The Way We Haunt Now
- Episode Four – The Haunting
- Music:
- You Haint Seen Nothin’ Yet theme by Courtney Floyd
- Link to PDF transcript
- For more information: www.hauntnowpod.com
- Twitter: @HauntNowPod
- Instagram: @HauntNowPod
Episode Four – The Haunting
COURTNEY: Hey there ghosts and ghouls, this episode depicts a graphic vehicle accident. Not graphic in terms of words or descriptions, but in terms of sound. If that’s something you’d rather not hear, I’d suggest taking a look at our transcripts today and skipping those bits.
SCENE 19
SFX: Phone voice recording tone.
EULALIE: Do you remember when we were kids, and every once in a while a cricket would get in the house?
SFX: Phonograph noise fades in slowly.
EULALIE: It was like the sound of it slowly swallowed everything else up, until all we could think or be or know was that chirp.
SFX: Ominous poltergeisty house sounds join the phonograph sounds.
EULALIE: Mom would usually find it after a while and stomp it into silence, but even then the sound would haunt us in its absence.
SFX: phone pings because Eulalie stopped the recording.
EULALIE: (Talking to herself) What am I doing? Everything is going to be fine. Everything is fine. I’m––
SFX: spooky phonograph / poltergeist sounds intensify… Eulalie takes a breath.
EULALIE: Fuck.
SFX: Sound of phone recording starting again.
EULALIE: (Shaky) Parker, something’s happening to me. Something like one of those crickets. Only, mom’s not here to stomp it out, and I don’t know if anyone can. It might be all in my head, it might not. But if… If for some reason we don’t get the chance to talk again, I need you to know that I fought it. Okay? I fought it.
SFX: Eulalie sniffles
EULALIE: I am fighting it.
SFX: Eulalie ends the recording.
EULALIE: (Whispering) But I don’t think I’m going to win.
SFX: Theme music (simple guitar with spectral oohs and ohs and occasional cymbal crashes) fades in
COURTNEY: (V.O.) The Way We Haunt Now, Episode Four: The Haunting
SFX: As music fades out, phonograph and poltergeist sounds amplify as if they’re a wave drowning everything. Frankie says “Remember” and it echoes as the pitch changes deeper and deeper.
EULALIE: Okay. Saving as “Listen to this Parker.” Ridiculous anxiety brain. (Swallows) Now will you let me sleep?
SFX: phonograph / poltergeist / Frankie wailing sound flares louder.
EULALUE: I’ll take that as a no. (Sighs) Okay…
SFX: Sound of Eulalie opening her laptop and typing.
EULALIE: I know it’s ridiculous, but maybe if I do some sort of anti-ghost ritual my anxiety brain will chill out enough for me to get a couple hours.
SFX: Eulalie types some more.
EULALIE: Hmmm. (Mumbling into hand) Mesopotamian anti-witchcraft rituals. No. Salt cleansing ritual? Mmmm, maybe. Sounds messy. What else?
SFX: Frankie’s wailing gets louder.
EULALIE: Ghost-proof your apartment in five easy steps? Worth a fucking shot.
SFX: Eulalie clicks on the link. The You Haint Seen Nothin’ Yet theme begins playing…
CAS: (On video) This is You Haint Seen Nothin’ Yet, I’m Cas Bromley and along with my team of seasoned specialists I hunt down ghosts and put a stop to violent hauntings. This week, we’re taking a break from our usual content to show you what you can do to prevent those hauntings in the first place. But first, take a second to like and subscribe! And if you’ve got ’em, leave your ghost-proofing tips in the comments below. And, with that, I’ll turn it over to Myrtle for some sure-fire ghost-proofing tips that you can try with things that are already in your pantry. Or your parents’ pantry. Or your friend’s pantry. Myrtle, do people have pantries anymore?
MYRTLE: (On video) Some of them do, Cas. And the rest of us can take a quick trip to the store or buy stuff online. Okay. So. You’re worried that, for whatever reason, your current abode might be a ghost magnet. Never fear. As long as your place isn’t already haunted, the tricks I’m about to show you should work in 99% of cases.
CAS: (On video) And in the other 1% of cases, you should call us!
MYRTLE: Definitely. Or shoot us an email.
EULALIE: (talking over Cas and Myrtle) Shit. This isn’t going to work. Wait. What am I saying? The place isn’t really haunted. It’s all in my head. I’m not trying to really ghost-proof. I’m just trying to turn the anxiety dial down. (Whispering) But if my anxiety brain doesn’t believe it’s gonna work, it’s not gonna turn the dial down. (Breathes stressfully). Okay, okay. I’ll send them an email and then do that messy salt ritual thing.
SFX: Starts typing email, Frankie / phonograph / poltergeist continue a bit louder in background.
EULALIE: Done. I hope that salt ritual doesn’t take long because I have… Oh, great, two hours to sleep. At this rate I might as well stay up. Do some dishes and some laundry. (Groans) Maybe I’ll be able to take a nap in my office later. TGI…M? (PAUSE) Jeez, I really have to stop talking to myself.
SCENE 20
SFX: A ghostly soundscape of crows cawing, cicadas and frogs singing, and an occasional thunderclap fades in…
NARRATOR: (weary) This is an old story. Girl meets ghost. Ghost haunts girl. Like most old stories, it is bloodthirsty. A narrative shaping the world toward inevitable tragedy and loss. Not because it wants to warn us. Not because it hopes we’ll learn to seek a better way. Nothing so noble as that.
(Sighs) There are those who insist that narratives like this one are agents of entropy, moving the world from order to disorder. That they, like everything else, obey the laws of the universe. And those folks might be right. But do you know what I think? (Voice gets angry) I think narratives are what give the universe its shape. I think they move from entropy to order, over and over and over again. And I know, believe me, I KNOW that that sounds like a good thing. But it isn’t. It’s… (PAUSE) Order is a shoebox with no holes poked into it. And we––we’re the unlucky specimens captured by some amateur scientist and left to suffocate inside.
When a narrative this ancient, this ugly comes barrelling toward you, the last thing you want to do is play right into its tropes. That’s how it gets its hooks into you. How it sorts you into a role and kills you off or turns you into a caricature of yourself before you even know what’s happened.
But how was Eulalie supposed to know that?
SFX: Ghostly soundscape fades out…
SCENE 21
SFX: Sounds of rain, traffic, walking fade in. Rain and traffic continue throughout scene.
EULALIE: (to herself) How am I still running late? It’s not like I slept in.
SFX: Eulalie pushes the crosswalk button several times. It starts saying “Wait. Wait. Wait.”
EULALIE: Come on, light, change. Help a girl out.
SFX: Crosswalk voice says “Walk sign is on across––” then the voice gets crackly “That silent land, where you can no more hold me by the hand.”
EULALIE: (strangled sound) Not here. It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not––
SFX: crosswalk / Frankie voice says “Remember me… Understand? Silent… Darkness!…Grieve. Grieve. Grieve. Grieve. Grieve. Grieve. Grieve.” (Continues in background)
EULALIE: I’m just going to keep walking. I can’t hear you! I can’t hear you because you aren’t real.
SFX: bus airbrake sounds as it gets ready to pull away. Crosswalk / Frankie voice morphs from saying “grieve” to “wait.”
BYSTANDER: Miss! Wait! The light changed! Miss!
SFX: Honking, swerving, sound of car hitting body, bystanders screaming and a man shouting “get some help!” Sirens. Scene fades to just rain.
SCENE 22
SFX: Phonograph crackles. Poltergeisty sounds come and go throughout scene.
FRANKIE: I wish I could say that I was confused by the light and the sounds and the sheer difference of the world around me. But that wasn’t it, not entirely. I was puzzled by lots of things, like the moving photographs in the folding metal frame the woman carried around like a book and the beeping and whirring metal box into which she put strange food before eating it. But I knew what I was doing. I knew what I was.
SFX: Frankie screams, poltergeist sounds amplify and then fade.
FRANKIE: I woke up to you rattling to life around me, gears whizzing and whizzing and whizzing until I heard the tinny sound of my own voice vibrating from the past like some sort of revenant––and I knew. I remembered everything. It doesn’t help to explain, really. It doesn’t absolve me of any guilt. But I have to say it aloud. I need someone to know. And there isn’t anyone, really, to tell but you.
All my life, I followed the rules. Wear a corset. Speak softly. Take up needle work, but keep it decorative. Play for the guests on the piano, but don’t expect to play on a larger stage. Learn French, but only enough to be fashionable. When I got sick, the rules changed, slightly. I was to stay in my bed. Take my tinctures and nostrums and pills. Allow the doctors to take my blood. Set an example with my patience and kindness for the healthy people who deigned to visit. And always, always listen to mama. Because “Mama knows what’s best.” (Said in imitation)
SFX: Frankie screams, poltergeist sounds amplify and then fade.
FRANKIE: When the blood first appeared in my handkerchief, mama told me to read a poem for the phonograph. So I read a poem for the phonograph. When it seemed I coughed more than I breathed, mama told me it was okay to let go, to move on. So I let go, and I moved on. Or, I tried to.
SFX: Frankie wailing and poltergeist sounds grow gradually louder then drop again.
FRANKIE: The rules are supposed to keep you safe and happy. The rules are supposed to bring you romance. Love. Children. Fulfillment. Something to fill the aching void of adventure cauterized and possibility ripped away, gifted to one’s brothers and male cousins and nephews at one’s expense.
SFX: Poltergeist sounds amplify like they’re going to drown out everything, then stop when Frankie says “disappear.”
FRANKIE: The rules are that when you die, you’re at peace. Unless you come back. If you should be so cheeky as to return to the world of the living, there’s only one thing you can do. Destroy it. Destroy whatever life you find yourself closest to. Punish whoever or whatever gets in your way. Rage until you lose yourself in the pain. And then disappear.
SFX: Frankie coughs and it echoes eerily..
FRANKIE: There are rules even for breaking the rules, and I followed them. Because even if I hoped for something better, it was all I knew. All of the stories, all of the wives tales, all of my experience pointed toward one course of action: a proper haunting, like the kind Anne Radcliffe or M.E. Braddon or E. Nesbit liked to write about. I knew what I was doing. And part of me? Part of me wanted to do it. Part of me almost… (PAUSE) almost enjoyed it.
But I didn’t understand what I was doing. I didn’t realize that there was another way. I didn’t think. And now? It’s too late.
SFX: Poltergeist and phonograph sounds fade out…
SCENE 23
SFX: Computer dings. Computer voice says “you have one new message.”
CAS: Ooh. Does someone have a new ghost for us to investigate? Oh please, tell me there’s a ghost for us to investigate. Our channel’s been nothing but fluff pieces for weeks.
SFX: Mouse clicks
CAS: (reading aloud) “Dear You Haint Seen Nothing Yet, I think my apartment is haunted. Well, not my apartment, the phonograph I just brought home.” Ooh! “It’s probably all in my head, I just… I can’t sleep and I thought I’d ask if you have any advice. Sincerely, A Desperate Insomniac.”
HECK. YES. The team is going to be so stoked when they hear this. Now, to trace the IP address and do some digging…
SFX: clicking and typing…
SCENE 24
SFX: Clicking and typing from last scene fade into phonograph crackles and hospital monitor beeping.
FRANKIE: (still talking to the phonograph) I haunted as direly as I knew how, throwing my voice into everyone and everything that would take it. And I drove the woman to distraction. She stepped into the street, and an omnibus––I think it was an omnibus, only horseless, like a motorcar––slammed into her and threw her back onto the sidewalk as though she were nothing more than a limp doll.
SFX: Hospital monitor beeping fades, replaced by ambulance sounds.
FRANKIE: They took her away in another sort of motorcar, this one like a hansom cab in shape. And I followed. I followed into a drab building full of beeping things and rushing people and machines and more boxes with moving pictures and beds with people lying in them, some crying out or tossing and turning with pain, some not moving at all. It didn’t look at all like the hospitals I knew, but the smell was unmistakable.
SFX: Elevator sounds, random beeps and clangs, people in background.
FRANKIE: They put the woman in one of those beds. Eulalie. The men and women clustered around her bed called her Eulalie. One of them seemed to know her, and clasped Eulalie’s hand when everyone else moved away.
SFX: People in background grow louder.
FRANKIE: I stayed there with her, phonograph, until the strange lights on the ceiling began to flicker and her breath puffed like fog into the air.
SFX: Hospital monitor beeping comes back in.
FRANKIE: That beeping machine drowned out all of the noise of that place, and each beep drove like a pin into my being until I was all abuzz and the lights popped and went out. The doctors rushed back in, then. They seemed worried, and prodded at the machines they’d attached to Eulalie with grim faces.
SFX: Grim muttering by doctors. Then, everything fades to just beeping hospital monitors and Frankie’s voice.
FRANKIE: It was me affecting the machines. At least, I think it was. So I left. And I ended up back here, in this tiny little flat where Eulalie lives. Phonograph, I did what I thought I was supposed to do. I did what I thought I’d been kept here to do. I followed the rules. So why do I feel like I made the wrong choice? Ghosts haunt people. Haunting hurts people. But I always thought that that hurting must be for the best. That it was divine retribution. That it was justice. That it was a lesson for everyone else. (PAUSE) Phonograph, what if it isn’t? What if the only thing Eulalie did wrong was fix a broken machine, give voice to a sound long kept silent? What if it’s not the order of things? What if it’s not destiny? What if I’ve made things immeasurably worse for myself and for Eulalie? What if I’ve done something I can’t make right?
(Whispers) I don’t know what to do.
CREDITS
SFX: Theme music (simple guitar with spectral oohs and ohs and occasional cymbal crashes) fades in
COURTNEY: (V.O.) This episode of The Way We Haunt Now is written, directed, and produced by Courtney Floyd with voice acting (in order of appearance) by:
COURTNEY: Courtney Floyd as Eulalie
BRAD: Brad Colbroock as Cas Bromley
TAL: Tal Minear as Myrtle
KIRA: Kira Apple as the Narrator
ELEANOR: Eleanor Grey as Frankie
CHRISTOPHER: Christopher Colón as the Bystander
COURTNEY: Whether you’re new to the spirit world or simply a ghost in need of some entertainment, you can visit www.hauntnowpod.com for more episodes as well as information about our cast and crew, content warnings, transcripts, and links to our social media.
SFX: Theme music fades out
COURTNEY: Remember to haunt responsibly!