The people who lived in the village of Liverpool still called it Janette's House, although no blood-relation had lived there for over twenty years. It had been neglected for so long that, in fact, moss started clinging to the chipped burgundy bricks; the grass below, instead of retaining their lovely shade of green, had been reduced to a withering yellow.
Yet even when it was newly-built, nobody dared go near it. Maybe it was the spine-chilling fact that there were murders in that mansion. Or that anyone that had ever moved in after Janette's death had woken up to bleeding walls, chills in the air although everywhere in the house was warm and scratches on the walls. The children of Liverpool liked to tell tall tales of those discoveries, saying it was the young girl herself who had come to warn those foolish enough to settle there. Many a small child would run away in fear, and whenever they saw the old mansion towering over them they'd shiver violently.
It was Clark, who had just moved here from Kent, whom had opted to buy this mansion. The rent was cheap and affordable, and the houses were spacious. No one dared step foot there; no one but Clark. No, Clark was neither foolish nor thick - just out of money, out of hope, and out of options. He had to live in the house.
Droopy-eyed and exhausted, Clark had trudged to his bedroom late at night after a long shift at work. The moment his head touched the pillow, his body beckoned sleep, only to be woken up by the faint allure of piano.
The music was clearly the works of Beethoven. He pressed his ear against a large wooden door in his room that he was yet to explore. The music was obviously coming from inside here. He opened the door with a flourish, expecting the unexpected. What he saw was definitely unexpected. A solid brick wall with a tiny peephole in the middle. Curious, he leaned closer, but what he saw on the other side surprised him.
A pretty young girl in a long white dress dancing to a stereo on the middle of his lawn. She had her back to him, but there was something about her that made Clark keep staring. Maybe it was the fact that she was a really good dancer. Maybe it was her elegance, her poise. Maybe it was the mystery of her appearance. Maybe it was because of a lot of things, but one thing was for sure. Clark was in love with her. All through the night, he watched her. He didn't know why, and he did not find it strange that she was on his lawn, dancing in the middle of the night.
Only until the young girl with the long white dress ran away did Clark realize that it was already morning. In a daze, he stumbled back to bed, as if in a trance. All through the day, he did nothing but think about the girl. He went to bed as usual that night, and yet again, he was woken up by music. He scrambled over towards the door, pulling it open and staring intently through the peephole. He saw the girl once again; this time, she seemed even more beautiful. Her hair, a waterfall of cascading golden silk. Her skin, tanned with just a tint of summer peach, an exquisite sight to behold. She was gorgeous, and Clark knew it.
For weeks and weeks, Clark admired her elegance and her beauty until one night. He did not see the girl. He woke to the music, this time the elegant Tchaikovsky, but when he looked through the peephole, he did not see her. Instead, he saw an ocean of red. Confused, Clark went back to bed, forgetting all about the girl in the long white dress, and instead, he thought about the leaky pipes in the basement, and how he needed someone to fix them.
The next day, Clark called a local handyman in to fix the leaks. The young woman who arrived was slim, tanned person who looked like she had seen a lot of things in her years on earth. Clark was confused. Woman had to do everything these days, didn't they?
Upon seeing her, Clark suddenly thought of the girl again.
"Excuse me, but do you know if there are any young girls who live down this street?"
"No one would be crazy enough to live down this street, young man. The howls at night could make the bravest man petrified as a mouse," the young lady answered politely, raising a heavily pencilled eyebrow.
"Really? A tall, blonde girl? Around 18 or 19 years old? Surely you have! She's a VERY good dancer!"
"You mean Janette? Yes, she is a very good dancer. She could have gotten into any dance school she wanted to, but you know those schools that they used to have, useless I tell you, useless! Too bad she wasn't around when they did accept her."
"What do you mean she wasn't around? I swear I saw her a few days ago! And anyway, she's a great dancer, why didn't they accept her immediately?"
"She died many years ago... They didn't accept her because..."
The handywoman hesitated before she answered.
"She was never accepted because of her eyes. She had no pupils, her eyes were just red."
