1873

Seven

(January 21, 2015) (3:15 am)

"I saw it! I saw him!," shouted Rose. "Are you all right? What happened?," asked Emily. "What do you mean you saw him?," Keira said with a shaky voice. Emily took Rose's hand and walked her to the couch, as Keira was turning on the lamp. Rose was still shaking with fear with her eyes like those of a deer in the path of an oncoming train. Her face was white like a vampire. Emily was trying to calm Rose down when Keira walked over and took Rose's hand and asked, "What do you mean you saw him?" as she emphasized on the word him. "The boy that the officer was talking about... I saw him and he saw me. The story he told us is true." Rose looked like she might have passed out if it weren't for all the adrenaline running through her body. "Yeah right Rose, nice acting, but you don't have anyone fooled anymore. You had us for a while though so I will give you credit for that. But seriously, did you really have to wake us up at two in the morning?," Keira said with disbelief. Rose looked like she had just gotten a punch to the face. "You think I'm joking? Why would I kid around about something so serious? I'm not lying...," she said the last part between sobs she was trying to hold back. "Keira I don't think she would joke around about something like this, I mean it's Rose we're talking about. Rose has never told a single lie.," Emily said standing up for her friend...

(January 19, 2015)   

It was a brisk morning when the three girls sat at the Coffee Shop with their warm coffee in between there hands. They were discussing how they needed to do something fun before Keira went to North America to attend college. A few ideas were thrown out there like going bowling or ice skating or having a party, but Keira only wanted Emily and Rose to be with her before she left. They decided on one topic; which was having a sleepover, but they'd have hundreds of sleepovers at each others houses so they decided they would rent out a flat that was cheap and not too far away.

The girls took their coffee with them and got into Emily's new Lexus. They drove around town looking for some rentals when they finally found one that was affordable. The flat was about 42.7 miles north  They ended up in a small city named Theydon Bois. The house was two stories but fairly small and looked as if it were made in the 1760's. There was a sign on the lawn with a name and phone number on it. Keira called the number and talked for about four minutes on the phone talking about the cost and how long it was available etc... After Keira did some negotiating with the man on the other end of the phone it would cost 133.81 Euro, which is $150 in the U.S. for four nights and five days. All three girls agreed on the house and split the cost three ways so each girl would only pay 44.60 Euro.

The girls decided that they would meet at the flat at twenty past seven in the evening. Rose got there early of course at seven o'clock sharp to park her car closest to the flat. Emily and Keira showed up five minutes late at twenty-five past seven. They weren't shocked to see that Rose was already there with a bag in one hand and a sleeping bag in the other waiting by the door. Keira got out of the car to unlock the front door to let Rose in. It took the girls about half an hour to set up and get dressed for the night. There were three rooms in the flat, but the girls decided that since this was a sleepover they would all sleep downstairs in the living room. For it was a long day the girls decided to go to bed early the first night, so they all fell asleep around half past nine.

(January 20, 2015)

    Rose was the first to get up. All through the night she kept hearing strange noises but she told herself it was just the house because it was so old. She couldn't shake the feeling though of thinking the flat might be haunted. She kept these thoughts to herself though of course knowing she would probably get made fun of by the other girls. It's not that Emily and Keira are bullies or anything it's just that Rose is the youngest being only seventeen and seven months old while Emily was only five months older and Keira being the oldest of them at age nineteen. Anyways, all through the night Rose kept hearing noises like someone might be in the house. She got up once to check upstairs but went straight back to bed when she thought she saw a black shadow scurry up the stairs. Of course she thought it was only her imagination but it still freaked her out.

    It was about half past when the two older girls woke up. Breakfast was already made; pancakes, toast, eggs, and some good ol' OJ. After the girls were done with breakfast they decided to go shopping. They spent most of the day shopping (well ok to be more realistic; looking around wishing they could buy everything in the store) at Debenhams. The store is one hour and twenty-two minutes away by car so they left around twenty past five to make it back to Theydon Bois in time for dinner.

    When they arrived at the flat they were surprised to see that the door was already unlocked. "I was sure I locked the door behind me when we left," Keira recalled. The girls looked at each other concerned about the lock so being the brave one Emily slowly opened the door. After seeing nothing had been stolen downstairs they decided to check up stairs. The girls found no one and everything was still in its place so they went back downstairs and decided to forget about the whole thing and make dinner.

    It had been a long day and the girls were exhausted from walking around all day so they went to their sleeping bags and turned on the telly (television for you Americans). The girls watched their favorite show Downton Abbey until about eleven o'clock in the evening.

(January 21, 2015) (2:30 am)

Rose wasn't getting much sleep again because she kept hearing noises that sounded as if it were coming from upstairs. At around half past two in the morning there was a CRASH that woke all three girls up. The girls were frightened by the noise but as scared as Keira was she tried not to show and act calm because she was the eldest. Keira calmly reached for the telephone and called the police reporting a burglar in the house. Once Keira hung up the phone she told the girls to go outside and wait for the police officer to come while Keira stayed inside. She grabbed an umbrella that was sitting by the door and gripped it hard and slowly walked to the stairs in case the burglar tried escaping. Finally, the police officer had arrived and came inside to check it out. After going upstairs and checking everything out he brought back downstairs a broken mirror that was from the bathroom. All girls looked at each other confirming that neither of them had ever gone to the bathroom upstairs. Rose decided to speak up ignoring the fact that they might disbelieve her. "Well the other night I was hearing some strange noises that were coming from upstairs... and at first I just thought it was the old house creaking but now I think this house might be haunted..." Emily and Keira broke out into laughter but was stopped quickly by the officer. "Rose here might actually be correct. We hear complaints all the time from people staying this flat about weird noises at night and having the flat be trashed in the morning. There is an old tale about this flat but no one believes it of course until they've stayed in the flat." Keira and Emily both looked at each other doubtfully but Rose looked like she was believing every word the officer was saying. "Well, what's the tale about?" asked Rose. The officer cleared his throat. "The tale goes back to when this house was first built in 1866 a married couple moved in with their two daughters that were seven and nine. A year later they had a son. Everything was fine for the next five years they lived there, until the year 1873. There was a serial killer in Theydon Bois on the loose so everyone in the neighborhood locked their doors and hid inside but the family that lived in this house, their lock on the door was broken so therefore they could not lock their door. It was about ten o'clock in the evening when the serial killer walked into their home. The cops showed up the next morning and found the whole family huddled together in the bathroom covered in blood. The whole family was dead but the cops never found the boy. Some say that the boy escaped and others say that he never left and to this day haunts the house."

When the officer left the girls tried going back to bed but Rose couldn't sleep. She decided to go upstairs and see if the boy was there. She saw the same black shadow she had seen the night before but this time she followed it. She followed it all the way to the stair that led to the attic but she couldn't see where it had gone. The only place it could have gone was in the attic so she climbed up the stairs and searched for a light until she finally found the switch. When she flipped the switch up she saw nothing but a wall in front of her, but when she turned around she was face to face with what looked like a seven year old boy.