Our First House

Recently me and my girlfriend, Heather, decided that after being together for two years it was time for us to move in together, we purchased a nice little house on the outskirts of our home town for such a low price that it felt like we were practically stealing it. The house is small with only one bedroom and bathroom but for a young couple like us it is perfect and we couldn’t have asked for better.

The house is old and like all old houses it has a lot of various creaks and noises with some loose and creaky floorboards and steps on the stairs so when we hear creaks and other small noises during our first night in the house we write it off as just the house settling. The sounds continue throughout our first week of living in the house and we continue to put it down to it being an old house and slowly we start to get used to the more prominent sounds like the hollow sounding floorboard near the front door, the high pitched squeak of the fifth step on the stairs and the low pitch groan of the step at the top of the stairs.

“George. George. Wake up, someone’s in the house.” Heather whispers urgently as she shakes me violently snapping me out of a peaceful dream.

“What? What are you talking about?” I ask her still groggy from having just been suddenly woken up from a deep sleep.

“Someone is in the house, I heard the floorboard by the door creak.” Heather whispers frantically with panic obvious in her voice.

I’m about to tell her that it is probably nothing and just the house creaking but the second I open my mouth to speak I hear the distinctive high pitched squeak of the fifth step. The sound wipes away all traces of sleep and doubt leaving me wide awake and ready to have to defend myself and my girlfriend from some intruder with unknown maybe vicious intentions.

I climb out of bed as quietly as possible and while still trying to remain silent I walk over to the chest of drawers and from out of the top draw I take a large torch, the kind made from metal that security guards use and can double as a weapon if the need arises. I switch the torch on to check that the batteries aren’t dead and that the torch will work, the torch illuminates the bedroom and I quickly flick it off satisfied that it is working and I start to move towards the closed bedroom door.

My hand is on the door handle when I hear it, the low groaning sound of pressure on the top step of the stairs, my blood runs cold and I freeze with my hand still on the handle because the stairs stop directly opposite the bedroom door and I know that whoever is inside our house could be right there on the other side of the door. I stand completely still waiting for some kind of sound to let me know that they have moved on or for the handle to move in my hand as they try to get into our room but nothing happens so after a tense couple of minutes of uncertainty I quickly open the door and flick the torch on at the same time hoping to catch the intruder off guard and blind them with the powerful torch light.

It takes a second for my eyes to adjust to the light but when they do I see nothing, there is no sign of any intruder and nothing seems to be out of place but I have to be certain. I tell Heather to stay in the bedroom but she refuses and demands upon accompanying me on my search of the house as she is understandably frightened of being left alone with a possible intruder in the house.

Knowing that we would have heard the stairs creaking and groaning again if someone had gone back down them we decide to check the upstairs rooms first starting with the bathroom, walking into the bathroom I turn the light on and look around the room finding no one in my search we head back out to check in the small storage room. The storage room yields the same results as the bathroom with no evidence of someone being in there so thinking that maybe they quietly slipped out of the storage room and into our bedroom while we were looking inside the bathroom we head back into our bedroom and quickly look around, once again we find no signs of an intruder.

Secure in the knowledge that there is no one in the upstairs of our house we decide that we have to check the downstairs, we leave all the lights on upstairs as we turn the stairs light on and descend. We search the downstairs of our house twice, once to check that there isn’t anyone inside and a second time to make sure that the doors are locked and the windows are closed and secure. Once we have made sure that all the doors and windows are secure and that no one is inside the house we head back upstairs in the hopes that we will be able to get back to sleep but we are so filled with adrenaline and fright that neither of us can get much rest.

The next day we are both exhausted and on edge, jumping at every creak and sound we hear within the house until the afternoon when thankfully my parents decide pay us a surprise visit. I’ve always been very close with my parents who are kind and loving people, Heather even proclaimed that while we are together she is adopting them as her parents because her own are abusive, so having my parents come to visit is a blessing after the night we had.

We tell my parents about what had happened the night before and my dad tells us to get security alarms and maybe even cameras installed so if anything like this happens again we will be able to see if someone has broken in or not. We agree that it is a good idea and will look into it, we spend the rest of their visit catching up, chatting and just having a generally good time, before we know it my parents are saying their goodbyes and darkness is falling.

Both Heather and myself are still shook up from the night before and are hesitant to try and get any sleep so as some kind of reassurance we leave the stairs light on. We lie there for what feels like hours unable to sleep but eventually we drift off.

I dream while I sleep, a strange dream that includes Heather and myself lying in bed sleeping but that isn’t all because at the window is what looks like a child only it isn’t inside the room with us but is outside which would be impossible anywhere else but in my dream because of us being on the first floor with no balcony or anything for someone to stand on and children don’t just float in mid air. I study the children trying to make out details but I can’t, I can’t even see any facial features, it’s like a piece of the darkness has suddenly decided to take on the form of a child, while I study the shadowy figure it raises a hand and seemingly points at me and while still pointing at me it taps on the window, once, twice, three times and on the third tap I jolt awake in bed.

I wake quickly with the feelings of pure terror and panic and for a few minutes I lie there paralysed and unable to move through the intense emotions but eventually I manage to get my panting breaths under control and then the rest of my body follows but as I calm down I start to hear a sound, a soft tapping on our bedroom window. The terror and panic return with force and I’m once again unable to move apart from to shake in fright because I know that there is nothing outside of the window that could make a tapping noise, not even any tree branches.

Despite my ragged breaths and the soft yet constant tapping at the window I hear the moment that Heather starts to wake up, I hear her start to whisper my name but I quickly and quietly shush her scared that whatever it is at the window will some how be able to get inside if it hears her voice.