The Real Ghost Busters of Hollywood

This is week 2 of Readers Choice for the Vamplit Friday Flash. Since I used all the prompts last week, I decided to try it again, this time with a different spin. I also decided to revisit some of my more...fun...characters, Bob and Ethel. They have been married a long time. Perhaps too long and Dead Charlie, an man that loves his job so much, death couldn't stop him from returning to work.

The Real Ghost Busters of Hollywood

By Lisa McCourt Hollar

“Have you ever had the feeling someone was watching you? Have you ever felt a chill run down your spine and known that you had been touched by the evil hand of something you couldn’t explain? Zombies, serial murderers, clowns, villains of all kinds, have often been portrayed on stage and screen in an attempt to thrill those attracted to the dark side. Rarely though has anything more disturbing been recreated, than what we are about to attempt today. Hi, I am Russ Collichio and this is The Real Ghost Busters of Hollywood.”

“Is this going to take long?”

“CUT! Lady, Ethel is it? What are you doing? You’re killing me here.”

“I didn’t realize this was going to take so long. I have a meeting with my book club. Maybe we should reschedule.”

“This isn’t something we can reschedule. You contacted us. You told us your house was haunted. You asked us to come out and remove the ghost.”

“But my book club…”

“We’ll try to get you out of here on time, but you need to let us do our job. No more interruptions. Please.”

Ethel nodded her agreement, as Peter gently moved the elderly woman back towards the couch, to sit next to her husband.

Bob Steman shook his head at the director. “She’ll drive you crazy. Old Biddy can’t mind her own business. Not like me. I’m surprised she hasn’t chased this ghost out of the house, with her craziness.”

“You old coot,” Ethel said, jabbing her husband in the side. “You brought this evil thing into the house with your perverted thoughts. See those binoculars?” Ethel pointed at the window next to an old recliner. “He watches the neighbor girl with those. She knows it too. Puts a show on for him every night, the trollup.”

“I do not watch that girl! I use those glasses for bird watching.”

“Bird watching my ass.”

“If your ass wasn’t sagging to the ground…”

Peter cut the man off before he could finish the sentence. “Please, we have a schedule to keep. We’re already behind and we have to be in Atlanta tomorrow. There’s a restaurant there that has an employee who refuses to leave.”

“What does that have to do with ghost hunting,” Ethel asked.

“He’s dead. Hit and run on his way home one night. Hasn’t stopped Dead Charlie from showing up to work every day though.”

“You hear that,” Ethel said, jabbing her husband in the side again. “A man with work ethic. I can’t even get you to fix that squeaky door in the kitchen and you’re alive.”

“Please, can we visit this later? Okay? Great! Let’s pick up with, this is the real ghost busters of Hollywood.”

“Are we gonna get through it this time?” Russ looked at his watch. He was supposed to have dinner with one of the actresses from The Real Housewives of Dracula.

“Let’s hope,” Peter said. “Okay, ready, set…ACTION!”

“Fifty years ago, madness hit this small town of Youngstown, Ohio. A series of murders descended on this close knit community, sending them into a nightmare of blood, lust and fear.”

Russ had been walking through the house, as the camera man followed him from room to room. He stopped in the kitchen, where the special effects guy had rigged the back door to open. On cue, it swung in, squeaking loudly, thanks to the effects team.

“Then one night a young man by the name of Murdock Jones entered through the back door of this home. With him, he carried a butcher knife, the weapon he intended to mutilate the family that lived here with. Murdock came from a troubled home. His father had murdered his mother in front of him, when he was only ten years old. After that he lived with an Aunt that had, according to rumor, done things to him. When he was thirteen, he killed her, by putting rat poison in her tea. Then he buried her in the cellar. It would be months before social workers would discover he was living on his own.”

Murdock listened to the actor’s monologue, reveling in the delicious memory of what he had done to his aunt. All these years later, he remembered how it had felt in that dark cellar, shoveling dirt on the bitch, but not before pissing on her. She wasn’t dead either, like had been reported. Somehow he hadn’t given her enough poison. It didn’t matter though. She couldn’t fight back and he buried her alive. Then he jerked off on her grave. A few weeks later he did the neighbor girl, only instead of poison, he used a paring knife, putting little cuts all along her breasts, before cutting her open. They never did find her body. It would be a few years before they realized there was a killer in their town.

“Murdock had made a mistake though. His victims weren’t as docile as he had anticipated. They fought back and won.”

“Fought back? There was no fighting. Just screaming and dying.”

Unaware of the ghost next to him, Russ continued, “One of the residents was a Navy Seal, home for a few days leave.”

“Navy Seal my ass. Are they still passing around that story?”

“He slit Murdock’s throat with his own knife.”

“The hell he did. He used his teeth. His very sharp, canine teeth. I knew I was in trouble when I saw him coming at me, all hairy and wolfie.”

“Really, are you almost done?”

“CUT!”

“Ethel, you old biddy, you’re ruining their scene again. Hey, do you think you could interview me next? I bet the little cutie next door would get a kick, seeing me on TV.”

“Bob, you old perv, sit back down!”

 The least he could have done was left me alive,” Murdock snorted. “I think I would have liked being a wolf better than I do being a ghost. At least then I could eat those two monsters I’m stuck haunting.”

Word Count: 1,000

Copyright© 2012 Lisa McCourt Hollar