Page 21 of Eldritch

The wall. The carpet. A sconce.

Three things she could hear.

What did she hear? The sound of Letisha running the other vacuum cleaner? She couldn’t hear Pauline or Maria working on the bathrooms and bedrooms on the second floor. The wind? No. She couldn’t hear it. This house’s stone structure was too solid to hear the weather outside unless a thunderstorm unleashed lightning like it had yesterday. Nope. She heard nothing else.

What did she feel? Her hair tickling her neck. The clothes on her body. Her breath moving in and out.

What did she smell? Pipe smoke. She sniffed deeply. Surprised. Someone was smoking a pipe in here? No--

She stepped forward until she could see the north side bedrooms again. And that’s when she saw it.

“No fucking way,” she said out loud. This time the words coming out harsh and louder than she would normally speak.

That door hadn’t been open when she’d been in the hall a few short minutes ago.

With a sound of disgust, she walked swiftly toward her bedroom door. She stopped in front of the slightly ajar door for a second, hesitating. What if the person who’d been messing with them was in the bedroom right now? If she called sheriff’s department again, this situation would turn into a shit show. No, she wasn’t doing it.

With her belly jumping with nerves, and her heart stumbling from time-to-time, she noticed that someone had left the door cracked open about four inches.

“Hello. Is anyone there?”

Silence.

A heavy weight.

She listened. Nothing. Okay, it was now or never. Time to step in there. She reached for the door handle.

Shuffling came from behind her.

She gasped, turned around. Letisha stood there at the end of the hallway.

“Jesus,” Sybil said as her friend headed down the hall toward her. “You scared the shit outta me.”

Letisha frowned. “I was checking on the ladies on the second floor and didn’t hear the vacuum on up here.”

Sybil shook her head and kept her voice lower. “I think there’s someone in my room.”

Letisha screwed up her face. “What?”

“Look down the hall. All the way to the window and all the way to the south end hall on this floor. There are new footprints. They weren’t here earlier.” She hesitated and then took the chance she wouldn’t sound like a funny farm occupant. “When I investigated the south side and then came back this way, my door was open. It wasn’t before. Someone is jerking us around.”

Unease flashed over Letisha’s face. “Shit.”

Sybil’s imagination recalled a scene with a character in a movie where the woman was so over a situation that she pointed at her neck and begged someone to strangle her.

Do it! Do it! Just do it! The character had closed her eyes and tilted her head back as she said it.

Do it. Do it. Do it.

Sybil pushed her bedroom door open and walked inside.

“Wait,” Letisha almost hissed the word.

Sybil looked around. No one was in the room. “Unless they’re in the bathroom or under the bed.” She headed toward the ensuite bathroom. The door was halfway closed. She reached for it and pushed it open. “If there’s anyone in here--”

Empty. Letisha came in behind her.

Letisha sighed. “Well, at least this isn’t The Shining. Otherwise you’d have an old, nasty, rotting woman moldering in the bathtub.”

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