Revenants and Hallucinations

1 - New Beginnings

Chan stood in the empty living room, a single window on one of the walls and two empty door frames on another. One led to the kitchen, and one led to the dining room, along with another door directing to the hall on another wall.

It was nice in there, definitely, but there was a weird vibe, he just couldn't quite place what it was. Much like the feeling of when you forget a word and it's on the tip of your tongue.

"Okay, our bedroom is the biggest, Chris gets the second biggest one because of all his music equipment" his mother scoffed jokingly. "So you two can fight over the other three, they're pretty similar anyway so it shouldn't be too hard" she laughed, taking a box into the kitchen as Chan's younger siblings raced upstairs, eager for the biggest room.

"Chris go help your dad with the rest of the stuff" she called after heading into the kitchen. Chan did as he was told and ambled back outside to see his dad fumbling about the truck that held a lot of their boxes. The furniture van would arrive tomorrow so they would have to sleep on the floor for the night.

His parents had decided to move as they wanted a bigger garden and also another bedroom for guests. The previous area was too small for them to get an extension so they decided to move instead.

Thankfully his parents thought about the kids and made sure they didn't move too far away to the point of moving schools.

Chan walked over and grabbed a box from his dad's arms. 'Study,' was written on the side of it. So it was either filled with books or cables. From the weight, Chan guessed books.

He paused when he glanced up at the house opposite, built further back from all the other houses in the street, with a vaster front garden and a longer way to walk to get to the front door. There was a large tree blocking the left side of the house and it was the only building that had tall bushes surrounding it. Therefore it looked quite incongruous compared to the rest of the street, and relatively hidden.

What caught Chan's eye the most when he was about to look away though, was the figure standing at one of the windows on the top floor. He squinted and leaned forward a trace, the inside being quite hard to see through the darkness of the room. The person seemed to be a man. Perhaps in his thirties. His blood ran cold when he realized this man was looking directly at him. Body remaining still and Chan couldn't tear his own away, as if he was drawn in.

Hesitantly forcing out a smile - as he couldn't wave due to the box in his hands - Chan got quite uncomfortable when he realized the man wasn't going to do anything back.

"Chris c'mon, we don't have all day" Chan turned around to see his dad waiting for him to bring in the boxes, presumably to show him where the study was.

"Sorry, yeah I'm coming" Chan glanced back to the window, revealing that the man had disappeared. A shiver ran down his spine, resulting in him speeding up towards the house.

Once all the boxes from the truck were in the house - not necessarily dispersed, but there nonetheless - they ended up getting take out and sat down in the living room to eat it.

They were all on the floor. Since they didn't have furniture. Which was also the main reason for their take out dinner: no dining table.

"Well this is nice isn't it" his mum smiled before taking a bite from the warm rice.

"Bigger than the last one" Lucas made a point.

"It gives me the creeps" Hannah scrunched her nose, looking around the room and continuing to shiver.

"You'll get used to it" his father spoke, standing up and heading to the kitchen for a glass of water.

"Have you seen the forest behind the garden, there's even a gate in our fence to get there?" leave it to Lucas to have explored the garden already instead of helping the family get all the boxes inside.