Steve closed the door behind him and went immediately to the large, four-poster bed where he threw himself across it. He never should have agreed to this. Ever since he'd arrived on the doorstep of this house from hell, he knew it had it in for him. If he was any other person, he'd have laughed at the very idea that a house could be antagonistic towards a person, but no one else had such a bloody connection to a pile of wood, stone, and glass.
After lying down for only a few moments, he bolted upright again. He was too wired to sleep. His feet propelled him across the floor towards the large bay windows. He rested his arms against the cool glass panes as he surveyed the scene below him. His room overlooked the side of the house and from his vantage point he could see an ankle-deep pool of stagnant water collected from countless rainfalls. Dead leaves and broken tree branches were scattered across its surface. Along the length of this pool were a number of statuesque imps, identical to the guardian of the house, figures frozen in mid-dance as they leapt around the tepid water. In another time, the figures could be called happy and gay, but frozen in the moonlight, they were the very epitome of calloused demons as they guarded their hellish domain. The guardian had scared him the most as a child. He stood guard over the entrance to the house, his elbow propped up on a knee as a mischievous smile tugged at the corner of his stony mouth. Steve had always wondered what secrets he was hiding, what horrors he had witnessed.
Spring may have come to the rest of Seattle, but Steve was certain it would never find a foothold in Rose Red. It existed in a perpetual state of dying and dead, a winter existence. The caretaker had lamented the horrid state of the grounds and tried his hardest to coax some life from a wayward branch or an errant bush. Steve had admired the man's persistence and hadn't the heart to tell him it was pointless. That's what he got when he hired immigrants. Nobody who lived in Seattle for any length of time would go anywhere near the house; they'd all heard the rumors. He'd finally resorted to hiring the little Frenchman that had gone begging from house to house for work. The little man hadn't spoken a word of English, so he hadn't heard the rumors of Rose Red, or hadn't understood them if he had. Steve's only saving grace had been his ability to speak French fluently. He'd insisted on taking it in high school in a vain attempt to impress women with the language of love. By the time the Frenchman had learned enough English to understand the rumors when they reached his ears, he'd decided the house had had ample opportunity to devour him and, as he was still alive, he was quite safe within her borders.
Steve laughed at that memory, his breath fogging up the window pane. His fingers brushing lightly across the glass to wipe away the fog, he only hoped they could all share in the luck that little Frenchman seemed to have bottled up. Something told him they wouldn't be that lucky. If he could put an actual emotion to it, he felt the house was a little too happy at having visitors. That couldn't possibly bode well for any of them.
Surprised to find himself pacing, Steve decided to make another attempt at sleep. Stripping down to his boxers and tee shirt, he slipped underneath the covers, certain that Joyce wouldn't be joining him this night. Trying in vain to count sheep in his quest for sleep, he finally gave up on that when the sheep started crossing his field of vision, splattered with blood and whispering his name in a hauntingly familiar feminine voice.