A/N: Here it is, finally, the first (short) chapter of 'The House'. This story would have been up far earlier if I hadn't had a short discussion with Devianta, which made me rethink the whole thing. I'm still not sure if I'm gonna scare her but I'll try my best...:)
I was gonna change the title to something more poetic, but I'm just not good at that and besides this title grew on me. It always amazed me that nobody would do a story about a haunted house, I mean, it's so obvious (maybe that's the reason). I know there are several haunted house stories out there but they're all ... dead (pun intentional :). I have three full chapters and the epilogue finished and the rest of it outlined fairly detailed, there's no reason for me not to update at least once a week, apart from sheer laziness. Or unless I get sidetracked (it happens).
Reviews? Question? Constructive criticism? Yes please. I always reply to signed reviews.
Rated for a reason.
Blanket disclaimer for the whole story: Danny Phantom is the property of Butch Hartman. I'm merely borrowing his characters for my own amusement, no money is made from this.
THE HOUSE
Chapter 1: Sleepover
"Come on, it's just a house and Dash is an idiot."
"Well duh. But that doesn't mean this place isn't creepy."
Creepy was an excellent way to describe the old brick house, standing a little away from the road between the trees of the forest that surrounded most of Amity Park. It looked like it had been uninhabited for a long time, maybe decades even, with the paint of the woodwork all but gone, the broken windows, the overgrown garden and driveway. It could be seen from the road, but only barely and most people just passed it by. Just another abandoned house, nothing to worry about.
If they had taken the trouble to enter the rusty gate that had been pushed out of it's hinges a while back by playing children, they would have reconsidered. It must have been a pretty house once, two stories high, tiled roof, red brick walls. They would have been able to imagine flowery curtains behind the windows, waiving a little in the light breeze of the sweet summer air.
Three stone steps led up to the front door in the middle of the symmetric house, two large windows to the left and two to the right. You could just see it opening and a happy family pour out into the front yard, a small boy playing with his ball, a little girl in a light blue dress, laughing happily while their parents stood there in the doorway, smiling. And then they would get into their car and drive off and the house would wither and darken, the paint coming off, the windows dark holes that seemed to suck the light out from around it, the gay curtains just gray rags.
That was the point where most people thought better of it, their original plan of exploring the house suddenly evaporating, remembering that they had better things to do. Turning around and leaving, they would spread the rumor that the house was haunted, that it was unsafe, best to keep well away from. And in Amity Park, when a place was labeled 'haunted', people stayed away.
Unless you were a teen on a dare.
Danny turned to his friends, an impatient smile on his face. "So is the Ghost Zone."
Tucker shifted his feet in the dirt of the driveway. It had been paved with cobble stones once, but it was now completely overgrown and the stones were buried under the weeds and plants. It widened at the house, allowing cars to turn around instead of having to back out through the gate onto the road again.
"The Ghost Zone is dangerous," Sam said pointedly.
She was standing next to Danny, apprehensively eying the house. As a goth, she had relished in the idea of spending the night in a haunted house. In fact, her own room looked like something out of a horror movie, much to her parent's despair. But looking at the eerie house she had second thoughts. She let her heavy backpack filled with snacks, soda cans and candles slip on the ground, but held on to her sleeping bag.
"Aw Sam, you're not backing out on me are you? I thought you wanted to do this?"
"Yeah, well, what if the house really is haunted?"
Danny sighed exasperatedly. "Dash has been in there. Do you seriously think he would do that if the place were haunted?"
"How do you know he was really in there?"
"He described the place pretty accurately. We can check his story by just going in. Besides, my parents have been here, they found nothing and best of all, my ghost sense isn't going off. I don't know how much more proof you need. It just looks creepy."
He stepped closer to her and grabbed her shoulders with both hands, his eyes gleaming mischievously.
"Don't worry, Sammykins, I'll protect you."
He then quickly jumped away before she could kick him. Tucker was grinning nervously at his friends as they started pushing each other, Danny frantically avoiding Sam's combat boots. He hadn't been happy with the idea of spending the night in an abandoned house on the outskirts of Amity Park from the beginning. To ward off his sense of uneasiness he carried a double amount of electronic equipment with him, among which two PDAs, a laptop computer, two separate hand held games and one mobile phone, the other having been demolished in a ghost fight earlier that week.
Some shouts and cheers came from the gate and Danny and Sam stopped fooling around, red faced. The three of them turned to watch Dash, Paulina, Kwan and several others standing on the road just outside the gate.
"Cowards," Danny muttered as he waved at them.
"I still think we should just go back," Sam said, wiping her hair out of her face, "It isn't worth it. This place really gives me a bad feeling."
"Isn't worth it? Field tickets to the Dumpty Humpty concert next week? They were completely sold out! I bet Dash has been sleeping in line for two days to get them!"
"Actually, that was Kwan," Tucker said.
Danny wasn't finished. "Besides, I have to do his homework for three months if I back out. I don't have time for that."
"Then why did you make that bet?" Sam said reasonably, "Remember the last time you made a bet with Dash?"
Danny shuddered for a moment, but then shrugged it off. "That's why I made a point of not going to eat his underwear again. But we can't loose guys. Those tickets are as good as ours."
Dash looked at the three geeks as they were standing on the driveway. The house gave him the creeps, there was absolutely no way he would go any nearer than this. He had never been in the house, although he had told everybody he had, just to irk Fenton in going in himself. And as an extra bonus, he took his two loser friends with him, the techno geek and the goth freak.
His cousin had been in there once and had told him about it years ago, scaring the living daylights out of young Dash. He remembered the story word for word and he had had nightmares for weeks after that. Still had, on occasion. So when the opportunity arose last Wednesday, he had dared Fenton to go in and spend the night there. For some reason, the boy always ticked him off with that knowing smile of his, the bored look in his eyes whenever Dash tried to punch him, the sometimes surprising elusiveness when he suddenly wasn't there where Dash expected him. He gave Dash the impression that even though he did his best to make his life miserable, Dash couldn't touch him, he wasn't important. Just annoying.
Kwan gave him an irritated look. He had been waiting in front of the ticket office for twenty seven hours two months ago, skipping school and getting a huge detention in the process, while Dash had slept peacefully in his bed and hadn't said so much as thank you. And now Dash had used the precious tickets in a stupid bet with that Fenton dude. He'd hate to lose them to those three geeks.
"Are you sure they'll come running right out?" He asked his friend.
"Of course they will. The house is haunted and Fenton is afraid of ghosts. You wait and see."
"Well yes, but, like, his parents are ghost hunters."
"Your point?"
"Well, he could have taken anti ghost weapons with him, those cannons his parents use all the time and just shoot them all down."
Dash looked at Kwan in disbelieve. "Are you kidding me? This is Fenton we're talking about! Do you see him hunting ghosts? Besides, did you see any cannons on them?"
"No, but..."
"And he's going to do my homework for three months. This is so totally worth it."
Kwan started grumbling to himself, something like 'your homework, not mine, and they are my tickets', but he didn't say it out loud. He turned away from Dash and almost bumped into Paulina, who had a bored look on her face.
"Tell them to hurry up and go in. I have better things to do than just stand here outside an ugly old house," she said.
Dash smirked at her and raised his voice at the three teens who were still standing on the driveway, whispering to each other.
"Hey! Get going already!"
They turned to look at them and the goth girl very childishly stuck her tongue out. Then the tree of them heaved up their sleeping bags and backpacks – whatever were they all taking with them, Dash wondered – and walked to the front door. They stood still for a moment and then Fenton stepped forward and pushed tentatively against the door. It opened easily, giving an eerie squeak. Dash watched as they peered inside and then jumped three feet in the air when they started screaming.
"Haaaah," he cried, backing away from the gate, ready to run if there came anything out of the house. His friends backed away also, looking fearfully at the three friends at the house who were... rolling on the ground with laughter. Dash got angry.
"Hey! That wasn't funny!"
They didn't answer him for a while, hiccuping and snickering every time they tried to look at the blond jock that had screamed like a girl. Finally they managed to quiet down somewhat and they looked back at Dash one last time, Fenton momentarily locking eyes with him. He was still laughing, he could see, but there was something else there too, something that worried Dash. A fierce defiance of him, the ghosts, the world. Suddenly he wasn't so sure anymore that he would win the bet.