to Bella.

'David went to bed early in the morning after conversing with Franny. He tried to get some sleep. Franny said he would need it to get through the next day. Some time after, Franny called me and talked briefly about her discovery. It was the shock of my life.' He exhaled. 'It was also the last I ever heard from her.'

He ran a hand tersely across his forehead, then proceeded to explain that when David woke up, Franny was gone.