Email exchange

[ladyfirestarter]

Date: January 07, 2007
From: "Charlene R. McGee" <charlie.mcgee@tetcorp.com>
To: "Marian O. Carver" <marian.carver@tetcorp.com>
Subject: Law of unintended consequences

Marian -

I feel I owe you a slightly more complete explanation of recent events.

As you're aware, my mental blocks slipped and let some highly unpleasant memories leak out into the atmosphere, where they were picked up by the kids. What I didn't mention at the time, because (a) it didn't seem relevant and (b) I was still considerably shaken, was that said memories are of very recent origin. This happened outside of work, and I have no reason to think it will affect any of the kids directly, but I think you should know.

A number of acquaintances and I were drawn through a door into a house place with walls and floors that shifted continuously. This structural shifting may or may not have been the source of the recurring growl-like sound we heard at intervals. The place was completely lightless, and cold enough to send at least one member of the party into hypothermic shock. None of us have any idea how long we were trapped there, though I don't think it can have been longer than one night.

I've been sitting here looking at that last paragraph for nearly ten minutes. It's accurate in every respect, and somehow completely inadequate. I'm not a writer, Marian, and I don't think I can convey what being in this place was like. And I'm not sure I want to.

I've taken steps to stop the leakage from happening again.

-Charlie

Comments

[walk_ins]

Date: January 09, 2007
From: "Michael John Copeland" <michael.copeland@tetcorp.com>
To: "Charlene R. McGee" <charlie.mcgee@tetcorp.com>
Subject: Creepy houses

Okay, Charlie, now, fair warning--you've still got some residual trauma, you probably want to read this in daylight with a cup of tea or whatever it is that keeps you zen. Or heck, just delete the damn thing--I've got to make a report to the BoW, but you don't really need to know all the details of where and if your experience syncs up with what Steve-O wrote.

Now, the Haunted House is one of the prime story archetypes--Steve talks about it in Danse Macabre pretty extensively. What he said is that the Haunted House story is frequently about economics.

You know, spend the night here and get the inheritance. Or the family buys what's supposed to make things stable and forever and great, and then it turns on them--a metaphor for bad drains. Amityville he calls the ultimate moneypit.

But you didn't buy your house, and honestly, King doesn't use that one so much. Rose Red, yes, and the house in Castle Rock in It Grows On You. Those are both the same house, I think, really--a mansion that grows on its own, and tries to kill the inhabitants.

Not you, again.

Another type of house we see in horror, specifically King, is the house-as-portal. This is related to trespassing and home invasion fantasies. The house with the elves in It and the Dark Tower series, the Marsten House in Salem's Lot and of course the nominal Black House. (Also, the raft in... the one with the raft. It's in Skeleton Crew.)

These are all about gateways--liminal experiences, where there's what King calls slippage. Slippage occurs on the border between two places, two realms, two realities, and bad things can slip through.

Now, initially, I thought we were looking at a Black House parallel. The House is Black House was built bad from square one, absolutely dark inside and out, and produced a pronounced feeling of dread from square one.

Now, visually, this kind of matches, but King also describes a variety of rooms, each one mind-bending and surreal, each one different. Plus, now evidence of haunting afterwards. Poisoning, yes--there's a kind of rotting corruption that's seriously gross, that sets in when one of the characters gets bit. But not what you describe in your latest email, which nails it for me.

Color or no, we're looking at 1408. It's a short story in a book called Everything's Eventual, and I really recommend you don't read it. Long story short, it's a hotel room in the Dolphin Hotel that slowly goes wrong, taking the protagonist's mental state with it. He's a pro ghost hunter, he gets carefully warned away, but he tries it anyway. The disorientation, the changing walls, and the haunting aftereffects all match.

What doesn't match is color--1408 is characterized by an orange light, King calls it tango-light--and fire. It's fire, actually, that saves the protagonist from the room--he sets himself on fire to break free.

We don't know what causes the badness of 1408--it's presented as chronic and there from the start. I've always theorized it's connected to one of the Bends of the Rainbows in King's DT, which are all color-aligned, but that's just guessing.

The overall message of the story seems to be that survival is its own reward, trauma or no. Take what you want from that.

Okay, that was long, and more than anything is probably a DO NOT READ list. It's also the rambly version of the report Marian will get.

Good luck, and fornit some fornus.

--Mike

[walk_ins]

Date: January 09, 2007
From: "Michael John Copeland" <michael.copeland@tetcorp.com>
To: "Charlene R. McGee" <charlie.mcgee@tetcorp.com>
Subject: RE: Creepy houses

I forgot to mention, the beginning of 408 was originally a writing exercise as a demo in On Writing, so... I don't know. If you want to avoid it, or whatever. There's honestly nothing scary in that part, though, just some good advice and a hilarious bit where King changes a guy's name from Overmeyer to Olin because he got sick of typing the longer name.

M

[ladyfirestarter]

Date: January 09, 2007
From: "Charlene R. McGee" <charlie.mcgee@tetcorp.com>
To: "Michael John Copeland" <michael.copeland@tetcorp.com>
Subject: RE: Creepy houses

So -- do you have any idea what this means? Is sai King writing a sequel with me in it, or is this a random similarity, or what?

And if 1408 is connected somehow to the Wizard's Rainbow, does that mean it exists here, in this world?

[walk_ins]

Date: January 09, 2007
From: "Michael John Copeland" <michael.copeland@tetcorp.com>
To: "Charlene R. McGee" <charlie.mcgee@tetcorp.com>
Subject: RE: Creepy houses

It's not easy to say. Not everything that happens is written by King. We're not sure if everything he writes happens.

My guess is the room in 1408 is a baby version of what you found. The blackness of yours makes me hope my Wizard's Rainbow theory is off, you know? I may be trying to overconsolidate, here--King also likes to throw out random, inexplicably monstrosities, like fingers in the drain or patches of oil that hypnotize and eat you.

There IS a Dolphin Hotel in New York, but the manager's name isn't Olin. Don't let it prey on your mind, Charlie.

Walk away.

All the best.