Abandoned

I always had an immense fascination with old abandoned houses. I’ve craved their architectural secrets and wondered what items were left behind by previous owners. The more the house looked decayed, the more I wanted to investigate. These houses were basically dangerous time capsules waiting to be explored, and I wanted to be the one to do it. I knew of an abandoned house located on one of the backroads headed towards a popular beach. The road curved off to the right, but was forgotten by the public since it led to a dead end. There were huge potholes and overgrown grass edging closer to the middle of the road. I parked my car off to the side of the road and decided it would be better to walk it. My car was basically one pothole away from losing my muffler, so I wasn’t going to risk it. 

I stood in front of the house, admiring its damaged look. It was a two story house with a big open wooden porch that wrapped around the right side. To match the porch, the house had wooden paneling with white paint chipping off of it. I wondered how nice this house must have been when it was being taken care of by its owners. I imagined myself living here when it was perfect, rocking in a chair and watching the birds fly by. It was too bad it was abandoned, it would have been perfect for me. 

I approached the beaten porch steps. I tried to keep my steps light by holding onto the column, but it cracked and I fell backwards with a chunk of rotted wood in my hand. Luckily, it wasn’t the whole column, just a section of it. I dusted myself off and stepped lightly on the first step. It creaked but didn’t break. I sighed with relief when I reached the top of the stairs. As I reached for the doorknob it occurred to me that it might be locked. If that was the case, I could probably bust down the door like the swat raiding a house. With that thought, I was slightly wishing it would be locked. I grabbed the doorknob and with a little bit of a tug, the door swung open. I was slightly disappointed with how easy that was, I really wanted to kick in that door. 

My face contorted in disgust as the smell of decay entered my nostrils. The floor was littered with trash and broken glass. Every step I took had a crunch sound to it. This first room must have been the kitchen. There were brown cabinets attached to the wall, some of the doors were missing or just barely hanging on. There was an old looking gas stove against the wall in front of me. Underneath the burners were piles of mouse feces and gray fur. The handle to the oven was hanging on one side, touching it would have surely made it fall off completely. Next to the oven was the fridge. It was compact and banana yellow, but what made it interesting was the pictures covering the fridge with small magnets. The pictures were pretty faded, making the people in them look like ghosts. Most of the photos contained children, from baby to teen. There was a wedding photo of a young couple. The woman was holding a huge bouquet of flowers, it almost looked like a bush. The husband had his arm around her, with her white gloves gripped tightly in his hands. They both smiled softly. It seemed like they had a lot of kids. In one of their family photos I counted seven children with little age differences.  

I decided to venture into the narrow hallway that opened up to a large living room. There were two matching single cushion couches that were all ripped up and molding. Angled awkwardly in the middle of the room was a large couch that was missing its cushions. Folding off of the wall was a discolored floral wallpaper. In the center of the longer wall was a box tv sitting on the floor. Its screen was cracked, but not too badly damaged. It looked like the same size as my microwave. It must have been hard for a family that big to gather around this small screen. The main window here was split into thirds. The larger window was in the middle with two smaller windows on the sides. It was too dirty to see through but I imagined it must have been a nice view of the forest. It made me smile thinking about the parents standing here, watching their kids play together outside. 

BANG! 

I jumped backwards and covered my head with my hands, thinking the ceiling was falling in on me. I waited a moment but nothing happened. 

“Did you hear that?” A woman’s voice whispered in my ear. 

I screamed, falling backwards onto the floor. My head hit the television, leaving me with a massive headache. I looked towards the voice and spotted a woman standing there. The woman looked to be about early 60s. She was wearing a light blue silk nightgown that just about touched the floor. There were large curlers still in her gray hair. It kind of looked like she had recently put them in. There was something about her that seemed familiar but I couldn’t quite place her face. She looked at me with concern. 

“Oh sorry dear, I didn’t mean to scare you,” The woman said, holding out a hand for me to grab. 

“What are you doing here?” I asked, grabbing her hand. 

“I could ask you the same question. Don’t you know trespassing is illegal?” The woman replied, pulling me up. 

“Uh, I got permission,” I said, dusting myself off. 

  “No you didn’t, sweety,” She replied, shaking her head. 

“How would you know? Who are you?” I asked defensively. 

BANG! 

I jump again, but she doesn’t flinch. 

“You should leave, darling,” She said. 

“Not until I’m done looking around. This house has so many memories, and I want to see them all,” I replied. 

The woman scoffs. “Memories. Is that what you’re here for?”

“Yeah! I don’t think things should be abandoned. I don’t know if it’s mostly made of curiosity or a yearning for history, but it feels important. At least to me it does,” I reply. 

The woman seemed to contemplate something, her eyes moving around as if she’s having a debate in her head. She takes a heavy sigh before looking at me. Her eyes welled up with tears. 

“I’ll let you continue, but only if you agree to help me share my story,” The woman said. 

“You’re story?” I said, searching my brain trying to place her face. 

“I used to live here,” She replied. 

“Wait…” I said, feeling the pieces click in my mind. 

I ran into the kitchen and looked at the photos on the fridge. I grabbed one of the family photos where the kids looked older. I studied their faces until landing on one. There she was. 

“Ah, you saw my family photos,” She said, somehow standing next to me. 

“You’re…You’re the wife?” I asked as my heart pounded in my chest. 

She nodded. She smiled softly, but it faded quickly. 

“Will you tell my story?” She asked. 

“Okay. Yeah,” I said, nodding. I was confused but excited to know what she had to say. 

She grabbed my hand and guided me through the living room and up the stairs. With every step that I took, I was worried that my foot would fall through, but she wasn’t worried at all. In fact, it didn’t even sound like she was putting any weight on the steps. Before I had any time to contemplate it, my foot crashed through the wood. It swallowed half my leg before getting stuck. Sharp pieces of wood dug into my skin, causing my body to clench up in pain.

“Nonononononono, NO!” The woman yelled. 

“It’s okay. I think I can– Ow!” I said, pulling on my leg.  

“Nononononono, you’re supposed to help me!” The woman said, tearing up. 

Her panicking worried me. I tried not to show it as I tried again to pull my leg out. I slowly revealed more and more of my leg, but as I did, I felt the splintered wood dragging into my skin. Trails of bloody cuts decorated my leg. I looked like I had pinstripe leggings on. When it was finally out, the woman sighed with relief. 

“Don’t do that again!” The woman scolded me. Definitely a mother with that tone.

“I- I won’t,” I said, hoping that was true. 

We continued up the stairs as I applied as little weight as I could in each step. The second floor looked worse than the rest of the house. It was a messy mix of natural decay and human interference. There were two rooms, one left and one right, and one room in the middle. I was guided to the middle room. The door to the room was lying on the ground, the hinges were broken and the screws were scattered along the floor. My eyes drifted up from the floor and halted on the bed. Other than it being dusty and the blanket being a little tattered, the bed was in perfect condition. But, that’s not what stopped me in my tracks. Lying in the bed were skeletal remains and on the pillow sat plastic curlers. There was a small hole in the side of her head, next to her eye socket. Fear gripped my body and my heart pounded in my chest, almost making me forget the pain in my leg and head. 

“Wha- are- bu- huh?” I asked, trying to get air into my lungs. 

“My name is Alice Stone, and I was shot to death. I was 63 years young,” The woman said, staring at her skeleton. 

I forced my body to move closer to the bed. It felt like my feet were stuck in buckets of cement. I probably looked like a zombie walking towards that bed. I gasped. There was another skeleton lying next to her. The body was positioned on its side, like they were looking at her before they died. 

“Next to me is my husband, Hubert Stone. He was 70 years young,” Alice said. 

“How d-did he die?” I asked. 

“Heartbreak, I suppose,” Alice replied. 

BANG! BANG! BANG!

I jumped and screamed. Whatever that sound was, it sounded like it was in this room and almost as if it were knocking. Alice looked at me with pity. She was unbothered by it and thought it was ridiculous that I was. 

“What is that?” I asked, looking around. 

“Don’t worry about it,” She said, coldly. 

“Are you sure? It sounds important,” I said. 

“Darling, I let you explore my house and all I’m asking is that you listen and tell my story. If you can’t do that then…” She said, looking downward. 

“You’re right. Don’t worry, I’ll help you,” I responded, feeling a little shaky. 

“My husband and I were bank robbers. We didn’t care about being rich, we just wanted to put food on the table for our kids. One day, we were fortunate enough to wipe clean one of the popular banks that all the rich folk would frequent. With all that extra money, we decided to save it for a rainy day. Unfortunately our oldest, Richard, wanted the money for himself. He busted into our room one night… God, I don’t know how long it’s been… He could be dead now… Anyhoo, Richard demanded we tell him where all the money was. I wouldn’t do it. I didn’t believe he’d shoot his own mother. When he did… Hubert told him where it was. Hubert… Hubert loved me so much…” Alice said, brushing away her tears. 

“I’m so sorry,” I said, feeling my heart ache for her. 

“What he didn’t tell him was that there’s another stash. People keep coming here and destroying our house looking for this evil money,” She said, glancing towards an armoire that had been knocked over.  

BANG! BANG! 

The sound was definitely coming from that armoire. I rushed over to it and as I went to lift it up, she grabbed my arm. 

“Let him rot under there. He broke into our house, ripped up my floorboards, disturbed my resting place. There was only greed in his eyes,” She said. 

I backed away from the armoire. The tone in her voice made me worry what would happen if I didn’t listen to her. She let go of my arm and smiled softly. 

“I’m going to tell you where the money is, but only if you agree to a few terms,” She said, searching my face. 

“Anything,” I said, thinking back to my busted up car. 

“I want you to tell the newspapers what happened here, except for the extra stash part, and I want you to spend that money as quickly as possible. Holding onto it will only bring you bad luck as it has done to my family. And if I have any living children, please tell them we love them,” Alice said, looking at her skeletal husband. 

“Deal,” I said before giving Alice a tight hug. It felt like I was hugging the air, but my eyes showed me I was holding her. It made my brain short circuit, but I held the hug for a few minutes anyways. I’m not sure if she felt it, but she seemed to appreciate the gesture.  

Alice told me where the money was and I followed through with everything she asked of me. I found out her two youngest children were still alive. It was a bit awkward introducing myself to them, but they seemed a lot like their mother. I decided to give them the rest of the money, after I used some of it to fix my car. They shared stories of their childhood and of their parents. I felt like I had given them the resolution they didn’t know they needed. I continued exploring abandoned houses and shining light on the past stories that were forgotten. I never met any other ghosts exploring, but I always felt like I did by learning people’s histories.