Hollows Valley

Prologue

"There are no ghosts in here," Edward, my husband, said sharply to me as I stood in our bedroom in the small cottage where we lived a few years ago, back when I trusted and loved him. He mocked me by saying what he used to repeat in primary school:

Mrs. Brown went to town, with her knickers hanging down.

She saw a ghost, eating toast, half-way up a lamppost!

In the circumstances this wasn't at all funny or helpful.

"But I swear I saw a woman in the library who looked ghostly pale and she told me she was once the owner of this cottage and your first wife. You told me you were never married before you met me Edward." I was close to tears, due to the fact that I didn't know what to believe. The woman whom I had encountered in the library a few times was always draped in a long white cloak; her hair was dark, her eyes black and her tone always bitter and laced with hatred.

"I didn't lie to you, Joan." He tried placing his hand upon my shoulder by way of comfort, but I shrugged it off. Something about his blunt tone frightened me and I couldn't comprehend what it was, or why it frightened me.

"Why do I feel you're lying to me? You've been telling me for weeks we are the only people here and yet, at night, the sound of crying comes from the library; when I walk there, there's always blood on the floor and when I see her in the library, she screams at me telling me to get out and says I'm trying to replace her." I continued to confront him and hoped that I wasn't losing my mind. His eyes hardened and a murderous look replaced the love and affection he once had on his face for me.

"You get out now!" he said in a warning tone and pulled from his trouser pocket a gun that he always carried for protection. He told me that he'd give me a ten-minute start and I couldn't help but think he had gone mad.

I ran out of the room, racing towards the front door while I swore I could hear a voice echoing throughout the cottage in the hallway. "Run like the wind, never look back, be careful with what words you use for they may be the last that you choose. Don't be a fool, be brave, for your past may come back to haunt you some day." I ran out of the house as fast as I could.

Hollows Valley, the village that wasn't too far away from the cottage was silent and creepy since crows were flying by and no-one was around at midnight. I wonder now that I look back on this experience, what people would have said if they had seen a girl with long brown hair running desperately around the village for a safe haven with nothing on but her dressing gown and a nightdress.

Shaking the thought off, I remember running towards a large church, banging on the front door continually since I could hear the sound of loud footsteps rushing behind.

"Help – is there anyone here?" I shouted as the door creaked open and revealed a dark and dreary large hall. I glided silently on tiptoe through the surrounding darkness, moving towards one of the walls beside the statute of the Virgin Mary, praying that Edward wouldn't find me. The unexpected and sudden sound of thunder nearly made me scream as I crouched down onto the floor, leaning against one of the pews. Rain was now gushing down outside. Windows started to rattle, and I could hear the sound of the loud footsteps again making my heart race.

Biting my lips, I got up and made my way slowly towards the door picking up a large candlestick from the altar. I knew that I shouldn't go to the door, but something was pulling me irresistibly towards it. Lightning struck again and made me drop the candlestick. I heard a bloodcurdling scream coming from outside and saw a body lying at the front door. I screamed when I realised that it was Edward. His face was covered in blood, his eyes open as if he had been shocked to see someone or something and his clothes were also covered in blood and ripped. I knelt down sobbing and eventually when I found the composure to close his eyes my hands shook uncontrollably.

Then I noticed an envelope beside his body and picked it up. Opening the envelope, I took out the small piece of paper folded inside. It had my name on the front of it. I unfolded the piece of paper and gasped when I read the large words written in blood:

RUN NOW

Ever since that day I have been running from whom or from what I do not know. The police suggested that Edward had killed himself since they couldn't come up with any other suggestion for his death. I always considered the police in the village to be dumb and stupid. I know that he hadn't committed suicide since he wasn't that type of man. I now work as a journalist for a large successful company in New York writing about animals. I try to stay away from the supernatural, but I can tell you now that those words even to this day, despite the fact that I am now thirty and no longer in my twenties, will always haunt me.

No more am I that kind, naïve woman who falls in love with a handsome man with blond hair and blue eyes. No, I am a woman who pushes others away when they try to get close to me. I wake up screaming sometimes when I hear the sound of guns in my dreams or when someone touches me on the shoulder. I focus on my work and depend on no-one.

I am haunted by ghosts; I am haunted by him.

I am no longer alive; I am dead inside. Isn't that what he wanted anyway?