In the Shadows of Creekside Farmhouse

There’s that moment of space just beyond your sight. It’s the movement you perceive from the corner of your eye. It’s the faintest thump in an empty room. It is that thing you know is there even though there is absolutely nothing there.

That thing lived in the Creekside farmhouse where I grew up. The house was old. It was built before anyone knew to keep records. The earliest references were pre-civil war but no one really knew its origins. It was long and stone and heavy. It gave the impression that it was never built but creeped out of the earth like a natural phenomenon.

We moved there the day before my fifth birthday and I was instantly terrified. The house had been empty long enough for bats and rats and snakes to infest every inch of it. And that should have been enough to feed nightmares but there was something else as well.

My father had restored enough for us to have some living space. He and my brothers and some guy named Robbie were there weekends and evenings, for I don’t know how long, before we moved in. We had a kitchen, bedrooms, bathrooms, a living area and a place to do laundry. It was livable but it wasn’t finished.

The house was thick. The windowsills were maybe three feet deep and a full porch and balcony flanked the front. As a result, there were rooms near the interior that were always in shadow. We had a brighter new staircase that went from the kitchen to the newer bedrooms. But there was a back stairway off the small dining room. They were dark and narrow with a slight turn at the base. And the wall the stairs climbed was covered in a fading mural.

It was a woodland scene. There were trees trimming a meadow with a small pool of water. A deer drank from the pool while another looked into the wood. Vines and wildflowers trailed upwards adjacent to the stairs. On the second floor the mural curved around the corners and continued down the halls. A delicate waterfall glistened in painted sunlight near the bathroom. Birds floated near the branches of a huge tree by the sitting room.  It was like walking through a child’s fairy land. And it could not be saved. The horsehair plaster crumbled with every attempt to preserve it. A short while after we moved in, the paintings were dust.

Construction continued long after we moved in. And one setback after another was figured out and conquered. That is until the smell arrived.  We moved from the newer addition into the older part of the house on the first floor by means of a hallway that was blasted through the stone wall. And every so often that hallway had a thick sulfurous septic smell. Plumbers were consulted. Holes were dug. More plumbers were consulted. Wooden panels were removed and stone cavities searched. No source was found. To my mother’s horror it would often waft unexpectedly into the kitchen and dining rooms whenever there were guests in the house. Other times, even on the most dank and rainiest of days, there was no sign of it. “I’m so sorry,” she would say as she lit another couple of candles. “We just can’t seem to find the source of it!”

And then there were the footsteps. Initially, there were seven of us living in the house. So, we became very accustomed to the sounds of footsteps and bumps and thumps and coughs throughout the house. The sound of someone pacing across the upstairs floors barely caught anyone’s attention. It was rare for it to even register to the listener until the moment they realized no one else was home. We all heard it from time to time. Eventually, my sister moved out and the wall between our tiny rooms was knocked out giving me a larger room. And each night I heard the steady step, step, step of someone walking in my room. My brothers and my mother all reported hearing the pacing of someone in the house.

“It’s an old house. It has creaking boards and thumping water pipes,” my father would say. “There is absolutely nothing else in this house.” Over and over he would dismiss our fears. Until one day, he finally heard it. He was reading the paper when he heard someone walking upstairs. It was the moment just before he called to my mother thinking it was her that he remembered. No one else was home. That’s when even the last skeptic knew that we were not alone.

There was always that thing just beyond your line of sight. There was always a feeling of being watched. You never felt alone and you could never quite put your finger on what it was. The smell came and went. The footsteps continued to pace. Years went by. We told our story to those who asked and it was always amusing. And we would leave lights on here and there throughout the house. There was always a little something to light up the shadows just a bit. And we learned to live there.

The house became a historical landmark. And from time to time people would stop. “Oh I hope you don’t think us rude,” they would say. “We were driving by and saw you outside. We just wanted to stop and say what a striking old place this is!” My parent loved it. They would tell these strangers the long story of how they found it and lovingly restored it. Sometimes they even told the ghost stories.

They all had this sightseer look to them. That, oh what a wonderful new sight we have experienced here, look. That’s why the man that stepped out of his car one summer day was so different. The gentleman had a remembering look to his face. He already knew this place.

He exchanged the usual apologies about stopping in on a whim. But then he said, “I lived here once. I just wanted to see it again. I hope that’s alright.” Of course it was, my parents agreed and shortly thereafter he was standing in the old dining room.

“How long ago?” My father asked.

The man was looking at the old stairway as he answered. “Quite a while ago. Were the paintings still here when you bought it or were they already gone?”

“No they were here.” My father answered a bit excitedly. “Were they here when you lived here?”

A small nod before the man looked to the floor. “Yes. My mother painted them.”

“Oh!” My mother instantly felt terrible and it showed. “We tried to save them. There was nothing we could do.”

With a slight dismissive wave of his hand, the man said, “Oh they weren’t happy paintings. They were a symbol of her misery.

My most vivid memories of this house are of her on her hands and knees scrubbing the floor. I remember watching her tears roll off her face and mingle with the scrub water. She hated it here. The house was in terrible shape. There wasn’t much she could do to make it nice. Her husband wouldn’t fix anything. And he would not let her leave the house. She couldn’t go anywhere. I was too young to understand then. But of course I do now. She was a prisoner here. I don’t know why. She was a widow with a child. I guess she thought this was her only option. Anyway, he would bring her paints when he felt like extending a token of kindness. Maybe it was guilt maybe it was just to keep her quiet. She painted nonstop. I think she was trying to paint the walls away. I think she felt if she painted the world beyond the walls, the walls wouldn’t be there. But it was, of course, just an illusion. She died here. She never got out.”

“Was she Edgar’s wife,” my father asked.

“Yes. Yes he was the man she married. The previous owner, I assume?”

“Yes. The house was empty a very long time. But the previous owner was a man named Edgar. I’ve never heard anything too nice said about him,” my father said.

“Well,” said the man gathering his things to leave. “I doubt anything you have heard was a bad as the truth. Thank you so much for allowing me to stop in. I really appreciate it. And, for what it’s worth, I think my mother would have been happier here if the house looked then like it does now. You’ve done a wonderful job.”

That story was retold during the dinner party my parents hosted several weeks later. As if in answer, the sickening fumes spit forth from the hallway. My frustrated mother apologized and opened a window and lit a candle. “I just wish we could find the source of that smell!” she declared.

One particularly boisterous dinner guest announced, “Well that must be nasty old Edgar. He’s just mad because you guys fixed the place up. Guess he’s a sore loser!” There was a round of laughter as the party poked fun for a while before moving on to other subjects.

My parents lived in the house for another forty years. They never once smelled that smell again. After a while, the footsteps slowly subsided and the shadows seemed emptier. I don’t know if it was Edgar. I don’t know if it was coincidence. Someone once told me ghosts don’t like being laughed at. Maybe that was it. All I really know is that there was something there. And I know it left.