Haunted Homework - Part III

We are greeted at the door by the mother, who leads us into a small foyer. I cannot even listen to what she's saying to us because they won't stop staring. There are hundreds of them.

Dolls.

As she leads us into the living room, they only multiply in number. Curio cabinets, bookcases, tabletops...all full of creepy, porcelain dolls. I did not remember agreeing to participate in a Charles Band crapfest. No, I did not.

We go on a tour of the residence. Kitchen, laundry, family room, the usual. Out of the three bedrooms, I really only remember one...mostly because of the blood. Its on the walls, the bare mattress and a ton of it on the floor in one area. "Oh, don't mind that," she says, "The cat had kittens in here a week ago."

I bite on my lip so as not to offend the client by making the obvious suggestion about maybe cleaning that up. You know, especially since its in your kids room. On his mattress. Where he sleeps. Also, I don't see any cats. I am totally keeping an eye on those dolls, though.

We do the interview. The mother retells pretty much the same thing she did in the initial investigation request and phone interview, however, this time the older son chimes in with his experiences. He's fourteen and, as a team mate of mine describes him, "...has an imagination that would scare Stephen King."

The boy proceeds to weave a crapily crafted story-web of inane video game and bad horror film plots, that I totally recognize. He also made a claim that sometimes, when he does his homework in the dining room and walks away, the ghosts/demons/spirits and sometimes even Abe Lincoln himself, will write messages to him. They use a lot of profanity, too. "Actually, its mostly bad words," he explains.

Obviously, I've been had. This multi hour trek to crazy town is for naught. Right? Wrong...again, girl genius.

First thing yours truly does, is go in there with a brand spanky new sheet o' bleachy white tree pulp with a pen and put it on the dining room table. I make sure the pen does not move easily, by blowing on it a few times. I shake the table too and make sure its level. The pen holds it's own. When I was taking base readings with the temp gauge I removed my coat and was wearing a sleeveless shirt so I could tangibly perceive the ambient temperature and the airflow. There wasn't any airflow, it was stagnant and approximately 78-80 degrees in the room. One video camera is set up in the room to record as well as a DVR. I lock down the room, we set up another camera to monitor the only door into the room and I inform everyone there's no touchy on my 'speriment.

Four and a half hours later, as we're breaking down and packing up, Christopher calls me all secret like to a corner of the dining room and shows me a video of that dang pen rolling back and forth and back and forth, rolling forward, pausing and then continuing to roll itself off the table.

The following night Christopher sends me the video. It's one of the most compelling pieces of evidence I've ever seen. And you know, that darn pen did that all night. It would roll back and forth for almost an hour at a time, stop on occasions, then, when the audio would pick up voices nearby it would stop, then start up again when it got quiet. Creepfest.

Photo source: flickr.com/photos/ arieldawn/3774920075/