How Awful About Allan

Years earlier, a fire caused by cans of paint thinner near a heater kills Allan's father and scars his sister Katherine. Allan's punishment as a child under his father's rule is implied to have contributed to his psychosomatic blindness. The trauma haunts the family and sets the stage for what unfolds later.

Allan returns home after months in a mental hospital, trying to readjust to life with his family. He remains haunted by memories of the fire and his father's discipline. He begins recording his suspicions and fears after his return.

Katherine takes in a mysterious boarder who can only speak in a whisper due to a throat injury. Allan grows suspicious of the lodger and fears an unseen threat in his own home. He starts documenting his worries on a reel-to-reel tape in his bedroom.

Allan records his suspicions on a reel-to-reel tape in his bedroom as the whispers grow louder and the figure seems to close in. He begins to doubt his own sanity while fearing an intruder in the house. The act of recording becomes a coping mechanism against the creeping paranoia.

Olive, Allan's fiancée before the fire, tries to renew contact with him. He is reluctant at first but agrees to see her again and asks her to watch for the lodger. The couple tentatively rebuilds their relationship amidst rising tension.

Olive drives Allan into town and leaves him alone in the car while she returns books to the university library. He thinks he hears the whisper again and, in a panic, tries to drive away, crashing the car. The crash intensifies his fear of being watched.

Katherine pressures Allan to see the psychiatrist again, and Olive claims to have seen Katherine's ex in town. Allan senses that Katherine is hiding something and that someone wants to have him sent back to the hospital. The tension between suspicion and care grows.

Allan experiences nightmare episodes that revisit his father's punishment, including hiding in a dark cupboard. In another dream, the whisper lures him toward a burnt-looking room where the ceiling timbers seem to collapse. The next morning he finds burnt wood as supposed proof that the room was real.

Allan tries to contact the hospital to arrange a meeting with his psychiatrist, but the doctor is away. He resolves to take a cab to meet the doctor when the doctor returns, hoping for relief from his condition.

The cab arrives for Allan, but as he heads toward it he slips on the path. The cab driver is Eric, Katherine's boyfriend, whose whispering voice he attributes to a cold. Olive arrives and helps Allan back into the house, avoiding a possible further crisis.

Katherine tells Allan she will have him sent back to the hospital the next morning, unable to bear the situation. Allan recalls that the whispered voice was on his tape, but Olive is not in the room to confirm it. In a fit of frustration he smashes the tape recorder on the floor.

The whisper lures Allan into the kitchen pantry and the door locks behind him. He discovers a fire burning inside, then douses it with flour and breaks the door down to confront his attacker. When he pulls off the mask, he discovers his sister Katherine.

Katherine confesses that she had the facial scar removed, arguing that it should have remained as a mark to reveal Allan's supposed crime. The revelation reframes the family tragedy as a personal vendetta rather than a simple accident.

Allan returns home and appears more normal, taking a music appreciation course and sharing meals with Olive. He then receives a letter from Katherine, who has been placed in a psychiatric facility, pleading for his help to release her. Just after reading the letter, his vision goes dark and he is blind again.