Happy House - 1. Chapter 1: One Truth and Two Lies

"We're recording." It was five o'clock on a Sunday morning. The interview was scheduled at the police station but the suspect had suffered to much injuries. Suspect James Hartin, Marla County Hospital; January 16th, 2004.

Agent Devins and Agent Carrington stood at the front of the hospital bed of James Hartin. The man in the bed was unrecognizable, bandages covered his entire body. Devins took a step forward. "James Hartin?" The man in the bed didn't respond. "James, now we are trying to help you, we need to know what happened in that house." James's hands started to shake when the agent said 'house'.

"I already told you what happened." James said in a soft, scratchy voice.

"Yes, well we need to get it on record." James turned slowly to his side facing away from the two agents. "Now we have 8 bodies on our hands and four suspects-you are one of them. We need to know the whole story so we can help you, that's all we want to do James." Agent Carrington started rubbing James's back as he started to sob.

"What more do you need to know! THAT FUCKING BITCH DID IT!" James yelled through tears. He started to unwrap the bandages around his hand. "She took all my fingers!" All ten of James's fingers were cut off. Then James revealed his mouth, "Then she took my teeth!" Noticeably the top four teeth in his mouth were missing. James started to pant then broke down. Agent Carrington handed him a tissue and started to comfort him.

"Now, James, I know it hurts so bad but we need to know all the details. We don't no what happened in that house, you need to help us please." Carrington said. James took the tissue from her then laid on his back, facing toward the ceiling. "Now, James, what exactly happened in that house?" James faced towards both agents and began to recount the day in the house.

"Well, it started like any other day, me and my husband Jeff were heading to the park with our dogs..." James starting tearing up again after mentioning his boyfriend.
Agent Devin tilted the camera towards James and said, "Continue."

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It was a gloomy morning at the Marrimount Park. James and Jeff Hartin had decided it was a good morning to take their two dogs for a walk, they had always gone to this park when it hit the weekend. They decided it was a Friday morning necessity.

James looked at his dogs and his husband of three years and thought, 'I have the greatest family'. Just then Jeff looked at the eyeing James.

"Babe, whatcha looking at?" Jeff said in a adoring smirk. Jeff was 5'8 to James 5'6, and although they both were young, 24 to be exact, they knew they were right for each other. A year after they met they decided to tie the knot.

James quickly responded. "I just feel lucky, thats all." he smiled then grabbed the dog's leash from Jeff's hand and headed to the woods. On their first date they had played hide and seek in these woods, even though it was dark they always managed to find each other.

"No fair!" Jeff yelled back and held their other dogs leash in hand as he covered his face. Jeff began counting, "10...9..."

James was looking for a great spot, he held his puppy, a golden retriever, one of two twin dogs they decided to rescue, under his arm. He found an old, big willow tree, James had no idea where he was. Not giving up on the game he hid behind the tree. He looked down at his pup and said, "Shhhh." He waited for a couple of minutes then all of a sudden he heard foot steps. He quickly sank to the ground covering his and the puppy's mouth. James started to laugh into his hand because he knew he was found.

James looked towards the way he entered the woods, he couldn't see a thing except for trees and darkness. He heard the foot steps but this time he could hear that they had past him. He decided to softly go towards the foot steps in an attempt to scare Jeff.

James saw a figure, a person heading deeper into the woods, but he couldn't figure out if it was Jeff or not. The person was holding something in his right hand; James immediately knew Jeff was a righty and he would probably be holding their other dog in his right hand. James crept closer. James was behind him. Laughing softly he was about to jump onto him when all of a sudden he heard behind him Jeff scream, "JAMES!" James turned towards Jeff's direction then back at the figure. It had turned around; James looked at it, it appeared to be a man in a gas mask. James started to run towards Jeff's screaming when the man grabbed James. James screamed. Silence.

James opened his eyes, the smell of putrid filth filled his nostrils as his sight came back to him. He was in a big rotting room, tied to the crumbling wall.The smell quickly overwhelmed James causing him to vomit. "James?!" James looked across the room and there, tied to the opposite side, was Jeff.

"Jeff!" James cried out as they looked at each other in tears. "Jeff don't worry, everything will be alright!" James said then looked at his bound hands, he couldn't, for the life of him, get loose. "Now, we just need to get our hands..." Before James could finish Jeff screamed.

The door to James's right and Jeff's left opened. They couldn't see the person coming in. Suddenly the door slammed close. They couldn't see the person who entered because it was way to dark. Then James started to really scan the room, he noticed that there were three light in a row on the ceiling above his head and the same over Jeff's head then complete darkness in between. The one thing, however, that stood out in the dark space between them was a shiny butcher knife on the floor. James immediately started to panic.

Both of them began to hear footsteps. Jeff screamed, "There's someone in this room!!!" James and Jeff could only see a dark figure heading towards the knife.

"Please! Help us!" James screamed at the figure but it didn't respond back. Instead it crouched and sat down in front of the shiny blade.

"Oh my god, oh my god, OH MY GOD!" Jeff screamed in tears as the blade started to spin.

James looked at Jeff, "Don't panic Jeff!" As soon as he said that the blade stopped. The figure immediately got up, knife in hand and headed towards James in the shadows. James immediately started to panic. It looked up and shattered the first Light above James's head.

"JAMES!" Jeff screamed. The figure brought the only visible object down then instead of progressing towards James he went back to the same spot, on the floor in the middle of the room. James and Jeff couldn't make out exactly what was happening. Then all of a sudden the blade started spinning again. James looked at Jeff and started comforting him.
"It's going to be alright Jeff, he's not doing anything but breaking these lights..." James immediately looked at the figure then at the blade, closely examining it. The blade stopped, James noticed that the blade head was pointing at Jeff. James gulped. The figure got back up, this time heading towards Jeff. Jeff screamed.

The figure shattered the first light above Jeff's head then headed back to the same spot. Jeff looked confused but seeing the actions James immediately knew what was going on. The blade started spinning again. James screamed at Jeff, "Try to get out! TRY TO UNTIE YOURSELF!" James quickly thrashed attempting to loosen the rope that held them up. Jeff mimicked James. The blade stopped, the head was pointing towards Jeff. "Come on Jeff! HURRY!" James screamed.

The figure headed this time again towards Jeff, Jeff scream, "HELP!" as the figure shattered the second light above Jeff's head, making the area around Jeff even more darker. Jeff thrashed harder. "James!"

James looked at Jeff and said, "He's letting the knife decide who's light to shatter, whomever the head of the blade lands on he shatters that person's light! We have to get out of here!" They both realized that they had to get out of their restraints. The figure sat back down and the blade started spinning again. James looked at Jeff as Jeff started to bite away at the rope. James could feel that his rope was loosen so he quickly thrashed harder. The blade stopped and James heart skipped a beat.

The blade stopped towards the empty third wall giving James and Jeff a sigh of relief. The blade started to spin again. James screamed, blood started to drip out of his restraints. Jeff chewed away at his restraints, the blade kept spinning.

"James!" Jeff screamed as he got his right hand out of the restraints. James looked at Jeff with hope in both their eyes.

The blade stopped in mid-spin.

James started to cry as the blade unintentionally landed on Jeff. "NOOOOO!" James screamed as the figured headed towards Jeff. Jeff looked at James and started sobbing, both of their eyes met. "NOO!" James screamed, Jeff looked at James for the last time then the figure shattered the last light. James couldn't see Jeff, he could only hear sobs. James began to scream, "JEFF!!!"

Jeff screamed a last blood-curdling scream then the screams were muffed with chopping and gargling sounds, the once visible butcher knife disappeared into nothingness.

James slumped over, defeated.

The noises stopped, James looked up and foot steps headed towards him. He didn't care, he just wanted it over with. He followed the semi-visible knife, the blade itself caked in blood. The figure shattered the second light above James then headed towards the last light. James, still slumped, started to sob. He figured it was the end of him, the end of this stupid game.

The figure shattered the last light and James closed his eyes. He could hear ripping sounds, he couldn't make it out. All of a sudden he fell to the ground. It was too dark for him to notice what was going on. The foot steps continued but this time they were heading away from him.

The door slammed open again and closed. There was no one in the room except for him and his slain lover. James couldn't see anything, he knew however that were Jeff was in the room so he headed towards his body.

Crawling through dirt and waste he managed to get to were Jeff was. The ground was soaking wet. James knew what that wetness was exactly. He cried again, his voice cracking with every sound.

He started to feel around for Jeff but couldn't find any sign of him.

The door slammed back open, "Hello?" a women's voice could be heard. James looked at the lady through watery eyes. James immediately collapsed.