Chapter Text
Since moving into town, Doug Turner learned one thing about his neighborhood.
No one goes to the house on top of the hill.
It was big, it was dark, and the owner rarely left it. The neighbors all knew that it was a man who lived there. Mr. Kingston, first name was unknown because no one ever bothered to find out. He had bought the house nearly thirty-five years ago, according to the people who lived there long enough to remember his appearance. Since then, he never really talked to anyone aside from a few gruff words to those who got too close to his property. Nothing unusual about a man liking his privacy, his father had said but Doug’s mom pitied him. She tried to send Doug up there once with a plate of cookies and he ended up hiding in Jack Denning’s tree house where they ate them all and he returned home feeling guilty and half-sick but free of awkward encounters with old, scary neighbors.
It wasn’t like Mr. Kingston had made his house look completely uninviting to visitors. He wasn’t eccentric enough to bar the windows or make ridiculously high privacy fences to surround his property, but the man didn’t make an effort to welcome people in either. Those people who went door to door passing on Jesus flyers always left them on his porch and ducked out of there, never touching the doorbell and they were supposed to be the resilient ones.
Which was why it was unusual when three years ago, out of the blue, a young woman was seen approaching the house every morning.
It happened like clockwork now. A pretty brunette woman would come up the sidewalk and head right for the door to the house on the hill before seven every morning. She would knock three times then let herself in even though it was typically customary to let the home owner open the door first. Over the years since her appearance, people noticed that she would leave at random times during the day or stay all afternoon but one thing was certain: She always left before nightfall.
Odd that such a pretty young woman would randomly make a habit of heading up to the house for the past three years. Of course, rumors circulated bearing all kinds of theories that were muttered at the mailbox or during backyard barbecues. They ranged from pity stories of it being a daughter of his coming to take care of him or a nurse from the hospital coming to check on his health to unsavory ones that she might have been a gold digger coming to prey upon an aging man. Whatever her story, Doug willingly got out of bed for school every morning in order to look out his window and watch her walk by. His mom greeted her in the morning sometimes, when she was outside and told his dad that she was polite whenever greeted but never stopped to talk.
Mrs. Jennings, a widow who lived next door to Marvin Young, discovered the woman’s name was Marianne and the only information gleaned was that she worked for Mr. Kingston but she never said what it was she did for him. The suitcase she wheeled after her was always in hand, but it wasn’t an overnight bag because she never stayed that long. It wasn’t clothing because those never changed from whatever she had worn that morning. Whatever she did for him, it was a well-kept secret that most of the time was left alone by the adults. It was the children who were mostly curios by the appearance of the woman going to a house no one else would dare go to.
It was the appearance of Marianne that inspired the children to begin making a game out of approaching Mr. Kingston’s house. They would see who would dare to stand the closest to it for the longest. Harry Jones held the record of standing on the first paving stone for five minutes before seeing the curtains move and running down the hill screaming. Hannah Young tried to walk up to the front steps of the porch but Marianne had come out the front door in that moment and she darted off, never trying to approach the place again. Marvin told him that he touched the front step on his birthday but Jack said it didn’t count because he ran away right afterward.
Naturally, when stories of scary old men were passed around the tree house on sleepover nights, dares would be included in the mix as well. Doug knew he should have stayed home that weekend but it was the first time he had been invited over to spend the night since moving away from his hometown. Martin and Jack were the first kids to even speak to him in the school cafeteria, he wasn’t about to say no to his only social acceptance. That was a new kid’s worst nightmare. In spite of that, he did wish his parents had told him to head home earlier the next morning than they did.
It was just after lunch, probably his last meal, when they headed up the hill. There were some dismissive statements that Kingston wouldn’t answer the door and he would be fine. Doug liked those scenarios. Then Marvin had to come up with a made-up idea of the door opening and Mr. Kingston would drag him into the house by his ankles and he’d never be seen again. That one he didn’t like so much. Jack shuddered over the idea of Mr. Kingston being a vampire that snuck away at night to find victims and Marianne was a thrall. That stopped him in his tracks because he had to ask what a thrall was and once he was finished explaining it, they had to start walking again. To cheer him up, Marvin eventually went into assumptions that the pretty young woman would be the one to answer the door if he didn’t run away fast enough. If that were the case, he was charged with having to tell them if she was as pretty in person as most of the neighborhood kids thought she was. Doug almost hoped that it would be her, just to spare him an angry old man possibly chasing him back down the hill for straying onto his property.
The three of them walked together to the top, stopping at the end of the sidewalk and staring up at the imposing house looming over them. Doug could understand their hesitation in being near such a structure. The house was crafted from dark woods and even darker shingles, the door was dark, the windows were curtained, everything about the house spoke of darkness, like the afternoon sunlight didn’t even touch it compared to the quaint houses of the neighborhood below. At least it wasn’t cloudy and raining with thunder and lightning in the mix when he stood before the house. They approached in the daytime, which was the best decision they could have made.
“Just go up and ring the doorbell. It’s easy.”
“If it’s so easy, why don’t you do it?” Doug grumbled, eyeing Marvin.
“Because I like living. I have a lot of living to still do! Come on, Mr. Kingston is a mean old man who hates kids!” Marvin explained, pointing at the house before them.
“He hordes the toys that kids lose in his basement.” Jack murmured, “I lost my new soccer ball to that old fart!”
Doug rolled his eyes but he still didn’t move any closer to the paving stones leading to the porch. He doubted an old man would horde a kid’s toys but he didn’t feel any braver when he finally broke apart from the two and started to approach the house. He was oddly reminded of Monster House when he approached it, half expecting the house to move when he set a foot upon the lower step then climbed to the next. The wood didn’t creak, which was odd for an old house, he expected it to groan and moan under his weight but they were surprisingly solid. Even the porch, dulled by age and sunlight, didn’t creak or crack when he crossed the wood. The door handle was polished and gleamed and the bell was softly illuminated in the shadow of the roof like most of the houses had throughout the neighborhood. Up close it was all remarkably normal and not what he expected for a reclusive old man’s house. He still found himself hesitating when he slowly extended his hand towards the doorbell.
His fingers trembled and he shook his hand out, forcing his thumb to press the little white button. He flinched when he heard the bell ring, lower than the one back at his house but not the resounding boom he expected. Doug should have turned and ran in that moment. That was the plan and he was supposed to stick to the plan! He beat the dare and rang the doorbell but he was still rooted to the spot, gawking at the door in front of him. Somewhere behind him he could hear Marvin and Jack trying to whisper-yell to call him back to them but they fell on deaf ears when the doorknob suddenly turned.
Would it be Marianne, or would it be Mr. Kingston?
The door caved in suddenly and Doug staggered back at the sight of a tall man standing on the other side of the doorway. Well he knew who he was looking at and it wasn’t the lesser of the two evils. Standing before him was the dreaded Mr. Kingston. He looked old but not as old as the kids had said he would be. His shoulders were hunched down, his back bent with increasing age but in his younger years he might have been tall enough to nearly touch the top of the doorframe with his head. His face was thin and wrinkled, hair gray but his eyebrows were black with a few gray strands sticking out at odd angles. He looked down his nose at Doug with a sniff, long arms crossing over his chest with gnarled fingers drumming over them.
“What do you want?” his voice was dry and rough with an accent that reminded him of the Hobbit films, some dwarves sounded like that but he had no idea where the real dialect was from.
“Uh…” he couldn’t think of a legitimate reason for being there. Doug didn’t think he needed one when he came up to the house because running away was supposed to be the plan!
Mr. Kingston blinked down at him, still waiting for him to explain himself when his eyes rose over his head and Doug jerked around to see Jack and Marvin nearly shaking where they stood, half ducked behind the garbage can. The moment they realized he had spotted them, they bolted back down the hill, leaving Doug still standing on the porch with the same old man standing right behind him. He slowly turned around to face him again and realized he was actually smirking after the two that had run away.
Stepping back, he looked down at Doug and held the door open. “Why don’t you just come inside?”
He swept his arm inside, inviting him in with a mocking gesture and that same smirk on his lips that should have been more unnerving than inviting. Doug’s feet moved before he even realized it, carrying him over the threshold and inside of the house. Mr. Kingston shut the door after him shortly after he was safely inside and stalked through the entrance hall while he trailed along after him. His eyes raked over every detail he could find while he followed Kingston through. The room behind the front door was huge, reaching up to the second story with a giant opening, a staircase leading to the upper floor, curling around to lead to the next floor that was half exposed over an ornate railing. A wrought-iron chandelier hung from the ceiling with several little lights casting gnarled shadows on the ceiling behind the bright glow.
Mr. Kingston led him through an archway leading out of the entryway and down a hall where more doorways branched off to other rooms, eventually stepping into one of them where the lights were all on after so many dark rooms. He paused to check over his shoulder, making sure he was still following and Doug scurried to keep up, following him into the room and saw that it was a lot like his father’s library back home. It was smaller in size but well-stocked with more furniture than his dad did. There were books lining the entire back wall behind a heavy-looking desk. A chess table sat in front of one of the windows to the right, the remains of a game still standing mid-play but only one chair had been pulled back from it. Two more chairs were angled towards the desk, similar to the ones he had seen at the bank his mother worked at. It was one of those that Mr. Kingston pointed a long finger at, resulting in Doug immediately sitting down. He dropped his hands into his lap, eyes following the old man when he lowered himself into the large, narrow seat behind the desk.
It felt like he had been called to the principal’s office at school when Mr. Kingston leaned across the desk, lacing his fingers together and staring down his nose at him again.
“Once again, what do you want?” he asked, raising his eyebrows expectantly.
Doug fidgeted in his chair.
“Your friends dared you to ring my doorbell, didn’t they?”
Doug’s head jerked up and he stared at the man across from him. “How did you know that?”
The old man smiled. “I hear the rumors you kids spread about me. Not all of them are unfounded but some of them are not true either.”
“If you know about it…why haven’t you tried to deny any of it?” Doug asked, though he immediately clammed up, squeezing his hands together tighter in his lap.
Mr. Kingston chuckled dryly, “I need my privacy. A few neighborhood kids spreading rumors actually helps me to maintain that.”
Doug raised an eyebrow now.
He seemed to notice his confusion because the corner of his mouth twitched a little higher. He leaned back into his chair a little, resting his hands on the arms. “I have an unusual sleep pattern because of my work. So, I like it when I am left alone. Kids are…louder than I prefer but I think I can manage one without too much trouble.”
Doug’s previous fears felt utterly ridiculous in front of this rather reasonable man. While he still looked scary up close, he was much nicer than the rumors made him out to be. He heard stories of the man having beady black eyes and clawed fingers accompanied by an ever-present scowl. Up close, his eyes were blue and they looked sharper than a man his age should have had. His nails, while a little rough, were hardly claws, though his fingers were longer than he had ever seen before.
His eyes flicked over his head then lowered back down to him, eyebrow quirking but he maintained a stoic expression when he asked, “Do you like coke?”
“What?” Doug blinked up at him.
“Coke, you know, that soda that most of you kids drink like water?” he held his hand over the desk about as high as a bottle would have been.
“Oh, yeah!” he snapped himself out of it. “I like it.”
“Good, because that’s all I have to offer you.” He stood up, passing the chairs and Doug twisted around, wondering if he had to follow him. He was surprised when he saw that on a little table beside the doorway was a bottle of coke already sitting there. It was a glass one like the modern remake of the glass bottles with a cap that could twist off. He watched him pick it up and carry it over, removing the cap with a little hiss from the carbonation and handing it to him. The glass was ice cold even though it had been sitting on the table, as if someone had just taken it out of the fridge moments ago. He puzzled at the oddity but took a sip while Mr. Kingston sat back down across the desk from him.
“Now that the hospitality bit is cleared up, I suppose you have questions.”
“A few, though I don’t know if you’ll like hearing them.”
“Kid, this is the first time one of you have been brave enough to come talk to me in years, I’m sure I can handle whatever ridiculous assumptions you may have heard about me.” He smirked at him, the curve of his lips looking younger than he expected from an older man. “Do your worst.”
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Doug gave an angry groan as Kingston slammed his piece down in front of him with a victorious laugh that left him throwing his hands in the air and leaning back into the chair. He didn’t remember when they had moved from questions to playing games of checkers but it had been an overall interesting visit with the man most kids dubbed as “the meanest old many you’ve ever seen.” If anything, he was the meanest double jumper he’d ever seen because that man had beaten him in three games before this final match, the older man smugly smirking at him as he glanced up to the grandfather clock standing in the corner.
“Well, if I keep you here any longer, your friends will think I’ve cooked you alive and eaten you.” He mused, standing up. “It’s been a pleasure, Doug.”
He almost hated to leave but when the hand extended out to him, he shook it eagerly. Doug thought checkers would be boring. He hated playing it with his grandfather because the man took hours to make one move and while he loved his grandparents, they didn’t understand a child’s attention span. After being whipped at it no matter how many times he had to strategize, it turned into his competitive spirit firing up full force and still losing to the other man.
Through the time he sat in the room with him, Doug discovered that while Mr. Kingston had a bit of a temper, he wasn’t as mean as kids made him out to be. He told him that while he was well past retirement age, he still worked at the hospital in town and that was the source of his odd hours. Marianne did indeed work for him as a sort of housekeeper and maintenance worker. The good condition of the place and more welcoming traits were all her handy work. He didn’t hate children, he simply found them noisy. The rumors of him hording lost toys were ridiculous and he finished that with a heavy sigh and a great eye roll that Doug thoroughly understood.
More odd appearances of snacks and another bottle of coke had happened during his visit as well, seeming as if they were popping into existence in the span of a few minutes whenever he turned his head. He snacked on hostess cakes and chips in between the games of checkers and talking with Mr. Kingston about the truths and falsehoods under his name.
By the time he reached the front porch again, Mr. Kingston lowered himself into a crouch, looking him in the eye on his level as he faced him.
“Feel free to visit whenever you like.” He told him, “But make sure you don’t tell your friends too much about me and ruin this little reputation I have. I only let in the brave ones, after all.”
Doug could have sworn when he saw Mr. Kingston smile he saw that his canines were a little longer than the rest of his teeth but dismissed it with a shake of his head. He had spent enough time in the man’s company to know he wasn’t as dangerous as the other kids made him out to be but he did like his method of weeding out those who could visit him and those who did not. He promised not to ruin his image before the man straightened back up and shut the door. Doug turned and ran down the steps and back to the bottom of the hill where Jack and Marvin were waiting for him by the stop sign, their eyes wide when they saw he was still alive and faces even more twisted in confusion at the even bigger surprise that he was smiling when he reached them.
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Bog returned to the study after his impromptu guest had left, relaxing himself from the stooped posture and rolling his shoulders, fingers massaging the back of his neck and giving it a crack. The snap of tension relaxing the crick that had been forming left him sighing contentedly, closing his eyes and sinking back into his chair. The boy had been brave to come up to his house and he made sure to reward him for his courage but silently prayed that none of the other kids in the neighborhood would come calling anytime soon. He had a reputation for being a recluse and he wanted to keep it that way.
Still, talking to the boy was refreshing.
“He’s made it back down the hill.”
Bog smiled to himself, opening his eyes as Marianne appeared in the doorway. His gaze dropped to her t-shirt and scoffed at the words “Bite Me” in purple glitter displayed proudly across her chest. Her hand ran through her dark hair with a thoughtful smile on her lips and she leaned into the frame.
“Did you enjoy playing ghost caterer today?” he asked, settling down and shutting his eyes again.
“Yeah, you’re lucky I still stock your fridge to keep me fed whenever I’m here.” She stated. He could hear her walking into the study now, the sound of her boots on the floor betraying her position as she came closer. “You owe me for those cokes, by the way. I really liked those glass bottles.”
“I’ll give you an advance on your paycheck.” Bog rubbed at his eyes with his fingertips.
“Hey, don’t smudge up my hard work!” He felt her slap his wrist and chuckled, opening his eyes and looking up at her. “I barely got any sleep last night and you got to sleep through the whole application this time!”
Marianne tilted his face up towards the light, surveying her handiwork to ensure he hadn’t smudged up the makeup she had used on him. The wrinkled skin prosthetics were hard to muddle up but her highlights and contouring brush strokes might have suffered a little at his thoughtless gesture. Her lips pressed together in disapproval, brows narrowing as she fixed him with a glare that he smiled apologetically back at, laying his hands over hers and gently guiding them away from his face.
“You’re still wearing that perfume.” He murmured, catching a whiff of it from her wrist before he released her hands.
“You know you like it.” She smiled and stuck her tongue out between her teeth.
“It’s because I like it that you’re not supposed to wear it.” He reminded her with a stern look. “We talked about this, Marianne.”
She rolled her eyes, “No. I talk, you shoot me down. It’s not like I haven’t had plenty of time to think it over in the past three years.”
“Answer is still no and tempting me with that perfume is just playing dirty.” He reminded her, standing up from his chair and going to the window. With the brush of his hand, he eased the curtain aside and looked down the eastern side of the hill to the houses below. “Hopefully he doesn’t tell too many people about today.”
“If you’re so worried about your scary reputation, why did you let him in?” she asked, letting him drop the subject in favor of the more relevant question.
“You were whining about having no Trick or Treaters at Halloween.” He glanced over at her, “I figured letting one child in would be a good start in shutting you up this year.”
Marianne’s expression softened as she stared at him, surprised by his gesture to appease her when he had been so adamant against opening up to the rest of the neighborhood for well over three decades before she came around. She smiled and nudged him with her elbow, the both of them looking down on the town below. Bog felt her ease a little closer to him but they didn’t touch.
“You know, Bog…you’re a horrible vampire,” she murmured, “but you’re a hell of a man.”