The House of Horrible Happenings, short story by Debbie Aruta at Spillwords.com

The House of Horrible Happenings

The House of Horrible Happenings

written by: Debbie Aruta

@Debbie_Aruta

 

The house filled the entire block. It filled it, in space and in fear. The town’s rumors about the murders, the missing people, and the blood curling screams are said to come from this ginormous house. Some are summoned to it. Some dared to walk down the street it was on, and yet some, well some we are not sure we ever saw walking alive. The house had a life of its own. Weird lights, odd music, a constant black cloud over the entire thing. This house was a mystery to all, but to me, it was where I lost my mind.

I was brought up in this house. I was always on the outskirts of knowing what was going on. When I entered a room, people hushed. When I asked who a person was that I believe I had seen, I was told it was a ghost wandering the halls. It was as if ghosts wandering the halls was a normal occurrence in all homes. When I asked about the screams, I was informed I had a wild imagination, that no one else had heard a thing, I tried to ask questions and was told that perhaps it was time to admit me to a medical facility for the insane. Me! Insane.

After my “vacation” in the asylum, I was more convinced that this house was evil. My therapist said she did not see how a non-living entity could be evil. I begged her to come see the house, to stay in it, so she could realize I was ok and that the house, my family, the ghosts, were what was insane and not me. After months of talking to her, and her to my family, she was invited to stay for a weekend in that hell house. I said a final goodbye to her because I knew that she would not be returning to work. I knew she would never be heard from again. If she had believed me, she would still be alive, but sadly, she is now one of the many ghosts walking the halls.

That house, it swallows souls alive, hence the blood curling screams. It was the scream of a human losing his soul to the devil himself. I had warned her. I had told her the truth and she thought I needed my medicine increased. I cheeked the meds and threw them away when she was not looking. No amount of medicine would help me cope with my own insane asylum, my home. Now I was without a therapist and even though my family said, it was ok for me to return, I knew that my return came at a price. Perhaps they would lock me up, or they would ship me somewhere like Germany for another vacation, but this trip would only be one way.

I remember growing up thinking, I was insane. Souls do not wander halls. Houses do not scream. Mirrors with no reflection. Beds with weapons on the wall above the headboards. We were armed even in our sleep! I always slept with an ax under my pillow. Sometimes the spirits tried to eat the living. Growing up my family said if a ghost ate our soul, they could inhabit our bodies and become us for a small window of time. No one was taking mine, a ghost? What good was an ax? The screams still fill the crevices of my mind and play repeatedly on a loop. How could my family be so callous? They are bloody horrible as to murder people, let ghosts suck souls, and let me fester in institutions. Yes, I never saw anything, but I knew.
As police chief years later, I look back, I saw what was happening, but I was a kid. I still go nowhere near the house. It will attempt to suck me in and do away with me. I am the last living heir to the estate. I have thought about demolishing the house, but there is no telling what lies down deep underneath. Bodies and bones are probably trying to come back alive. If I tear it down, they will rise. I can own it, drive by it, and make sure no one else gets near it.

Each year as Halloween time approaches, more and more children dare each other to touch the door, to go through the holes in the dilapidated house. They throw pumpkins at the house, they toss bottles to litter the yard, and they get braver and braver each year. I place officers every fifty feet around the entire block that the house is on. No one stops the youth from throwing items in, but they do stop the children from placing themselves on the property. This way the house takes no more victims. It can suck no more souls. One year I did lose an officer because he was new to the area and did not know of the legend of the House of Horrible Happenings.

I am getting ready to retire soon and have thought about selling the house again, but more bodies would pile up under the wooden planks of the house, so I will remain close and continue to make sure our police force keeps our local children safe. I still hear the screams and see the ghosts in my nightmares. I will never be free of the hell I lived in. No amount of therapy can keep my soul from being tainted by my family name, but until I am gone from this earth, I will keep others from stepping a foot on that property and living in the hell that is now my life.

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