The Stamford Pistachio Trail, Part VI

The Stereo

She went up to her room quickly and then back to sleep, and dreamt she herself was a womb-baby: a hard-boiled egg on the kitchen counter Ronnie and Merri were preparing to cube and dice for a nice salad.

She woke again in partial darkness, a terrible moaning inside of her room. Mournful at first, it quickly turned guttural, sneering, making words:

“I’m going to get you -- get you get you get you. You will die tonight, Merri Adler -- at my hands! I am the killer computer. I hate you! Die, Merri Adler -- dii-eee…”

Merri went running by out in the lit hallway, sobbing.

Ronnie was taunting her over the house stereo. In every room except Nana´s there was at least one speaker mounted high on a wall for parties and such; all connected to the main receiver which also had a microphone down in the family room. Merri once put on a Bobby Sherman album, then walked Rosie through the entire house while it played.

Now Merri stood in her pajamas out on the landing, the ghastly shrieks and moans pouring forth from every direction.

“Stop!” she cried before running into her room and slamming the door. Rosie followed, simply closing the door behind her while Ronnie continued over the wall-mount:

“...bound for hell, Merri Adler! The devil is waiting for you. Do you know what he does to lonely monkey-faced girls? I do. Trust me, you won’t like it. But first I will break your neck and send you there -- to hell!”

“I HATE YOU, TOO!” Merri screamed up at the speaker.

Rosie slid a chair over from the desk, stood on it and reached up and turned the little knob at the bottom, but nothing happened.

“It’s on manual override, only he can lower the volume,” Merri said, collapsing into her pillow and crying. 

Rosie got down from the chair. “Please don’t do that. Where’s Aunt Ann?”

Merri raised her head. “She went out with Daddy, I think they made up…” then paused, letting the next thought wash over her.

“And I’m glad they did!” She sobbed again into her pillow.

“Guh-roww...the demons of hell will be eating your flesh soon…”

“There must be one other room,” Rosie said, “with no speaker. What about your secret spot? Or Barbara’s room?”

Merri looked up at her. “Barbara went home. You made her cry, remember?”

The ranting had stopped, leaving a heavy silence.

“I didn’t mean to…”

“There is one thing we can do,” Merri sniffled, heading to her door. “C’mon.”

They went out to the landing and were greeted by a crazed nut in a lifelike gorilla mask -- grunting and screeching and leaping about. They both yelped and returned to the room, slamming the door.

“I think I’m losing my mind, Dave. I can feel it...”

“That was only Andy in a gorilla mask,” Rosie said.

“That was a mask?”

They both snorted.

“We’ll wait until he clears out,” said Merri. ¨If he doesn't, we’ll throw him over the railing. We have to get down to the basement, to the circuit breakers.”

When they checked again, gorilla-boy was gone, and they slipped unhindered down the curving stairway and across the marble floor of the entryway. The door to the basement was at the head of the kitchen, and they were soon downstairs, heading for the dark, unfinished side. Merri carried a flashlight and switched it on. Onward then behind the dull yellow beam: Rosie acutely aware that anything might grab her at any second. She kept glancing back, but there was only the lighted playroom a universe away.

“It’s over here,” Merri said lowly. They were at the back stairs, she raised the light to the gray metal circuit box, opening it and revealing two long vertical rows of switches.

“I’m not sure which one goes to the stereo, they should be labeled.”

She went ahead and flipped all the switches, shutting down the house. The light in the playroom was gone. Then the droning furnace shut down, leaving only the cold wind outside and a dull, prevalent buzzing in Rosie’s ears. Merri closed the box and trained the flashlight beam between them, her face ashen and pasted with dried tears.

“This is the best way,” she said. “They’ll be down any minute to check the circuits, thinking we ran off somewhere to hide, but we’ll be right here waiting...” 

They backed into a dark alcove just off from the foot of the stairs, hidden from any approach. 

“They won’t have a flashlight, I hoarded them all in the event of a blackout. They won’t see anything until it’s too late and their hearts are in their throats. We’re going to scare the living shit out of them,” she added before switching off the flashlight.

Rosie heard the approaching footsteps on the floor above, Ronnie talking to Andy in a low and steady monotone. Then the door opened and they were heading down the stairs, if unsteadily.

“She’s always doing things like this,” Ronnie said. “Why would we care if the power went out? I don't need a flashlight. She probably flipped all the circuit breakers...they’re right here.”

He opened the box, and the flashlight came on.

“Ron.”

Ronnie took off, panicked, the yellow beam trailing him. Then it was gone, and there was a loud crash out in the playroom. Merri started flipping switches.

In light now, Ronnie groaned and raised himself up in the middle of a gutted Lego City, and hearing the others chuckling at the other end, proceeded to kick apart the remains, reducing it all to a pile of plastic rubble within moments. Then he stormed upstairs.

“Can’t take a joke,” Merri observed as the other three came out of the darkness to inspect the rubble. They picked out decapitated skyscrapers and other buildings with the little knobbed edges frayed and twisted by the force of impact. Rosie found the red and green church steeple, though none of the church.

Soon Merri pulled out three empty fruit crates, and they began to pile the pieces inside. She asked Andy why he didn’t run like Ronnie did when she turned on the flashlight.

“That’s easy,” he answered. “I knew you were there once we came down the stairs. I could smell you.” His voice grew faint. “I mean you always smell the same, like soap.”

Merri’s expression turned dark and gloomy, a pile of Legos dropped listlessly from her hand, then she went upstairs.

“You idiot…”

“What’d I say?”

“You told her she stinks!”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

Andy and Rosie gathered up the rest of the Legos, then watched some of Tom Snyder on the sofa bed. Rosie was certain she’d never been up this late on a Monday night -- and Andy informed her it was actually Tuesday morning. When Aunt Ann and Uncle Jerry arrived home, they went upstairs to say goodnight, and received kisses from both.

Merri was still up, wandering the second floor in a kind of daze. Andy stopped her on the landing and tried to apologize.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,¨ she said to him, ¨You must be insane.”

In the morning before breakfast, Merri burst into Rosie’s room and placed the Tuesday newspaper under her nose.

“The strangler struck again late last night -- which means Jerry is off the hook.”

Rosie brushed the paper aside and rested back on her elbow.

“Victim?” she asked.

“Another fitness instructor. That’s two in two days, a whole new facet to the case.”

“He must have something against fitness instructors… What’d he use this time?”

“A weightlifter’s belt.”

“Oooh.”

Merri tapped the newspaper. “They found the victim face down in the sink, for god sake…”

Rosie had to chuckle.

“Someone is dead -- and you’re laughing!”

“But we’re not dead.”

“What difference does that make?” 

Merri hit her with the paper.

Two uneventful days and nights went by before it was time to leave. Rosie was able to apologize to Barbara in the entryway, and she promptly teared up and took the child in her arms and squeezed until Rosie feared she might suffocate.

Aunt Ann was going to drive them home but then Uncle Jerry decided to do it. Merri came along for the long ride, but wouldn’t talk to Andy or even acknowledge his presence.

Back home in New Hampshire, Rosie fairly gushed over the trip to her mother:

“I saw 2001! I slept through most of it. I saw the apes at the beginning and the giant baby at the end. We met some really weird teenagers and gave one a ride home. There’s a strangler loose! But we were okay… Merri and Ronnie fixed breakfast for us every day! Merri and I built a whole city out of Legos, but then Ronnie knocked it down. It was an accident. Mom -- they have a ghost, I’m not kidding! We saw a light in the shack, and he left some boot-prints in the snow…”