Vampires
In the three years I lived in my Cambridge apartment, I don’t think I ever lost my fascination with the Hogans who lived directly across from me. The only time they ever seemed to leave their house was at night; during the day, the house was silent, unreadable.
THIS IS A FOUR-PART STORY BASED ON REAL EVENTS
Originally published October 2021 on nicolejeffords.com
Part 1: Vampires
Cover Image: Night Windows by Edward Hopper (1928)
After having lived in some difficult places, I felt blessed to find an apartment on what seemed like a very ordinary street of unprepossessing houses in north Cambridge. I’d never lived so close to neighbors before and I wasn’t sure who any of these people were -- the small, feisty, redheaded woman with her six children in the house next door, the weird tribe of nocturnal beings across the street, the hard-drinking Irish lady and her female partner on the corner. I quickly became friends with Maureen next door (she was the most popular person on the street) mainly because we had children the same age, and because -- not to put too fine a point on it -- we were both active alcoholics who would sit and get blitzed at her kitchen table just about every afternoon of the week. What better place to park oneself with a bottle of wine as the kids were getting out of school? I spent three years on that street, and the whole time I was there I don’t think I ever lost my fascination with the personalities who conducted their daily routines behind the facades of those closely spaced houses, or with the Hogans who lived directly across from me.
Their house… well, I never went inside it and I don’t know anyone else who did, either. But it always looked as if it needed a paint job, the door knob rusted, the windows aslant, the exterior shabby, and one rarely saw a light on in the place. It was impossible to tell who lived there or how many or what they did or who they were. Everyone referred to them as “the Hogans,” but the only time they ever seemed to leave their house was at night; during the day, the house was silent, unreadable. One would have thought it was empty.
I knew a little bit about the Hogans because a writer friend of mine, Jane Barnes, lived in their rental apartment, a tiny place that jutted out from, and shared a wall with, the dark, mysterious Hogan residence. Jane painted the walls of her apartment the minute she moved in. She scrubbed the place top to bottom. She got the wood floor gleaming and put her touches everywhere -- a sumptuous bowl of fruit on the kitchen table, an array of books on newly-constructed shelves, a fall of silk thrown over a chair.
But no matter what she did, the apartment had a rank odor of decay, as if an army of rodents had died in the walls and under the floorboards, or as if a body had perhaps been left to decompose in the neighboring basement.
It was difficult to hang out with her there because of the odor. But perhaps even creepier were the droning sounds that drifted through the wall every night, a cross between a long, low moan, as if someone were suffering, and a dirge, as if the Hogans had gotten together and with their out-of-tune voices were chanting some sort of ode to the devil.
Part II: Vampires
Jane and I made a game of sitting in her miniscule kitchen, trying to puzzle out what was going on in the Hogans’ house next door. The odd sounds and smells. The only time we ever heard signs of life was at night when the Hogans must have been preparing for their forays out into the real world. This is what those forays looked like: the house would remain as dark as a cave, but after about midnight various members of the Hogan family would venture out, one by one, on their bicycles. They’d flit down the street, going in different directions, each with an empty basket affixed to the front of their bike. Where were they going? As far as we could tell, there were six Hogans: the father, Joe, who was rumored to live in the basement; the mother, Eileen, who we later learned was educated and spoke fairly fluent French, and four children, one of whom was said to be mentally ill and locked away in the attic. As to where they were going … Well, after weeks of watching, that became fairly obvious since, on their return to the street, their bike baskets would be filled with all sorts of junk. Clearly they were visiting dumpsters and trash cans all over town.
Of all of the Hogans, there was really only one who interacted with the world on a regular basis, a teenaged girl named Joey, who looked, dressed and sounded like a boy. Joey would help you change your tire or walk your dog or carry your groceries upstairs; to me, she was like an ambassador from the shut down, secretive territory of the house across the street. I studied her in the hope of gaining understanding of the Hogan family, but if I asked too many questions (actually if I asked any at all), her expression would snap shut as tightly as a door slammed in my face. I learned early on there were no real answers with Joey, and the vampires (as I thought of them) who lived across from me would have to remain a mystery -- which, for someone like me, was like being condemned to struggling with an itch that was impossible to scratch.
The Hogans were weird, eccentric and smelled bad. That was about it.
One unbearably hot August weekend, my friend Sander Witlin came to stay with me. He was a painter from New York whom I’d known for years and we were looking forward to a quiet time of reminiscing as we shared a joint back and forth. Best laid plans because, as we settled down for a juicy conversation, there was suddenly a commotion across the street. It wasn’t yet midnight, but I heard a rough voice -- perhaps Eileen’s -- yell: “Fuck you!” And then all hell broke loose.
Part III: Vampires
Image: Pexels | Jimmy
As usual, the Hogan house was in inky darkness. Suddenly the front door flew open, and there was a loud thudding sound as what appeared to be a body was flung down the steps. A voice yelled “Fuck you!” and the door slammed shut.
Sander and I looked at one another in alarm. As we watched, the body, which was lying in the dirt at the bottom of the steps, managed to rise to standing. It was Joe Hogan, paterfamilias, a large, stumbling shape as big and broad as a linebacker. I’d never actually seen him before, but I’d heard enough to know it was him. He scrambled up the steps and began pounding on the door. From inside, his wife Eileen yelled, “You’ll never come in here again!” Her voice was deep and booming, no nonsense. As if to taunt him, the front door light came on, flickered, and was doused.
Joe ran around to the side of the building to try another door. A loud, cackling shriek came from within. “You’re not getting back in here,” bellowed Eileen. We could hear her shouting orders at her daughter Joey to lock all the doors and windows. There were slamming sounds as the lights kept flickering on and off. Poor Joe continued to make his circuit around the house. We could see him pause at an opening that must have led to the basement, but no luck … that door had been sealed off as tightly as a drum. Joe roared something in anger and flung himself up the front steps, where once again he battered the door with his fists. To no avail, of course.
For me and Sander this was great theatre, and we watched from my study window, mesmerized. How would the drama end? Well, we didn’t have to wait long.
After perhaps fifteen minutes more of screaming and yelling and door pounding, Eileen came out with a baseball bat. She raised it threateningly, and with a cringing yowl Joe fled down the steps.
“Goddamn bitch!” he shouted. But he was very unsteady on his feet. He tripped and tumbled face forward on the last step, landing in a heap in the dirt.
The heap didn’t move. We couldn’t even tell where it was in the darkness. Suddenly all the noise and commotion stopped. No one opened the door to see what had happened to Joe. For all we knew, he was dead … or perhaps just dead drunk.
Part IV: Vampires
We pulled down the blinds and stopped watching. The house across the street had grown preternaturally quiet, no lights shining from within. The people who lived there would forever remain a mystery. Perhaps they had once been a functional family, but the father’s alcoholism had destroyed them. I don’t know what he had done for a living before he succumbed to drink. The mother, Eileen, was said to have once been a fine, educated lady. That was hard to believe, looking at her coarse, shapeless face, her matted grey hair and shambling body. My friend Jane and I were always talking about the Hogans in French, thinking we were hot shit as we sang out childish phrases that, to us, described the strange, freaky family to a T. What we didn’t know was that Eileen had been brought up by a French Canadian mother and understood every word we said. Despite our meanness, she held her head up high and was pleasant whenever she saw us on the street. What had happened to make her decline so badly? Perhaps at one time years ago, Joe had been a handsome catch with a house he owned and a future in front of him. Alcoholism, that sly killer of a disease, would have dragged him and the entire family down.
Now there was always trouble, the truant officer at their door because of the kids not going to school, creditors showing up, furious because of unpaid bills.
For some reason, the Hogans chose to be nocturnal, leaving their house on mysterious errands only after midnight, the light of day something to be feared and avoided.
I explained all this to Sander, who would have liked to march across the street and explore the Hogan’s house firsthand. Instead he offered to walk my dog, a sweet terrier mix my daughter and I had rescued from the pound. Once he was down in the street, he turned on his flashlight and casually crossed to the other side where he peered into the Hogans’ front yard. There, he told me later, lay Joe Hogan, flat on his back and sleeping soundly as a baby. He had the look of someone who slept comfortably outdoors every night, and perhaps that was so, perhaps Eileen grew so sick of him that she tossed him out on a regular basis and the front yard, which was really no more than a patch of dirt, became his bedroom.
And here’s the weird thing. Sander went out to walk the dog the following night at about the same time. There were no theatrics that second night, no yelled curses or slamming doors, but when Sander pointed his flashlight into the Hogan’s yard, what did he see but big Joe Hogan fast asleep, arms curled back beneath his head, mouth open as he snored up at the stars. This, we figured, was perhaps a regular thing -- the dad getting soused and difficult, the mom insisting he sleep outdoors. Whatever it was, these people were vampires, creeping out at night to feed off the goodies that offered themselves up in bins and dumpsters and garbage pails and unlocked cars all over town. To me, as I watched from the window, their eyes seemed to glow red in the dark.
