Whisper

Reality

I stand in the entranceway, shocked. In my worst fears I would've never guessed that this house actually exists. slowing my breaths, I calm my heart rate, and continue on through the hallway. As I do, I come across a portrait on the wall. Facing the photo, I examine the little girl that it depicts. The picture held the transparency, of one that has been there for a while, its edges having a white tint to them. Inside, I see that the little girl in the photo, is holding a brown teddy bear in her arms.
Smiling at the child's own smile, I move away from the picture, and continue along the hallway. As I look up, I am met with the image of cracked plaster, breaking away, revealing the planks of wood behind it. Stepping over more fragments of broken plaster, I enter the first room inside of the house. I realize as soon as I step foot inside the room that no one has lived here for a few years at least, considering the mounds of dead rodents, and other little critters.
Moving away from the living portion of the scavengers, I take out my little furry friend, and cradle him in my hands, shielding him from the cool air, that is heavily scented with decay. Examining the furniture, I see that the house is in dire need of updating, seeing that most of it is from the late eighteen hundreds. Walking over to the window, I see that the ledge beneath is littered with metallic looking flies. As I come closer I look towards one and find that they are of a rather large size, just a bit more than the tip of my pointer finger, and have the average size wings of a house fly, that look to be tiny on the gigantic version of one in front of me. Growing more curious as to what the other side of it looks like, I begin to turn it over with my fingers.
Squealing, I drop the insect, as it squirmed in my grip. My jaw hanging crookedly in awe, I look towards the fly, and see that it shows no signs of movement.
Not wanting to endure another panic attack, I move on. Standing below the light, in the center of the room, I pull the beaded string hanging from it, to see if it still works. I tug on the string again, when I find that no light comes from the fixture. As I turn to the set of french doors, I look through the warped glass windows, leading into another room. I push down on the handle with my thumb, and become surprised when the doors open easily, revealing a smaller room that is completed with an old antique desk, and a beat up wooden couch. Inspecting the piece of furniture more closely i see that has been upholstered with flower printed fabric, that contains mainly cream coloring, and various shades of dark pink.
Angling my attention towards the desk, I see that the top has been finished with the same shade stain as the door frame, for the majority of the top, accept for the upper right hand corner that seems to be missing a rather large chunk out of the top layer, making the contents in the drawer below visible. Looking through the gap, I see a brown thing inside. I quickly step away when I see a skinny tail peek out as the creature repositions itself atop the collection of shredded paper that forms its nest.
As I look up to the portrait hanging above the desk, I see that it is an etching of the house in its prime. Staring at the photo, I see that the large oak trees covering the sides of the house, are seedlings, a mere four feet tall at the most, and the large strains of ivy concealing most of the visible portion of the house that I saw in my brief glance from outside, seems to be non existent. Looking into the portrait, I admire how beautiful this house must have been when this was drawn.
Exiting the small office, I move into the kitchen, and find that there seems to be an odd stench filling the area. Walking over towards what resembles a refrigerator, I wipe off the majority of old cobwebs covering the kitchen appliance, and pull open the off-white colored door. I instantly regret the decision to open the door, as I see the items of food inside, they all appear to be covered in both a collection of spiderwebs, and a thick layer of mold, making it impossible to identify what they once were.
Disgusted, I leave the room, and investigate an odd looking door on the opposite side of the hallway. Finding that it opens up to form a staircase leading to the second level of the house. As I climb the stairs, I find that there is a landing a few steps up, then it curves, up to a hallway. I trip, on one of the steps, grasping the curved, wooden hand rail to keep me from colliding with the ones above. Reaching the second floor of the house, I see that the ceiling is also in roughly the same shape as the floor below.
In the middle of the hallway, there is a wooden latter, hanging ajard along a trap door, opening to into the attic. Ahead, I see that the hallway opens up to four rooms, two along the the walls, parallel to each other, and two at the end, which appear to be side by side. Passing by one of the sets of doors, I rotate the handle and push on the wood, however it doesn't move. Defeated, I attempt the one parallel to it, same response, as I try the closed one at the end of the hallway, I find that it too won't open. Luckily, one of the upper rooms isn't closed. As I step inside, I am surprised to find posters covering the walls, depicting REO Speedwagon, and Chicago.
Shaking my head, I remember my mother telling me, that she listened to those bands as a kid. How old these people must have been. Turning around, I leave the room behind me, and peer out the window above the mouth of the staircase. I stiffen as I look into the prairie, and find that the child is staring up at me with unblinking eyes, still holding the bloody knife in his hand. As I turn away from the window, I hear wood splinter, followed by several thuds against the walls and floor. Leaning over the opening to the staircase, I see that fragments of wood, and broken glass cover the wood at the bottom of the staircase.
Focused on the open doorway at the bottom of the steps, I watch the boy walk past, into the living room. Silently, I creep down the stairs and tip toe to the door. I twist and jerk the handle, but the door doesn't move. Looking over my shoulder, I see the little boy standing in the hallway, looking up at me through the upper portion of his eyes. Panicked, I whip open the nearest door and climb inside. As I continue to make my way down the steep wooden stairs, I walk into the house's cellar, and slip behind collections of plastic tubs and cardboard boxes.
A loud creek fills the air, as the boy opens the door atop the stairs. I sit on the. Concrete floor, holding my breath, and placing my hand over my mouth to limit the noise even further, afraid that the slightest bit of movement will give away my location. My lungs begin to burn as I sit in the deafening silence. My eyes widen in fear as the child rounds the corner of cardboard boxes, facing me. In a last resort to escape, I press myself further into the boxes behind me. Feeling the tension of the cardboard, I know that I have nowhere to go. Looking to the boy, I see that he is now directly in front of me. My heartbeat quickens as the boy raises the knife above his head. I turn my head to the side, and close my eyes tightly, as I feel the knife plunge into my chest.
I jerk myself upwards, screaming. As I open my eyes and brush the hair back from my face, I see that I am back in my bedroom. Placing my hand on my chest, I search for where the knife went in, but can't find a single scratch. Looking to the wall on my left, I expect to see the photos and articles that I'd tacked up, and there isn't even an indent where the thumbtacks would have been. Flipping over my sheets, I get out of bed, and look at my calendar. Tuesday, September 2nd. It was all a dream.
In the following weeks everything shifted back into place in pines, well sortove. The so called murders ended up being a string of suicides, caused by an intolerance to the chemical run off from one of the new factories upstream, The fire department dredged the lake, and fished Maggie out a day after I had the dream. I went on living my life, making new friends, getting good grades, what I did before.
I visit Maggie at Memorial Park, after school each day, and tell her what happened in my life. I still miss her from time to time, even many years later. After the incidents, I grew up, went to a local Police Academy, and became the head detective for the Pines Police Department, and I haven't looked back since.