This is Episode 6 of American Horror Story season 1.5 - Murder House Revisited. If you haven't already, you should probably read the previous episodes or you may be confused. Check my Profile to find them.

1976

Constance and her 4-year-old daughter Adelaide were out on a drive around their new neighborhood when they saw the old mansion a couple of blocks up from where they had moved in. The blonde woman was extremely sensitive to spirits and to her the place was a strong magnet. She pulled the car up to the curb, shut it down and got out. She stepped up onto the sidewalk and stared at the overgrown Victorian house. She'd never wanted anything so badly. It was obviously vacant and uncared for so she decided to take a little tour of the grounds.

Constance let Addie out of the car and took her hand. The little girl looked at the house blankly, her curly-haired head tipped to one side.

"Mama. The house talks," she said.

"I know, sweetheart," smiled Constance. She was proud of her little girl. "I hear it too. Come on. Let's look around."

She led Addie up the front walk to the enclosed porch. Her free hand went to her collarbone; standing next to the place gave her an electric chill. She barely felt Addie's hand slip away from hers. The door opened silently, just enough to permit the child entry. While her mother was looking up in awe at the suspended lamp overhead, the little girl with Down Syndrome disappeared inside the house.

Constance noticed her missing seconds later. She glanced quickly about the yard but the open door said it all. She pushed it further open and stepped into the dark foyer.

"Addie!" She called into the abandoned house.

She thought she saw movement in the gloom back by the stairs and headed that way. The interior of the house smelled of dust and decay. Cobwebs tickled her cheeks and arms, giving her goose bumps. She tried to brush them away but there were more.

"Adelaide!" She was starting to get cross. "You come out right now!"

Behind the main stairs she found an door standing open. On the other side there was another flight of stairs, that one leading down into darkness. She heard something move down there. Nearing her patience's end, she started down the basement steps. Near the bottom of the stairs her foot slipped on the old wood and she sat down roughly, injuring her tailbone and her ankle.

The pain wasn't severe but it did hurt. Not only that but the heel on her pump had broken free of the sole. She had to find Addie in the huge, empty house with a shoe that didn't work. Frustration stacked on top of frustration. But the root of it was knowing her husband was off screwing the neighbor. While Constance was out chasing after one of his mongoloid offspring, he was out banging someone half his age and pretending to be free of responsibility.

She ripped the heel off the shoe and threw it down into the darkness. "Adelaide, you come out this instant!" she screamed. Tears ran down her cheeks.

Constance dropped the broken shoe and put her hands over her face and cried. She wept her broken heart out until she felt a hand on her shoulder. She lowered her hands, expecting to see Addie standing in front of her, but it was a strange man with dark hair. He wore outdated clothing and a mournful expression. He reminded her of Rhett Butler.

"It will be all right, darling," he said to her.

He put a hand out to her. It was a strange situation but Constance had seen many strange things over her lifetime. His attitude toward her was a refreshing intrigue compared to the sorrow she'd just been living. She took his hand.

"I know I failed with our son," he said to her as he helped her stand. He led her away from the stairs, one arm going around her waist to support her since she was missing a shoe. "But we can try again. We can... start over."

He led her to the back of the basement, into his little office and the couch there. She knew it was wrong to let him take her there, to undress and love her. But she was tired of being the only one upholding her marriage vows. The attention the mysterious stranger paid her felt so nice, so intoxicating, that she could let everything go for a little while.

She didn't care that he called her Nora. She didn't even care when she found the bullet hole in his head and realized he was dead. By that point they were making love and she refused to let anything spoil the only moment of pleasure she'd had in years.

...

░A░m░e░r░i░c░a░n░ ░H░o░r░r░o░r░ ░S░t░o░r░y░

...

2018

Ben was still sleeping when Tate woke. The child-sized ghost thought about waking the therapist but decided to be nice and leave him be. So he went to find someone else to play with. He had to search as far as the kitchen. That's where he found both Chad and Patrick. Chad was cooking breakfast. Pat was poking around on a laptop at the center island. Neither man was paying attention to anything but what they were doing.

No one ever expected the zombie apocalypse.

Tate shuffled quietly up behind Patrick. He only growled when he was close enough to hop up onto the guy's back. Patrick wasn't prepared to have a child land on him but Tate had randomly attacked him more than once over the years so he recovered from the surprise quickly. He absorbed the impact and reached back to find Tate's hands.

"What are you doing?" he asked once he was sure the kid wasn't armed.

Chad looked over but he could tell at a glance that it was nothing that needed his personal attention. He wasn't going to ruin food without a good reason.

Tate had to think about Patrick's question before could answer. He also had to stop chewing on the man's t-shirt. "I'm a zombie," he said once he'd done both.

"You're a pest," corrected Pat. He went back to scrolling through the news.

Tate didn't think that was the right spirit to have in the face of the zombie apocalypse. So he bit Patrick's shoulder. Not super-hard. Just hard enough to get his attention. It worked, but not in a good way. Patrick yelped then he reached back and pulled the boy off his back. He dropped him on the floor. Tate looked up and found a whole lot of irritation glaring back down at him.

"I was just playing," he said, because it seemed like Patrick was taking things too seriously.

"It is way too early for this shit," Chad interrupted impatiently. "Both of you go sit down at the table. I'll bring your plates. And for God's sake stay away from each other."

Pat shot Chad an offended look. While he was distracted Tate got to his feet and hurried out to the dining room. He thought maybe the other two would come along together in a bit but Patrick came in alone shortly after Tate sat down. He took the seat across the table from where Tate was and stared at him.

The boy looked back at him with wide-eyed wonder. "What?"

"I didn't say anything."

"No but you're looking at me funny," said Tate.

"I'm just looking at you," said Patrick.

They both knew that wasn't true, which bothered Tate. "Well, stop."

"No."

Chad came in then, skillfully balancing plates of omelets Florentine on his arms. He distributed them, putting his plate down last. Then he sat down and looked proudly around the table. The look melted when he saw the staring contest in progress. He rolled his eyes and picked up his fork.

"Good morning, Chad. Thank you for the wonderful breakfast you worked so hard on," he said in a blend of bright and sarcastic. "Oh, you're welcome," he answered himself. "I do try."

Pat took the cue and picked up his fork but he kept eyeing Tate till the boy looked away in search of his own utensils.

"I had the coolest dream," Tate said as he hacked apart the neatly-folded omelet.

"Going out on a limb here," Chad said. "Could it have been about zombies?"

Tate smiled. "Yeah. I was one, only I was like... this super zombie. I could drive and everything. I had a rocket launcher."

Chad had no love of zombies but he couldn't help wondering about the logic behind a zombie with a rocket launcher. "What were you shooting at?"

"Evil super zombies."

Chad put his fork down and laced his fingers, elbows on the table. "Evil super zombies."

Tate nodded and carved the omelet to small, pointy shards. "Yeah. They looked kind of like the Hulk and Clayface put together and then ripped in two." He shoved egg in his mouth. "Only bloody."

"Add that to the list of things we don't discuss at meals," said Chad. He picked up his fork again.

"Dreams?" Tate asked, looking wounded.

"Zombies."

Patrick wiped his mouth. "Why'm I not surprised that Ben's dream therapy has Tate biting people?"

"Doctor Harmon didn't make me bite anybody," Tate defended. "I was just playing around. God."

"Playing around doesn't mean jumping on someone's back and taking a bite out of them," said Patrick. "I don't even know why I'm having to say that. You know that!"

Chad decided to keep eating and let them sort it out. He wanted to believe this wouldn't be the high point of his day but it was already off to a questionable start. So he wanted to squeeze what pleasure he could from his omelet while it was warm. He topped off his glass of white wine.

Tate made a face and glanced over at Chad but could tell there was no support for him in that corner. "I didn't bite you that hard," he said to Pat. "And it's not like you can't heal it."

"That's not the point," said Patrick.

"Want me to kiss it and make it better?" Tate grinned.

Patrick wasn't amused. "Knock it off. Just eat."

...

The Harmons only did breakfast - or any meal - together during holidays and special occasions. With Joshua to care for it just didn't make sense to go to that much trouble every day when no one actually needed to eat. Ben and his family didn't generally see one another until after noon. Once in a while they would do lunch or dinner if they all happened to be together and in the mood. Sometimes they dined with other ghosts in the house, either as a group or individually. But food had become a purely social thing for them.

It made it easy for Ben to avoid Vivien. He wasn't doing it intentionally but he spent more time in his office or the basement than he did with his wife and children. He had a lot to think about and he did that best alone. He had notes to write and ponder. He had to form a plan for the night. He didn't want to have another situation like the previous night happen again. Ever. He hated retreating from a dream. The more he thought about it, the more it bothered him.

He spent the day considering his options and poking around in Dr. Montgomery's personal library. There wasn't much help on the shelves that he found. While there were some books about the brain, they had to do with physiology, not intangible ideas like dreams. He was exploring territory few - if any - had seen, much less written about.

...

(( Author suggests playing the Deadcom remix of 'Mad World' by Gary Jules for this section involving Violet. ))

Violet spent the day in her room. She did that more often than not most days but she hadn't planned to do it while Billie Dean was in town. But she just couldn't get out of bed. Earlier that morning she'd been sitting in on an internet chat belonging to one of the support groups she was a member of.

It was a suicide chat room where people were supposed to help each other through low moments. Most of the time it was just where regulars hung out, caught up with each other and complained about life. That was the main reason Violet still visited it: Getting to talk to people who could tell her about life. That and the perverse amusement she got from being in an anti-suicide chat room after she'd successfully killed herself.

Within a couple of hours a recent addition to the chat family logged on. His screen name was GrimmReefer and he often talked about his heavy drug use when he was online. He would boast about how loaded he'd gotten the night before, along with detailed lists of the crazy things he claimed he was doing. Many dismissed him as a liar. Most old hats ignored him when he went off on one of those tangents, figuring he was trying to stir up drama. But there was always someone who'd argue with him that he couldn't possibly be that hard core.

That morning someone called him out on his claims. They didn't believe anything he said and wanted a screenshot before they would. They called him a drama-monger and a sock puppet so GrimmReefer had turned on his webcam. He showed the various implements of destruction he'd said he possessed: Mushrooms, pot, alcohol and pills, pills, pills.

He said he'd been taking the lot for over 20 minutes when Violet logged on. She got caught up quickly on the situation: Thanks to the up-to-the-second mentality of other chat users, there were already copies of the video on YouTube and transcript logs to share.

After she saw what all he had left, Violet joined the small camp of people who were trying to talk sense into him. Most of the other chat room occupants were egging him on by that point. One guy was even encouraging Grimm to kill himself. Another merely wanted him to black out, preferably where they could see it.

Violet was appalled at how ruthless the others were. She was used to the standard bullshit that went on, the idle cursing and crude jokes, but to encourage someone to kill themselves on camera... Human nature never ceased to astound her with how low it could sink. She tried Private Messaging GrimmReefer but he didn't answer. She wasn't sure if he was ignoring her or if he was just too wasted to notice it. His typing was getting kind of weird and on the webcam he seemed to be having trouble sitting up straight.

And still he kept popping pills and drinking. At one point he mentioned how his mother was in the next room. Someone else in the chat told him she wouldn't notice if he died. He agreed. The chat rolled by for a few more minutes but Violet couldn't bring herself to participate any longer. It was too futile and too depressing. Then Grimm posted his phone number and asked if anyone wanted to call him. The words were misspelled.

It was the last thing he typed.

He passed out in front of the webcam. Some people in the chat room posted cheers. A few encouraged each other to call 911 but no one did. One person tried Grimm's cell phone. The guy moved a little on camera, which got a few more text cheers. Someone flashed the chat room with the contact number for Poison Control. Someone else encouraged him to vomit up what he'd taken; another person told him to call the hospital. But since he was face-down on his desk he couldn't see anything.

Again the subject of 911 was brought up but the person asking was 'shouted' down by several other people. They started worrying that the chat logs would lead to their being arrested for mob rule-induced suicide if Grimm actually died. People started dropping offline. Violet stayed on for a while but only because she was too depressed to shut the laptop.

When she finally powered it down she was so despondent that she couldn't face the task of getting dressed. Going downstairs seemed impossible. Her parents would ask questions and she really didn't feel like talking to anyone, about anything.

What was the point of going downstairs anyway? She couldn't go out. There was nothing to do. No hope of change. It all seemed like a big joke with a rotten punch line. Migrating through life, slogging through school or work day after day, hoping there was something greater after all the bullshit in life had ended. Some great reward. This was it: Eternity in a depressing house with depressing parents and even more depressing ghosts as roommates.

She wondered numbly if GrimmReefer was truly gone or if he'd just condemned himself to an eternity of ODing in his bedroom.

After that she tried to kill herself. She executed a couple of different suicides but it was more like morbid role play than any serious attempt at self-destruction. She hung herself from her ceiling fan in a fit of film noir. Once she'd recovered from that and freed herself from the sheet noose, she tried slitting her wrists. That was a little more satisfying.

As she sat on the floor, slumped against her bed and bleeding out, she contemplated the tired achy feeling that constricted the heart she didn't have. She'd give anything to make that feeling go away. Sleep used to but not since the bad dreams had taken over. Before that there was Tate. But she didn't want to be the girl who loved a mass murderer, even if she already was deep down. A couple of tears trickled down her cheeks even though her expression stayed blank.

The world faded away for a little while. The blackness didn't last nearly long enough. When she came to, there was blood everywhere and the dull ache was still inside, untouched. She cried a little harder then. But that didn't help either. So she cleaned up the mess before Moira or her mother showed up. Then she went back to bed.

...

Author's note:

Here we are again. I did the math and at the rate I'm going, I'll be writing the 2-part Halloween episodes around the same time as real Halloween. Got to love that for inspiration. And speaking of inspiration, the title of this Episode is "Persistence of Memory". It's the Dali painting of the watches melting everywhere. If you look closely at the painting in my cover art, you'll find Rubber Man in among the clocks.

So Constance. Ever since I first watched the show, I always wondered about the intro of the pilot. There we have 6 year old Addie in a Sunday dress out in front of Murder House in 1978. It's obviously abandoned and run down. The twins run past her and tear it up. What the heck was she doing there? How did she know there were things inside it? What the..?

So I narrowed it down to Constance. She's the one who's always been obsessed with the house, even before her kids died. So it makes sense she'd be the one to take her kid there. But... why? Well. Now we know.

GrimmReefer was inspired by the real life story of Brandon Vedas (aka Ripper), who killed himself with drugs while people egged him on in an IRC chat. You can find logs online if you're morbidly curious but it's some pretty sad stuff.

Check out my Profile for my playlist. We're sliding back and forth all over the timeline again this episode. Hold on tight. We're taking some strange turns.