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theladycarpathia · 2 years

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The Creel House. Built by famed architect, Buford Newton, in the late 1800s, this once glamorous building now goes to ruin on the outskirts of Hawkins. Abandoned for the last twenty years, the house has been unable to keep a buyer since 1987. After Buford died in a freak accident, the house passed to his nephew. Andrew Newton eventually died in the house of a heart attack. Was it medical causes? Or was it fright that caused Mr Newton to die in the same room as his uncle? And when the house was put up for sale…

“What the hell are you doing?” Billy asks, dropping another box into the van. Steve fumbles with his phone and it slips out of his hands and down between the seats.

“Fuck,” Steve hisses and jams his hand between the space for it. Billy sighs loudly and slams the rear doors shut.

“Robin, let’s go!” he shouts back to the house, giving no mind to the other Loch Nora inhabitants. “Steve’s already being weird!”

“Fuck you, I’m recording a voice-over,” Steve says, managing to grab the edge of the phone between two fingers and carefully pulling it up. “This is the biggest episode yet, I want to add some drama.”

“Drama,” Billy snorts, climbing into the driver’s seat. “Sure. Us breaking into an old house and wandering around for an hour isn’t exactly going to bring us in the big viewer numbers, Steve-o. And anyways Andrew Newton’s death wasn’t caused by some ghost. It was almost definitely caused by his love of red meat and prostitutes.”

“You are a buzzkill,” Steve complains, shoving his phone back into his backpack. They’re losing light and they need some good shots of the house. There’s a slam of a door and Robin races out of the house, clutching her camera and dressed for exploration in dungarees and boots, a green beanie pulled low over her ears.

“That’s why they love us,” Billy says, with a grin, as Robin pulls herself in next to Steve.

“I’m here,” she pants, slamming the door behind her. “Let’s go.”

“Belt,” Billy chides and waits for her to buckle up before he’ll even start the van.

Annoyingly, he’s right. ‘Mystery Spot’ was started a few years ago, in high school, when they were bored and Billy thought it would be fun to break into the graveyard at night to see if the ‘wandering maiden’ ghost rumors were true. They weren’t but them being busted by an annoyed caretaker got them enough hits that they decided it might be worth trying for an actual channel.

It does pretty well, especially with the LGBT crowd. They have Robin, who delights in wearing rainbow themed outfits on camera, and Billy who is eye candy to both men and women, even if he’s only interested in the former. The big draw comes from the bickering between Steve - the consummate believer - and Billy - the hardcore sceptic. Anything that Steve says that even remotely suggests something supernatural is instantly shot down by Billy. It’s weird and shouldn’t work but the fans love it.

Robin spends the drive over reading comments from the last video. Creel House has long been suggested by their fans, the old ruined mansion an established feature on the outskirts of Hawkins. They’ve been saving it for a special episode and a Halloween episode seems fitting.

“‘Robin, I like your socks, where did you get them?’” Robin quotes and Steve rolls his eyes.

“Why are so many of our comments asking about your clothes?” he says, watching the streets with their brilliant fall colors race by. Hawkins sometimes feels a little chafing but the small town charm isn’t all bad. There’s already carved pumpkins on peoples’ stoops, the odd skeleton propped up in a yard.

“My clothes are great,” Robin says easily, and as she should when she has a whole dedicated fanbase for her quirky thrift-store outfits. “I can read out the other kind of comments, if you like?” She raises her eyebrows but it’s enough. Steve has to turn his head so that Billy can’t see his blush.

So…a lot of their fans like commenting on the supposed sexual tension between Billy and Steve. Which, yeah, he certainly gets with their back and forth, and they’ve been friends forever. Which is kind of the problem.

So what if Steve’s been nursing a crush on Billy for the last four years? The guy is basically his best friend, aside from Robin, and if anything got fucked up, that would be the end of the show. Their group. Billy has never shown any interest in Steve anyway, dating the guy from the pizza place, a football player, and his next door neighbor in quick succession.

It’s fine. Steve is completely in love with him but it’s fine.

“We’re nearly there, shitheads,” Billy comments, flicking the indicator to turn down Peach street. “Get ready for the most non-event of our lives.”

“Fuck you, this is going to be great,” Robin says, stashing her phone away in her bag. “Halloween special, super creepy fucked up murder house, I’m wearing my lucky bra and a new beret. The only way we could get even more views is if something unexpected and highly anticipated happens.”

Billy pulls up at the kerb by Creel house and blinks in confusion. “Do you mean ghosts?”

“Yes. Ghosts,” Robin says flatly. “Or some other highly nervous, insecure spook completely lacking balls.”

Steve discreetly stomps on her foot as they climb out of the van.

The unloading is quick, because they’ve learned to travel light when breaking into abandoned and possibly condemned buildings. Robin gets her camera rolling pretty quick to catch Steve’s shiver.

“Man, this place is creepy,” he mutters, staring around at the large broken mirror over the fireplace.

“It’s a shithole,” Billy says, sweeping his own camera over the empty living room. There’s still a mottled throw flung over the back of the couch, paintings on the walls. Something bumps into Steve’s foot as he steps forward and he looks down to see a small ball, the kind of brightly coloured toy a child might play with.

“Did they just…leave?” Steve asks, taking it all in. Aside from the dust and thick cobwebs, this could be any normal house. The kitchen still has bowls and cups on the draining board, just waiting to be put away. A small swing set rusts outside and the grandfather clock in the hallway has a cracked face, a small spider climbing up the mahogany.

“Basically,” Billy says, scrunching up his nose at the dead plants sitting on the kitchen windowsill. They’re little more than empty plant pots of dirt at this point. “Creel House was still occupied until nearly a decade ago. The Packard family packed up and left everything behind, took only themselves and whatever necessities they could shove in the car. Mom, pop, kids, dog. They said they couldn’t take the evil in the house anymore.”

“And you thought this was going to be boring,” Steve says, bending over to peer at one of the framed photos hanging next to the kitchen table. Billy snorts.

“It’s an empty house. They got freaked out by some creaking boards and a spider infestation and they bolted like pussies. There’s a logical explanation for everything, Steven.”

‘Except for why you don’t want me,’ Steve thinks. But he’s not so sure that this house can be so easily explained away. Something is causing his hair to stand on end, some uneasy feeling in his gut like they’re being watched.

Robin sticks her head next to his, face softening as she catches sight of the little kids on Christmas day, all clad in bright Santa sweaters, among piles of presents. The kind of picture you’d get in any family home.

“Doesn’t feel right, does it?” she whispers, focusing her camera on the frame. Steve shakes his head. He knows enough about this house to know that everyone who tried to live here experienced horrible luck. The original architect’s family had sold the house off after yet another distant relative died here but it hadn’t improved once the ownership passed out of the Newtons. When a young couple moved in during the first world war, the man went mad and beat his wife to death in the master bedroom. In the forties, the teenage daughter drowned in the tub. In the fifties, the owner’s prized Pekingese dogs both choked to death in the garden. An Investment banker crashed his car off a bridge in 1972.

The Creel family moved in during the eighties, the famous case that gave the house its name. One horrible and stormy night in 1986, both of the Creel children vanished from their beds, leaving behind one battered teddy and a message written in blood on the walls. Neither body was ever found.

After that the house sat empty until the Creels both died. Victor and Virginia died barely a decade after their children went missing, Virginia taking a large bottle of pills and Victor’s heart gave out once all of his family were gone. A cousin fixed up the house and sold it off several years later. It bounced through several more owners, none of whom were able to keep the house longer than a few years. Finally, the Packards took it on in 2009, the last people to ever live in the house. But they didn’t last long. They made it five months before they fled and the house has sat empty ever since.

“It has to be something,” Robin continues. “How does a house go through this much bad luck? This much blood?”

“Sheer fucking dumb luck,” Billy insists. “Idiots. That’s all. This house isn’t haunted.”

Something creaks overhead, like someone leaning on a floorboard. They all look up at the ceiling, waiting for another sound.

“It’s an old house,” Billy says firmly. “Shit creaks.”

“Steve, let go of my arm,” Robin complains and Steve releases her wrist. The unexpected noise had startled him more than he’d care to admit.

“Do we have weapons?” Steve asks, eyes still tracking the ceiling overhead and Billy sighs.

“No, we don't have weapons. Do you want a photon pack or something?” he asks and Robin cackles.

“Billy’s a nerd who makes references,” she says gleefully, flipping the camera around so she can grin at the audience. “You heard it here first, folks.”

“We don’t know what’s in here,” Steve says defensively. The feeling of being watched hasn’t gone away and while he’s never run away from a hot spot before, he’d very much like to now. He doesn’t like this house. It’s not like the others.

“Aww, Steve, don’t worry. I’ll protect you,” Billy says, with a flirty wink. Steve’s stomach dips, first with arousal and then disappointment. He doesn’t mean it like that. He never means it like that.

Robin pats his arm as she passes by, drifting out into the hallway. She wanders down the hallway and they hear her sudden exclamation.

“Robin?” Steve follows her, wondering what fresh she’s found but she meets him in a doorway, face alight with joy.

“Steve, come look at this!” She drags his arm and pulls him into the room, shouting for Billy all the way. They’re in the family dining room, a grand room with paneled walls and a formerly plush red carpet, a full set of chairs still arranged around the ornate dining table. Steve gawps at the gilded sconces as they pass by.

“Wow,” Steve says finally, when they come to a stop at the end of the room. Robin beams, turning to look at her find. “Holy fuck, is that them?”

“The Creels,” Robin says, eyes flicking over the four faces in the portrait. “The Packards must have bought it at an auction or maybe it came with the house. We have to film our intro here.”

Steve nods mutely. Victor Creel stands in the center of the picture, arms around his family. Virginia sits on a chair, legs folded neatly and a coy smile on her lips. She looks like the picture perfect housewife, golden hair gently curled under her chin. Alice is wearing pristine white skirts and gleaming buckled shoes, a wide toothy grin on her small face. Only Henry is dour, narrow chin and dark eyes staring resolutely out of the frame.

“Creepy fucker, right?” Robin says, following his eye-line. “Are you gonna be okay with…this?”

He knows that she’s not talking about the house.

“It’s fine,” he says automatically and Robin snorts.

“I stopped believing that one two years ago,” she sighs, tucking her arm through his. “I just…thought you’d get over it. Move on. You certainly dated enough.”

“Yeah,” Steve says miserably. “Me too.”

Onto Chapter 2

#harringroveweek #harringrove #billy hargrove #steve harrington #harringrove harvest #prompt: ghost hunters #bless their hearts #they're gonna find actual ghosts and stuff #tired robin #idiots in love #pining #I think this will be a full fic eventually?#after nano #modern au

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