In your own words, retell the myth of Daedalus and Icarus; 

in a separate paragraph, explain the main point of the myth.

Penny had probably read the question at least four times before she actually started to write. She normally sailed through Lit tests, but her thoughts were elsewhere today. After school, she and Eric were taking the key back to the house. They had each packed their backpacks with extra food, water, flashlights, and a couple small kitchen knives. Just in case, Eric had said, although Penny doubted that knives would do much against whatever was in the house. Or elsewhere. The thought made her shiver. Mrs. Scholtz’s suggestion that all the lost people were still living or existing somewhere other made her heart leap into her throat.

She scribbled a few more lines about Dedalus and his wax wings, then glanced at the clock in the back of the room. She still had a full page of short essay questions and only ten minutes left in class. She hunched over the desk and wrote furiously, determined to not let thoughts of haunted houses, keys, and lost souls keep her from getting at least a B. She might be a total failure as a daughter and as a friend, she might be poor and chubby, but she sure as heck wasn’t going to get bad grades. That was probably going to be her only path out of this stupid town someday.

That is, if she didn’t get sucked into some otherworldly vortex of misery and torment.

The tip of her pencil snapped, and she realized she was very close to growling out loud. Not a good way to improve her social standing. She raised her hand for a new pencil, then managed to finish the last of the questions without growling, breaking her pencil lead, or improperly placing a comma. She sighed as she packed up her bag, then set the finished test on the podium. Only five more periods to go. And lunch. Her favorite.

Penny managed to survive history, computers and was most of the way through her pasta with red sauce and mystery meat when Madelynne, Sophie, Lisa and Tyler--all part of Eric’s posse--passed her on their way to empty their trays in the trash. She avoided eye contact and hoped they would just pass her by, but then she felt something narrowly miss her head. A piece of garlic bread was spinning on the table a few inches from her tray.

“Whoa, sorry,” Tyler gasped in mock horror. “I was totally aiming for the trash. I’ll try to do better next time.” Just wait for it, Penny thought to herself, sighing. A carrot stick--still sticky with dressing--landed right in the middle of her pasta. She attempted to tune out the bubbly laughter from the girls.

“Yes!” Tyler pumped his fists. “Made it!’

“Dude, just-- It’s just not funny.” Another voice cut into the girls’ giggles and Tyler’s self-congratulations, this one dry and bored. Penny’s head snapped up in surprise. Eric didn’t look at her, but stared at Tyler, clearly annoyed. Penny felt like she must have heard him wrong. Tyler clearly did too. Madelynne, Sophie and Lisa just looked confused.

“Uh, Eric, it’s hilarious. I said I was throwing it in the trash, and I threw it at her plate. Cuz, you know, she’s trash?” Tyler didn’t seem to understand that explaining a joke never made it funnier. Eric rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, Ty, I get it.” The bored expression was back. “But it’s stupid. Find some new material or just give up. I don’t care.”

Tyler started to turn red. “What’s your deal, Martinez? You suddenly into fat girls now?” Penny felt her face heat up and her throat tighten, and she gritted her teeth against the fury that seemed to well up inside her.

“Yeah, I’m totally into her,” Eric said sarcastically. “Seriously, Ty. I don’t have to be into someone to see that you’re being an idiot.”

“What the--” Tyler spluttered. He glanced at the girls, who had stopped looking confused, and were now whispering to each other and gazing adoringly at Eric. “Fine.” He spun on his heel, and shot a dark look at Penny before slamming his tray onto the table and stalking off in the direction of the lockers.

Eric glanced briefly at Penny, something unreadable flickering in his eyes, before directing his attention to the girls who were still whispering and giggling. “Aren’t you all in Miss Callahan’s class with me?” he asked casually. The girls giggled again, and they all turned and walked out of the lunch room, Madelynne gushing about how sweet it was for Eric to stick up for social outcasts. He must think we’re going to die tonight, Penny thought incredulously. There was no other reason for him to intervene. Although. She glanced at Eric, surrounded by pretty girls who seemed to fawn over his every move--maybe it hadn’t been such a big risk after all.

Penny spent the rest of the afternoon trying not to count the minutes until the last bell . She managed to avoid interacting with Tyler and the rest of the guys in Earth Science, although Mrs. Scholtz kept looking at her with a slightly tragic expression on her face, which only added to Penny’s growing sense of nervousness. Then Pre-Algebra, PE, and band. Although it had seemed to drag on interminably, the school day was finally done. Her stomach seemed to be full of fluttering wings, and her heart was racing. She grabbed her backpack from her locker, and then raced out the door before Tina could find her and tag along.

The Other Place. Penny tried to imagine what it would be like, if they were actually able to get past the guardians and use the key. Would it mirror this world? Or be a darker shadow of it? Would time pass the same way? Would they be able to find the way out? She plunged her hand into her pocket and felt around for the brass key Mrs. Scholtz had entrusted to her. She gripped it tightly in her palm, feeling the teeth biting into her skin. She tried to remember the instructions Mrs. Scholtz had given to them before thrusting the key at Penny.

“The man you saw--” Mrs. Scholtz had begun.

“You mean the zombie,” Eric interrupted.

“No,” Penny countered. “He was more like a mummy, all dried out and nasty.”

Mrs. Scholtz shrugged. “It doesn’t really matter what you call him. His name is Randolph.”
Penny shuddered at that. Not “was.” “Is.”

Mrs. Scholtz eased herself into the reclining chair behind her desk. “He was the first one the house took. Well, not really the house,” she corrected herself. “The house is inhabited by...something. As far as I’ve been able to learn, the workers uncovered some old human remains when the house was being built originally, and I think that they must have disturbed it then, but we’ll never know for sure. The bones are long since gone.”

“Anyway, Archie and Randolph were brothers--they’d built the house together after making their money in coal. They had a sister, Agatha--she was the mother of the twins--who died in a automobile accident back in upstate New York. The girls were shipped to Archie and lived with him till, well, you know.”

“But what about Randolph?” Penny pressed. “You said he was the first, but I saw him in that picture online.”

“Well, I know the picture you mean. And that was taken not long before he just up and disappeared one day, probably about ten years before Agatha died. Folks never saw him again. Archie always said he’d moved out to Washington or California or some such nonsense.” She snorted. “Poor Archie. He was never a very good liar.” Her sharp eyes fixed on Penny’s. “That’s why the people around here knew he could’ve never murdered those girls. The shock of finding them almost did him in, and police could never find any evidence linking him to the murders.”

“Anyway, all that to say that Randolph was the first. And so he’s a guardian now. As are the girls. The house apparently didn’t need any more after them, so the rest of the people it takes get sent...somewhere else. I almost saw where, the time I was in there, But it spat me out and left me with this key. I couldn’t ever get in again, and I never saw the guardians again either, no matter how many times I tried.” Her voiced grew soft. “Since then, It’s only ever been an empty house to me.”

“So what does the key open?” Eric pressed.

“I’m not sure,” Mrs. Scholtz admitted. “I think there must be a fourth door. The guardians--you’ve got to get past them--and then maybe it will be revealed or something similar. I saw lights shining, heard my sister’s voice.” She trailed off for a moment, and Penny knew she was playing the sound over again in her head. Penny understood what that was like. Mrs. Scholtz pressed her lips together and then continued. “I know there’s something beyond, and I think that key must be the ticket in."

“But once we get in,” Penny tried to keep her voice even, “how do we get out?”

“Beats me. No one has ever gone in by choice--always taken. My guess is that whatever it is will let you know what it wants, and you’ll have to either stay or do what it asks.” Mrs. Scholtz grimaced. “You sure you still want this key?” Penny took a deep breath and glanced at Eric. His face was set.

“Yeah. I’m sure.” The key had felt cold and heavy in her hand, and it was as if something had settled in Penny, a chain that linked her to Eric, to Mrs. Scholtz, and the house itself.

Penny snapped out of her reverie and found herself standing on the sidewalk two blocks north of the O’Hallaran House, her hand still wrapped tightly around the key. She spotted Eric a block behind her and decided to wait for him.

“Well, if it isn’t my knight in shining armor,” she said snarkily, as he drew nearer. “Thanks for rescuing me at lunch today.”

“No problem,” Eric said breezily. “You looked like you needed it.”

“Seriously? That’s all you’re going to say?” Penny threw her hands up. “You are impossible.”

“Look,” Eric’s voice became serious. “I--I felt bad. After what you said yesterday.” Penny could hardly believe her ears. “I told you I would say something. And I did.”

She rolled her eyes. “I just can’t believe you told off Tyler, and you still walked away with Madelynne and the rest of them looking at you like some movie star.” Penny shook her head and snorted. “Only you. It’s not fair.”

Eric grinned widely. “I can’t help if the girls love me.”

“Not this girl,” Penny muttered, trying to ignore the fact that Eric Martinez was smiling at her. Not just smiling, but acting like her friend. Forget the O’Hallaran House. She was already in the Twilight Zone.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Eric said dismissively. “But--” and he broke off awkwardly and cleared his throat. “Uh, just know that I don’t--er--think you’re fat or that weird or--”

Penny put a hand up. “Just stop. You’re freaking me out. And we’re about to head into a house that eats people, so--”

Eric laughed. “Good point.” He hefted his backpack higher on his shoulder. “You ready to do this?” The house stood just ahead of them, and Penny felt the little hairs on her arms lift as she stared at the empty windows.

“No, but if we don’t do it now, it will probably take someone else.” As soon as she said
she knew it was true. The house would take another kid, and Penny couldn’t live with any more accidents on her hands. She squared her shoulders, glanced up at Eric, and pulled out the key.

“Let’s go.”

                Penny was fighting with her locker, about ready to break something out of frustration, when Eric appeared around the corner, hands shoved coolly into his pockets and a vacant expression on his face.  Penny tried slamming the locker door one more time before she began slamming it over and over.  Eric, expression quickly melting, reached over with a quiet, “Hey, hey, chill.”

                Penny froze and glanced around, wondering if anyone had seen.  Luckily she and Eric weren’t the primary focus of the school that day, but she still took several steps away.  He had also looked around, realizing his mistake.

                “You have to jiggle it…” he said a little lamely, wiggling the handle in such a way that the door finally swung open smoothly. Like it had never been stuck stubbornly at all.  She resentfully grabbed her books and began shoving them into her backpack, unwilling to look at him.

                “You said you found something,” she said through gritted teeth as she jammed her math textbook between two notebooks.

                “Yeah, but I’ll wait ‘til you’re done.”  She sighed and zipped up her bag, slamming her locker door and crossing her arms.

                “Done,” She said, her tone a little snarkier than she meant for it to be.  Eric threw up his hands in mock surrender.

                “Geez, why are you so cranky?” he asked.  She gritted her teeth again and muttered, “You should know.”  When he only looked confused, she almost screamed in frustration.  During their simultaneous lunch periods, Penny, who had been minding her own business and eating the disgusting school lunch had become the primary topic of conversation at his lunch table, with one of the girls eventually calling her “a little fat” and ending with a critique of her clothing as “white trash rags”.  It wouldn’t have hurt so much if Penny hadn’t already started feeling that thing her aunt called “normal girl stuff” about her weight.  And her clothes were bad, she knew, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it.  She tried to take consolation in that fact, but it hadn’t worked.

                “Your stupid friends were calling me fat and poor. Again,” she hissed at him, crossing her arms more tightly.  Tears she had been suppressing all day sprang into her eyes and she hurriedly blinked them away, focusing on how angry she was instead.

                “Really? My friends did?” he asked, but she knew he had remembered by the slightly guilty expression on his face.  She rolled her eyes.  He sighed and lowered his voice.

                “What do you want me to do about it?  If I say anything they’ll…”

                “They’ll what? Think we’re friends? Think we’re ‘going out’? They wouldn’t make fun of you. Come on, Eric. Seriously,” she burst.  She laughed bitterly and turned to go.  Eric sighed loudly and said, “Wait.  Okay, I’m sorry. I…I’ll say something to them. Tomorrow. I promise.”  She doubted it, and if she was honest, she didn’t actually think it would help, but it was enough to keep her around to hear whatever he had found, the purpose of their discreet afterschool meet up.

                “What did you find, Eric?”  He watched her for a long time before he said, “Follow me.”

                She slung her backpack over one arm and followed him, exhausted from the variety of emotions that had raged through her in only a few minutes.  He led her down a hallway, up a flight of stairs and through another hallway before stopping in front of a classroom door.  The door was closed, but he glanced through the window and quickly ducked out of sight.

                “She’s in there. I was hoping she hadn’t left yet.” Before Penny could ask who he meant, he swung the door open and ducked into the classroom. She followed and slowed to a stop when she saw who was sitting at the desk.

                They had arrived at Mrs. Scholtz’s classroom, and the moment they walked in the door, Mrs. Scholtz looked up and smiled. “I wondered when you two would show up.”

                Penny glanced at Eric curiously, cheeks blushing a little for some reason she couldn’t explain.

                “Sorry,” Eric said, “I just wanted to make sure you were alone.  I didn’t want to ask you about this between classes.”

                “That’s fine.  You should probably sit, though,” she said.  Penny glanced between Eric and Mrs. Scholtz again, a little lost, but she stayed silent and followed Eric to the two front desks.

                “I probably should have told you as soon as I knew you had gone to the house,” Mrs. Scholtz said, staring out the window, “but I wanted you to figure it out for yourselves.  That means you’re truly…seekers, I guess.”

                “What are you talking about?” Penny asked finally, staring at Eric who was leaning forward in anticipation.

                “Well, I’m assuming you made the connection between me and my unfortunate sister, Ann,” she began, and Penny nodded.

                “She never stopped looking for her,” Eric said, glancing at Penny.  Mrs. Scholtz nodded.

                “My brother…he blamed himself.  God knows why.  He went off and died in Vietnam a few years later.  I was alone.  So, no, I never stopped looking.”  Mrs. Scholtz walked to the window and stared out at the school yard emptying of students, afternoon sun oddly cheerful despite the dark nature of the conversation.  Penny could almost feel Mrs. Scholtz’s loneliness across the room.

                “I studied the paranormal, the occult; I studied religions, met with religious leaders.  No one could give me answers,” She continued, her voice tired, “So, I finally decided to go to the house myself.  I had been too afraid that whatever had happened to Ann would also happen to me if I went there, so I had avoided it for years, but I had no other options.”  Eric was so excited he was bouncing in his seat as she spoke, which was in direct contrast to Mrs. Scholtz resigned gait across the room.

                “Did you see the doors?” Penny asked.  Mrs. Scholtz looked at her for a long moment, the sun reflecting off her glasses so that Penny couldn’t actually see her eyes.

                “I not only saw them, I understood them.”  She sighed and reached to pull a chain from around her neck.

                “And they also gave something to me,” she said.  She pulled the chain out from her dress, and held it up for them to see.  An old golden key swung from the chain, the handle shaped into the symbol Penny had seen on the last door.

                “Whoa,” Eric murmured, and he leaned so close to her that he almost tipped over his desk.  Penny felt oddly terrified as she stared at the key, and a chill ran through her as she glanced at Mrs. Scholtz’s face and saw her own terror mirrored on her face.

                “Why haven’t you used it?” Penny asked.

                “I tried.  It won’t work for me,” Mrs. Scholtz said, tucking the key back into her dress.  Eric leaned back and sighed.

                “Really?  But…but why?” Penny asked, feeling almost instantly relieved as the key disappeared from sight.

                “I have a theory about that,” Eric said quietly, and they both looked at him.

                “Well, I mean, it’s really just a theory, but…what if the house sort of…calls to certain people?  I mean, like me and Penny.  Tina didn’t see or hear any of the things we experienced.  And maybe that’s because she was outside, but she doesn’t really care about this stuff like we do, right?  I mean, I’ve been dreaming about the house…thinking about it all the time. I even…” He didn’t go on, but Penny knew he was right.  She had seen the garden on her TV. She had felt the house calling to her.  Something wanted her to enter the house.  Something had drawn her in.

                “But why us and not Mrs. Scholtz or Tina?” Penny asked exasperated.

                “I don’t know. I haven’t figured that out,” he said, shrugging.  Mrs. Scholtz sat down on the edge of her desk and studied them.

                “What he says is true,” she said quietly, “the house chooses some and not others.  I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse, but I do believe that all those people that have vanished…they are somewhere.  And I’ve been waiting a long time to give this key to someone.”

                Penny felt the bottom of her stomach drop out.  They would have to go back to the house, use the key.  And who knew what kind of doors that key would open.  She looked at Eric, and when their eyes met, he grinned broadly and squared his shoulders.

                “What do you think, Penny? You in?”  Penny looked from one to the other, then stared down at her hands for a long moment.  What did she have to lose anymore, she wondered.  Then, setting her jaw, she looked up at Mrs. Scholtz and said, “I’m in.”

The first thing that came up when Penny searched for “O’Hallaran House” were the stories of mysterious disappearances. Not the murders of the twin girls, not their murderer found in the basement, but a string of disappearances going all the way back to the ‘20’s. They hadn’t all happened in the house, but to people connected to it in obscure ways. The first was the real estate agent who had tried to sell the house after Jimmy O’Hallaran, the father of the girls, had died. One man was a contractor who had attempted to renovate in the ‘70’s. Last was a teenager who had gone into the house on a dare about twenty years ago. It was the last story that made Penny grow cold.

The seventeen-year-old girl had gone into the house when her brother dared her. When she came out of the house half an hour later, she was scared out of her mind. She told her brother all sorts of stories about ghosts, doors, and pockets of the house being in different times. Her brother had believed it to be a prank, but she claimed it was all true. When no one would believe her, she stopped talking about it. Eventually, life moved on and they forgot about the incident. Then, one day about a year after she had gone inside, the girl disappeared on her way home from school. The last person to see her – her best friend from school – had seen her go back into the O’Hallaran house.

“What is she doing here?” Eric demanded from the computer next to hers, breaking Penny out of her reverie.

Penny glanced at Tina who, not noticing Eric’s arrival, was staring intently at her phone.

“I couldn’t convince her to go home,” Penny muttered back.

Tina, hearing their whispered conversation, looked up. “Oh! What are you doing here?” she asked Eric.

Eric shrugged. “I have some homework to finish up. My computer’s broken.”

“What are you looking at?” Tina asked, suddenly drawn to the images on Penny’s computer screen. “You aren’t seriously looking up stuff about that house, are you?” She shivered.

“I was curious to see if the story you told was true,” Penny told her. “So far, I haven’t seen anything about it.”

“That’s because you’re not looking in the right places,” Eric told her, turning to his computer and scrolling through the results. “See, it’s this one.”

The page he chose – called  “Haunted Houses and Paranormal Places” – pulled up an old black-white-photo of the twin girls standing on the porch of the O’Hallaran house. According to the article, when the house was built, it was the biggest one on the block. Very little about the house had changed in the last century besides its decrepitude. Penny recognized the girls immediately. Violet and Rose, were the only daughters of Mr. and Mrs. James O’Hallaran. The parents had died in 1908 from a tragic train accident and the two girls had been sent to live with their aged uncle. It had definitely been the girls she had seen in the house. Standing behind the girls was an older gentleman. The article outlined the basic story – it was a lot like the one Tina’s brother had told her – but it also talked about the man that had supposedly killed the twin girls.

WM. Archibald O’Hallaran, the uncle of Violet and Rose O’Hallaran, was a wealthy businessman. He grew up on a farm, but early in his life, he made money working for the railroad. When he got tired of that, he invested in cattle and made most of his money by running one of the largest cattle ranches in the state.  After a time, he moved back to where his father had once farmed and built the biggest house the Irving had seen. Still, he hadn’t been satisfied, it seemed. He was constantly looking for new ways to make more money. When the twins had been forced into his custody after their parents’ deaths, it seemed he wasn’t thrilled, but he took it on as he did any other job. He had been found wandering in the basement looking for something after the twin girls had been found dead upstairs. He was confused about what was going on when they arrested him. He tried to plead his innocence, but  no one would believe that he hadn’t done it and he couldn’t explain how he had come to be in such a state. He died less than a year later before the trial was over. The town paper had even published a short obituary for him.

MR. WM. Archibald O’Hallaran, prominent businessman and entrepreneur, passed away in his house last night. The causes of Mr. O’Hallaran’s illness is unknown, though he was always known to be in good health. Recently implicated in the murder of Violet and Rose O’Hallaran, Mr. O’Hallaran spent the majority of his days in his home.

Known to his friends as Archie, Mr. O’Hallaran enjoyed passing his time by playing Croquet in his garden or reading the paper in the local diner. Despite the recent tragedy, Mr. O’Hallaran is widely remembered as a good, gentle soul and will be missed in the community.

There was more, but Penny did not read it. It seemed odd to her that a man accused of killing his twin nieces would be so well thought of in the small Irving community, but perhaps people knew more than they were telling.

The O’Hallaran estate, having no heirs, fell to some distant relative after the murder of the twins and the house went up for auction. Archie had died somewhere in his house, supposedly. After that, no one who entered the house lived very long or disappeared completely.

“I told you, it’s creepy!” Tina complained. “Can we look at something else?”

“Wait,” Penny told Eric as he scrolled through the page. She had seen a picture of the man who attacked her in the house. He was a lot younger, but she could almost swear it was him. “Who is that?”

Eric squinted at the page, “It says  here he’s the last known owner of the house.”

“What’s his name?”

“Randolph O’Hallaran.”

“Is that all it says?” she asked. Eric kept scrolling but there was nothing else about him. There were more detailed stories of disappearances on this website than Penny had found previously. There seemed to be one every ten or fifteen years until the last girl had gone missing in 1999. One took place around 1968 involving a Betty, Jimmy, and Ann Sholtz. Jimmy had accidentally driven his car, his two sisters in the backseat, into the fence. They all got out to move the car, but Ann had gone up to the door of the house to see if they could get any help. Two days later Ann went missing after she had left home to go to a friend’s house.

“Betty Sholtz,” Eric read aloud, “Isn’t she the science teacher?”

“Maybe that’s why…” Penny began, but she couldn’t finish the thought.

Suddenly, Tina’s phone rang. Startled, she looked down at it as if she didn’t know what to do with it. When she answered it, it was her mom. They had lost track of time and it was now close to four-thirty. “I have to go, guys,” she said when she hung up. She gave Penny a questioning look. Penny was all for staying and looking at the stories, but she noticed Eric was also packing up his things.

“I have to be home soon or my dad will be mad,” he explained, sounding almost apologetic. Almost.

With an inward sigh, Penny logged off, packed her bag, and followed Tina out of the library, Eric not far behind her.

At home alone, Penny idly flicked through the few TV channels that her aunt had available. There wasn’t much on – news, nature, reruns – but it was better than sitting around doing homework. She couldn’t stop thinking about the information they had found that afternoon. The website looked like maybe it had been put together by some kind of fanatic, but it was interesting. Definitely more interesting than anything else this dull town had to offer.

What if Ms. Sholtz knew more about the house that she was willing to share? Had they gone inside? Penny felt more and more questions popping into her head and all she wanted to do now was find out more. Who was Randolph O’Hallaran?  Her mind raced, coming to strange conclusions and even more questions.

Maybe it was best to just let it go, she thought. Everyone else seemed to want to. Everyone except Eric. What had made him so interested in it? In her mind’s eye, she saw the glowing door and its chilling inscription. Something very weird was going on here.

The doorbell rang, startling Penny. Her aunt was out somewhere in the town, but she had left her a few bucks for a pizza and Coke. Cash in hand, she went to the door. When she came back to the couch, pizza and Coke in her hands, the TV had…changed.

The picture – some prime time channel she had landed on – had disappeared, replaced by a weird flickering. There was a familiar noise, like the sound of leaves in the wind. The screen sprang to life. It was like watching a really old home video, but with the quality of a Charlie Chaplin clip. Dad had loved the old comedies… Penny shook herself and focused on the TV. It was a video of people wandering around in a lush garden, walking back and forth as though parading for the camera. They talked and laughed among themselves.

“Penny…”

Penny froze, nearly dropping the pizza on the floor as a shiver ran down her spine. She recognized that voice.

“Come on, Penny!”

Some of the people in the garden looked familiar, like they had belonged to another part of her life, one she could only just remember. The camera zoomed in on a girl, holding the hand of a woman that Penny recognized. She smiled at the camera.

“Come on!” the voice said.

Penny gasped and the TV abruptly shut off. She grabbed the remote and turned it back on, but it was just some show about a group of penguins. She changed the channel and it was some old man sitting behind a desk looking serious and talking about a war somewhere. Again. No matter how many times she changed the channel, the video of the garden never came back. Sullenly, she ate her pizza and waited, but she didn’t see it again.

Maybe she had imagined it…

With a sigh, she pulled out the homework she had yet to finish. Tomorrow was Friday. One more day in this long week and she would finally have time to properly look into this mystery.

Her phone buzzed and, swallowing her bite of pizza, she answered it.

“Hey, it’s me,” Eric’s voice came through.

Penny fought the urge to roll her eyes. “What is it this time?”

“I think we should go back to the house,” he said resolutely, as though he had only just made up his mind about it. “I’ve been doing a little more research, and…well, I just think we need to go back.”

Penny was not surprised. She had been feeling the same way. “Well, maybe it should wait until Saturday…” Penny answered.

“We can talk about it tomorrow,” Eric replied quickly. “Just wait until you see what I found.”

“Alright,” she answered. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow then.”

After they hung up, a vague sense of unease settled over Penny. Would Eric believe her if she told him about what she had seen? She dismissed the thought; she didn’t need to tell him about that. Tina wouldn’t believe her, of that she was sure. Eric was right, though, if they wanted answers, they would probably find them at the house.

Making herself more comfortable on the old couch, Penny started on her homework, hopping to distract herself. For the most part, it worked; by the time her aunt came home around eleven to say a quick hello and goodnight, Penny had all but put the house out of her mind.

The next day, school was disconcertingly normal.  Penny wasn’t surprised that Eric completely ignored her.  Well, not completely--he had managed to look sufficiently annoyed when they had inadvertently made eye-contact in the hallway during a passing period.  True to form, he had elbowed whatever idiot he was walking with, nodded in her direction, and the two of them stifled a laugh.  She had immediately made up her mind not to meet him at the library after school.  Stupid, she thought.  Stupid to think he actually might be different today.  Everything about the day made her wonder if she had somehow fantastically dreamed the whole scenario from the day before.  But then she sat next to Tina in Earth Science, and knew it had all been real.

“So are we going to talk about yesterday?” Tina gushed.  “I mean, I was thinking about it, and it still seems so weird.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Penny murmured, feigning interest in her science book.  

“I mean that freaky scream!” Tina did not look sufficiently scared, Penny decided, and she was not going to say anything that might make Tina think she was insane..  

“Oh, that was just me.  I was trying to creep Eric out.  He’s not exactly my bff, you know.”  Penny wondered just how much Tina had noticed.  “I mean, he’s like, so cute, and like, so popular…” She adopted an airy, vapid tone and fluttered her eyelashes at Tina, and then pretended to gag.  Tina giggled.  

“Oh my gosh, you sound just like Madelynne--” Tina broke off abruptly as Ms. Scholtz tottered up to the podium.  “Poor Ms. Scholtz.”  

For a second, Penny didn’t understand why Tina was being so sympathetic toward the nearsighted, diminutive woman.  But then she spotted the tiny print at the top of the white board and coughed to stifle her shocked laughter.  

Miss Scholtz is short.

She glanced around the room and saw one of the taller boys trying to hide a red face behind his textbook, his eyes bulging with squelched giggles.  Several of his friends were attempting to sit up straight and tall, their faces grave, as if Ms. Scholtz’s droning lecture about sedimentary rock was the most riveting thing they’d ever heard.  
 Ms. Scholtz adjusted her thick glasses and squinted at the class.  Penny figured the woman had been hired when the earth’s crust was still cooling, and had never caused enough of a stir to lose her position.  She was definitely a terrible teacher, but Penny felt pity for the old lady anyway.  Not like she was going to say anything, but still.  These guys were like five year olds.  

Class wore on, and eventually Ms. Scholtz instructed them to spend the last ten minutes working on their homework.  She puttered toward her desk, passing right by Penny’s desk.  

“Uh, Ms. Scholtz?” Penny asked quietly.  “Do you need help, uh, cleaning the board or anything?”  Penny almost fell out of her seat when Ms. Scholtz winked at her from behind coke-bottle lenses.

“What, and ruin their fun?”  She gave a low cackle.  “This isn’t my first rodeo, kiddo.”   Penny gaped.  “What,” the gravely old voice drawled quietly.  “You think I’m going to let a bunch of middle school boys hurt my feelings?”  She chuckled.  “Close your mouth, girl.  If you want to erase the board for me after class, go right ahead.  You’ll save me from falling off my chair and breaking my hip. ”

The bell chimed.  The boys raced loudly from the room, shoving each other and hardly believing their good luck.  Penny loitered afterwards and easily reached the top of the board to erase the ridiculous comment.  Maybe Ms. Scholtz wasn’t so terrible after all.  

“Ms. Scholtz,” Penny called, “how long have you lived here in town?”  Regroup and research, she couldn’t help thinking.  Maybe the science teacher knew something about the old house and the kids that had been murdered.  

“Oh, for about a billion years,” the older woman joked.  Penny stifled a laugh. “Nah,” she continued, “but I have been here my whole life. Sixty-nine years.  Graduated from this same school.  Probably messed with my science teacher too, back in the day.”

“Do you know anything about that old house on Third Street?”  She tried to sound casual.  “I walk past it every day on my way to my aunt’s apartment, and I just wondered what happened to it.”    

“Still telling stories about that house, huh,” Ms. Scholtz muttered.  “We loved to scare little kids with stories of witches and ghosts when I was in school, but truth is, that house still gives me the willies.”  She gave a little shiver.

“Why?” Penny asked eagerly, momentarily letting her guard down.  

“You starting to feel like you’re getting your feet back under you?”  Ms. Scholtz abruptly changed the subject and shuffled a thick stack of papers on her desk.  Penny was startled.

“Uh, you mean, m-moving?”  she stuttered, taken aback.  

“I know it’s been a big adjustment,”  Ms. Scholtz paused, peering down at the stack of papers with a aggravated look on her face.  “Now where are those hall passes?” she muttered, pushing her glasses back up her nose, and then sighing.  “Think your next teacher will take an ‘unofficial’ note from me?  Or would you rather just take the tardy?”  

“Um, Mr. Kincaid is usually pretty chill about whatever,” Penny answered.  She was still feeling confused at Ms. Scholtz’ avoidance of her question.  “You were saying something about that old house?”

Ms. Scholtz looked up from her desk, her eyes sharp and focused.   “Best to not poke around in the past,” she said flatly.  “If it were up to me, they’d tear that house down and put up a Kwik Mart.”  

“Uh, okay,” Penny said, hesitantly.  The whole conversation had taken an awkward turn, and she wasn’t sure if she was supposed to leave now, or what.  Ms. Scholtz’ expression softened a bit.  

“I meant it when I asked if you were adjusting okay.  New town, new friends--it’s a lot when you’re in seventh grade.”  Penny didn’t say anything, images of Sadie and Trevor flashing through her mind.  The skyline of Denver, the mountains crisp and dark to the west.  Then, without warning, the chaos of the wreck.  The limp forms of her parents in the front seat.  She blinked hard against tears that seemed to appear out of nowhere.  A knot was forming in her throat, and she knew if she tried to speak, she might burst into tears.  Stupid, stupid, stupid, she thought.   

“Honey,” Ms. Scholtz’s gravely voice broke through her thoughts.   “It’s gonna be terrible for awhile.  But then it will be less terrible.  And then one day, it’s actually a little okay.”  She hugged Penny awkwardly from the side.  “Now, get on to whatever class they have that hottie Kincaid teaching.”  She winked again, and Penny scrubbed at her eyes with her palms and took a deep breath.  

“Thanks, Ms. Scholtz,” Penny mumbled, but she meant it.  People usually said stupid, empty things like “Everything happens for a reason” or “You’ll see them again someday.”  It was refreshing to hear someone say life was just going to suck for awhile.  She made her way to her locker; the halls were beginning to clear out, and Penny knew she was going to be late to pre-Algebra.  Might as well take my time, she thought.  The last thing she wanted was for Eric and his pals to see her face all blotchy and gross from crying.  She started thinking about her conversation with Ms. Scholtz--the part where the teacher had started to tell her about the house and then had randomly decided to make a seventh grade girl cry.  Clearly the house had a history beyond just the current urban legends, if someone as old as Ms. Scholtz had been scared of it as a kid.  Maybe Eric had been right about the murders after all.  

Penny’s aunt didn’t have a computer--she basically used her phone for everything--so if she was going to seriously look into the house she’d need to go to the school library.  Or maybe the city library.  Then she’d have to get a library card, though.  She closed the door to her locker and gave a little scream when she found Eric calmly lounging against the locker right next to hers.  How had she missed him?  Oh crap.  My face, she thought.  She cast her eyes downward and hissed, “What are you doing here?  Aren’t you afraid someone might see you slumming it?”

“Relax, I’m not going to stay here long enough for anyone to notice.”  His brown hair hung across his face, and she couldn’t help notice that his almost-black eyes and dark skin were as close to flawless as was humanly possible.  She rolled her eyes at this thought.

“Fine.  What is so important that you had to risk social suicide to speak to me?”  she demanded.

“I found out something last night.  I didn’t get time to really google much because my dad is a total hard-case when it comes to ‘screen time.’” He sounded annoyed, and then looked sharply in her direction.  “You’re not telling anyone about this, right?”  

“Easy, Martinez.  It’s not like I want to world to know I’m talking to you either.”  She slung her backpack over her shoulder.  “And I could care less about how much ‘screen time’ you get.”  

“Whatever.  I told him we had a history project to work on together, so he won’t pick me up till four.  If you get to the library before I do, just google ‘O’Hallaran House’.”  They were approaching a split in the hallway.  “Look.  Don’t bail on this.  I’ll tell you more later.”  

“Fine,” she muttered.  O’Hallaran House.  Clearly Eric thought yesterday’s drama was real.  He had actually looked a little scared again.  And he had practically begged her to meet him at the library.  Penny had tried to avoid thinking about the little girl she’d seen, or the zombie-guy.  He’d reminded her of those bodies scientists dug up in the desert or the swamp--perfectly preserved but sucked dry.  She reminded herself that she would have to confront the reality (or unreality) of them sooner or later.  Maybe during band.  Penny had played bass guitar at her old school, but they didn’t have one here, so she was relegated to the bass drum.  Despite what her teacher said, Penny still didn’t agree that they were “practically the same.”  

Just as she had predicted, Mr. Kincaide flashed her a wide smile, asked where she’d been, and just as breezily, waved her to her seat.  She knew all the girls, including Tina, thought he was cute, but she thought he was trying too hard.  And any guy trying to be cool to middle schooler girls was a creeper in her book.  Pre-Algebra flew by, followed by PE, and then band.  

Absent-mindedly thumping the bass drum, Penny carefully considered her encounter from the day before.  She had touched the door--the glowing door--and then had met the girl.  She had touched the next door--also glowing-- and then had confronted the zombie.  Then she and Eric had opened the closet door--alright, enough with glowing doors!--and then the girl again.  A girl and a zombie.  Three doors.  Maybe the girl was actually two girls?  Didn’t Eric say an old man had killed twin sisters?  That would make sense of the one girl being sad and the other girl being freaky.  

She registered the fact that she was still playing and everyone else had stopped.  Mrs. Dunwoody was looking at her with annoyance.  “Sorry,” Penny called.  “Missed the cut off.  This gosh-darn music is just so complicated.”  She grimaced dramatically, and the rest of the band tittered. The band teacher just rolled her eyes.  

“Right, Penny.  Just try to pay a little better attention for the rest of the period, please?  You are the tempo-keeper for the rest of us--that’s an important job.”  She shifted her attention to the remaining restless middle schoolers.  “Okay, guys, I know we’re almost done for the day, but do your best to stay focused.  Let’s pick back up at measure sixteen.”

Rather than keep annoying Mrs. Dunwoody, who was actually pretty nice, Penny focused on playing and the last twenty minutes of class went by faster than she expected.  Soon she was fending off twenty questions about her day from Tina and trying to explain why they couldn’t walk home together.  

“I, uh, just gotta use the school computers for something,” Penny said evasively.

“Oh, well, I’ll just tell my mom I’ll be home by four and I’ll work on stuff too,” Tina answered dismissively.  

“Well, I don’t really think--” Penny started to say, but then sighed.  She knew a hopeless cause when she saw one.  “Fine.”  Eric would just have to deal with it.  

Penny stood rigidly still, her pulse thrumming as it quickened in her chest.  She saw it, glowing vividly, warmly, enticing her.  That was the only way to think about it.  Like it was calling to her, tempting her.  A perfect, glowing door.  It looked brand new, right out of wherever doors came from. Even the door knob was shiny and new. She felt as though she was being drawn nearer and nearer, and soon it was only inches that separated her from the door.  She glanced up, the light blinding her momentarily, transporting her to a life that was so familiar and yet so foreign, a life where she lived with her mom and dad, where they had loved her. The yearning in her chest was so strong that she quietly gasped with the pain.  She bit down on her lip hard, drawing tears to her eyes, and she brushed them away quickly, shifting her focus to the doorknob, that just like the others she had seen, had something etched into the metal.  She could still feel the pull of a door like a magnet, but she didn’t let it draw her focus away. Narrowing her eyes, she stared hard at the words engraved on the metal.

“These three that lead thee from death to life through time and back again,” she read, feeling the words turn to ice as she tried to speak them aloud, and try as she might, the words wouldn’t come.  The glow around the door pulsed, and Eric, who she had forgotten was there, leaned in for a look.  She blinked and felt the spell-like trance that had stolen over her fade.  Silently, she backed away, unwilling to look at the mysterious glow anymore.

“Three door handles,” she said quietly, imagining the two she had already seen.  This handle had a symbol etched over the word time.  She inspected the handle several more times, memorizing every detail, and scolding herself inwardly for not being more observant earlier.  Eric was still reading the words, his lips moving slightly.  Then, glancing at her, he spoke them aloud.  She heard them, felt them tearing at her, and couldn’t help wincing. Why had he been able to speak them?  As soon as he had finished, the light in the room became unbearably bright.  They both stumbled back and covered their eyes as the light pulsed blindingly white and then disappeared, leaving a plain, wooden door behind.  Penny looked around desperately, but sighed heavily when she realized that all the magic or whatever it was that had been coming from that door had disappeared with the light.  She shook her head. Her brain really couldn’t take any more of this.

“What is it with this place and doors?” Eric muttered irritably.  She could hear the frustration in his voice, like the frustration she was feeling in that moment. She couldn’t be sure what was more insane: the creepy zombie-ghost experiences, the fact that the whole place seemed to have swallowed them and taken them through a mind-boggling maze, or the three mysterious doors that had continually warped reality.

“Should we open it?” he asked, quietly, and she let out a short grunt and gave him a look that she hoped communicated that she thought he was nuts.  But before she could stop him, he reached out and touched the shining metal. She braced herself for chaos, but when he pulled the door open, nothing happened.  There was nothing but a brick wall behind the door.  She had to admit that once that bright glow had disappeared, she had stopped worrying about the mystical powers of it.

“I think its time to regroup,” she said straightening and looking around.  The “tunnel” they had come through was still where it had been before.  She stepped up to the enormous opening and squinted as she peered through.

“I’m going back,” she said, confident for some reason that the place at the other end would still be creepy but minus a few ghosts.  Besides, what choice did she have? She wasn’t going through that door if it was what she thought it was.  But that was what she really needed to do.  Think.

“Are you sure?” Eric asked, his voice quivering slightly as he spoke.

“Don’t be such a wimp,” Penny said, emitting confidence she didn’t really feel.  If she hadn’t detested him, she might have offered to hold his hand, or even just held it anyway, but she remembered the taunts at school, the look of amusement on his face, and it was easy to leave him behind and climb through the hole.

She wanted to gloat a little, rub it in his face, when she emerged into a creaking house filled with shadowy afternoon sunlight.  She suppressed a shiver as she glimpsed the moldy nursery furniture, but as her intuition had told her, there were no ghosts, zombies, or other undead creatures creeping through the house now.  Instead, it was just what it had appeared to be: an old, broken, empty mansion.

He had followed her through, his face betraying his confusion, but he didn’t speak or react to her gloating expression.  He just let her lead him through the dank hallway, down rickety stairs, and into the foyer.  They had used a side entrance, but Penny wasn’t sure where that was in relation to where she stood now and wasn’t really interested in trying to find it.

“Here, help me open this door,” she said, and together they began heaving themselves against the door.  If the planks nailed against it hadn’t been rotting away, she was sure they wouldn’t have been able to manage it, but after several hard shoves, the wood splintered and fell away.

When they emerged into the afternoon light, she felt such intense relief to be back in the world that her knees seemed to grow weak.

“What are you guys doing?” Tina squeaked, appearing from the side of the house, her face flushed and her eyes red.

“Whoa, what’s up with you?” Eric said, his face white in the afternoon light.

“I heard someone scream, and I totally thought you guys were dead. When I looked in through the windows I couldn’t see you anymore, and it got really cold out here.  It was the weirdest thing…” Her voice faded, and she shivered and wiped tears from her cheeks.

“I totally thought you guys were toast, and I was about to go get a grown-up or something when you came out the front door.”

“How long were we in there?” Penny asked.  It had seemed like hours, but she hadn’t been able to keep a grip on time with all the blacking out and running away from…whatever that guy was.

“Only a few minutes, but…”

“You didn’t call anyone did you?” Eric asked, sharply. Tina’s lip quivered but she shook her head. Penny, feeling bad, put her arm around the other girl.

“Hey, it’s okay.  We’re okay,” she said.  She glanced at Eric, giving him a cold stare, and tried to tell him mentally to keep the truth to himself.  Whether he understood her or not, he didn’t speak.  He just ran a hand through his hair and glanced around.

“I’ve got to get home,” he said awkwardly.

“Sounds good. See you later,” Penny said pointedly, hoping once again that he had picked up her meaning.  But he glanced at her, his face seeming to shift into his usual indifferent expression. Without another word, he turned and headed back around the side of the house, where she assumed he had stowed his backpack.

“What happened to you guys?  I really did hear someone scream.  And you both look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Tina asked, letting Penny lead her to the front gate.

“Let’s just get out of here,” Penny said, glancing back at the house, a cold sensation creeping over her skin as she glanced back at the house.

---

Tina’s mom insisted she stay for dinner, and Penny couldn’t refuse, tired of the TV dinners and frozen burritos her aunt had supplied for her evening meals.  Tina chatted nonstop through dinner, along with her four siblings, including a set of seven-year-old twin boys that were currently obsessed with Minecraft and determined to explain every detail of the castles they had been building. Admittedly, the noise and number of people was overwhelming, but she liked them.  Tina’s house was clean and bright, filled with electronic gadgets Penny hadn’t even heard of.  Her mother was a lawyer – “Not the kind on television. I’ve gone corporate,” she had explained with a breezy laugh, though Penny had to admit that she didn’t really know the difference.  But it must have meant they made a lot of money, judging from the nice cars and enormous house.  Tina’s dad was a surgeon. “Dad cuts open people’s brains,” one of the twins had told her, his eyes going as wide as his grin.  Penny was instantly glad she didn’t have a squeamish stomach.  And, despite the annoying little brothers, Tina’s family was super friendly, even her older sister, who was in high school.  As Tina’s mom drove her home, with Tina still chatting away in the front seat, and intermittently singing along with the radio, Penny felt something inside of her ache.  Like a hole that she hadn’t noticed until now.  But she knew it was there. Until she was alone, she ignored it.

“This is my phone number,” Tina said, handing her a piece of paper.

“Mom makes me shut my phone off at 8 every night, but you can message me when you’re bored.  Do you use Snapchat? Mom won’t let me have a Facebook.”

“Yeah, I have Snapchat,” Penny said, with a small grin.  She hadn’t used it in months, had intentionally ignored the notifications on her screen from her old friends.  If they could see her now, they wouldn’t even recognize her, she thought.

She waved to Tina as her mom backed out of the driveway, fumbling in her pocket for her keys at the same time.  The apartment was dark – she could tell from the parking lot – and her aunt’s car wasn’t in it’s space.  She wasn’t off work for three more hours.  Penny sighed heavily as she was finally left completely alone and hurried out of the darkness and into the building.

She triple-checked the locks, hung up her jacket on a hook near the door, and surveyed the empty apartment.  It was quiet and cold.  The minimal furniture and empty fridge made it feel as though no one lived here.  She tried to push the feelings down, tried to think of homework and school, tried to think of Tina, but she felt something inside of her break in half.  And right there, her back to the door, she slid to the floor, great, aching tears rolling down her cheeks as she realized this was what it was to be alone, to be left behind.

She would have stayed there all night if she hadn’t felt her phone begin vibrating in her pocket.  Confused, she pulled it out and stared at the screen.  Someone from a number she didn’t recognize was calling her. Her hands shook as she slid her finger across the screen.  And it took her a moment to steady her voice before she answered.

“Hello?”

“Penny?” It was a boy’s voice.  And she knew which boy.  She almost hung up, but memories of her psychotic afternoon stopped her.

“What do you want, Eric,” she muttered, knowing she sounded as miserable as she felt.

“We need to talk about what happened,” he said, his voice quiet but much steadier than hers.  She sighed and didn’t speak.

“How did you get my number?” she asked, her voice growing steely.

“Called Tina,” he said shortly.  She sighed.

“Okay, yeah, let’s talk.”

“Let’s meet in the library after school tomorrow,” he said, his voice low like he was telling her a secret.

“Regroup and research?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’ll see you there.”  He hung up before she could say anything.  She looked at her phone and shook her head.  Silently, she got to her feet and dragged herself and her backpack into her room, where she could bury herself in homework until she fell asleep.

When Penny awoke, she was lying on the floor of a dark room, her head throbbing as though someone had hit her over the head with a baseball bat. As she sat up, she rubbed her temples, trying to focus. Where was she? Better yet, how did she get her? A wave of panic swelled in her as she jumped up and started looking for a way out, ignoring the jab of pain her head as she did so.

“Eric!” she called, just in case he was somewhere nearby. She waited but heard nothing. She was alone.

It was dark enough wherever she was that she could practically feel it, so the first thing she did was pull out her phone. He battery was low and she had no signal, but she turned on the flashlight and started sweeping it around the room.

It was not a large room; there was a small bed in one corner, a chest of drawers in another. The window had been bricked up, so there was no way out through that. She saw two doors, one might just be a closet, but the other could be a way out. The first one she tried opened with only a little effort, but on the other side, she saw another wall of bricks. What kind of house was this? How on earth did she get stuck inside a bricked-up room? Those were questions she would have to answer later, right now she had to focus on getting out.

Taking a deep breath, she went to the second door. Before she touched the handle, she noticed markings like the ones she had seen downstairs. Shining her light on it, she saw that it was the same – except this time, their eyes were open. Maybe it meant something. She felt a chill, but took the handle anyway and pulled the door open.

A closet. She had gotten her hopes up on a closet. Rolling her eyes, she went inside and started to look around. There were old, moth-eaten dresses on wooden hangers, little shoes, and other things scattered around. It was eerie, to be sure, but Penny was not about to let her fear get the better of her. A floorboard creaked behind her and she turned, shining her light back into the room, but there was no one there. Finally, she found a small knobbed lever in the back of the wall that practically screamed “Pull me!” Instinctively, she didn’t want to touch it, but it was her only shot. She pulled the lever.

Immediately the floor under her feet started to shift. Jumping back as fast as possible, Penny managed to avoid getting drawn into the dark stairwell that was forming under her feet. She noticed something else when the floor started to move: the voices started up again. They were under her somewhere and they were louder than they were before.

“Hello?” she called into the darkness. The voices turned to whispers, but they didn’t stop. There was nothing for it. Using a shelf to keep herself steady, she started down the stairs. “If this is some kind of prank, it’s not funny guys!” she added, trying to keep her voice calm. No one answered.

Upon reaching the bottom of the stairs, they started to retract back into the ceiling. Penny whirled around, but there was nothing she could do. They were already gone.

She shone the light around her, but there was nothing nearby to help identify where she was. There were old children’s toys strewn around as though they had just been played with. Nothing looked dusty. There was light coming in from some distant window or gap in the ceiling, but she couldn’t tell where it started. Picking her way cautiously through the room, she followed the sound of the whispering.

Someone giggled and Penny turned around. Behind her, she saw someone in the shadows. “Hey,” she said, feeling a strange mixture of relief and fear. “Who’s there?”

The girl stepped forward. She was probably about eight, dressed in some weird old-fashioned dress, her hair in a braid. She was pale and looked scared rather than sinister. In one arm, she was carrying a ragged looking teddy-bear. If this was a prank, it was turning out to be a pretty elaborate one. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I know,” Penny answered, “but…”

“You need to go,” the girl interrupted, “before they come back.”

Penny swallowed hard. “Before – before who comes back?”

But the girl didn’t answer. She looked past Penny, her attention seemingly drawn to something else. Penny glanced over her shoulder, but saw nothing. When she turned back, the girl was gone.

“Great.” Penny muttered. “Just great.” With an inward sigh, she turned and set about her search again. The whispering grew louder with every step until it seemed to follow her instead of her following it. She found another staircase, this time going down, but the stairs looked worn and broken. She was not about to break her neck going down those, so she kept her slow search. Finally, she found a window. It seemed to be the source of the light, but when she looked through the cracks in the boards, she couldn’t see anything.

“Whatever,” she sighed. She turned away from the window and noticed a door in the wall that she hadn’t seen before. Curious, she went to it and inspected it. The handle was it’s normal, brass self, but it was lock or stuck fast. She tried for a solid two minutes, but nothing happened. Suddenly, there was a thump on the door from the other side. Penny jumped back just as a second thump sounded, accompanied by a low growl.

Another one; the door shook and blew apart in a shower of splinters!

Penny covered her head just in time. Then, silence fell. Penny looked up to see a large, decaying man standing in the doorway. He was breathing hard, as though he had just run a mile. He was tall, dressed in old, ragged clothes. His hair was lank and dark; his skin was as white as a ghost. He looked at Penny, threw back his head, and bellowed as loud as he could. He charged at her and she started to run, not the way she had come, but to her left, down a long dark corridor.

Grabbing the first thing she saw that looked like a club, she turned to face the man. He was growling at her, walking like a fast zombie and too close for comfort. As soon as he got close, she hit him with the piece of wood in her hand, knocking him to the ground. He stopped moving and she took her chance. Holding her phone out in front of her so she shouldn’t stumble, she made her way as fast as she could away from the horrifying man. On either side of her, she passed several doors.

The first one she opened led to what looked like had once been a nursery. There was a crib in one corner with an old mobile hanging haphazardly above it. Children's toys were strewn around the room as though the child had only just left it. Penny turned her light to the other corner and saw a light coming from under the closet door. It grew steadily brighter, filling the room. “I don’t like this,” she whispered, knowing no one would hear her. She backed out of the room, and started searching for another one.

She looked over her shoulder – the man had recovered from her attack and was not far behind her – so she wasn’t looking when she ran headlong into someone else, knocking them to the floor.

“Penny!” it was Eric. “What are you doing all the way up here?”

“Up here?” she repeated incredulously, before she had time to think. Then she remembered the man chasing her. “Quick! We need to hide.” She pulled Eric up and, to her surprise, opened the first door she came to, pushed him inside, closing the door behind them just as the creepy man tried to grab Eric’s collar.

“What was that?” he asked, eyes wide.

Penny was too busy pushing a dresser in front of the door to answer right away. “Whoever or whatever it is, it can break through doors.” She paused, “I could use a little help, you know.”

Together, they moved a few more pieces of furniture in front of the door, but the man or creature outside was not even trying to get in.

“Now,” Penny began, turning to face him, “What did you mean, ‘up here?’”

“This is the attic,” he said in a tone that implied she should already know that.

“But that doesn’t make sense,” she replied, “I came down here.”

“From where? Last time I saw you…well, last thing I knew, you were behind me.”

“But what happened?” Penny persisted. “I was just about to climb the stairs, then I woke up in some weird room. What happened to you?”

Eric was scratching his head thoughtfully. “There was this door…”

“I saw it too,” Penny interrupted excitedly.

He shot her an annoyed look. “I wanted to get to it, but I couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

Eric shrugged. “I don’t remember. I woke up at the foot of the stairs.”

She wasn’t buying it. “Then how did you get up here?”

“Found another staircase,” he answered easily. He moved past her and started to look at something on the wall behind her. “I only just got up here when I ran – you ran into me,” he corrected. “Hey, come look at this.”

He was shining his flashlight on the closet door. “We should open it,” he said, his voice sounding odd. “I can feel… I can’t explain it…”

The door in question looked like all the other doors Penny had seen today. There weren’t any figures on the handle, it didn’t even appear to be locked since Eric took the handle and started to turn it. It did give her a vague sense of unease, however.

“Sure, why not?” she answered slowly.

Eric, his hand still on the doorknob, pulled, and the door swung easily open. At first, it looked like just another closet, but when he shone his light into the darkness, it did not reach a wall. In fact, there was nothing beyond it but inky black emptiness.

“I wouldn’t go in there if I were you,” a voice said behind them.

As one, they whirled around, both shining their flashlights in the direction of the speaker. It was the same little girl Penny had seen in the other room not ten minutes ago. Well, it looked like the same girl, but this one was grinning at them in a way that made Penny’s skin crawl.

“Why not?” Eric demanded, seemingly unperturbed. “What’s in there?”

“It’s not what’s in there, it’s where it goes.” Her smile widened. “It’s a tunnel.” She said it like it was a challenge.

Eric and Penny exchanged a nervous glance, both trying to ignore the fact that the girl had appeared out of nowhere,

“I’m going to take my chances,” Penny told the girl stubbornly. Anything to get away from that man in the hall. She turned and plunged into the darkness, followed only by the sound of the girl’s angry scream. When she found herself on the other side of…of whatever it was, she looked around trying to get her bearings. The voices intensified and she felt the pulsing she had felt before, but differently. Behind her, Eric emerged from the sea of black. She heard his sharp intake of breath.

“What the…?”