In Absentia

a Black Acres novella

Volume 1

By Ambrose Ibsen

Copyright 2015 by Ambrose Ibsen. All rights reserved.

Synopsis:

There's No Place Like Home.

Kim and Julian Taylor are in the market for their first home, and a visit to the secluded Beacon estate finds them enamored. It's a peculiar home, rather large and in need of some renovations. The price is right however, and after a tour, they snap the house up without hesitation.

The man who sells them the house has one last detail to share before they sign on the dotted line. The previous owners of the home disappeared under mysterious circumstances nearly eight years ago and have recently been declared dead in absentia. Unperturbed by this fact, Kim and Julian set about making the home their own.

It quickly becomes clear that the two of them are not alone there, however.

In Absentia is the first novella in the Black Acres serial by Ambrose Ibsen. It is approximately 25,000 words and contains adult language, scenes of horror and a cliffhanger ending. Reader discretion is heavily advised.

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In Absentia

Black Acres Volume 1

Chapter 1

The tires kicked up gravel as they dug into the snaking driveway.

Julian turned to her and grimaced. The house was coming into view just ahead. It was a big house, but it still looked awfully small to warrant the superlative “estate”. “I can't wait to stretch my damn legs,” he yawned, wiping at the corner of his eye and giving the wheel a slight nudge to the left. “I feel like we've been in the car for days.”

Kim leaned back in her seat and stretched out, one of her flip-flops dropping off in the process. “You and me both.”

Their visit was owed to a brief internet posting. For a few months now they'd been scouring the web for real estate listings, looking for something that they might fashion into a dream home. The Beacon estate was at the end of a long line, the latest in an effort to find an HGTV-worthy diamond in the rough. They had very strong opinions on what sort of house they were looking for, and they knew just how they'd renovate and decorate it once they'd found it, from the countertops they'd select for the kitchen down to the finish of the furniture in the living room.

From the very first, the look of the Beacon estate threw them both for a loop, however.

The two of them leaned forward in their seats in near-unison, looking it over narrowly as it loomed large just ahead of them. Stopping at the end of the lengthy driveway they idled for a time and studied its exterior, a smooth, beige stucco. They'd seen a few grainy photos online, but in-person the building possessed an arresting quality. The seeming bastard child of a smattering of architectural styles, the first story appeared long and wide, with numerous bay windows jutting out towards the woods at the rear of the property. Perched atop it in relative simplicity was the second story, a narrower, somewhat boxy thing that terminated in a black, slanted roof. The shingles looked not unlike a bolt of black hair atop a long and malformed head. Neither of them could come up with a detailed critique of the house right off the bat. It had character. That was about all either of them could say.

Julian shut off the car and stepped out, stretching and carrying on with exaggerated vocalizations. He placed his palms against the outside of the sedan and squatted down, testing his range of motion and reawakening the muscles in his legs that'd gone dormant over the long car ride. Kim stepped out, yawning as the autumn sunlight washed over her. There was a pleasant, earth-scented breeze pouring in off of the woods. The sky was mostly blue, save for patches of wispy white clouds peppered throughout. She stationed herself against the hood of the car and poked her husband in the side as he ambled by. “So, we're supposed to be meeting the guy here, right?”

Nodding, Julian looked this way and that. “Yep. He said he'd meet us here, outside. And we're right on time. Dunno where he's at. We should have a walk around the house in the mean time. Get a good look at it, you know? That way, if there's something hideous about it-- and I'm not loving the look of that cupola up there-- we can take off before he gets here, yeah?”

She laughed. “Yeah, all right.”

They paced around the perimeter of the house, taking in the sights and sucking in lungfuls of the gorgeous breeze. The air out here was different than it was back in the city. Julian had talked about living out on a farm as a kid, had said again and again how different it was from city life. Only now was she beginning to understand what he meant. A dyed in the wool city-dweller, Kim had never spent much time in rural settings. She was used to the constant clatter of pedestrians in the street outside their apartment, the sounds of rush-hour traffic as a backdrop to their dinners, the smell of exhaust in the air. The marked lack of these things was baffling and interesting to her, if not a little disorienting.

Pausing before the back door of the house, they peered up at the small balcony, at the beige cupola Julian had taken such an exception to, at the dust-choked, heavy-looking windows that peered down at them from up above. They pushed on, marveling at the grounds as they went. Stacks of sun-bleached logs littered the back yard. Who'd put them there or how long they'd sat was hard to say. There was a fire pit, clogged up by the refuse of the changing seasons and fallen into disuse. The grass was tall in places, absent in others. Julian opined on the patchy lawn as they rounded the other side of the house and appraised yet more of the heavy windows with their thick, wooden frames.

All the while, they stole occasional glances at the woods, which came up a hundred yards or so from the back door of the abode and stretched on for what seemed to be an incalculable distance. The trees shot up from the ground like thick Roman columns, but not one of them seemed to have anything in the way of leaves. The limbs jutting out from the ash-colored trunks were all shrunken and bare, and the forest floor was curiously clear of fallen leaves. Though Kim was no expert on trees, she couldn't ascribe the sight of that forest with the usual shedding of autumn. The forest looked utterly dead to her, nothing but bald, rigid trunks to be seen for miles.

Rounding the other side of the house and walking about the front, they admired the large door and the smooth concrete steps that led up to it. To the immediate right, flanked by a few unruly bushes, was a dirt-flecked garage door that'd seen better days. Julian tugged on the waist of his jeans and sidled up to the house, climbing the few steps and running a hand against the smooth stucco. He pressed his face up against the nearest window and attempted to look inside. The interior proved dim, impenetrable.

“Well?” asked Kim, waltzing over to the spacious front porch and taking a seat upon the steps. She plucked a curious-looking yellow flower from the grass and wrenched its petals off one-by-one. “What do you think?”

She could already tell by the way he studied the house and tried to look inside that he was interested however. Julian tried to play it cool, sniffing the air and stretching, giving his shoulders a rotation and hitching his hands behind his head. “Not bad,” he said. “Looks to me like a little work could go a long way with this one. Won't know until we get inside, but she's got good bones. I'd bet you top coin she does.” A little grin betrayed his excitement. “And did you see that back yard! More space than we'd know what to do with. Could finally take up a proper garden, just like you've always wanted.”

They were set to meet with the home's owner, a man by the name of Edwin, for a tour. It'd initially caught their eye for its remote location, and because it fell well into their price range. This was a lot of house, and for only a little more than a two-room bungalow in the city might cost them. She hoped their search would end here, that the inside would impress them as much as the exterior had. Though hodgepodge, the house was large and boasted a great, quiet location. The only problems to speak of were cosmetic, and even then, there'd been nothing so egregious as to turn her off. She chuckled, combing a hand through her black hair and knocking a small yellow leaf from her locks. “Why do you think this place is so cheap?” she asked, looking up at Julian, who now paced across the porch like a caged animal. “Think there's a mold problem? Did someone get canned in the living room? This place ought to be way out of our price range.”

A disturbance in the gravel driveway attracted their gazes at once.

From the main road a large pick-up truck could be seen to pull up, maneuvering the winding stretch of dull grey pebbles before stopping behind their sedan.

Julian nodded towards the truck. “Guess we're about to find out. I reckon that's Edwin.”

Chapter 2

After nearly a half-hour's worth of chit-chat, the portly Edwin Kelley prepared to take them inside the house. A squat man of about Kim's own height with a swollen paunch and a thinning veil of greyish brown hair swept greasily to the side, he wore a faded Carhartt jacket and spoke in a baritone voice tinged with chain-smoking raspiness. In fact, as they spoke outside, idling near the porch, he'd gone through two cigarettes and seemed on the verge of lighting up a third when it finally occurred to him to carry on with the planned tour.

“Lovely couple,” he said as his sausage-like fingers sank one-by-one into his pocket in search of the keys. “How long have you been married?”

Kim smiled politely, glancing at Julian, who was absolutely twitching with impatience. “Uh, three years now.” She cleared her throat. “Just looking for a good starter home. Tired of living in the city. We've got an apartment right now, but want to upgrade to something full-size.”

Edwin loosed a laugh, almost dropping the keys as he sank one into the meaty deadbolt. Nothing she'd said had been particularly funny but he laughed all the same. “Oh, this will be more than enough house for the both of ya, I'm confident of that. This ain't like some tiny apartment in the city, no, this is a proper house, plenty of room for you both. And plenty of room for any tikes down the line, too!”

Kim blushed. In her few years as a married woman, she had noticed strangers to have a certain fascination with the concept of children. The first question new acquaintances tended to ask was always how long she'd been married. Then, when that was out of the way, they were quick to follow up the first query with “So, when are you going to have kids?” It wasn't that Kim disliked the thought of children. She and Julian had discussed starting a family and it was something they would likely pursue in time. Nevertheless, the insistence of strangers that they breed always came across as obnoxious to her. The man was just trying to be friendly, to make polite conversation, but he was relying on the most grating of tropes.

With a grunt, Edwin shoved the front door open. Then, with a clumsy theatrical flourish, he bared his yellowed teeth in a grin and waved them inside. “Right this way, folks.”

Julian all but rushed past the man, stepping into the foyer and studying his surroundings with the utmost urgency. When he'd taken in the sights, he pushed on further without invitation, stepping into the living room, and then the kitchen.

Edwin hitched a finger Julian's way and grinned at Kim. “Fella's excited, I take it?”

She smiled. “Yeah, he's been waiting all day for this.”

“Well, I know you folks came a long way, so let me give you the run-down on this old house. They call her the Beacon estate.” He sucked in a deep breath, his paint-dappled work boots producing a persistent thudding against the dusty wooden floors.

“Why is it called that?” asked Kim, tugging on Julian's sleeve and drawing him back towards her. He frowned, not wanting to be hampered in his exploration, but fell into step beside her as Edwin entered into his spiel.

“No reason in particular that I know of,” admitted Edwin. “But I'll tell you what I do know about her.” Approaching the chimney he rested a meaty paw upon the mantle, a gesture that required him to reach upward awkwardly, and stroked the lacquered wood lovingly. “She was built back in the 60's, late 60's. There'd been an old house on this land before that, but it was torn to make room for what you see all around yas. Property extends all the way to the main road up front and all the way to the edge of the woods around back, but the woods are effectively yours as well, since there ain't another property to be seen for miles around. I mean, your closest neighbor is probably on the other side of those woods, and ten miles away. If you're looking to get away from city living, for something secluded and private, you simply can't beat this.

“Anyhow, like I was saying, this old house was built in the late 60's by a pair of young lovers not unlike yourselves, went by the names of Marshall and Dakota Reed. Lovely folks, and they financed the construction of this house themselves. Built her from the ground up, they did, after tearing up the old shanty that used to be here. Put in five bedrooms, two bathrooms, an attic and built her to last.” Edwin cleared his throat and moved from the mantle, starting into a rambling tour. First he led them into the kitchen.

Kim's first reaction to the kitchen was one of dismay. The room wasn't simply outdated; it was essentially a snapshot of the 1960's set in amber. The appliances were ancient, probably didn't operate, and everything else, from the tacky-looking brown linoleum, to the orange tiles along the wall, would have to go. She almost threw her hands up right then and walked out. This room alone would require an incredible amount of work. The cabinets were perhaps the only thing that could be salvaged, done up in a traditional style from hardwood, however a few of them looked shabby on their worn-out hinges and would have to be repaired. She'd been looking for a fixer-upper, but this was a whole other level.

“Now I admit,” said Edwin, scratching at his ear, “that this kitchen could stand a little update.”

Kim held back a laugh. A little update? That was one hell of an understatement.

“But she's got good bones,” he said, switching on the tap as if to make a point. It sputtered to life, spilling into the worn-looking basin. “Pipes still in good shape. Copper, sturdy. None of that plastic crap you'll find in the city.”

Amused, Kim looked to Julian, expecting him to call the whole tour off, or to offer some sarcastic quip.

But to her surprise, his eyes were alight. He was clearly fascinated, looking around the room and imagining what it could become. She'd seen this look on his face before and knew that he was falling hook, line and sinker for this old clunker of a house. She placed a hand on his forearm, hoping he'd snap out of it, but instead he only dove deeper down, tapping on walls and knocking on the floors with his heel. “Seems solid, overall. A little work and this could be a Michelin-star-worthy kitchen.” He threw his arms out and shot a smile at Kim. “Look at all this room! You bust out this linoleum, throw an island in the center and you're all set. Gut the cabinets and such, too, of course. But just think! No more standing shoulder-to-shoulder in that little kitchen back at the apartment. It's an open floor plan in here, not some little corner to hide away in!”

Kim chuckled, but was having trouble seeing what he saw in it. To him, it was a grand project. To her it was a long, grueling chore. “Let's see the rest of it,” she pressed.

“Sure thing.” Edwin waved them on through the hall, leading them into the nearby living room. “You've got wooden floors throughout, and as you can see the former owners were real good about maintaining 'em. Just a little white vinegar from time to time will keep these in tip-top shape. That's the secret.” He pressed on the floorboard beneath his boot, making it squeal. “Good, strong floors. No nasty carpet in here.” He started through the room, motioning at the bare, white walls. “Could paint this up any which way. Walls are all white in this house, so painting over 'em and making it your own is real quick and simple.”

They started next into a dining room, which looked much the same as the living room. Then there was a small alcove, featuring a closet and a hallway. Down the hallway they discovered a stairwell, which was marked by a hand-carved bannister. Small figures had been etched into the side, seeming to depict a rudimentary biblical scene. Kim frowned as it came into view, the clumsily-carved cherubs in the varnished wood looking back at her. It was just another thing that would need replaced. Here and there, too, in the molding, she'd noticed the occasional artistic flourish. Some amateurish hand had attempted to personalize a good deal of the house, whittling tacky motifs into places they didn't belong.

Edwin led them upstairs, and Julian's interest remained palpable all the while. He asked a lot of questions of the guide, examined many features and remarked consistently to his wife upon the qualities of the place. He was enamored by it, and though she didn't share his enthusiasm entirely, she had to admit it was infectious. She loved seeing him in this mood, and wondered if she couldn't tolerate the house's gaudy charm. It would take a lot of work, but given enough time, they could probably flip this house into something respectable; attractive, even.

And time was something they had a lot of. The entire reason for their move was Julian's sale of a new screenplay to a Hollywood studio. They'd paid him well for it; so well, in fact, that they could afford to move out of the city, settle in a proper house and have more than enough to renovate it. After years of struggling in the industry and near-constant money troubles, Julian had made some progress. Now he was determined to enjoy his spoils.

The bedrooms were all plain but relatively large. In their open spaces Kim saw potential. The bathrooms, though hideously dated, were not beyond help. They, along with the rest of the house, could be salvaged. By the time the tour ended at the foot of the attic stairs, Edwin was terribly out of breath and red-faced for the exertion. “I think that about wraps it up,” he said. “But if y'all have any other questions for me, fire away.” He led them back downstairs, and the trio exited the house. Fanning himself in the cool breeze, Edwin lit up a cigarette. “What do you think of her?”

Julian replied quickly. “Honestly, I think it's great.” He looked to Kim tentatively, hoping she might echo his sentiment.

“Y-yeah,” she replied. “I mean, the price is good and it's pretty big, I guess.” Her lack of enthusiasm was clear, but it did little to dissuade Julian.

“We need to talk about it, of course, but I really like this place. I like it a lot more than any other house we've seen so far, and for the price, well...” he paused, grinning, and looked to his wife. “I don't think we can beat it.” Pulling Kim aside a few paces, he leaned in, speaking quietly. “I think this is it. I think this is the one!”

“I'm glad to hear you like it,” replied Edwin, sending a puff of smoke skyward. He knocked a cone of ash from his cigarette and leaned against the side of his truck. “I'm pretty flexible about the price. I know this is your first home, so if you're really interested, I think we can work something out. The house has been vacant so long. I really think Marshall and Dakota would be sad to see it in this state. Houses get lonely too, you know.”

Julian nodded. “So, you knew the former owners well, then?”

Edwin took a pensive drag, nodding. “Yes, they were good friends of mine. Good, good people.”

This gave Kim pause. She stepped forward, smoothing out her hair as the breeze kicked it up. “I'm sorry, they were friends of yours? What does that mean?”

At this, Edwin grew visibly uncomfortable. He chuckled slightly, but the sound died away on his lips, stifled by a nervous puff of the cigarette. When he'd sucked the thing nearly to cinders he threw it down into the gravel and put it out with his heel. He turned his head this way and that, trying to find the right words. “Well, uh, yeah. They were good friends of mine for many years. See, the thing of it is, though...” He cracked a sheepish smile. “I suppose I should have told you this first-thing, you know, before I showed you the house and all, but... you understand, this isn't the kind of thing that you'd put in an ad for a house you wanted to sell.”

Kim arched a brow and gave Julian a sidelong glance. “What do you mean?”

Edwin cleared his throat. “See, a little more than seven years ago now, Marshall and Dakota, well... they disappeared. Vanished. Just recently the courts ruled 'em...” He paused, trying to think of the right word. “What do they call it... dead in absentia. You know, missing so long they've been declared dead. And they didn't have any family, those two. No kids-- poor Dakota was always crying about that. So they wrote me into the will, wanted me to manage their affairs if something ever happened. Never expected that they would just turn up missing, of course, and obviously I'm not pleased about ending up with the house in this way. I'd have much rather never received the thing, but...” He gulped. “Here we are. I certainly hope that doesn't bother you; it's still a fine house, and they were both very proud of it in life. It was their legacy, and I'm sure they'd want it to be lived in. Sorry for not being more forthcoming about all that. It's been seven years but it's still mighty hard for me to talk about. Seems like just yesterday they were still here.”

Kim wasn't quite sure how to react.

Julian, however, clapped his hands. “So, I imagine you've got some paperwork we can look over, yes? I'd like to see the terms you have in mind for this sale.”

Chapter 3

Two truckloads was all it took to transplant the entirety of their apartment to the Beacon estate. As its proud owners, Kim and Julian set about making the place their own.

Kim was not without her reservations, however.

To start with, the house was so ugly to her in so many regards, it was hard for her to know where to start. Everything needed renovated, everything was in need of cleaning and fixing, and after sitting vacant for seven years, the house had to become accustomed once more to being lived in. This meant that the floors settled rather loudly at all hours of the day. The pipes could be heard to rattle and sometimes expelled brackish well water. The lights were unreliable, too, often flickering or going out entirely for brief stretches. One by one Julian sought to address these problems, but the list was long and with every day they spent in the new house it seemed only to grow longer.

Finally, when the place was liveable and they felt they could stay there without much difficulty, the pair took to unpacking their things. Then, some days later, with most of the moving boxes out of the way, they were ready to start working on the house.

They'd bought the thing for a steal after the signing of some few papers. Edwin had given it to them for an even better price than he'd advertised, at least partially because he'd felt bad about his little reveal at the end of the tour. Though it was a minor detail that had nothing to do with her, Kim found herself thinking a great deal about the previous owners and wondering just where they'd gone. That two people had simply vanished from their home of more than four decades out in the middle of nowhere didn't sit well with her. It was one of those uncomfortable, unexplainable things, conjuring up thoughts of alien abduction or the Bermuda Triangle. Moving into their house almost didn't feel right. She felt, in some small way, like she and Julian were intruding, imposing on the missing owners.

Still, as the days passed and they began debating on what room to renovate first, she worked to put all of these thoughts out of her mind.

It was decided after much deliberation that the archaic-looking upstairs bathroom would be the first to get gutted. The house was in a remote location, far from any hardware store or the like, so parts and supplies would have to be shipped in at great cost from the city. This wasn't a huge concern to them, and it was a luxury they could afford, but it did serve to slow things down.

One afternoon, after a late breakfast, the pair made their way up to the bathroom with sledges and chisels and squared up the space. The water in the bathroom was shut off, and the targets of the day's work were decided upon. It was quite simple, really. Nothing was to be spared.

The two of them got into the spirit of the renovation, doing their best to dress the part. Julian wore a sleeveless t-shirt that put his thin frame on full display. He'd neglected to shave in the days since their move, giving his square jaw a sandy rash of stubble. He'd always been skinny, and as he hoisted the sledge over one shoulder, preparing to knock in a bit of drywall, she was struck by how thin he'd grown working in the city all that time behind a desk. For her part, she swept her hair back into a ponytail and threw a red bandana around her head. Together they looked like something out of a home and garden reality TV show.

The tiles around the shower were the first to come down, knocked loose by a gentle tapping of the sledge. The stubborn pieces were then chipped away by a chisel and hammer. One-by-one the tiles clattered noisily into the tub, and before long the drywall behind was in clear view. Weighing their next move, Julian made some measurements and then drew a large, black X on the wall, pointing at it with his sledge. “X marks the spot!” he said with a grin. And then, hoisting up the tool, he made his first swing.

They took turns tearing into the drywall, hitting only specific areas to avoid messing with the pipes, and made room for the new tub and shower they'd ordered. It would be delivered within the week, and in the mean time they'd be forced to use the small shower stall in the other bathroom downstairs. With each subsequent strike, more of the drywall fell away, revealing hardy studs and sending up clouds of dust. When they'd torn down most of the marked section, Julian reached inside and finished the remainder by hand, tugging on the jagged bits and breaking them away.

As he did so, he paused. Something in the wall caught his eye.

“What is it?” asked Kim, leaning against the old porcelain sink, wiping at her brow.

“Hold on,” he said, reaching into the wide opening and bending down. Slowly, he drew something up out of the cavity. Dusting it off, he looked it over closely. It seemed to be a slip of paper.

“What is it?” she asked again, sidling up to him. Peering over his shoulder, she saw it was a photograph. It was old, the graininess of the image bespeaking a time some decades passed. The subdued oranges and yellows of some nearby light fixture highlighted a pair of subjects, a young man and young woman, leaning against one another, both of them smiling. “Who is that?”

Julian studied the photo for a time. “I dunno,” he admitted, knocking a cloud of dust from his mop of blonde hair. “Probably the former owners. It's an old picture. They probably slipped it in the wall here back when the house was being built.”

Kim looked up at him. “People do that? Leave things like that behind?”

He nodded. “I remember helping my dad work on our old house as a kid. People leave all sorts of things behind as mementos. Under floorboards, in the walls. Kind of like a time capsule or something like that.”

It was a sweet picture. The people featured didn't appear much older than Kim or Julian themselves, and they smiled warmly. “They look young,” she said after a time, taking the photo from him. “I bet they were around our age.”

“Could be.”

Turning the photo over, Kim dusted it off further. On the reverse she found a bit of writing. It was rendered in a rough hand, so that it was hard for her to read. Standing beneath the light, she squinted and tried to make out the harsh characters. “There's something written here. It's sloppy, but...”

“What does it say?”

When she managed to decipher it, she almost dropped the photo. Clearing her throat, she read it again and again, doing so once out loud, before laughing incredulously. “You're in our house. We're coming back for it.”

Julian laughed, giving her a playful shove. “Oh, shut up.”

She glanced up at him, the amusement draining from her face and only the apprehension remaining. Kim offered him the photograph. “No, really... look for yourself.”

Snatching up the picture, Julian glanced over the reverse. “Hm,” he said after a time, holding it between his fingers and flipping it back over. “That's... interesting.” He loosed a little laugh, unsure of what to make of it.

“What the hell's that supposed to mean?” Kim's arms broke out in gooseflesh, and without even thinking she begun to cradle herself. Something about that photo didn't sit well with her. Looking briefly at the smiling faces on it once more, she almost felt as though there'd been a subtle shift in their expressions. Like the smiles weren't genuine, had grown narrower, more savage, and were hiding some sort of sinister intent.

Julian shook his head and set the photo down on the edge of the sink. “I don't know. I guess... I guess the folks who lived here before us just had a weird sense of humor or something.” He shrugged and dusted off his hands.

If the people who'd left that photo there had intended it as a joke, Kim wasn't finding it funny. Mathematically speaking, the odds of finding such a thing in the wall were slim; that they'd stumbled upon it in their renovations seemed to her anything but dumb luck. Someone had wanted the two of them, specifically, to find it. Kim felt certain somehow, but she couldn't articulate why. She gulped as she appraised the photo, even from afar, and then glanced out into the dim hallway. “I need a break,” she said. “Come on. I'll make us some lemonade.”

Chapter 4

The installation of the new tub was an ordeal that took them nearly two whole days of work. A slight miscalculation on their part about the dimensions of the thing required a number of last-minute adjustments, and when all was said and done Julian had thrown his back out and burnt through all of his patience. Limping about in his pajamas for the next few days he made a point of sleeping in and lounging about, postponing any further work on the house until he felt up to it. The bathroom still needed some work; a new toilet, new sink and a fresh coat of paint, but at least it was functional.

In those days, spent lounging, the two of them really got to know the new house. Though its gaudy flourishes clashed with their sensibilities, they felt for the first time that they were the masters of their domain. They could do anything they wanted to this house, and thanks to its remoteness, they could listen to their music or television as loudly as they wanted. Back in the city, in their cramped little apartment, they'd always been at the center of feuds with the inhabitants of surrounding units. They'd always had crooked landlords telling them what they could or couldn't do to their apartment. But not here. This space was their own. They were like caged animals set free.

And for Kim, at least, the freedom came as a shock. The almost intoxicating degree of liberty and openness they now had in their grasp made her feel aimless, adrift. She assured herself that it was merely because the house was unfinished; that, once they'd picked out new furnishings and completed their renovations, she'd grow used to it and it would feel as natural to her as the old apartment they'd left behind, except with none of the limits. She spent her days catching up on reading, living a somewhat bohemian life in the house for nearly a week before their work resumed.

She'd packed along her small library of cherished books. Some hadn't made the cut and had been sold off to the second-hand bookseller back in the city, but those that did, mainly handsome, leather-bound editions of her favorite classics, now sat upon a wide, wall-mounted shelf on the wall opposite the fireplace. She leafed through them, getting lost in the stories languidly. And due to the lack of distractions in this new home, she felt herself time and again almost slipping into the stories full-on. Absorbed in her reading, she subsisted off of coffee and tea, along with whatever bland food they had on hand. Grocery stores were not exactly common in the area, with the closest one clocking in at some forty or so minutes by car. The appliances worked well enough for hot beverages and cooling lunch meat, and they feasted on sandwiches and jasmine tea. Sometimes, while munching on roasted turkey sandwiches, Julian would give a little grin and suggest they simply order a pizza for delivery. Pleased with himself for the joke, he'd laugh, insisting that they only needed to find a chain pizzeria whose policy guaranteed something along the lines of “Thirty minutes or it's free!”

There wasn't a damn thing, save for open space and scarcely-tread road, within thirty minutes of them.

For having sat vacant so many years, the house proved in good condition. The basement showed evidences of water damage in a few corners, and the attic was little more than a number of dusty rafters wrapped in discolored, fluffy insulation. Those would need cleaned up, and Julian wondered if there might not be a mold problem in the basement. Studying the walls, he recalled the details of some documentary about mold toxins and suggested they have a professional come out to test the air for spores when the other work was through. She was happy to let him have his way. Though sore, he marched about the house with an air of triumph, throwing his ankles up on chairs, opening and closing doors and stomping on the well-worn floors like a king in his own palace.

In their few years as a married couple, Kim had never seen him this happy. Back in the city, prior to the sale of his screenplay, he'd been something of a homebody. Especially in those weeks leading up to its completion he'd been prone to mood swings and long silences. It'd disturbed her, made for the first significant disruption to their married bliss. The sale had turned everything around, however. They could afford to move out of that stifling unit, with its leaky roof and occasional ant infestations, and into this enormous house. This place had its share of aesthetic flaws and structural abnormalities, but in time they could all be fixed, and Julian could sense it. For almost a year he'd shopped around his screenplay and fretted over it. Now that it was out of his hands, he was back to living.

While up in the attic one day, remarking on the sheer volume of insulation, Julian came upon something curious tucked up against one of the rafters. The attic was not a large space, and the ceilings were low, so that in order for him to enter he would have to ascend a flight of stairs and stay hunched, walking carefully along the rafters lest he take a dive through them into the story below. He did so nimbly, keeping his hand on a ceiling beam and zeroing in on something amidst the pinkish fluff. Plucking it up, he hopped back to the stairwell, the beams beneath his feet groaning for their load, and took to dusting it off. He frowned as a little cloud of dust and insulation drifted off of it and then held it up to the dim-burning bulb that hung from the ceiling by a black coil of wire.

“Huh,” he said, looking it over. He made a face she'd never seen before. Kim was waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs, watching as he studied his find. His eyes were narrow, and the corners of his lips were turned up in a little smirk, but beneath it all there was something of fear. She could see it in the way his Adam's apple trembled, in the way he gulped and pushed on down the stairs without looking, but instead by guiding a shaky hand along the wall. By the time he'd reached the foot of the stairs he'd recovered, but a touch of the discomfort she'd glimpsed still plagued his expression.

He handed the thing to her and shot her an expectant look. “A photo,” he announced.

Kim unfolded the thing in her hands. It was curled up in on itself and not a little discolored, probably due to the changing of the seasons over the course of many years. How long the photo had been sitting in the attic they couldn't guess, but that it'd been a long time there could be no doubt. The reverse featured nothing, but the photo itself gave her pause. “What... what exactly am I looking at here?” she asked, turning it slightly and crinkling her nose as if she'd just smelled something foul.

Foul was about as good a word as she could think of for the sight she found in that photograph. There were six individuals pictured. The scene was grainy, rather dark, save for the far-off orange glow of some lamp. It almost looked like firelight, but the subjects had been photographed indoors and there was no sign of a hearth in frame. If not for the masks the subjects wore, they would have almost blended into the murky background, as was the case with their bodies below the neck. But those masks, made of a bright, white material like plaster and lent something of overexposure by the elements, waxed repellent as she took them in, one-by-one. They were all the same, featuring two clumsy, small eyes, a ridge of a nose, more fully-molded in some than others, and a wide, exaggerated smile. A small hole existed at the center of this smile to better allow the wearer to draw breath. Six faces crowded the frame, all of them close together and all of them baring their plaster-forged grins for the photographer.

She shuddered and handed it back to Julian in a hurry. “What is this?” she asked, running her hands along her arms as though looking to banish a nonexistent cold. “It's creepy.”

Julian regarded the picture from a slight distance and glanced up at her. “Honestly? I dunno.” He chuckled, teasing the curled edge of the photo and easing the attic door shut. “Probably, like... a Halloween picture from years ago.” He nodded, further convincing himself of this answer. “Yeah, you know, that's gotta be it.” He laughed aloud, the sound echoing somewhat discordantly in the hall. Noting her evident discomfort, he added, “Kind of weird, but old-timey pictures like this are always weird. You know, they didn't have the same technology we did growing up, so they made their own costumes and such for holidays. Sometimes, out of context, well... they just look eerie. My mom has this picture of me and my brother sitting with the easter bunny from, like, the mid-eighties, and the thing looks monstrous. You know what I mean? Google 'old Halloween pictures from the 60's and 70's' and you'll see what I mean.”

“No thanks,” she said, arching a brow. As she started down the stairs, hoping to rendezvous with her dogeared copy of The Count of Monte Cristo, she paused. “I wish there weren't so many little pieces of the previous owners in this house. I kind of liked it better when we didn't know anything about them. When they were just a story.”

He rolled his eyes and followed her downstairs. “I know, right? I mean, just look at what our search has revealed! They were true monsters!” He slapped the photo against her arm. “They liked dressing up in costumes and celebrating holidays! The nerve! The outrage!”

Their laughs filled the halls. It was a bit strange to think that their voices were the first to reverberate against these old walls for more than seven years. They were laughing and carrying on now. Someday these walls would be witness to their disagreements, and more.

As she settled back into her chair and picked up her book, Kim wondered just what the house had seen or heard in those days and hours before the previous owners suddenly disappeared without a trace.

Chapter 5

“I know what you're thinking,” he said, arms crossed. “It would be too perfect if this place, old and in the middle of nowhere, its previous owners having vanished mysteriously, ended up being haunted, right?” He waved his arms around wildly in mockery, as though he were a magician hyping up some trick on a stage before children. “But the reality is a lot less interesting than that.” Julian peered over at the bedroom door, which still sat ajar. “You say you shut it, but did you make sure it was good and closed?”

Kim was getting irritated with him now. “If you don't believe me, then fine, just get out of here and leave me alone! I said I closed the damn door and then it opened on its own, OK? Why is that so hard to believe? I never said it was, like, Jack the Ripper doing it, so fuck off!”

Julian sighed, placing his hands on her shoulders and peering down into her eyes sympathetically. “No, maybe not, but when I came in here, you looked spooked. And this isn't the first time it's happened, either. I mean, the door to the basement does this sometimes. And last night, when the house was settling, you woke me up because you thought it was--”

“Footsteps, yeah, yeah.” She broke away from him. “It's just weird, OK? I'm not used to... doors and stuff moving around on their own, you know? It makes me uncomfortable.”

“I get it. But you know this is an old house, and old houses have their quirks. These door frames have been warped over time. Changes in temperature, in moisture, can loosen 'em up till the door doesn't fit quite right. That'll make them swing open at the slightest breeze.” He smiled wide, pulling her into a tight hug despite her resistance. “Come on, babe. Don't worry about it. It's really nothing. I promise, when the more important stuff is out of the way, we can replace all those dumb old doors, too.”

The comfort she gained at this reassurance was fleeting.

Precisely when the change began to occur in her she couldn't quite say. Perhaps it was around the time she first took a good, long look at the woods behind the house, at the sordid stretch of bald and ashen trunks that went on for miles, that the worm of fear wriggled into her heart. The shadows that gathered in the house even during the daylight hours like cobwebs in the corners made it so that she had to use lamps at all times. The house made its fair share of noises, seemed to speak to her with a language all its own. Not fluent in this tongue, Kim couldn't help but read sinister things into the old home's creakings and churnings. The floors were given to loud squeaks even in those moments when the two of them were seated or in bed. Pipes rattling in ancient sockets would sometimes stir up fear in her, the metallic discord sounding like a prisoner shaking at the bars of a prison cell. Kim couldn't help but anthropomorphize the house's noises; it carried on a life of its own.

Julian was always there with the explanations. He was a master at digging up chestnuts about his time living in an old house as a child, and about the transition that would be necessary before she was used to living in such an isolated rural area. To his mind, every creak and thump had a reason behind it, could be explained away offhandedly, and without the slightest concern. His nonchalance was a comfort at first, but as the days passed and her mood worsened towards the house's many “quirks”, it became not a little grating.

Once, when the two of them were reading late at night in the living room, their feet up on an ottoman, the lights had begun to flicker. They did so in a most peculiar way by Kim's appraisal, the bulbs gradually dimming until they suddenly flashed back to life. It happened a few times in slow succession, and before she could even account for the way the hairs on the back of her neck stood up, Julian was rushing in with his expert opinion.

“The wiring in this house could stand to be replaced. Faulty wires, a good breeze messing with the power lines... could have been a lot of things.” He spoke so confidently.

She found herself thinking about the house, its reported age and the fragments of knowledge she'd gained about the previous owners with a good bit more frequency than was healthy. It wasn't such an old house, really. More or less fifty years old. Was it really so aged as to have developed these many curious defects? On this, too, Julian was quick to opine. He maintained that the house's lack of tenants in the past several years could have led to an atrophy of the house's infrastructure and fixtures.

Perhaps it was so.

Try as she might however, Kim couldn't beat back the subtle dread in her gut. It built slowly, a single drop trickling into the well each day. But then something would happen-- a strange knock at the door in the middle of the night, a sound like footsteps in the attic-- and she would find her fear reaching new heights. Daylight provided little comfort, as the shadow-swollen abode seemed to pay no attention to the hour. Its noises were not limited to the night, even if they were most concentrated in those hours after dark.

This move was shaping up to be something she hadn't anticipated. Something she hadn't signed up for. The source of her unhappiness and dread was difficult to pinpoint, and it was likely issuing from a series of smaller concerns, but that it was there all the same could not be denied.

***

Kim rolled over in bed, her body tensing beneath the plush comforter. She put Julian's subdued breathing out of her mind and tried to focus on the sound that'd knocked her out of a light sleep. It came from somewhere else in the house, and the distance made it muffled, doubtful.

She could have sworn it was the screaming of an infant.

Kim shook her head and blinked in the moonlight, fluffing her pillow. You know it's not a baby, she thought. No one lives around here. There isn't another person for miles around. Her mouth grew a little dry as she considered their utter isolation, and she was quick to change the subject of her thoughts. The strange crying sound that drifted up from one of the lower stories; what the hell was it, then? If I woke this jerk, he'd probably just tell me it was a bird that got stuck in the chimney, or maybe some other animal. She grimaced a little as she imagined Julian giving a self-assured grin and offering such an explanation. That's exactly what he'd say. I'm sure of it. But... but why doesn't it make me feel any better?

Ratcheting up her nerves, she'd slipped half-way out of bed, preparing to open the bedroom door, when a sudden and ponderous silence fell over the house and made her reconsider. She didn't want to be a coward in her own house, to have all of these commonplace noises unsettle her like a child. But when the noise ceased, she scrambled back under the covers and closed her eyes. Kim shuddered, grit her teeth and pressed her face against her pillow. Well, the noise stopped, so there's nothing to investigate. I'm sure it was nothing.

Somehow, sleep returned to her.

***

Kim saw she was standing at the top of the stairs. Step by step, and with an airy grace, she descended. The stairs did not creak under her feet as they usually did; it felt almost as if she were the weight of a feather, her mass scarcely registering on the old planks that were ordinarily so noisy.

Then she was downstairs, rounding the bannister with its carved, staring cherubs and making her way into the living room. The living room was dark, black, and only a few bold shapes could be made out in the veil of night. Whether they were pieces of furniture as she expected or something that did not belong in the room she didn't give much thought. Instead, her bleary eyes locked onto a dim light registering in her periphery. She recognized it as the glow that came from the light above the kitchen sink. Had she left it on all night?

Kim drifted into the kitchen, and then stopped in the doorway. She cocked her head to the side, surveyed the room and tried to process the scene before her. Her mouth felt parched, dry, but she couldn't say why. Maybe you're feeling scared? she thought.

But she saw no reason why she should be scared.

All she saw in the kitchen, hunched slightly over the counter, was the profile of an old woman. The woman was completely naked and had her back to the doorway so that Kim could not see her face. A thinning shock of whitish grey hair snaked down the length of her pale, bony back as she busied herself at the counter. She seemed to be preparing tea, holding Kim's own stainless steel kettle in her quivering, arthritic hand. She was pouring a cup of tea into Kim's favorite glass mug. The woman moved with slow, measured gestures. It was like she was stuck in slow-motion. Even the water that poured from the spout of the kettle seemed to pour at the lowest possible speed.

Confused and vaguely bothered at the sight of this naked stranger in her kitchen, Kim tried to wet her lips, to no avail, and to call out to her. “What are you doing in my house?” she asked, her voice bursting forth from her lips and then hanging in the air as though suspended in molasses.

At this, the woman slowly set down the kettle and corrected her hunched posture, standing bolt upright. That she'd heard and was now aware of Kim's presence was clear, however she did not turn around. She stood at the counter, her back remaining to the doorway, and was still as a statue.

“Why are you in my house?” Kim asked again, her voice dribbling out nebulously, uncertainly. She felt in some way as though she'd forgotten how to speak, forgotten the English language entirely.

The stranger did not turn around. However, from somewhere close-by, perhaps from the old woman's unseen mouth, there finally came a reply.

“I told you we'd come back for it.”

Kim awoke with a gasp. The light of early morning stung her eyes as they burst open and she sat up in bed, her mouth so dry it hurt. Julian was awake, sitting at the foot of the bed and fiddling with his socks. He looked back at her confusedly, cracking a smile. His blonde locks were sticking up in odd cowlicks where he'd rested against his pillow. “You OK?”

Surveying the room and casting off the blankets, she nodded. Her breathing slowed and, when she'd drained the glass of water at her bedside, she finally found it in herself to explain. “I just... I just had the weirdest damn dream.”

“Tell me about it,” he said, throwing on a t-shirt and stepping into the closet for a sweater.

“I dreamt that I went downstairs and there was a woman down there, making tea in the kitchen. An old woman with long hair. And she was... naked.”

Julian laughed aloud at that moment. For Kim, though, it hadn't been amusing in the least. He hadn't seen the woman, hadn't glimpsed the bluish veins coursing through her papery white skin. He hadn't seen the length of wispy silver hair, or the way she'd just stood there, with her back turned. She understood why it might sound funny, but in reflection, it'd been a terrifyingly life-like dream.

Kim sighed. The longer she sat in bed and sought to describe the dream, the more she found the finer details mercifully effaced by wakefulness. Wiping her eyes, she forced a little smile and stood up. “Never mind.”

When they'd brushed their teeth and dressed, the pair went down the stairs and set about preparing their morning coffee.

It was Julian who remarked on the kettle and half-filled teacups on the counter near the sink when they first entered the room. “Did you leave those out last night? I don't even remember you making any tea.” He emptied the cups, rinsed them out and set them in the drying rack. He replaced the empty kettle on the stove and stashed away the tin of tea with complete nonchalance.

He hadn't put things together. But from where she was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, looking to the sink with fearful eyes, Kim was thoroughly unnerved. No, she hadn't left those things there. She hadn't made any tea the night previous. But she had had that dream just then. And as she lingered in the doorway, staring across the room, she found it an eerie, day-lit analogue to the dreamscape she'd just emerged from. The only thing missing was the old woman.

Kim accepted a mug of freshly-brewed coffee and took it out to the living room. For the remainder of the day she stayed clear of the kitchen, opting to let Julian cook their meals. As the hours passed and her memories of the dream faded further, she worked at convincing herself that she had been mistaken. You left that kettle out. You must've made tea at some point yesterday and you never put the cups or tea bags away.

She spent the day telling herself that, because to entertain the alternative was simply too much.

Chapter 6

Julian slammed down the phone, red-faced. “Couldn't hardly hear a damn thing.” They'd settled for a landline in the new house, since cell phone reception was incredibly poor in the area, however like so many other things it didn't work very well. The line was known to cut out from time to time, and even when calls did come through there tended to be a good deal of interference, making callers hard to hear. He kept talking about getting the people from the phone company to look into it, but Kim didn't see the point. What could they really do about it? It seemed to her a consequence of living so far away from civilization.

“Who was it?” she asked, looking up from her lunch. She'd fried up a few eggs with peppers and onions. Mopping up the yolks with a piece of toast, she leafed through a graphic novel.

“It was the cabinet company. They botched our goddamn order. Scheduled the wrong product for delivery. Said they 'lost' our order, though how that's even possible in the twenty-first century is beyond me. They need someone to come in and pick everything out again. Have to sign the paperwork and whatnot. In-person, apparently.” He was fuming, pacing across the kitchen in his slippers as though he intended to burn a hole through the floor. He took a quick sip of coffee. “The manager wants to give us a discount or something, but I don't care about that. I just want my damn cabinets. The sooner we get them, the sooner we can tear this shit out.” He motioned to the kitchen around him. The old-fashioned cabinets, chipped and ruddy, were certainly in need of an upgrade. The shelves within them were so soiled Kim almost hesitated to store anything inside.

“Well, it's not such a big deal. It's, what, two hours out? Make a day trip of it. Have some lunch, re-do the order and then come back,” she suggested, flipping a page and scanning it absentmindedly. She wasn't even reading it, but merely looking at the art. The colors were subdued, pleasing to the eye.

Julian arched a brow. “What, you don't want to come with?” He scratched his head. “We could both go, you know? No need to just sit around here all alone. I know how you get about the house and I don't want you feeling uneasy. Maybe we'll hit up a good restaurant, or...” He stalled.

At this junction, Kim gulped down a bite of food and peered up from her book. “I'd rather stay.” This, however, was something of a lie. She blurted it before she had time to truly weigh the implications, before the decision had a chance to sink in. Spending some time alone in the house was extremely unappealing to her, however it seemed about the best way to go about steeling her nerves. Go on, stay behind, she thought. Putz around the house for a day, on your own. That way Julian won't think you a scaredy-cat. And anyway, this will be a good way to get to know the place on your own terms, to prove to yourself that there's nothing weird about it.

While Julian mulled it over she considered more excuses. There's a lot of laundry to catch up on, she thought. Could read without Julian interrupting. The 'me' time might be nice for him, and even though he's pissed off right now, he'll come back in a good mood. Listening to him bitch about these cabinets over the length of a long car ride sounds awful.

Another voice rose up in her as she resumed her meal, mechanically picking up the fork and scooping up a bit of egg white.

This is a bad idea, said the other voice. This is a stupid, shitty idea.

“Well, if you're sure,” said Julian, the thought of spending the day goofing off in town solo apparently gaining some appeal in his eyes. “It won't take too long. And I'll be back in time for dinner. Don't worry about the meal, I'll cook when I get back. Sound good?”

She nodded, putting on a brave face and donning a smile. Without her realizing it, her feet were twitching against the linoleum, rapping out a nervous cadence. “Have a good time.”

Julian threw on some jeans and a sweater and, within a half hour, stepped out the door, giving her a kiss on the head as he made his way out.

The silence that settled over the house as the sounds of the car died away was utterly pestilential. Kim bit down on her fork and shoved her plate away. “You got what you wanted,” she muttered to herself. “Time to walk the walk, I guess.”

***

An hour passed. Then two. Nothing out of the ordinary occurred, and as a result Kim found herself feeling rather relaxed. Things were going better than expected. There'd been some settling in the upper story, a creaking of the floorboards. But she was used to that, and after being startled a moment, she'd settled back into her chair and forgotten all about it. She ran a bath and didn't think twice about the rattling of the pipes as the tap came on. When the odd thump issued from the attic, she reminded herself it was probably just the shifting of some air pocket or something similarly commonplace.

For the first time since moving in, she felt at peace in the house. This didn't stop her from keeping the lamps on. Something about the darkness that perpetually gathered in the corners of each room unnerved her, but she did her best not to dwell on this and remedied it by keeping things well-lit.

While sitting in the bath, the smell of lavender wafting through the air from her bath beads, she reflected on the move and everything that'd hitherto disturbed her and had a laugh. She was making a mountain of a molehill, causing problems where none should have existed. Here she was, living in a nice, secluded house with the love of her life. They weren't living paycheck-to-paycheck anymore. No, they had money now, could afford to do things, go places and upgrade their living space. She could spend as much time with Julian as she liked, not like before, in the city, when his work had kept him busy day and night. So, what was the problem? Why the fear? Why the jumpiness? Looking at it now, from a more sensible place, she had to admit it was unwarranted. So much had changed over the course of a relatively short time, and the transition had been jarring to her. That was all. She wasn't handling the move well, but only because she hadn't stopped to consider how good it would be for the two of them in the long-term.

In the city she'd worked part-time as a bartender to help with the bills. Now their finances were in order and she could afford to hang around the house, reading or doing whatever she pleased. It was an ideal life, really. An arrangement to be envied.

Things are looking up. Don't ruin them by being a Negative Nancy.

Upon draining her bath, Kim toweled off and sought out some comfortable clothes to wear. Pajamas, hooded sweatshirts and sweatpants had been her go-to garments for the past several days. With nowhere to go and no one to impress she was free to dress however she pleased. It was liberating. She tugged her black hair into a ponytail after giving it a thorough brushing. Then, picking up the hamper of dirty clothes in their bedroom, its lid refusing to close for the bourgeoning load within, she carried it down the stairs and to the basement door, setting it down with a thud that rang out like a gunshot.

At the sound, the warmth she'd cultivated during her bath withered and gave way to a slight chill. “Damn, it's quiet,” she said aloud, in an effort to offset the prevailing silence. She paused at the cellar door, giving the hamper a nudge with her foot and pondering the quietude. There isn't another person for miles around. There's the main road out there, but hardly anyone ever drives down it. She licked her lips pensively. You could go outside and scream at the top of your lungs if you wanted to. But no one would be around to hear you. Her chest began to grow tight as she considered this, her heart breaking into a steady gallop. If something happened to you, there'd be no one around to help. Just like the previous owners. Something happened to them and no one was around to see it. She glanced over at the phone on the kitchen counter, the corded thing looking like an antique to her. She chuckled to herself. A corded phone? A landline? Did people even use such things nowadays?

Her grin faded. Somehow it seemed in poor taste to mock the object that might serve as her only lifeline in the event of an emergency.

Kim picked up the hamper and held it precariously in one arm while simultaneously throwing open the cellar door and swiping the cool wall for the light switch. From the moment the door opened she was struck by the smell of dampness. Something earthy, like decaying autumn leaves, reached her nostrils as she steadied the load in her arms and took the first few steps. It was an awful little basement, easily her least favorite space in the house. The stairs were rickety, their porous boards groaning and squeaking. Though she was probably imagining it, she thought she could feel the whole stairway swaying as she descended, as though it were a tightrope. The handrail was there mostly for effect; it was bolted the the white brick wall in just two places, and looked too thin to support even her weight.

She recalled with equal parts amusement and frustration the way the deliverymen had struggled to get their new washer and dryer down into the basement some days previous. Julian had supervised the process, and had eventually acted as a spotter for the big guys who grunted every step of the way, arranging and rearranging the massive metal boxes in the narrow passageway. They got them down there by some miracle, but the stairs had trembled the entire time, threatening to send the trio, along with their thousand-dollar payload, to the concrete floors below.

Setting foot on the cool concrete, her toes writhed and she suddenly wished she'd had the foresight to put on her slippers. The two of them had mopped up the damp, dark floors with a good soap, but still they felt somehow unclean. She walked on the balls of her feet, passing a stack of unsorted boxes as she went, and dropped the hamper in front of the washer. She paced before it for a time, catching her breath and studying the silver buttons on the front. “Let's see how to work this thing,” she mumbled, wrenching open the door and tossing a few clothes in.

Using the new washer proved to be more difficult than she'd expected. First, she had to seek out their laundry detergent, which had been placed by Julian on a high shelf in the opposite corner, perhaps as a cruel joke. When she'd referenced the instruction manual no less than five times, she finally managed to hit the right configuration of buttons and start the thing, but then realized she'd forgotten to add the detergent. She dumped a cup of the blue liquid into the tray on top of the machine and then took a few steps back, watching the small window grow sudsy. “Might've added a little too much.”

She took to pacing about the cellar, the familiar churn of the washer providing an agreeable backdrop despite her unpleasant surroundings. She walked away from the washer and dryer, past the metal shelving unit, and around the stacks of cardboard boxes. Surveying the walls with some closeness she did her best to appraise them open-mindedly, hoping to banish the discomfort she felt. She wanted to get to know the space, to rid herself of the apprehension she felt towards it by fostering familiarity. You'd better get used to this basement. You'll be spending time down here from now on whether you like it or not.

The walls were made of brick, painted white, except for one wall which was covered in the tackiest blue wallpaper imaginable. Wallpaper in a damp old basement? What were these people thinking? It featured a hideous flower design and seemed to house a spot of mildew on its reverse, if the splotches on the peeling edges were any indication. She frowned, looking it up and down in the scant light. There were two lights in the basement, rudimentary things composed of single sockets sticking out of the beams in the ceiling and featuring one lightbulb apiece. They didn't do much to light the room, and like the other parts of the house, this space seemed to possess the unusual tendency to gather shadows in the nooks and crannies to a ridiculous degree. More than once she startled herself, catching peripheral glimpses of things in those shadow-nested corners. The sight of a simple mop or a shop vac, when transformed by the veil of subterranean darkness, was ample cause for alarm. Kim tried to laugh it off, but each subsequent scare only left her laughter more and more hollow.

There was one thing that caught her eye as she studied the wallpaper and silently criticized the taste of the former owners. In one of the corners, the paper seemed to bubble up in the most peculiar way, and when she finally rummaged up the nerve to poke at the wall, she found the mildew-encrusted paper did not give. There was something solid beneath it; metallic, seemingly. Running the tip of her pointer finger against it gingerly, she tried to divine what it was. Above it, and to the side, she counted three other such bumps, each of them possessing similar qualities. Perhaps the previous owners had clumsily wallpapered over some bolt or screw sticking out of the wall.

But then, maybe it was something else. Unless she could see it with her own eyes, there was no telling what was hidden behind the wallpaper.

Propelled by an intense curiosity she couldn't fully place, Kim found a loose edge and gave it a tug. The wallpaper didn't even make a ripping sound, but fell away in a soggy strip. She dropped it like she'd been burnt, but then continued her work, tearing away another piece, then another, till she realized what she was looking at.

The first bulge she'd found in the wallpaper proved to be a metal piece with a key-shaped hole in its center. The others, hinges, were meaty and flecked in orange rust. Running her hand against the exposed wall, grey in color and a bit sticky, she realized herself to be looking at a door.

There was a small slit in the wall with a dimple large enough for one or two fingertips, perhaps, that answered for a handle. She traced the door's seam carefully for a time, furrowing her brow in the process. “A door. Down here?” She gave a little tug on the handle but it wouldn't budge. “Where do you lead?” she asked.

A door could be heard to slam shut somewhere in the upstairs. The sound made her jump, and even as she gave herself the usual pep-talk, citing Julian's earlier explanation of warped door frames and worn-out closures, she couldn't help but shiver. Kim looked back at the concrete door in front of her and appraised it affrightedly. It looked like the door to a bomb shelter, calling to mind military bunkers and the like.

Frowning, she began up the stairs, wiping her hands off on her pants and shutting off the light. She was no longer curious about the strange door or where it led. As she closed the cellar door and shuffled across the kitchen to the sink, she was beginning to wish she'd never found it at all.

Chapter 7

He set a plate in front of her with a sheepish grin. It was roasted pork with asparagus. In an effort to make it extra special, he'd caramelized some pineapple rings, however the yellow fruit had gone crispy and black on one side. She turned the pineapple rings over gently, inspecting them with amusement. Their stove was in need of replacement. While it may have been a good machine back when the house was first built, its coils had been warped over the years, which made things cook unevenly.

“Sorry,” he said, sitting down and pouring them each a bit of wine. “It's that damn stove.”

She thanked him just the same, starting into her asparagus and eschewing the burnt pineapple. “How was your trip into town?” she asked.

Julian shrugged. “Fine, I guess. Had a cheeseburger, stopped by the book store in town and then took care of the cabinet business. Grocery store, too. Wanted us to have some decent food to eat. Sandwiches are fine, but I'm damn sick of them. They had a sale on coolers, so the meat didn't spoil on the drive back. Traffic was light so it made for a pleasant drive.” He chewed a bit of pork thoughtfully, looking up at the light fixture in the ceiling. “It was nice to get out, I suppose.” He then glanced at her, trying his best to hide a smirk. “And, uh... how did you fare in this house of horrors?” The dam broke and a small laugh escaped.

She dismissed him with practiced nonchalance, carving up a cutlet and spearing a piece with her fork. “It was fine, actually. Caught up on the laundry and had a bath. It was peaceful around here, without a certain someone getting in my way.”

The more she spoke, the more she just wanted to blurt out something about the strange door she'd found in the cellar, however.

Kim had withheld this information up to that point, had kept it close to the chest in the hopes that she wouldn't come off as jumpy or over-eager. The last thing she wanted was for Julian to pick on her again. And so she bided her time. She'd gone for a nap while he cooked dinner and hadn't so much as touched on the subject of the basement, except to say that she liked the new washer and dryer.

“So,” she began, licking her lips and setting down her utensils. Kim pressed her hands together and leaned in a little. “I found something down there. In the basement, that is.” She motioned to the cellar door across the room, her gaze shooting towards it for an instant. When she continued, her voice quivered with a noticeable energy, betraying her excitement. “There's a door in the basement, built into the wall across from the stairs. I dunno where it leads and couldn't get it open to save my life. It's locked something fierce, but I thought it interesting.”

Julian arched a brow and appraised her incredulously. “A door? I don't believe it. Where would it even go? The two of us were down there cleaning up and we never found it then. Are you sure it's a door?”

Recalling the dark cellar, the smell of dampness and the mold-encrusted wallpaper, she drew in a deep breath and feigned composure. “Well, actually, do you remember that ugly wallpaper down there? It was hidden behind that. It was peeling in places and I just decided to give it a tug. Behind it was a door. It's got hinges, a lock and some little handle pressed into the concrete.”

Narrowing his gaze, Julian worked over his food in silence for a time. “Huh,” he finally said, apparently unimpressed. “Well, it's weird that Edwin didn't say anything about it when he sold us the house. But if it was hidden behind the paper, then perhaps he didn't know about it. You say it's locked?”

She nodded.

“Don't think we got a key for it, then. The only keys we received on signing were for the exterior doors.” He ran a hand through his hair, leaning back in his seat, and picked up an asparagus spear. “I guess I'll go down there and monkey around with the lock later on. I'll bet I can wrench it open. But, there's something that concerns me.” His face suddenly hardened and he bit down on the asparagus, falling into silence.

“What?” she asked. She watched him mull something over. Whatever it was, it made him scowl.

“Well, it's just that... How many bodies do you think we'll find behind that door in the cellar?” he said, his eyes widening in a flash. “You don't think the previous owners...”

“B-bodies?” she blurted. “You think their...b-bodies are down there?”

Julian erupted into a fit of laughter, almost falling out of his chair. He smacked the table and then reached across it to pluck up the neglected pineapple rings on Kim's plate. “No, I'm just shitting you. But I dunno what could be down there. Probably just some storage room.”

Kim folded her arms and glowered at him. “You're a dick, you know that?” Taking a swig from her glass, she said nothing to him for a long while.

“Come on, don't take it all so seriously. I'm just messing with you.” He polished off his wine and then replenished his glass, offering more to Kim. She declined curtly. “Ever since we moved here you've been on edge. Little things have been getting you spooked. I know it's a big change and all that, but I feel like you've just gotta calm down if you're going to be happy here. Don't get so bogged down by this place; the isolation, the house's age and whatnot... they can do a number on your mind, if you let them.”

Kim rolled some bits of food around her plate disinterestedly, her fork clanging against it. “There are some things that bother me about this house,” she admitted. There was no sense in playing brave anymore. She was going to level with him, do her best to articulate her fears. If her husband couldn't listen to her and bring her comfort, then who could? She added a caveat before continuing, however. “I'm not looking for some condescending explanation from you for any of these things, either. I can come up with those on my own, thank you very much. But... this house.” She pursed her lips a moment, trying to call up the proper words. “It's got a bad vibe. Have you ever noticed the way shadows tend to linger in the corners? Feels like a cave in here sometimes.”

Julian was about to chime in and impart some reasoning for the pervasive shadows in the corners, probably some architectural quirk he'd picked up on, but stopped short when Kim gave him a sharp look. “Sorry. Go on.”

“The house feels unkind to me. A bad vibe, that's all I can say. And it doesn't help that, well, the previous owners vanished. I mean, we know so little about that and it doesn't sit well with me. Did they vanish in this house? While out on a trip? What happened?” She cleared her throat. “I find myself wanting to know more about them. I want to learn about who they were, try and figure out what happened to them. Maybe then I'll be able to put these things behind me and be happy here. But until I have some answers, I have to be completely honest: This place gives me the creeps.”

Julian nodded emphatically, reaching out and taking her small hand in his. “Babe, you know what I think? I think you're putting way too much thought into the past and not enough into the future. What happened here seven years ago has nothing to do with us. I mean, for all we know, the old couple that lived here just ran off because they couldn't afford their mortgage anymore. Or maybe they went out for groceries, or a walk, and just never came back. These things happen everyday. There's nothing remarkable or noteworthy about it. It's a sad story, nothing else. We didn't even know them, all right?” He cocked his head to the side, intercepting her pout with a smile. “We're slowly making this place our own. Before long there won't be a single thing left in this house to remind us of the previous owners.”

Kim gripped her husband's hand, gripped it hard till she could feel his pulse against her digits. Still, comfort was elusive. It would've been a relatively easy thing for her to get over her apprehension if the only complaint she had was the occasional bump in the night, or the disappearance of the previous owners. Things had happened to her in that house, however. Things she couldn't write off so easily. The volume of peculiar and disturbing events was such that she had to read into them something sinister. That they were unrelated, coincidental, benign, never once occurred to her. There'd been the photograph in the upstairs bathroom, with the warning scrawled across the back. We're coming back for it, it had said. The memory of that photo in the attic of masked individuals made her shudder. More frightening still was the surreal, life-like dream she'd had of the old woman in the kitchen. That it'd been a dream at all she couldn't be sure.

The pleading look in her eyes made Julian's expression soften. She was scared, positively frightened, and she looked it. “I just... I want to reach out to someone. Maybe Edwin, or someone else who knew these people in life. I want to get to the bottom of this if I can, or closer to the truth, so that I can put this behind me. This couple has to have friends that are still alive, right? Edwin could probably put us in touch and we could find out more about the people who used to own this place. Maybe then--”

Julian tried to smother an exasperated sigh, throwing up one of his hands and nodding. “Sure, OK. That's fine. If you want to call him up and find out more about these folks, then do it. I won't stop you.” It was clear he was uninterested in her little investigation however. “Let me be straight with you, though. This is a bad idea. You need to let this go, not fixate on it harder, know what I'm saying? Call Edwin in the morning and have a chat with him, but don't go too deep. Don't jump down some rabbit hole, all right? This is history, ancient history as far as I'm concerned, and whatever happened to those people is none of my business. We own this house now and that's all that matters.”

Pleased with this, Kim perked up. “All right, yeah. I'll call Edwin tomorrow morning after breakfast. Maybe he can come by for coffee.”

“Sure,” he replied, shoveling a bite of food into his mouth.

Kim had lost her appetite. Recalling everything that'd hitherto bothered her about the house had ruined her mood. Nevertheless, she latched onto a bit of hope. Maybe Edwin will be able to tell me something more about this house, or to put me in touch with someone who knows about these people. Maybe... I can figure this thing out and make peace with living here. I just need someone to tell me more about them. Maybe then I won't feel like I'm going crazy. This house has a vibe about it. I know I can't possibly be the only one to feel it. Clinging to this fragment of hope, the kitchen seemed a little brighter to her, a little cheerier. To her, it was a glimpse of what the house could become if only she succeeded in learning more about the previous owners and subsequently banishing the veil of mystery that surrounded the place.

***

Nodding off on the sofa, Kim felt a finger tap her shoulder firmly. She looked up to find a groggy-looking Julian waving her towards the stairs. “Come on,” he slurred. “Bedtime.” While she'd attempted to stream a movie using the terrible wi-fi connection, he'd busied himself by polishing off the remainder of the wine. Guzzling the rest of the large bottle in the hours after dinner, he was pleasantly sloshed now, and he ambled sloppily towards the stairs, hiccoughing. “Gotta rock a piss,” he muttered, wiping at his eyes and sniffing the air.

Taking him by the arm, she helped to guide him up. The stairwell seemed to be made up of a million stairs as it took forever to get him to ascend, but when it was done, he staggered down the hall mainly by his own volition and used the bathroom. Then, leading him into the bedroom, she supported him as he lowered himself onto the bed and pulled back the covers. He hadn't been tucked in but a minute or two before the air was pierced by his drunken snoring.

Kim brushed her teeth and washed her face, putting out the light and walking across the moonlit bedroom to her side of the bed. As she went, she thought to close the curtains. The sun always blinded them in the mornings if they didn't, and Julian looked as though he'd be needing extra sleep. She frowned, could already hear him complaining about his hangover come morning. She gripped the soft brown curtains and gave them a tug.

She stopped short, however, her gaze drawn to something outside the window.

Her pulse quickened and her heart smashed against her sternum.

Eyes widened in disbelief, then terror.

Her knuckles went pale as she gripped the curtains, and the rod on the wall began to rattle in its socket.

The bedroom window gave her a view of the woods behind the house. Had the woods been more picturesque, then perhaps this would have been an attractive feature, however the view of the bald, dead woods to the rear of the house had only ever served to provoke dread in her.

Her dread at this glimpse of them was a thousand-fold for the wan presence of a humanoid figure standing in amidst the ebony, night-shaded trunks.

The figure, even from such a distance, seemed to zero in on her as she stood in the second-story window. It leered, or seemed to leer, from behind a white plaster mask. A mask of clumsy, bulbous and, worst of all, familiar make, stared up at her from the woods from more than a hundred yards away. Of the individual's appearance she could say very little; their clothing was dark, mixing in well with the surrounding shadow. The figure seldom stirred, except to look up at her. The movement was so slight, but it smacked her like a load of bricks all the same and saw her gasp. The figure was watching her. Kim could feel two eyes scanning her body, boring straight through her, from behind the clumsily-fashioned pinholes that answered for eyes. She fell back onto the bed and grabbed up a fistful of Julian's shirt, shaking him violently awake. “Julian,” she bawled, “wake up. T-there's someone standing out there. There's s-someone--”

He sat up on his elbows groggily, slack-jawed, and gazed at her from behind listless, drunken eyes. “W-what now?” The words left this lips in a jumbled mass, accompanied by a bit of drool.

“There's someone outside, standing in the woods,” she said, shaking him afresh. A trail of tears marked her cheek and she stole a glance at the window as though she thought the suspicious figure might hover just outside it. “He's... he's wearing a mask, a mask just like those people in the picture we found.”

Julian hiccoughed, then belched, his brow furrowing. “Picture?”

“The picture we found in the attic!” she shrieked.

It took him a few moments to process this, and when he did, he began to chuckle. He gulped, tried to rein in his slur and speak with his usual confidence. “Babe, no, look, that was an old, old picture. Real old. Anyone in that snapshot's long-dead by now. Or in a nursing home.” He hiccoughed and waved her away, throwing an arm over his face and stretching out in bed. “You just had too much wine. Seein' things...”

She could have slugged him for that. She wasn't drunk, hadn't hardly imbibed during dinner. Her anger was overshadowed quickly by terror however, and she slowly crept from the bed, keeping close to the wall and making her way back towards the window. She had no doubt of what she'd seen. She was awake, and it had been no hallucination. As she took hold of the curtain and slowly peered through the window once more, she did so with a breath dwelling deep in her lungs. She wasn't sure if the masked figure had come closer in the interim, if he'd attempt to enter the house.

She looked out the window, scanning the woods frenziedly for the solitary masked figure standing in amidst the trees.

A few seconds passed.

A few more.

There was no sign of the figure to be found. Though she zeroed in on the particular stretch of woods she'd earlier spotted him in, no tearful search could yield even the remotest evidence he'd ever been there. It was possible he'd made a run for the house. Or that he had simply disappeared back into the woods from whence he'd come. Either way, the masked figure was gone.

Somehow, that seemed the most likely explanation to her. She couldn't say why, but as the minutes passed and the figure could not be heard to enter the house, she pictured the ghastly white mask, the dark, nebulous body, and imagined it seemingly blinking out of existence, evaporating in a flash into the surrounding murk. That was all it was. One minute he'd been there. In the next he was not.

Kim rushed into bed, curling up beside her drunk husband and tugging the covers high over her head. She listened for the longest time, till the evidences of dawn began to emerge through the open curtains, for an intruder. The bed beneath her was left damp with sweat, and she hoped, prayed, for morning.

When it came, she fell into an exhausted sleep.

Chapter 8

Kim woke up in a fit of terror, leaping out of bed and startling Julian, who was teetering back from the bathroom, a palm pressed to his reddened forehead. Her fright was owed to no dream; upon waking, she'd recalled the events of the previous night, the frightening masked figure she'd spied in the woods, and had jumped almost immediately to the window, searching the tree-line for any sign of him.

The woods were clear, sunlit.

She shuddered, turning to Julian and pointing at the window. “I'm telling you, I saw someone out there last night, and they were wearing a damned mask.” She pursed her lips, immediately seeking out her phone and searching through the history for Edwin's number. “I'm calling Edwin. He's going to come by today and we're going to talk about this shit.” She held the phone out towards the window, finding a weak reception, and then held it to her ear, slumping against the dresser.

Julian groaned, motioning to the window in the hopes that she'd tug the curtains closed. “Too bright,” he moaned, turning away and staggering to the doorway.”And don't get so carried away,” he mumbled, taking an unsteady step into the hall.

The phone rang three times before the familiar voice answered. “Hello, Edwin speaking.”

Kim gulped, shoving back a handful of her matted hair and thinking of the most delicate way to make her request. The fright coursing through her made this no easy feat. Don't make it sound like you're going crazy. Don't tell him about any of this creepy shit. Just tell him you wanna talk about the previous owners. She cleared her throat. “Hi, Edwin? It's Kim Taylor. You sold me and my husband Julian the Beacon estate?” She paused, waiting awkwardly for some acknowledgement.

After a few moments, he finally responded. “Ah, yes... and how are you this morning, Mrs. Taylor?” Then he added, “I hope everything's going well with the house, of course.”

Kim gave a nervous laugh. No, everything was not well with the house. The house situation, in fact, was going rather poorly. But she feared she'd scare him off if she spilled her guts and described all of the frightening things she'd been subjected to in recent days. Instead, she put on the most cordial tone of voice she could muster and asked him to come by for a chat. “I don't suppose you have any free time today, do you? You see, I have some questions about the house-- about its previous owners, specifically, and I'd like to speak to you about them. You were a close friend of theirs, after all, so who better to speak to?”

The request seemed to make him a little uncomfortable. He made a little open-mouthed sound, barely audible, that indicated something like hesitance, then chuckled. “Well, uh, all sales are final, ya know?” When he'd finished laughing at his own joke, he continued, “But what do you wanna talk about, exactly?”

Kim munched on her thumbnail and took to pacing around the bedroom. “Oh, nothing too serious, really. I just...” She waffled. “I'd like to... like to know more about the house's history. And I want to know more about the former owners, and their lives. Their interests. You know... what kind of people they were.” Before he had a chance to ask her any more questions, she interjected. “I just feel like I'd be a lot more comfortable if I knew more about the lovely people who built this gorgeous house.” There, she thought. You phrased it like some kind of compliment. Maybe that'll work.

“Erm...” Edwin sighed. “Yeah, sure, I can be by around noon. I don't live too far, so it isn't a terrible drive for me.”

“Excellent,” she said, barely able to contain her excitement. “Noon. I'll see you then.”

Hanging up the phone, she called downstairs to Julian, her voice carrying happily and making his headache flare up something fierce. “Edwin's coming by at noon!”

“Great,” he growled, switching on the coffee maker and standing in the doorway between the kitchen and living room. “Can't wait.”

“You know what, you stay home and nurse your stupid hangover, then. I'll take him out for a walk around the house,” she said, diving into the closet and seeking out a sweater. She pulled her hair back, slid into her jeans and put on comfortable flats. Descending the stairs, she yanked the mug of fresh coffee from Julian's grasp and thanked him sarcastically before carrying it out onto the back patio.

The sun was competing for room in the sky with a mess of grey clouds. Very soon now the day would be overcast. It might even rain. Kim sucked down a mouthful of hot coffee and looked to the woods, a chill walking down her spine despite the warmth of the brew. With a little effort she picked out the spot where she'd seen the figure the night before. It was daylight out, and there was still no sign of the figure to be found there, however she was out in the open now, rather than in her bedroom, and being within such close proximity to the spot in question made her heart flutter.

Had it all been a dream, maybe? Perhaps she'd been tired, hallucinating? No. She'd seen something, someone, in these woods. Who it was, why they'd revealed themselves to her and stared silently up at her window she hadn't the foggiest. But she would find out. It would take a while, could be like pulling teeth, if the hesitance in Edwin's voice was any indication, but she'd learn more about this property and figure out just what the hell was going on. Something was happening in this place. She was caught up in something, a web, whose parts she couldn't fully see.

Edwin would be by soon, she kept reminding herself. Perhaps he'd be able to shed light on some things, put her mind at ease. He could tell her about the woods, about the photographs they'd found in the house. And then there was the matter of the door in the cellar. What were the odds that he knew about that?

She let the steam rolling off of her coffee tickle her nose as she raised the mug to her lips. Soon you'll have some answers. She looked up at the sky, its face stained more grey than blue now. Hopefully.

Chapter 9

“Mind if I smoke?” was the first thing out of his mouth as he joined her around back. Edwin lit up a Marlboro and sent a puff of smoke into the air with a satisfied sigh. He looked out to the woods, up at the sky, and then smiled at his hostess. “So, how have things been? With the house, I mean?”

She answered by way of a pointed silence.

Taking a longer drag, he coughed a little. “You two having problems, maybe? Trouble getting used to it?” They'd begun walking aimlessly, leaving the back of the house and trending towards the woods. He seemed apprehensive about the subtle change in their direction and eyed the woods constantly with an almost fearful vigilance. Now when he spoke he didn't even look at her, merely keeping his eyes glued to the trees as though waiting for something to jump out at him. “You said you wanted to know about Marshall and Dakota. I don't even know where to start, really. They were fine people, lovely people. Very warm.”

The woods towered beside them. The bare trees stretched high into the air, their bodies fragmenting the weak sunlight and casting long, dark shadows. It shouldn't have been so; to Kim it seemed awfully early for such shadows, and the overcast sky wasn't allowing enough light through for them. But there they were all the same, cast upon the crunchy grass like black, oily stains.

Kim shoved her hands into her pockets and lowered her gaze, watching the blades of grass go by as she walked. She spoke quietly, furtively, as if she were afraid the woods might eavesdrop. “Start from the beginning. How did you meet them?”

He ran his tongue across his yellowed molars, falling into deep thought. This single question launched Edwin into a reminisce of nearly an hour, wherein he recounted his friendship with Marshall and Dakota Reed. There were countless tangents along the way, so many that Kim had some trouble keeping things straight. But she retained the broader strokes of his talk and felt, by the time they started back towards the house almost an hour later, that she had a semi-faithful caricature of the previous owners built up in her head.

Edwin must have smoked half a pack of cigarettes while they spoke. Whether he was simply that addicted or the conversation necessitated a sort of crutch Kim was unsure. He was silent for a time before starting, looking deep into the woods whose edges they were skirting like he was searching for the best starting point.

“I met Marshall when we were just kids. We were both straight outta the Navy, the two of us. Had served together during our last deployment and got to be pretty good friends. Well, coming back home, we settled in around this area. Has always been quiet like this, unpeopled n' such. It's strange to look around at these woods, at these open spaces and find them unchanged. But that's exactly what it is. This place ain't changed a bit in almost sixty years, I reckon. Sometimes I like it that way...” He busied himself, lighting a fresh cigarette. He didn't take a drag at once, but instead watched the tip burn away into embers for a short time. “Sometimes I don't like it. Can't say why, except that it's a little disorienting sometimes. Take, for instance, these trees here. They've always been dead, all of 'em, as far back as I can remember. Never seen a single leaf in these here woods. Some would call that peculiar, and I don't say I would disagree, though some tree expert out there could probably give a mighty pretty-sounding explanation for why these trees are still standing this way after so many years and so little growth.

“Anyway, we settled into this area, the two of us. Built our homes, stayed relatively close so we could keep in touch. And we married. My wife, God rest her soul, was actually a friend of Dakota's. That's how we all met. It was like a fairytale in that way, an idealized sorta life. Me and my wife would come by for long visits with the two of them, would have cookouts, go on little trips and such. But then things changed.”

Kim tensed. “What happened? The Reeds changed?”

“No. My wife became pregnant.” He wet his lips and smoothed out the front of his faded jacket against his bulbous paunch. “We were young back then. Had good jobs, though, nice houses, all that. But something money can't buy is a child. And when me and Rhonda had our son, well, I suppose Marshall and Dakota figured it was their turn to follow suit. And they tried for a few years there, they were hopeful. A child never came, though.” He shook his head, flicking away a cone of ash. “Some people, you know, they just ain't blessed in that way. God only sends children where He sees fit. He's never been much for requests. And well, let's say that Dakota, especially, didn't take so kindly to that fact. They kept trying until they got on in years. It was their hill to die on, the one thing they couldn't let go. They had a marvelous life out here, you gotta understand. Everything was picture perfect. But so long as that one piece was missing they couldn't be happy. I don't think they ever determined whose fault it was-- that is, who was infertile, but, uh, it was something that plagued them to the very end and put a strain on their marriage.” He cleared his throat. “Even now, years later, it doesn't feel right to talk about it. Feel like I'm talkin' behind their backs. And it's like I said to you, this place, well, nothin' ever changes here, so in a way, it's like I expect them to still linger on around here somewhere. I expect to come 'round here one day and wave to 'em from the driveway, like they never went anywhere to begin with.

“But a course they did go somewhere, no doubtin' that. And maybe it's because it happened out here, in this place where things never seemed to change at all, that it seemed so damn queer to me when they did. It was autumn-time, almost eight years back, that me and my wife first thought something might be wrong. They weren't returning our calls. In their younger days they were avid travelers like us, but as the years wore on they lost their taste for all that. They got to be home-bodies, always here in this house, workin' on it. Hell, it got so that they wouldn't even come over to our place any longer for cookouts or movies. We still visited at that time, still saw them at least a couple of times a month, but when they stopped answering our calls, we couldn't help but think something was up. We did some drive-bys, and we saw the truck was still there in the drive. Figured they just didn't want to talk to us; maybe they were having difficulties, or we'd done something to offend 'em. But then we stopped by and knocked on the door, looked in the windows.

“It's surreal to think back on it now, but when I found one of their doors open I walked in and shouted out for them. Was worried that something bad had happened, that they'd hurt themselves or God knows what. But we looked and looked and, believe it or not, they were nowhere to be found. There was no sign that anyone had been living in the house for a few months at that point, in fact. Checked their meters, their taps; seemed to me that they'd up and gone around the time they'd first stopped taking our calls. For that matter, I came upon their answering machine and found the same damn messages I'd left there weeks previous.” He loosed an exaggerated shudder. “I hope you can forgive me for saying so, but it was the scariest goddamn thing I've ever known, standing in that empty house with my wife, playing back those messages, loads of them, and knowing they hadn't been in that house for a few months.”

Kim nodded. “So, did they leave any clues behind as to where they'd gone?”

Edwin shook his head firmly at this. “Not a one, I tell ya. And that was even after the sheriff came through from the next county over with one of his deputies and turned the house upside down. After a long, hard look they theorized the two of 'em had simply bailed on the house. Now, I knew better than that. It wasn't like 'em. They loved that house like a child, would never have left it. But their truck was still there, so we knew they couldn't have gone anywhere. I mean, it's almost an hour's drive to the nearest grocery store in these parts, there was just no explaining where they might've gone without a car. I begged the sheriff to search the woods, and I even went in there and helped them do it. We had a search party some fifteen or twenty strong, but we didn't find a thing. Not a one. Sheriff interviewed some of their other friends and acquaintances as a last resort, hoping that maybe they'd said something to someone before just dropping off the radar, but if those people did know anything, and I'm not saying that they did, then they didn't say nothing. Dead ends all around. Short while later the case went cold and seemingly everyone lost interest. Oh, in the years that passed I made sure to drive past the house on occasion. Made sure no one had messed with anything, hoped that they might suddenly return from wherever the hell they'd gone off to. But it never happened.

“Flash forward to a few months ago, I get a call from some fella at a legal office, saying the Reeds have been declared dead in absentia and I'm now the executor of their estate. Well, I wasn't too thrilled about that news. I'd always held out hope. But when a man in a thousand dollar suit gives you all their belongings and tells you they're good and dead, well, you tend to believe him. And so I fixed her up, made sure things were still working. Cleared out all of their things, sold 'em off. And then I put her on the market as quickly as I could. You understand that owning a house like this one was just too much for me. Too many memories, too much sadness tied to it. I didn't want nothing to do with it, was willing to sell it at a loss if only it meant getting rid of it. And I wanted to put the whole thing behind me. I didn't want to keep driving by that house, hopin' and wonderin' if one day they'd turn up. Made no sense to. And here we are, it seems. Here we are.” He put out his cigarette against the nearest tree trunk. “Does that answer any of your questions?”

It certainly answered some of the questions on her mind. What it didn't cover was all of the freaky shit she'd had to put up with since moving in. Taking in a deep breath, Kim tried to shove the conversation in that direction. “So, why did you guys move out to the middle of nowhere? Why did they like this area so much, the Reeds?”

Edwin tugged on his collar. “They were fiercely private, those two. They liked their alone time, their solitude. A house as isolated as that one just suited 'em, I guess. Like I told you, especially in their older years, they were home-bodies. Hardly ever set foot outside their own property. They even took up hunting and gardening so that they wouldn't have to go out for groceries as much. Funny though, the deer don't run through this stretch quite like I remember. In fact, I don't know that they ever did, not through these dead woods.”

“You said at the showing that there'd been a house on this land previously, and that it'd been torn down when this one was built. Can you tell me anything about that?”

Growing increasingly wary at her line of questioning, he had little to offer on this subject. “Don't think I even saw it before it got knocked down. It was a tottering little thing, if I recall, but they cleared it out in a hurry and built right over its foundation.” His greying brown combover was ruined by a strong gust of the breeze. He batted it back down onto his greasy head with a frown.

“I see.” Kim worked over her lower lip. “Tell me, did the Reeds have any family they kept in touch with?”

“No, I don't think so. They didn't get along with their parents, either of them, and I'm sure they passed on years ago anyhow. They had siblings, maybe, but I didn't know them well and heard that they'd stopped talking to them, too, years and years ago. They lived out here alone, kept a small number of friends and were content to leave things that way. Never were hard to please, those two.”

Kim jumped at the mention of other friends. “These other friends of theirs-- could you possibly give me their names, phone numbers? I wouldn't mind speaking to them--”

“Now, hold on a minute,” said Edwin, turning to face her, looking stern now for the first time all day. “Why are you so interested in all of this? Now, if you've gone and found something, something that'll help me get to the bottom of what happened to 'em , then I wanna know about it. What's this all about?”

Kim evaded. “No, nothing like that. I'm just curious, that's all. I swear. I haven't found anything like that. A few old pictures is all.”

His gaze narrowed. “Pictures of what?”

She couldn't give a good answer to this. What was she supposed to say? Pictures full of masked freaks? A photo with a threat scribbled onto the back? She couldn't bring herself to say anything about the photos. They seemed irrelevant to her now. “You know, just old pictures,” she said. “I was just hoping I could speak to other people who knew them. More than one perspective would be interesting.”

Edwin cleared his throat. “I'm not sure that it would be very appropriate for me to just give you people's names and phone numbers like that.” He hesitated a little. “I could give them to you, maybe, but only if you promise not to tell 'em I was the one to give you the information. I don't much keep in touch with most of these people. But maybe I could pass it on. I still feel a little bad about selling you this house without your knowing what happened here. That is, unless you're going to use it to harass them or somesuch, because then it's absolutely no deal. You and your husband seem like nice folk and I have nothing against your tryin' to learn more about the house's history. And without Marshall and Dakota, well, there wouldn't be a house to begin with.”

“That would be great!” She thanked him profusely and waited as he swiped around on his phone, digging through his contacts for the names and numbers in question. She added them to her own and felt a great deal of excitement wash over her. “This is so excellent, thanks. No funny business, I swear.”

“No problem.”

They were back at the house now, and Kim still hadn't received all of the information she'd been hoping for. She knew a few things about the owners and such, but Edwin hadn't hinted at anything unsettling or supernatural in nature. For an instant she felt a gut-wrenching fear. See? He didn't mention anything about mask-wearing apparitions or weird nightmares. Nothing about the house's bad vibes in his entire speech. Maybe you are just imagining it. Maybe you're going insane. A raindrop struck her shoulder as she stopped near the fire pit and turned to him afresh. She needed to get this out, to steer the conversation back to what was really bothering her. “I'll let you go, Edwin. But before I do, I have one last question for you.” She put on a smile, but her lips trembled too much for it to stay long. “In this house, have you... or the Reeds, for that matter, ever noticed anything... off?”

Edwin stuck his hands in his pockets and then motioned with them, giving the front of his coat a flap. “What do you mean, exactly?”

“Have you... ever seen things.... around here? Things that you can't, well... explain?” She knew how she looked right then. It was embarrassing to have to ask, but if she didn't get something from him, she'd explode.

His gaze firmed a little, then he looked up to the sky, a raindrop striking his cheek. “Guess I was right about that rain,” he said, offering a little sigh. “Strange things, eh?” He kicked at a clod of dirt near the pit, watching as it burst into dust upon the tip of his boot. “Well, let me tell you what I think about strange things in these parts, young lady. The quiet, the open space out here... it can be disorienting if you're not careful. Especially for a city girl like you. And with these trees here...” He motioned at the woods, now to his back, and appraised them from his periphery with a deepening of the creases at the corners of his eyes. “At night, they cast those tall, tall shadows, they do. One never quite gets used to that. There ain't a thing in these woods, like I said, but at night, when the moon is right, well, you can sometimes see things. Things that ain't supposed to be there, maybe looking out at ya.” He cleared his throat, pulling one of his hands out of his pockets and shaking it before him playfully. “That's not to say that you're seein' something real out there, miss. No, rather, these woods can play tricks on your eyes. They play tricks on the best of us. So don't take them too seriously. You'll be seeing things that aren't really there and losing sleep over it otherwise.” He chuckled nervously.

“Are the woods dangerous?” she asked, kneading her hands together.

“Dangerous? If you get lost in them, maybe.” He gulped, patting his forehead dry. She thought it strange that he should be sweating. It was cool out, breezy. His face seemed extra pale in the grey light and he began quickly for his truck. “Stay out of them at night, of course. Could lose your way or, uh... scare yourself unnecessarily.”

Trying to get him to talk any further about these “unnecessary scares” was like trying to draw blood from a stone. Citing the now increasing rain as an excuse, Edwin said he simply had to get going and refused her invitations inside for coffee. He waved a somber goodbye through the windshield and pulled away just as the rain began to pour.

Chapter 10

The rain was short-lived. The rumbling clouds said their piece over the course of five or ten minutes and then fell silent. The thirsty ground sucked it all up, so that by the time a freshly-showered and sober Julian stepped out to clean the fire pit, there were precious few signs that it'd rained at all.

Kim had gone inside to steep in a bath, rebuffing sarcastic questions from Julian about how her talk with Edwin had gone. On the one hand, she felt like she'd learned so much. On the other, she felt as though she hadn't leaned a damn thing. He'd grown nervous in the end, gone in a hurry, but precisely why that was she could only guess. She figured that the man was superstitious, that perhaps he had seen something in the house or the woods that'd set him ill at ease. Something that he didn't care to revisit in his mind or speak aloud. Maybe he'd seen that masked figure outside just like she had. Or maybe he'd seen something else.

She meditated in the bath, her head swimming in uncertainty. When the water cooled she went for a warm shower. When she was done, her skin was rosy and her fingers pruned. Still, a persistent cold lingered. She wiped away the steam on their new mirror and looked herself over. Then, running a comb through her hair, she worked out a few tangles. All the while she focused on the things Edwin had told her and tried to convince herself that the sighting the previous night was just a fluke, an illusion.

After a cup of tea, she went into the living room but couldn't focus on her novel. She was sick of reading, but it was more than that; her mind was elsewhere, filled to the brim with questions. The remainder of the day was spent idling in deep thought.

Just after sunset, Julian came in from the back yard. He'd been cleaning up the piles of ancient firewood and had started a respectable fire in the fire pit. He urged her to come out and look, but she hesitated. The thought of a fire sounded nice, but she didn't much care to be so close to the woods after dark. When he pressed it, she finally relented, snatching a sweater up and throwing it on.

The evening was chill. Kim hastened to the fire, which roared in a mighty blaze. Julian had stayed behind in the house a moment, emerging a short time later with two drinks. He'd poured them a little whiskey, and set hers down on a flat tree stump nearby.

“Haven't you had enough to drink for a while?” she asked, sniffing at the booze and taking a meager sip. The liquor rolled down her tongue and warmed her throat.

He grinned, smoothing back his tousled hair. “Just a nightcap, I figure.”

They watched the fire for some time. Its warmth radiated about the space and they sat down upon a pair of old lawn chairs, holding their hands out.

“I could get used to this,” said Kim. “It's lovely. Being out here, having all of this space to ourselves.”

He raised his glass. “Finally getting over your fears, are you? Did Edwin talk some sense into you, perhaps?” He took a sip, looking over at her expectantly.

She lowered her gaze, peering at the dark liquor and seeing her own flickering reflection in it. Kim shook her head. “Not quite. I spoke with him and he shared a lot of details about the former owners. But he didn't tell me what I really wanted to know. He gave me some other phone numbers, though-- of people who used to know the former owners, so maybe I'll give them a call and--”

Julian about choked on his drink. He cleared his throat and shook his head. He sent the last few drops from his glass into the fire, and it flashed for a moment in a brilliant burst. “No,” he said, setting down the glass between his feet. “That's ridiculous. You talked to Edwin, isn't that enough?” He sighed. “This is getting out of hand, babe. Way outta hand. We've got this big house to ourselves, a great view of the stars, a warm fire, and you're sitting here thinking about some old people who disappeared years before we even met. Aren't you?” He spit, crossing his arms and leaning back in the lawn chair.

“Damn it, it's not just because I'm curious. I feel... I feel like I need to know more about them. I want to know what happened. It's nagging at me, Julian. I can't breathe easy in this house. Not until I know. And it isn't as though I don't want to be happy here with you. I appreciate all of the hard work you did in writing your screenplay. I appreciate the house, everything you've done. I just...” She fell silent.

Julian brooded in his seat, appraising the twinkling stars above. He wasn't having any of this.

After a time, Kim decided to continue. “These people, the ones who vanished from here... what do you think happened to them? Talk to me about it, give me one of your rational explanations like you always do. If you think it's nothing, then paint me a picture and make me feel at ease. Because right now, I'm still frightened. I've seen things in this house, have had a bad vibe for a while now. But you've just dismissed it every time. So, other than post-move jitters, what else could it be?”

He straightened himself in his seat, sighed emphatically and poked a stick into the fire, watching with annoyance as the tip fizzled and popped. “I've said it before and I'll say it again: It's none of our business. Drop it. Those people disappeared in some way or another, but wondering about it all day is going to make you insane. It's like those people who get obsessed with alien abductions or conspiracy theories. I'm not going to foster this. I'm not going to feed you new theories or anything like that. Some people lived here years ago, then they didn't. End-of-fucking-story, OK? Why can't you just let it be? Why isn't that good enough for you?” He raised his hands towards the sky. “All of this freedom, all of this space, and you have to pick this to worry over? What, we're not living in that cramped little shit-hole, living from check-to-check, so now you have to fixate on this? You have to stress out over these people to fill that void? Chill out and drop it. Please.”

She grit her teeth. “Yeah, great. Thanks for taking my feelings into account. You say that this is all for me, that you want to give me the best, but when I say I see something scary outside, or think there's something wrong with the house, you just give me the same canned responses or, worse, get angry at me. Thanks a lot.”

“I'll say there's something wrong with the house,” he replied. “Take those floors in the kitchen, for instance. We'll put some hardy stone tiles in there instead of that dated linoleum. I'll call tomorrow and see what their hours are. We can even drive out there and see what colors we like best. Plan the whole room together, yeah?” He patted her on the leg. “Let's focus on what's really important. Making this house our own.”

She grimaced. Something about the words he'd chosen just then didn't sit well with her. “Make the house their own”? If it wasn't theirs right then, then who did it belong to? She shivered and looked back at the fire, uninterested in further talk of renovations or countertops. None of that mattered to her in the least. Not right now. She was pissed at Julian. He was willing to dismiss each and every concern of hers. As usual, the only thing he ever cared about was the project at hand. First it'd been that goddamned screenplay. Now his grand project was the house. His self-centeredness was getting to her. Where she'd thought this move might be a panacea, allowing her to spend more time with him, she saw it for what it really was now. This was his next passion project, more work for him to get lost in.

Kim was about to storm off and reenter the house when a sudden noise issuing from the direction of the woods made her drop back into her chair and grip at the plastic armrests. “What in the hell is that?” she asked.

She watched as Julian's expression transitioned from cool annoyance, to concerned confusion, before finally giving way to dread. He leaned forward, listening pensively, and then looked over at her, shaking his head. “An animal,” he breathed, going quiet as though he didn't want to be heard. “It's gotta be.”

Kim wasn't an outdoors-type, didn't know a thing about the native fauna. But she did know two things. The first, was that Edwin had told her that there weren't any animals in those woods. As a resident of this area for almost sixty years, he'd never known animals in this stretch of trees. The other thing she knew was that no animal she had ever encountered, whether in a zoo, in a park or on a television program, had made a sound quite like this one. It was a fierce, aggravated sound, not unlike a human scream. It was garbled however, pained, and carried with it the guttural foundation of something like a bear's roar. It was also loud. Very loud. It shot out from somewhere in that black nest of dead trees, and to her frightened mind it seemed awfully close. Edwin had alluded to the possibility of one's eyes playing tricks on them where these woods were concerned. But could they play tricks on one's ears, too? Could the sound of the wind passing through the trees generate this sort of noise?

No.

And they both knew it.

Standing up and cautiously perusing the treeline, the paleness in Julian's visage was highlighted by the orange glow of the fire. He didn't see anything, but the recurrence of that hideous sound, ringing out like a siren in the stillness, made him blanch further. Stuttering, he waved towards the back door. “W-wounded animal. G-get inside, babe. I'll, uh... put out the fire and join you.”

She didn't need an invitation. Quickly, Kim dashed from her chair and burst through the back door. She watched from the kitchen window as Julian took a bucket of water and doused the half-burnt logs in the pit. Poking at them with a stick, he whipped the mess inside into a steaming slurry, and then frenziedly stomped out whatever embers he could see with his boot. The sound was streaming through the air again, the gasping, screaming vocalization sending her into a cold sweat even from the confines of the kitchen. The lights overhead flickered. It may have only been a coincidence, but Kim whimpered all the same.

Finally, Julian rushed inside. He was covered in sweat, his shirt clinging to his thin frame, his cheeks red and eyes wide. He locked the door, made sure the windows were locked, and then continued through the rest of the lower story, securing every other lock he could find. When he was through, he sat down on the sofa quietly and seemed to reflect on everything that'd happened.

“What's wrong?” she asked, sitting down beside him. “Did you... did you see anything out there?”

Julian loosed a little laugh, shaking his head as if in disbelief. The sound hadn't come back again, and in the virginal quiet he felt he could finally relax. “Well, uh... no. I don't think I did. Those trees, man... they play tricks on you. I could've sworn I saw someone standing out there. In the woods. But, uh...” He shook his head again, palming at his sweaty chin. “Nah, no way. That sound had me freaked. Probably just some wandering bear. Got hurt and made some awful noise, that's it. But those woods, really, they do a number on you at night.”

Kim took his arm and shook him gently. “See? I told you--”

“No, no, babe...” He took in a deep breath. He was visibly shaken, but remained obstinate. “Look. There isn't another building for miles and miles. Haven't heard a car pass by all day. There isn't any way someone could just show up in those woods. Makes no sense. The only explanation is that my eyes were fooling me. That's it. I swear.” He wiped at his eyes, laughing weakly. “The firelight didn't help. Probably reflected all kinds of shapes against the dark woods. Like a shadow play or something.” Regaining some composure he slapped at his knee and looked at her with some relief. “That's what it was, babe. Nothing but a trick of the light and a wounded animal.” He broke out into laughter. “I won't lie. Scared the shit out of me, though.”

She leaned back against the sofa. She wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe he'd been mistaken. But she knew better. Nothing natural had made that terrible sound outside, and his eyes hadn't deceived him. She'd seen someone out there the night before, too.

“Let's go to bed, yeah?” he asked, looking somewhat defeated. He stood, shutting off the light and hiking up to the stairs. She followed him and ascended silently. The pair threw off their sweaty clothes and made their way to the bed.

Before laying down and switching off the bedside lamp, Kim felt the urge to look through the window at the woods one last time. She wondered if the figure was still out there or if, from this vantage point, she'd get a look at whatever had been making that sound. She walked over to the window and took hold of the curtains.

“No!” Julian barked, throwing his hand out and scrambling towards the foot of the bed. “No, don't look. Just... just lay down. Go to sleep. Forget about it, it was nothing.” He took her arm and drew her away.

Kim switched off the lamp and settled into bed beside him, stomach roiling with unease. Whatever it was he'd seen was still out there in the woods. She was sure of it.

Chapter 11

Kim had trouble getting to sleep. Too many thoughts paraded through her mind, conjuring frightening images. She wondered how safe they were in the house, whether something from the woods might try and break in. That figure standing out there; was it a flesh-and-blood person, or an apparition? It seemed ludicrous to consider the possibility of the latter, but after everything she'd witnessed on the Beacon estate thus far...

She reassured herself constantly. She was with Julian. After a bit of tossing and turning, he'd finally managed to slip into a light sleep. See? she thought to herself. He's not too freaked out to sleep. He feels safe here. So, why don't you? She reminded herself that the odds of a break-in or some other violent incident were extremely remote out there in the middle of nowhere. And if something did happen, then help was only a phone call away.

Sure. If your landline even works. Or if your stupid cell can find a reception.

When finally she slept, Kim began to dream. She approached dreams now with a subconscious dread. There was no telling what she would dream of, but after her first dream in the house, the vivid one of the old woman in her kitchen, Kim knew better than to expect happy visions.

The darkness of the dreamscape cleared away, revealing a familiar sight. Curiosity arrested her sleep-addled mind. She was crouching, looking up at something she recognized. It was the door in the basement, the one that was built into the wall. The door she'd stumbled upon while doing laundry. She reached up to touch it, the cool concrete sending a shiver through her like an electric current. The seams, the small handle, the cold, metallic keyhole. She touched them each as though she were a blind woman trying to make sense of its dimensions.

And then she heard it. A sound that made her stand up within the dream and step away from the door.

It was the sound she and Julian had heard outside. The sound coming from the woods. Hateful, violent, demoniacally discordant. She raised her hands to her ears and felt her body seize with dread. The baleful call seemed to issue from the other side of the concrete door, and as she watched in abject horror, a deep rumbling joined the shrieking cry. The door was trembling before her, its ancient hinges bracing against some great force. Something on its other side was pounding on it, trying feverishly to break out. The cacophonous cry grew louder, became deafening, and the pounding reached a fever pitch. The rusted screws in the hinges began to ease out of their holes. The worn-out metal began to crack. The seams of the door were moving now. Whatever it was, it was making headway.

And Kim couldn't move.

It wasn't that she didn't want to. It wasn't that she didn't try. Her legs were stiff, held fast to the ground. She peered down at them and couldn't see her feet. It was like they'd been swallowed up by the floor.

Suddenly, she awoke.

Kim felt instantly thankful to have awoken before the dream took an even darker turn and revealed to her whatever was on the other side of the door. She took in a deep breath, opened her eyes, and took in the perfect darkness of night.

As she tried to gain her bearings, she noticed that the air smelled damp. Did you leave the window open? she wondered. Then, she realized something else. She wasn't in bed. She was standing up. Kim wiggled her toes, finding a hard, smooth surface beneath them. These weren't the hardwood planks of her bedroom.

Though she knew she was awake, terror coursed through her afresh. She reached out through the darkness. There was nothing but empty space directly in front of her. To her side she felt something solid. Tracing her fingers along it clumsily, she found it cool, partitioned by slight grooves, like bricks.

Her throat closed up on her, a bolus of dread choking her and making her gag. Oh my God... you're in the basement.

Frightened to her core, she turned and felt out the stairs before her. Struggling, banging her knees on the sagging planks, she thundered up them and searched on the brick wall for the light switch. Giving it a flip, the dim space was lit up in an instant. She was blinded for a moment by the flash of light, but it confirmed her worst fears. She was in the basement, indeed.

But that wasn't all.

Teetering on the top of the stairs, shoving open the cellar door and hovering in the threshold to the kitchen, she peered down at the concrete wall opposite her. Kim had never been a sleepwalker. She'd never wandered out of her bed at night, so that her presence in the basement came as a great shock. But that wasn't what worried her just then. Her clothing was soaked through with sweat, and her legs were shaking.

The strange door in the cellar, the one she'd discovered just days previous, was sitting ajar.

What this meant, or how it'd happened, were mysteries. Kim shook in the cellar doorway, appraising the open door with wide, fearful eyes. There did not appear to be a key in its lock, however the hinges were broken, with one of them having fallen apart completely. She recalled her dream, and then wondered with a tightly-held gasp whether it'd been a dream at all. Her chest burned and her heart quaked. Her stomach felt as though it would drop out of her completely and bounce down the stairs.

In the corner of her eye, just beside the foot of the stairs, she thought she saw something scurry. The mere sight of it made her consciousness lapse, and it was only by a thread that she didn't faint into a heap.

Something, a hand, she fancied, had reached out and struck the concrete floor with force. She'd heard that sound before, flesh meeting cool, smooth concrete. Whatever it was, it made a ruckus for a time, propelling itself across that damp floor as it disappeared beneath the stairwell. It moved unnaturally, like an animal of some kind. If a centipede were given human limbs, then perhaps it would have made a similar sound as its hundreds of appendages writhed in locomotion.

It'd been a human-shaped hand. Of that she was sure. Pale, almost translucent skin. The nail beds had struck her as vaguely red. The seconds-long glance had borne out no other details of note.

But that'd been sufficient.

Clinging to the door frame and falling onto her ass, she scrambled across the kitchen floor, screaming at the top of her lungs for Julian. Tears streamed from her eyes and she backed herself up against one of the chipped cabinets, her gaze locked onto the door leading to the cellar.

Julian stumbled downstairs in a groggy stupor, tripping over his own feet as he crossed into the kitchen. He sought out a light switch and looked around, his gaze finally settling on her. He wiped at his eyes, kneeling down beside her. “W-what happened, babe? What is it?”

She was a shuddering, blubbering mess. She tugged on his arms, bawled incoherently at him and pointed at the cellar door.

“What are you doing down here?” he asked, scratching at his sandy stubble. “What's wrong?”

“The door...” she finally managed, her voice breaking free in a shriek. “The hidden door... it's open...”

He furrowed his brow. “Hidden door? Oh, you mean... that door you found behind the wallpaper?” He wet his lips and peered over at the cellar stairs. Sure enough, he could see the strange door sitting ajar. “Did you open it?” When she shook her head fervently, he added, “Well I sure as hell didn't open it. Didn't even look at it, really. I was intending to go down there and play with the lock, but are you saying it opened all on its own?”

She didn't know how to answer, and just bawled.

“What's the matter? What's inside?” he asked, easing towards the cellar cautiously. He was in the doorway now, his foot searching for the first step.

“N-no,” she managed, reaching out towards him. “Don't go down there. S-someone... something came out of there,” she gasped. Her eyes were wide and red, and she crawled over to him on hands and knees.

His expression hardened. “There's someone down there?” He took a step back, reaching over to the kitchen table. He rummaged through a tool box that'd been left sitting there and drew out a hammer. Picking it up, he pointed at her. “Stay put. I'm going down there to check it out.” Despite her incoherent protestations, Julian made his way to the cellar stairs, hammer in hand, and began to descend.

Kim crept to the cellar entrance, watching him as he took each step cautiously. He looked this way and that, hammer poised to strike anything or anyone that might jump out at him. She hissed at him, gripping the doorframe till her knuckles went white and eyes seething with hot tears. “No... they're... under the stairs,” she warned.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, he took a quick glance around, securing his immediate surroundings. “Show yourself!” he bellowed, holding out the hammer. “If there's someone down here...” he looked beneath the stairs, looked across the room and then leveled his gaze on the concrete door. Sucking in a deep breath, Julian reached over and grabbed the door's edge. With a bit of trouble, he pulled it back. An inky darkness poured out of its opening, and as the door was opened further, the shadows about the cellar only seemed to multiply. The bulb overhead flickered unsteadily.

Julian stood before the newly opened door and raised his hammer.

He took a step forward and looked inside.

To be continued...

Thank you for reading! I hope you've enjoyed this volume of Black Acres. Look for the next volume, “The Borderland”, coming soon. And remember that you can read the series for free in Kindle Unlimited!

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