Page 6 of The Ghost of Ellwood
A room set to the left of the entrance. Looked like a parlor.
A thud came from upstairs.
“Someone there?” I asked, snapping my attention upward.
Probably just the house settling.
My phone rang, and I jumped like five feet high. I chuckled at myself and retrieved it from my pocket, seeing it was the moving company.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Cross? We just got into town,” Frank, the driver, said. I’d met him early that morning when they came to pack my things into the truck. “What’s the street name again?”
“Ellwood,” I answered. “Go straight down the road and it’s the house at the end.”
***
The first night in my new house was uneventful. For the most part.
Staying in a new place always came with a few odd occurrences. All of which could be explained. The manor was old, for one, and old homes tended to creak and groan. With the cold front coming in, some of the noises came from the wind blowing against the outside. Tree branches had scraped against the siding.
In the city, I had heard so much; cars, sirens, and other people. So, of course, being somewhere secluded and quiet would make the smaller noises more noticeable.
Even though I had woken up several times during the night, I opened my eyes refreshed and ready to start the day the next morning. After the movers arrived yesterday and unpacked the truck, I had been able to sort through some of the boxes but had stopped when exhaustion won over. I wasn’t able to fully explore the manor, either, and planned to do so that day.
First things first? I needed coffee.
I pulled myself out of bed, stretching as I did. Two five foot windows were in the room, and the sun streamed in, adding life to the place. A new day. A new adventure.
I still couldn’t believe I uprooted my life on a whim and moved over two hours away from the city. I didn’t know anyone in Ivy Grove. A gut feeling told me I had made the right decision, though.
The floor was cool beneath my feet as I padded across the room and pulled on pants and a long-sleeved shirt. While I was at it, I slipped on socks too.
Boxes holding movies, books, and more clothes were stacked against the far wall. All things I’d get to at some point. I baffled once again at the size of the room. I had my queen-sized bed, a dresser, TV and entertainment center, plus a bedside table, and there wasstillspace for more.
It would also take a while to get used to the constant chill in the air. Seeing as to how a majority of the house had hardwood floors, it made sense for it to be on the cooler side.
After making a quick stop to the bathroom, I walked down the stairs to the kitchen. The dark gray cabinets were broken up by a red countertop, and a red curtain was draped in the oval window above the stainless steel sink. One wall had rose-printed wallpaper that would definitely need to be replaced at some point, but the other walls were painted cream and weren’t so bad.
More boxes littered the floor, and I stepped around them on the way to the coffee pot. It took a bit of searching to find my can of coffee, but once I did, I added water to the pot and clickedstart.The hissing of the machine as it started to brew added noise to the otherwise quiet morning.
I slid onto the barstool and checked emails on my phone before browsing social media. Readers had tagged me in posts, some asking about the new book and others posting about reading my older ones.
And then I came across a post with several hundred comments.
Ben Cross has lost his touch!Murder in Scottsvillewas the worst book I’ve ever read. Predictable and boring. Used to be my fav author.
A reply to the post:OMFG I agree! What happened to him?
Another response:I hate when authors get too successful and start crapping out on the quality of their books. They write shit and expect us to spend our hard-earned cash on it.
I stopped reading the comments. Nothing like a nice sprinkle of self-deprecation to jumpstart my morning. That was a hard dose of reality. I never intentionally wrote a shitty book. Shit just happened sometimes. And no one was more disappointed about it than me.
As I ripped open several boxes, searching for a coffee cup, a thump sounded from behind me.
I jumped around, looking at the open archway leading out of kitchen. The noise had come from the hall. I waited with bated breath for some explanation for the thump.
Had a stray animal gotten inside? Or maybe it was a mouse?
