Horror

by Scribe Leaf Library · 1 min read · 1 view

The Hendersons were told the attic creaked because old houses settle, and for the first year they believed it, the way people believe things that are easier than the alternative. It was their daughter who noticed the creaking kept the same rhythm every night — four steps, a pause, four steps back — long after they'd learned no floorboard in that attic could carry a person's weight without breaking through. She counted the steps for a month before she told anyone, and when she finally did, her mother went up with a flashlight and found the dust undisturbed, every board intact, and a child-sized handprint on the inside of the window that faced a street where no child had lived in this house for sixty years. They didn't move. They simply stopped questioning the sound, the way you stop questioning a neighbor's habits once you've lived beside them long enough. Four steps, a pause, four steps back. Some nights, the daughter swears, there are now two sets.