"You go first."
"No way. You go first."
"You're both pussies. I'll go first."

With that, Jack scaled the makeshift fence that had been erected in front of the house. He fell onto the front lawn. We hesitated for about thirty seconds, waiting for something bad to happen. When nothing appeared out of the shadows to attack Jack, we joined him in the yard.

I stared at the house. 112 Ocean Avenue. A slight shiver went through my body, the kind of shiver that makes you think there's someone standing behind you, maybe reaching out a cold hand, ready to grab your neck. I pulled a beer out of the brown bag I was carrying and took a few swigs to settle my nerves.

This was in 1979, soon after a movie had been made about the house. The murders that happened there were the old news; five years had passed and the bloody family siege was all but forgotten in the wake of the tales of hauntings, glowing-eyed pigs and demonic possessions. The new owners of 112 Ocean Avenue had come and gone, leaving behind a legacy that was far more disturbing to some than the tragic life of the DeFeos before them.

We were teenagers with nothing better to do, I suppose. So we sat on the rickety dock in the back of the Amityville horror house, along with many other bored Long Island teenagers, drinking, telling scary stories and waiting. Just...waiting for something to happen.

While my friends were anxious for the moans of the dead to be heard coming from the house, or for a floating pig to appear at the windows, I thought about the real horror that had occurred there. A young man possessed by his own personal demons slaughtered his entire family right inside that home. Not that I was too mature to believe in demons and ghosts; I was just more concerned about the spirits of the DeFeo family members getting pissed off at us being there than the manifestations of some deranged couple's fantasy ghouls haunting us away.

Based on a true story? Sort of. There really was a guy who killed his parents and brothers and sisters one night inside 112 Ocean Avenue. There really was a couple named the Lutzes who moved in to the house shortly after. That's about as far as the "true story" goes.

But as drunk teenagers, we mostly preferred to believe the gruesome tale of oozing toilets and slimed walls because it gave us something to do. I think about it now - we spent nights hanging out in the vacant backyard of a fake haunted house? - and I almost laugh at myself until I remember all the other stupid things we did in the name of suburban excitement.