Monroe House

Saturday Night

The remainder of the week flew by as the group's dread grew. Before they knew it, it was Friday. An uneasy feeling practically wafted through the school the entire day. At lunch, Julia met up with Chris and Layla to discuss their plans for the next night.
"So what do you guys think about this whole thing. Be honest with me" Julia said.
Chris and Layla shared a look then averted their gaze to their hands. Chris adjusted his ball cap before he spoke.
"We think it's a bad idea. We checked out the video Hunter was talking about. That place is crazy. They caught a lot of scary shit. The voices, those wolf things, and that laugh. Whatever it was scared the hell out of Carmen and Justin. These guys went to some of the most notorious haunted places in the world and never shut off the cameras, not even when things got really bad. This place we're going to.... is different then anywhere else".
That night, Julia's curiosity was eating away at her. She didn't want to scare herself further but she wanted to know what they were up against. She grabbed her laptop, fired up YouTube, and scrolled to the search bar. She typed in 'Monroe House' and was met with a bunch of mixed videos. Most were debunking videos and sightings of things in the backgrounds. The remaining videos were tribute videos to the missing explorers and other explorations the group went on.
Julia scrolled up and down the collection of videos until one caught her eye.
'Who had the last laugh? The suspect(s) behind the disappearances'.
Julia clicked on the video and cranked up the volume. The video started with some text in big white letters, 'The notorious Monroe House is known to be the final resting place for the murderous Monroe family. Charlotte Monroe was burned at the stake in town, while the rest were hung from an old tree on the property. They were buried at the base of the tree later that day".
In the video, two people were heard talking. Carmen and Justin, Julia assumed. Minutes went by with nothing but the sounds of the woods, the two siblings walking and the faint cheesy, creepy music the uploader attached to the video. Just then a high pitched cackle sounded from the tree line behind small makeshift cemetery. Silence filled the video until Carmen and Justin started talking again.
"Did you hear that", Justin asked.
"Yeah, I sure did, buddy" Carmen replied.
The crunch of footsteps were the next sounds to flow from the speakers before Carmen loudly asked, "Hello"?
Another pause. Another cackle resounded louder and closer then the last one. Almost as if it was right behind the tree. The video then cut to black. More text scrolled across the screen. "This was the last known footage found on Carmen Andrew's camera. The laugh heard in the footage was believed to be a separate group of people that were stalking the teens. Others believe it was fifth party member to help stage an elaborate hoax. This theory suggests the internet famous explorers wanted out of the spot light and opted to run away. However, close friends and family have denied any claims they would want to disappear on their own. The investigation is still ongoing in hopes of finding answers.
Julia clicked out of the video and powered off her laptop. The more she watched, the more hesitant she was about going. She set her laptop on the nightstand and rolled over into an uneasy sleep. The next morning came far too quickly for Julia. The sound of her phone dinging.

CandyGurl🍭: Hey, girl! Could you pick me and Caleb up tonight?
JuliaChilds🥐: Sure! U nervous?
CandyGurl🍭: That's an understatement. I'm pretty scared, actually. But we're gonna have more people than four. So.....
JuliaChilds🥐: True.

The rest of the day went on uneventfully until it was time for Julia to pick up Candice and Caleb. The two teens sat in front of Candice's house looking anxious and distracted. They hopped into Julia's car and sat in uncomfortable silence until they reached the bowling alley parking lot. Hunter, Layla, and Chris were already there waiting for them. Hunter being the only one looking excited.
"You guys ready for an adventure"? He's asked loudly.
The rest gave off a mock 'yay' while half heartedly twirling their fingers. Hunter opened his car trunk to reveal cameras, voice boxes, one night vision camera, and EVP recorders.
Everyone grabbed a camera and recorder, Hunter grabbed the night vision camera, while Caleb and Chris grabbed the voice boxes. The group started their trek towards the Hazard Falls forest entrance. The very forest the mob entered to kill off a whole murderous family. The same forest four normal teenagers went missing in.
The wind began to blow an abnormally cold breeze the closer they got. Finally, they reached the entrance. The path to the woods led to a large wall of darkness.
"Well, kids. Here we be. And before anyone asks, no, we're not gonna split up. And if we do, we don't travel out of anyone's sight. Just thought I'd get that out in case anyone was wondering", Hunter said.
"Actually, we were wondering that. Believe it or not. Thank you". Chris replied.
"Hey, guys! Look at this", Layla called from the direction of the entrance sign.
The group turned in her direction and found her standing next to the sign in front of a tall, stone plaque with names covering it top to bottom. They scanned the plaque and caught familiar names: Andrew Cassidy, Sandy Arnold, the sheep farmers, and countless others that were never found.
The group then took notice of bundles of dead flowers, shirts, sweatshirts, hats, worn messages on notepads, and a weathered and stained picture frame of the four urban explorers that took their, possible, final steps in the woods that loomed in front of them. Above the makeshift shrine were the spray painted names of the four teens, four more names on the already crowded plaque.
"Did you guys know Carmen was my science tutor when I was a freshman. She helped me pass, like, thousands of tests" Candice said.
"Yeah. Wayne and Kendall saved my ass once. A couple assholes tried to hide some marijuana in my locker to pin it on me. Wayne reported them while Kendall went hunting for the actual culprits", Hunter added.
"Justin encouraged me not to give up while running the mile. I nearly settled for a shit time when he ran up behind me and kept pushing me to keep going. At the end of our last lap, he raced me to the end. I never had a better time on a run after that", Julia concluded.
"Wish we could have gotten to know them a lot better", Candice said, somberly.
"Me too", Hunter responded.
"You think we'll end up like them"? Layla asked.
"No way. We have a greater task ahead of us. Find answers for them and their families", Hunter said. "We owe them that much".
The group placed a hand on the plaque respectfully and took one last look at the frozen, smiling faces of their predecessors as they began to enter the forest. Julia looked back, instinctively, and noticed a dented and rusty blue truck parked haphazardly on the street. Bottles and crumpled cans littered the floor around vehicle.
"Hey, have you guys seen that truck before", Julia asked.
The group looked at the the beat up truck and replied 'no'.
"Well, whoever they are, I don't want to meet em'".