In this week’s episode of Syfy’s SurrealEstate, a little boy’s “imaginary friend” puts him and his family in grave danger, and interferes with his parents’ plans to sell their house and move. Meanwhile, Susan struggles to fit in at The Roman Agency. Written by George R. Olson and directed by Paul Fox, here’s what went down on the episode, titled “The Harvey.”
The Roman Agency has brought on a new client: The Quincys. The three-bedroom, two bath, 2,600 square foot home is currently owned by husband and wife Tom and Patty Quincy, and their son, Jamie. The family has been living there for years and nothing out of the ordinary has happened, but when they put their home up for sale, all the potential buyers have been hearing things… seeing things.
During Luke (Tim Rozon) and Susan’s (Sarah Levy) initial run-through of the property, the husband and wife tell the two that their home inspector heard a child crying as if her heart would break. They also share that their agent saw some sort of apparition floating in the hall. “We don’t believe in ghosts, or evil spirits, or any of that crap, okay?” Tom Quincy tells them. “We don’t believe in anything.” Adds Patty, “We’re Presbyterian.”
At the office, the team is surprised that Susan has decided to return. “Our track record with new employee retention has been, um, lackluster,” August (Maurice Dean Wint) tells her. After Luke’s new client rundown, Susan brings up some changes she’d like to make within the agency.
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“Father Phil, I have opened a Dropbox folder on the Quincy account,” she says. “If you could send me all your research, I’ll add it in so we have a comprehensive database.” “I like to keep my own files,” he replies. Susan says to the team that if everyone’s data is in a centralized location, it’ll be easier for everyone to access. “Probably not going to do that,” Phil (Adam Korson) says under his breath.
Susan goes to the Quincys to stage the house and hears a little girl crying in the closet. Susan swings the door open to find it completely empty. Immediately after, the girl, Cindy (Molly Lewis), appears on Jamie’s bed, in tears. She tells Susan that she can’t go home without her doll Betsy, who is somewhere up in the attic. After Susan’s phone rings, the girl disappears.
Back at the office, Susan gives Phil a description of Cindy. “She was such a pretty girl,” Susan says. “So sad.” When Phil completes the mockup of the ghost, Zooey (Savannah Basley) finds that it resembles a certain fast food chain’s mascot. “You weren’t near a Wendy’s, were you?” Luke asks Susan why she was in the attic, and she tells them that the little girl mentioned she left her doll up there. “Wait — and you believed her?” Zooey asks. “She’s dead, right? Why would she lie?” Susan replies. Zooey walks away with a laugh.
Susan tells her new boss that she has a couple who wants to see the Quincy house. They’re pre-qualified and motivated to buy. Luke tells her the house is not yet ready for new owners. She believes that whatever is haunting the house is harmless, but Luke says that Jamie’s “imaginary friend” Cindy and others like her can be very dangerous. He shows Susan a video of what happened to a different property 8 months prior that inexplicably went up in flames.
The voice on the news reel says that all four occupants of the home are believed dead: Mr. and Mrs. Henry Travis, daughter, Alexis, and son, Martin. Luke says that they were a very nice family who’d experienced a few minor phenomena, a few moans and rattles, moving furniture. Certainly nothing dangerous. “Or so we thought,” he says. He says that he had failed the family. He tells Susan that the investigators found the parts of the bodies of that nice family of four in eleven smoking pieces. Luke assures Susan that the things that she thinks is harmless can hurt you. “They are dangerous.”
Against Luke’s orders not to show the property to anyone before they get the Cindy situation sorted out, Susan schedules a showing to motivated buyers who are willing to pay top dollar in cash. She agrees to a showing under one condition: “Do not tell anyone. This is our secret, okay?” During the showing, the prospective buyers hear a lot of eerie sounds coming from everywhere. The last straw is when they hear the voice of a woman screeching. Susan says the scream was just noisy pipes, but the buyers don’t don’t believe her, and they leave in a hurry.
Luke gets fed up with the whole situation at the Quincys, and goes into Jamie’s room to sort it out with Cindy. The little girl appears and starts to cry. “I’m so lonely,” she tells him. “My mommy, my daddy? They went up to the light and I couldn’t –” “Bull shit,” Luke says, cutting her off. “You are something old and ugly.”
Meanwhile, Susan tries another angle with getting along with her team. She tasks Zooey to come up with her own way to coordinate their subcontractor visits. Whether it’s a database, a spreadsheet, whatever. She let’s Zooey design something that Susan can use and she will make sure everyone does, too. The office manager is grateful for the coffee Susan brought her and the team. “Thank you for the quad long shot medium-in-a-large-double cup half-caff salted caramel mocha latte with two pumps of vanilla and extra foam.”
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With a lot of help from August, Luke brings an apparatus to the Quincys and is determined to bring out the true form of the demon haunting the property. He summons the young girl and challenges her to a game of chess, all the while lashing insults to get her inner beast to come out.
“You’re like an insult to nine-year-old girls everywhere,” he tells her. “I hardly worked up a sweat had I actually known I was up against Casper’s not-very-bright niece, whose only superpower was emotional instability and Candyland.” The plan is a success, and Luke is able to capture the demon in its original form and destroy it.
At the agency, Luke expresses how grateful he is to Susan for saving the Quincy account. He shares that most of their clients are skeptics; they don’t believe in the very thing they hired them to manage. “Now, the best we can do — the best you could do,” he tells her, “is make sure that they believe in us.” Susan invites Luke for dinner with her mom, but he tells her that it’s important to keep her family time. He never realized how important that family time was until his dad died.
Later that evening, Luke spends his time playing miniature golf. An older gentleman approaches and brings up the subject of Angels, and how he doesn’t believe in them. The man tells Luke that the woman he was with at the batting cages, Susan, is very pretty. “I’m a fool for redheads,” he tells Luke.
“Susan is a co-worker and a colleague,” he responds. The man tells the real estate agent that he always did poorly with women. Luke reminds the man how poorly he did with women, and how the second Sunday in May always tears his guts out. “Except when the Padres win,” Luke says. “Sometimes, even then.”
Luke turns his head down and focuses on his putt. A big gust of wind flows through, and the gentleman is gone. “Good night, dad.”
SurrealEstate airs Fridays at 10pm on Syfy.