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The Sinkhole

Going down Serenity Road will lead you to the residential area of Brooksview. This is where many are housed, including yourself. It's a normal day, children riding their bikes, mothers hanging laundry on the line, and you're taking a stroll down the sidewalk. It's a lovely summer day and you can't help but indulge in the peaceful calm of the weather. 

Now, Serenity Hills Residential is a neat, normal neighborhood. Very average, low crime rate, and friendly faces just about everywhere.

Just about...

You near the treeline, where the road forks. One direction goes up, towards the old antebellum house that belongs to the Winston family, gated off from the rest of the community. You turn the other way, going downhill, which leads to the end of the Residential area and opens up to what used to be the old carnival grounds. The edge of the Residential area is where old Mrs. Florence used to live...  

That is before her house got swallowed up by a gaping sinkhole.

Harriet Florence was a cruel, old woman, you recall. Your mother had never allowed her near you when you were a child. However, you recall some of your college buddies spent a night after the incident drinking and talking about how she tormented them. 

According to them, she hated everything and was always complaining. "And when there wasn't anything to complain about," Felix had added, staring down at the beer in his hand. "She'd do something or make something up, and complain about that."

She sounded like a nightmare, you can't help but think guiltily.

The day before the Sinkhole Incident, you recall, she had been going off on some kids who had walked past her house. She had claimed they had been being disruptive and disrespectful as she sat high and mighty in her rocker on the porch. Sweet ice tea was half melted on the table beside her, forgotten in her ranting. Mrs. Florence screamed and screeched until her voice was hoarse, and then blamed them for her sore throat.

You aren't quite sure what happens next... Your memory is fuzzy, even as you find your feet guiding you to the gaping hole in the ground. All you remember for sure was Mrs. Florence swore never to leave her house again.

You tilt your head, looking vacantly at the submerged roof of the house, deep down in the hole. You recalled her saying something about her returning to the Earth and making the town regret her mistreatment.

Much to everyone's dismay. she vanished into her house, slamming the door after that. There was quite a crowd, and, at the time, this was the talk of the town. No one saw her in the following days, and the kids she had yelled at scoffed at any adult who tried to make them apologize.

Then, that Friday, there came a deafening sound of wood being crushed from the far end of the Residential area. Drowsy and concerned townsfolk, yourself included, stepped out of their houses or peered out their windows before noting something peculiar had happened.

As you all crowded around what used to be Mrs. Florence's front yard, you were met with a shocking sight.

Harriet Florence had gotten her wish. Her house, with her buried deep inside it, had been swallowed up by the sinkhole that was roughly the size of two or three football fields all around. No one had tried to measure how deep it is, and no one has plans to since. Considering the fact that standing here now you can barely see the crushed tin on the top of the roof, you have always assumed it was pretty deep.

An odd phenomenon, sure, but you can't help but agree that it must be natural. Though... It sure is odd that it happened after Mrs. Florence said she hoped to return to the Earth.