jar.

It was a hot summer's day, and Katharine Bennett had been cleaning out a cluttered kitchen cupboard when she came across a jar that she had never seen before. It caught her eye, as there was a label on it, a white rectangular sticker that had her name neatly scrawled across it. It wasn't her mother's handwriting, her father's, nor was it her own.

Clutching the jar in her hand, she slowly climbed down the step-stool that she had been precariously balancing on. The jar wasn't made of clear glass, it was yellow porcelain, with pink detailing across it. It looked like a jar that belonged in a kitsch home catalogue. Definitely not something that her mother would have ever brought in the house.

Katharine tried to open the jar, only it was sealed shut, and no matter how many times she tried she could not remove the lid. Her fingers ached from the stress, and eventually she gave up, placing the jar on the kitchen table and slowly sitting down.

Her mother walked into the kitchen, "What are you doing?" she asked her daughter. Katharine looked up.

"Hm?" She hadn't heard her mother. "Sorry, what did you say?"

"I asked what you were doing," she repeated herself while filling the kettle up. "I walked in and you were just staring at that jar."

"Oh, I found this in the cupboard," she picked the jar up and handed it to her mother, who sat down in the chair across from Katharine. "It has my name on it."

"I can see that," her mother said. She tried to open the jar, but she was also unsuccessful. "Do you know what's inside?"

"No, I've never seen this before in my life, I thought it was yours."

"No, it must be your father's then, ask him when he comes home."

So, Katharine waited until the end of the day, and her father finally came home from work, and sat down at the dinner table.

"Smells good in here, what's in the oven?" He sighed while taking off his shoes and putting them on the mat next to the door.

"Lasagna," Katharine said, and waited until he sat down before she procured the porcelain jar and set it down in front of him.

"What's this," he asked, picking up the jar and studying it.

"I don't know."

"Why don't you just open it?" He asked and tried to pull off the lid, but again it would not come off. "Oh."

"So you don't know what it is either?"

"No idea."

"That's strange. I've never seen this before, neither have you, and mom doesn't know what it is either." She sighed sadly.

"Why do you want to know what's in it so badly?"

"Because it has my name plastered on the front of it." She said bluntly, thinking that her reasoning was obvious. "I thought it might be something you or mom put aside for me, but I guess not."

"Why don't you break it open and find out?" He suggested.

"Break what open," her mother asked, walking into the kitchen, this time with wet hair after taking a shower.

"The jar."

"Oh, yeah, the jar. That's a good idea."

"But then it will be broken," Katharine fretted.

"So? You called it ugly two hours ago."

"I know, but it could still be used for something," she tried to argue.

"Not if you can't get the damn thing open you can't" her father deadpanned.

Katharine looked up at her two parents. She could tell they were both itching to know what was inside, and she was too. "Okay," she sighed and went to the backdoor, she heard her parents follow her through the creaky door. One squeak. Two squeaks. Three squeaks; and they were all outside.

Katharine closed her eyes and clutched the jar tightly, raised it above her head, and with all the force she could muster she brought her arms down, and let the jar slip from her hands, forcefully colliding with the concrete patio.

She heard a satisfying smashing noise, and opened her eyes to see yellow and pink shards littering the ground in front of her. Her two parents came up behind her and peered over each shoulder.

"Go on then, check what's inside."

Amongst the porcelain shards there was a small parcel. She picked it up and ran back into the kitchen. squeak. Her parents footsteps followed. Squeaksqueak.

Katharine quickly opened the package, inside was a folded up piece of paper, a ring, a key, and a photograph. She carefully unfolded the letter and scanned its contents.

My dearest Katharine,

I hope this letter finds you well. Lately, I cannot help but think of you and your charming ways. I miss you so very much, and can only hope that you might feel the same about me.

I have recently purchased a house, but it is too empty, and I wish to fill it with the joy and happiness that follows you wherever you go.

So, I must ask, will you marry me? I will anxiously await your reply.

love,

Michael Weiss

"Would you look at that, it must be from the original owners of the house," her mother carefully took the letter as Katharine moved onto the photograph.

"This must be them," she murmured. It was a photo of a good-looking man next to a good-looking woman, both dressed up. Him in a suit, and her in a wedding dress. "This must be their wedding day," she told her parents as they all examined the photograph.

"Well, the ring must be her wedding ring, but I wonder what the key is for?" Katharine's father picked up the key and studied it, before sitting up straight in his chair and exclaiming, "the trunk!" He quickly got up, and the two girls in the kitchen heard his footsteps quickly running up the flights of stairs until he finally reached the attic.

They followed him up, and when they reached the attic they saw him next to the trunk that had come with the house. They had never been able to open it, but had been too heavy to move, so they decided it to leave it where it was, and eventually forgot it existed as the years went by.

"You guys have got to see this," he said, and his wife and daughter apprehensively moved closer until they reached the trunk and were able to see its contents. Inside were albums upon albums of photos, as well as old clothes and shoes. Disregarding the clothes in front of them, they quickly brought the albums down to the living roomed and poured over them while they ate their lasagna. But as they moved through the different albums, which were listed in order of year, they began to notice that at some point the happiness in their eyes began to die, and eventually Katharine stopped appearing in them at all, replaced by a new woman.

"Oh," her mother said, "they must have divorced." The excitement had died down after the hours they had spent looking at the happy couple enjoying their lives.

"Well, that just happens sometimes," her father said sadly, and turned to his daughter. "Katharine, why don't you go get those clothes that were in the trunk."

So she did, and when she emerged from the dark attic and back into the light of the sitting room another piece of paper fell from the pile of clothes in her arms. She left it on the floor for the time being.

"This is the wedding dress," she lifted the garment up, wrinkled and stained with age, but still incredibly beautiful. After laying it down neatly she picked up the next item.

"I think these are just normal cloth- ah!" She exclaimed, dropping the top that she had held up. The three of them looked at the crumpled shirt on the floor, but even in that state it was impossible not to notice the copious amounts of blood that stained the light pink fabric.

"Oh my god," Katharine whispered, and slowly bent down to pick the top back up. Upon closer inspection, it was indeed blood, and there were holes in the shirt, almost as if it had been sliced open at different points. "Mom, check the last photo that Katharine was seen in." Her mother opened the album, and when she found the last photo of Michael and Katharine together, both with tired smiles and sad eyes, it was clear that the top that Katharine was holding up the same top that was featured in the photo, and the same pants were still on the floor.

Katharine remembered the paper that fell earlier, and ran back to pick it up. She quickly unfolded it.

Katharine,

Our time together has made me regret my hasty decisions. I believed that I loved you, but over time, I began to resent you. Your cheerful smiles made me feel as though you were mocking me, and your beauty attracted the attention of too many others, which made me jealous.

My love would have been better described as infatuation, or obsession, as over time, it didn't get stronger, like love should, it simply withered away like a dying flower.

But I deserve to be happy, sadly I cannot do so with you as my companion. I hate to do this, but after all, we did make a vow.

Until death do us part.

your husband,

Michael Weiss

"Oh my God," Katharine whispered, tears in her eyes, "he killed her."

What had began as a light-hearted evening of reminiscing over the past soon became tainted with their discovery. A young woman, murdered by her husband, who got away with it.

In fact, they would soon learn that the disappearance of Katharine Weiss was a mystery that the town had never been able to solve. It became a ghost story, passed on by generations, but forgotten over time.

The police were called that evening, and the age old mystery solved. But the story of Katharine never left the Bennetts. They carried her memory with them wherever they went.

fin.