Gary and Morris at the Old Haunted House

It was Halloween morning, and you could feel it in the air. The grounds around The Hervey Foundation for Cats were covered in leaves and the neighbours’ properties had been decorated with spooky spider webs, ghoulish ghosts, and a plethora of pumpkins up and down the road. 

Gary and Morris are both big Halloween fans. As cats, nothing tickles their fancy more than people watching, and this holiday is like the World Series of people watching. 

“BOO!” shouted Morris, into the ear of a sleeping Gary. 

Gary awoke with a startle.

“WHAT!?”

“Happy Halloween!” said Morris.

“Why’d you scare me?!” said Gary.

“It’s the reason for the season!” said Morris. 

A volunteer walked past them dressed as a pirate. 

“See? The humans are already getting into their disguises!” 

“Already? It’s 7am,” said Gary, who was still waking up. He kicked into his ears with his back foot. “I do love Halloween… What’s the plan for tonight?”

“I was thinking we do what we always do and go watch all the humans walk around from up high in a tree!” said Morris.

“I like the sound of that,” said Gary. “Let’s grab something to eat first.”

The two cats went to grab a meal and then hung out on the back porch, digesting.

A few moments later, Marjorie came outside to run a box to one of the sheds. Once back on the porch, she stopped, looked at the two cats, who were lying down, belly up, and told them, “You two boys look comatose!” 

She was dressed like a pirate. 

“There seems to be a theme developing here,” said Morris.

“Yes. I think they are all wearing tablecloth pieces,” said Gary. “Perhaps they are all dressing as tables.”

Marjorie then gave both cats a belly rub and walked inside.

“Those are Pirates,” said Morris. “They seem to growl quite a bit, and they talk with deep voices.”

“I assume this is another thing you picked up while living in the city?” said Gary.

“At this time of year, pirates seem unavoidable, yet strangely, through the rest of the year, they aren’t much of a problem,” said Morris.

“Humans are so weird,” said Gary.

The cats had a few more hours to kill before they headed into town, so they just stayed on the back porch, soaking in the final rays of the day.

As the sun started to set, both cats got up, stretched, yawned, then stretched again. Once that was all complete, it was time to head out.

The boys had decided to go by public transport. As they had done in the past, they would hop on at the nearest stop and ride it into the city. 

Getting on the bus wasn’t hard. Since people aren’t used to cats using public transportation, they are usually met with one of two reactions: people on the bus are excited to see them, or they don’t want anything to do with them. 

This time, the bus was full of witches. Not like the ones they met in the forest last Halloween, these ones didn’t seem to have any real magic. They were mostly young women dressed as witches, and according to some of their conversations, they were headed to a Halloween party at a place called The Convention Centre. 

“How perfect!” said one of the witches. “We have summoned two familiars to our cause!”

“Oh, stop it, Mary,” said another.

They all laughed.

“Come here, boys! Pst pst pst!” said the one who spoke second. 

Gary and Morris went over and sniffed the hands of each person then sat on their laps and let them pet them.

“These witches really seem to like us!” said Morris.

“Oh, there is our stop!” said Gary.

The cats jumped off the laps of the witches and ran to the door as another passenger was stepping off the bus. 

“This is the best place to watch all the action. It’s a neighbourhood with lots of young families!” said Gary.

The neighbourhood had lots of big, older houses. Some were a bit run down, but others were very nice! The trees were all very tall and wide, and lots of houses had big front yards with bushes all around them.

Gary and Morris were having a great time darting across the yards, feeling the cool grass on their toes, jumping over fences, bushes, and big stones

Every once in a while, they’d need to use the sidewalk, at which point they’d notice more and more kids were filling up the streets, wearing their costumes and carrying big bags in their hands. 

“It’s starting to happen!” said Morris.

“Let’s get up high!” said Gary. 

Both cats sprinted up a big thick tree as quickly as possible. Once at the top, they came face to face with another cat, who puffed her fur up as soon as she saw them. 

Morris immediately puffed up, but Gary was calm.

“Hey there! I’m Gary. This is Morris. We are just here to watch the humans.”

“My name is Willie!” 

“How are ya, Willie?” 

“I’m great! I was just watching the people as well, care to join me?”

“I think that’s a great idea!” said Gary. “Morris, you can pull your fur back in?”

Morris took a few deep breaths and pulled his fur back in. 

The three cats then took up a spot on one of the bigger limbs on one of the bigger tree limbs, watching all the trick-or-treaters.

“So, I live only a few blocks down,” said Willie. “But the both of you live outside the city?”

“That’s right,” said Gary. “We took a bus here!”

“Wow!” said Willie. “I’ve never taken a bus before.”

Just as Morris was about to brag about how they had ridden the bus numerous times before, they heard all the kids on the ground gasp and a few shouted out, saying, “Look! In the sky!”

It was a giant owl, swooping over the heads of the trick-or-treaters. The cats were both mesmerized and terrified. It let out a giant, “Hoo!” and then swept upwards into the air, around, and into the branches of the tree the cats were in. 

“RUN!” shouted Willie.

The three cats bolted down the side of the tree and lo and behold, the owl followed them! Gary and Morris were so freaked out they ran as hard as their bodies would let them, going straight for the first piece of cover they could find. That piece of cover just so happened to be a nearby house. There was a basement window that had a missing pane, so the cats jumped in through there. 

“Where are we?” said Morris.

“I don’t know,” said Gary. “But it’s very dusty.”

The two cats sneezed a few times after stirring up all the dust. 

“It sure is dark in here,” said Morris.

The only light the cats had was whatever remaining moonlight was able to stream through the windows. 

“Let’s see if we can find some stairs or something,” said Gary.

Both Gary and Morris hopped down from the workbench they were standing on and started walking on the cold, stone floor. 

“This house must be ancient,” said Morris. “Everything feels so old in here!” 

“I bet it has been here a long time,” said Gary. “You’re right about that.”

Suddenly a rack fell over, full of pots and pans, making a massive crashing sound.

Gary and Morris bolted, but it was so dark they couldn’t see where they were going. Gary ran in circles for about a minute until he could make out the side of a bookcase and then jumped onto one of the shelves and squeezed himself in between some books. 

Morris was less fortunate. He was so spooked he ran full speed into a small locker and hit the back of it so hard, the door shut on him. 

After all the pots and pans had settled to the floor. Gary slowly looked out from his bookshelf hiding spot. Given a moment to gather himself, he soon realized just how silly it was to try to disguise himself as books. 

Morris was sadly meowing from the locker he was in. Gary walked over and pushed the handle down, letting the door swing open. Inside was a puffed-up Morris. 

“You’re okay buddy,” said Gary. “It looks like a shelf fell over.”

“Did you do anything to make it fall?” said Morris.

“Nope,” said Gary.

“Neither did I,” said Morris. “Weird.”

“Oh! Stairs are right here!” said Gary. “Follow me!”

Morris sucked his fur back in, then both cats went up the stairs to the main floor. 

The stairs made a lot of noise. Gary and Morris were fairly trim cats. They didn’t eat a ton of dry food and they got lots of exercise, so it was odd how loud the stairs were, but they were made of old very old wood.

The stairs opened up into the middle of the main floor. Both cats stood atop the stair just before the main floor, with their heads just barely peaking over the hardwood. 

“It’s empty!” said Morris.

“And creepy,” said Gary.

“You go first,” said Morris.

“You go first,” said Gary.

The two decided to count down and go at the same time. 

As they walked out onto the floor at the same time, nothing happened.

“Phew,” said Gary. “I thought something was going to-”

Just then they heard the sound of something big falling onto the floor that was still above them. It was a two-storey house, without any furniture, and nobody living there, and yet somehow something had fallen once again, without any interaction from either cat.

“You don’t think this place is… haunted?” said Morris.

“Morris, don’t say that!” said Gary. “I’m already scared enough as is.”

Right after Gary said that both cats heard a faint meow come from the second floor.

“There must be another cat up there!” said Gary, who looked over at Morris only to find him fully puffed up again. 

“Morris, we have to go see if there’s another cat upstairs!”

“Technically, we don’t have to,” said Morris.

“Oh, deflate yourself, again, and let’s go,” said Gary, who took off towards the stairs. 

“Wait up!” said Morris, who tagged along.

At the base of the stairs, both cats noticed they were in a terrible state of disrepair. Some boards were broken in half, some were missing, and it looked as if the entire staircase was pulling away from the wall. 

“Carefully now,” said Gary.

“Right behind you,” said Morris.

Both cats started to make their way up the stairs. Like two rock climbers, Gary and Morris slowly wove their way between usable spots and up to the main landing. Once up there, they felt a very cold wind blow past them, but then it was fine again. 

“What was that?” said Morris.

“That was really cold. It’s not even that cold outside,” said Gary.

“Where do you think that meow came from?” said Morris. 

“I’m not sure. Let’s look around,” said Gary.

Both cats started to peer into the many different rooms on the second floor, while meowing and trying to encourage whatever made the previous noise to repeat themselves.

“Anyone there?” said Gary.

“Come out! We are friendly!” said Morris.

“Morris! Come over here,” said Gary, with excitement in his voice. “This must be what fell down earlier.”

There was a broken, run-down, foldout bed that seemed to have crashed down and out of the wall it was harboured in. 

“I wonder what made it fall?” said Gary.

Both cats entered the room and started to sniff around the bed inquisitively. 

Then it happened.

A massive blast of wind started to blow through the room, making a ton of noise, whipping up all the things in there; leaves, paper, and dirt. It seemed to get louder, and louder, and louder, then the door slammed shut and the wind stopped instantly. All the stuff that had whipped up into the air suddenly fell to the floor again. 

Gary and Morris looked at each other.

“What was that?” said Gary.

Morris was so scared he could hardly move.

Out of nowhere, the lights came on. Then off. Then on again and continued to flicker. Gary jumped on Morris and the two ran into one of the corners. Suddenly all the objects in the room started to float again, but this time there was no wind.

“I don’t like this at all!” said Morris.

With the lights flickering, and the floating objects, a voice started to make itself heard. 

“Get… Out…”

Gary and Morris were so terrified they didn’t know what to do. 

Suddenly the lights in the fixtures started to pop, one at a time. 

“What do we do?” said Morris.

“I don’t know! The door is shut!” said Gary. 

They were a windowpane break, and in from the outside came their new friend Willie!

As soon as Willie entered the room, she ran over to the shut door, then through it, then opened it. Once the door was open, everything that had previously been floating, fell to the floor once again and the voice stopped speaking.

“Let’s go!” shouted Willie.

Gary and Morris ran over to Willie and followed her back down the upstairs hallway, down the broken stairs, then out the front door that was now open somehow. Once outside, the front door slammed shut.

“Did you just see that?!” said Gary.

“Which part?” said Morris. “That was all way too crazy to even imagine!”

“You’re safe now, friends,” said Willie.

“What happened?” said Gary.

“There is a spirit in that house,” said Willie. “The previous owner passed away and had unfinished business on this earth. They were never kind to cats and when I saw the owl chase you two into the house, I knew you’d need my help.”

“So, it is haunted,” said Gary.

“Very much so,” said Willie. 

“Thank you for saving us!” said Morris.

“It was my pleasure. You two are great cats and my business on this earth is now to make sure other cats don’t get hurt here.”

“Did you grow up in this house?” said Gary.

“I did. Many years ago. Before the human ghost even moved in,” said Willie. “This was my house, then he showed up and it became my duty to protect the cats who happen to walk through this property.”

“Wait. How many years ago was that?” said Morris.

“In cat years, about 700,” said Willie.

“Wait. So, you’re a… ghost?” said Gary.

“Goodnight boys,” said Willie, as she walked through the now closed door – as if it wasn’t even there!

Gary and Morris stood on the step for a few minutes, speechless, and in total awe of what just happened. Children continued to walk up and down the street, laughing and chatting, eating candy, and having fun on Halloween. 

After regaining their composure, Gary and Morris slowly walked back to the bus stop, hopped on another bus, then rode it back to The Foundation. 

Once inside, they were greeted by Marjorie, who picked them both up and gave them lots of pets.

“Happy Halloween boys!” she said, as she handed each of them some treats. “What a night, eh?”

Gary and Morris chowed down and then curled up with her. 

“What a night,” they both said. 

Written by Dan Huen

Image from ChoiceOMG