Mason’s phone rang, pulling him out of a dreamless sleep. He answered without looking at the screen. He didn’t have to. He knew it was a work call.
“Uh huh,” he sighed groggily into the phone.
“Sorry to wake you. I got a no-heat call for you.”
“Of course you do,” Mason grunted into the phone.
“It’s off Harper Road in Lincoln.”
“Why aren’t the late ones ever close?” Mason asked. “What time is it, anyway?”
“2:27 in the morning”
“Well, I didn’t think it was the afternoon,” Mason said. “What’s the address?”
“43 Harper Road. The customer’s name is Linwood Jones. He said to let yourself in if he doesn’t answer the door. The boiler is in the basement. The stairs are in the kitchen.”
“Got it. I’ll head over.” He hung up without saying another word.
Mason got out of bed and dressed in the same uniform he had thrown on the floor four hours earlier.
Less than ten minutes after hanging up the phone, he was walking out his front door toward his work truck. He got in the truck and plugged the address into the GPS on his phone; the trip was going to take twenty-eight minutes. Great. An hour of driving for a flipped breaker. I guarantee it. Mason thought. He set off listening to Nickleback’s greatest hits on full blast.
***
Turning onto Harper Road, Mason lost cell service. He didn’t think much of it. That was pretty common in this part of the state.
Harper Road was an old rural road littered with potholes and lined sparsely with rusted mailboxes. When he found the mailbox belonging to 43 Harper Road, Mason pulled down the narrow lane of a driveway. It was lined with dense trees on either side, and for a second Mason started to worry he had taken the wrong turn.
Then, after rounding a corner, Mason saw the house. It seemed to jump out at him from between the trees. It was a large, white, colonial-style house.
When Mason’s headlights washed across the front of the house, he could see that all the windows were boarded up. Half the shutters were askew.
He pulled up to the front of the house and killed the engine.
“Who would want to live in a dump like this?” Mason wondered aloud.
He grabbed his flashlight, multimeter, adjustable wrench, and screwdriver and got out of the truck. He clicked on his flashlight and started making his way toward the house.
Tall grass and weeds brushed against his thighs as he made his way across the unkempt yard toward the porch.
As he drew closer to the porch, he could see that the stairs were sagging, paint was missing in large jagged chips, and half the boards looked rotted.
He put his boot down on the first step and applied some weight to see if the porch was strong enough to hold him. The step held.
Slowly, he climbed the three steps up the porch and approached the door.
He pounded on the door three times.
He waited a few seconds and pounded on the door again.
“Kingford Energy.” Mason called out.
Nobody lives here, he thought.
He tried the doorknob. It turned. He slowly pushed the door open. It was pitch-black inside. He shone his flashlight into the entryway. He saw a small table with a stack of old newspapers on it. The rest of the entryway looked abandoned.
He took one step inside and was immediately assaulted by the smell of something rotting.
He gagged.
Just don’t think about it. Probably a dead animal stuck in the wall.
Mason shined his flashlight on the wall, looking for a light switch. He found one and flipped it. Nothing happened. He pointed his flashlight at the ceiling and saw that there wasn’t a bulb in the light fixture. Of course.
Mason walked farther into the house. He came to a parlor with a green velvet sofa and a coffee table. A thick layer of dust entombed the furniture.
He continued through the parlor to the kitchen. When he stepped into the kitchen, he saw that the light above the kitchen sink was on.
Approaching the sink to get out of the dreadful dark, Mason could see that there was water in the bottom of the sink. Like someone had recently run the tap. How long does a sink take to dry? He wondered. Someone’s been here recently.
Mason found two doors in the kitchen.
He approached the first one and pulled it open.
It was an empty pantry. He shut the door and moved on to the second door.
This time he found the stairs to the basement. He saw a light switch at the top of the stairs and flicked it on.
Nothing happened.
Naturally.
He shone his flashlight down the steep staircase. It went down six steps before turning and continuing out of sight.
Mason stood there for a while, staring at the basement stairs.
When suddenly he heard:
“The… boiler is… down… here…” came a breathy whisper of a voice from deep in the basement.
“Linwood?”
“The… boiler is… down… here…” The voice sounded almost exactly the same as before. Something about it didn’t sit right with Mason. But he was tired and just wanted to get the job done so he could go home. He shone his flashlight down into the darkness.
“I figured as much.” Mason called from the top of the stairs. “I’m coming down.” He began to walk down the stairs.
“What happened to your lights?” Mason asked as he came to the curve in the staircase.
No response.
“Hello?”
No response.
Mason reached the bottom of the stairs. The basement smelled of damp earth and mold.
He stepped down onto a dirt floor. The basement was pitch-black. He swept his flashlight across the room. He saw support beams and shelves lined with old boxes. To his right, rusted tools hung above an old workbench. He noticed a large crack in the far wall. He didn’t find the owner of the voice that had drifted up the basement stairs.
“Linwood?” Mason called again.
Again, no response.
Determined to complete the job and get back to bed, Mason walked deeper into the basement. He approached the far wall. He planned to follow the walls until he found the boiler.
He just started to follow the far wall when he heard something move in the dirt to his right.
He whipped around, bringing the flashlight to the spot the sound originated.
There was nothing there.
Probably just a mouse.
Looking closer, he saw footprints in the dirt.
Could be old footprints.
He spotted the boiler in the corner.
As Mason approached the boiler, he found more footprints in the dirt surrounding it. The footprints belonged to a barefoot human.
A barefoot human with four toes on each foot.
Mason was uneasy, but having found the boiler, he got to work.
Power was always the first thing Mason checked. So he pulled out his multimeter and connected it to the boiler. The boiler didn’t have power.
Yep. Totally a flipped breaker. The panel has to be around here somewhere.
Mason disconnected his multimeter and stood up. He started following the wall again, looking for the breaker panel.
The door to the basement slammed shut with such force that it seemed to shake the foundation of the house.
Mason froze.
“Linwood? This isn’t funny!” Mason was starting to get scared, which made him mad. “I think it’s just a flipped breaker. Where is your panel?”
No response.
Mason kept walking along the wall. Now looking more for a bulkhead than a breaker panel. There’s got to be another way out. No way I’m going back up those stairs after that slam.
Mason walked the entire far wall and had just turned left to follow the other wall when he found the breaker panel. Might as well fix it. He thought. Whatever is making those noises and slams knows I’m here and isn’t doing anything other than being creepy. Probably just a squatter or something.
Mason opened the gray metal panel and pointed his light into it.
All the breakers were flipped off except for the kitchen breaker. Half of them were torn out completely.
Well, there’s your problem.
Mason ran his finger down the line of breakers until he found the one labeled “Heat”.
He flipped it.
The boiler came to life.
Knew it.
“I fixed your heat. I’m going to leave now.” Mason said, in case Linwood was still listening to him.
He closed the breaker panel and continued following the wall, still looking for a bulkhead.
Something moved behind him.
He swung around again. Again, he found nothing.
“Show yourself.”
No response.
Mason continued his search, eager to get out of the basement.
Maybe I should just go up the stairs. This basement might not even have a bulkhead.
He pointed his flashlight at the stairs that led to the kitchen. He took one weary step towards them when he heard the sharp click of a breaker being flipped, then he heard the boiler die, and the room was silent again.
Mason swung his flashlight toward the breaker panel.
The panel sat open.
He walked back toward the breaker panel. The boiler breaker had been flipped. Fuck this. I’m getting out of here.
He flipped it again. The boiler came to life once more.
Mason slammed the breaker panel shut and quickly made his way to the stairs that led to the kitchen. He mounted the steps and climbed them two at a time.
He reached the top of the stairs. The door he had left open was shut. He knew it would be from the slam he had heard, but actually seeing it shut sent a fresh wave of adrenaline coursing through him.
He reached out and grabbed the doorknob. Despite the chill in the air, his hands were sweating profusely.
The door was locked.
Shit!
From deep in the basement, he heard the click of the breaker again, then the boiler died for a second time.
Mason pulled his wrench out of his pocket. He didn’t carry a weapon with him, so this would have to do.
“The… boiler is… down… here…” the voice repeated.
Mason wasn’t sure he could break the door down while standing on a steep flight of stairs. So he slowly went back down into the basement.
When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he did a quick sweep of the room with his flashlight. He saw that the breaker panel sat open again.
He didn’t approach it. He continued his search for a bulkhead.
He had completely searched two of the walls and was turning to start the third one when he heard:
“We don’t have any heat.” It was raspy and inches from his right ear.
Mason spun around with the flashlight.
A face was there in the darkness. A human face. But something about it seemed off to Mason.
The eyes were too big and seemed to glow yellow in the light of the flashlight. The ear-to-ear grin showed too many pointed teeth. The man licked his lips over and over. And despite appearing to be in his mid-seventies, the man’s arms were bulging with muscle.
Mason tried to scream, but couldn’t.
He brought up his wrench and slammed it down on the man's head.
The wrench bent slightly. The man didn’t flinch.
“We don’t have any heat,” the man repeated, taking a step closer to Mason.
This time Mason screamed.
It didn’t do him any good, but he did scream.
The man grabbed Mason in a flash and threw him onto the dirt floor, knocking the wind out of him.
Then he got down beside Mason and licked his face from the bottom of his chin to his temple.
“What…Are… You?” Mason croaked.
“We don’t have any heat,” the man replied.
This time he leaned down and bit a large chunk out of Mason's stomach.
Mason tried to howl in pain, but only a weak gasp escaped him.
Warm blood ran down his side and pooled beneath him.
Then three fingers and a thumb closed around Mason’s throat. Snuffing out the last of his cry.
His vision began to fade. He heard the thing say one more thing.
“We don’t have any heat.”
Then Mason’s world faded to black.
Epilogue
One hour later
“Kingford Energy, how may I help you?”
A pause.
“We don’t have any heat.”
“Where are you calling from and what’s your name?”
Nothing for a second.
“We don’t have any heat.”
“I understand that. But where are you calling from?”
Silence. Then:
“43 Harper Road.”
“We already sent a technician out there. Didn’t he come?”
“We don’t have any heat.”
