The Bloodstain on the Wall

When I was seven, my family moved into a sprawling Victorian house on the edge of a town that seemed to have forgotten it existed. The place had been empty for years, and the realtor’s smile never reached her eyes when she handed over the keys. My room was at the end of a long hallway, a corner room with tall windows that faced a dead oak tree. As we tore down the old floral wallpaper, we found a dark, rusty stain that bled through the plaster, spreading like a map of some unknown country. My parents dismissed it as an old leak, but I knew better. It was too large, too deliberate, too much like the shape of a man sprawled on his back.

It started with the curtains. Every morning, before the sun was fully up, I would lie in bed, watching the pale light filter through the cheap cotton. And then I would see him: a face, not quite solid, forming in the folds. He had a high forehead, a sharp nose, and a beard that seemed to move like smoke. He wore a crown, tarnished and bent, and his eyes were empty sockets that still managed to stare right through me. I would hold my breath, frozen, until the light shifted and the face dissolved back into the fabric. I never told my parents. They would have laughed, or worse, sent me to a therapist.

The face began to appear in other places. On the window glass when it rained, in the grain of the wooden floor, in the water stains on the ceiling. Always the same face, always that crown, always staring. I started to talk to him, at first just in my head, then out loud. ‘Who are you?’ I’d ask in the dark. The curtains would ripple, but there was no answer. I called him the King, because of the crown, and because he seemed to demand attention.

When I was nine, I found a loose floorboard under my bed. Beneath it, wrapped in a discolored cloth, was an old photograph. It showed a man with the same face, standing in front of this very house, but the house looked new, and the man was dressed in clothes from a hundred years ago. On the back, in faded ink, was written: ‘He is still watching. Forgive him.’ I shoved the photo back into the hole and replaced the board, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

That’s when the face became more active. It would whisper my name in the middle of the night, a sound like dry leaves scraping against stone. I woke up one morning to find the bloodstain on the wall had grown, spreading to the ceiling, forming the vague outline of a crown. My parents noticed it then, and my father tried to scrub it away, but it only darkened, like a bruise. He muttered something about ‘old houses’ and ‘rust,’ but I saw the fear in his eyes.

The King started to follow me in mirrors. I’d be brushing my teeth, and behind my reflection, a shadow would shift, and there he would be, his mouth moving as if trying to speak. I couldn’t hear him, but I felt the words crawl under my skin. I began to stay in my room as little as possible, but he was waiting for me in the hallway, in the kitchen, in the car window. The school nurse called my mother, concerned about the dark circles under my eyes, but I couldn’t explain. I was thirteen, and I was terrified.

One night, I woke up to find myself standing in front of my bedroom window, the curtains thrown open, pressing my palms against the cold glass. The moon was full, and in the reflection, I saw not just the King, but the whole background: a room I recognized from the photograph, with vintage furniture and a four-poster bed. I was standing in that room, not my own. The King was behind me, his crown glinting, his hand reaching for my shoulder. I screamed, and the image shattered, and I was back in my room, lying on the floor, my heart pounding.

After that, I learned to sleep with the lights on, and I kept a silver cross under my pillow, though I wasn’t religious. The King didn’t like it. The air in my room turned cold, and the whispers turned to a low growl. My parents, worried, hired a medium. She took one look at my room and went pale. She said there was a ‘spirit of authority’ here, a man who had owned the land before the house was built, and who had been wrongly wronged. She said he wasn’t evil, but he was tied to this place, and he was trying to communicate. She gave me a small sachet of herbs and told me to hang it over my bed. I did, and the face became less clear, less present, but it never fully disappeared.

Now, I’m fourteen, and I still live in this house. The King is still here, but I’ve come to understand something. He’s not trying to hurt me. He’s trying to tell me something, to confess something. The bloodstain on the wall is his, isn’t it? He’s the one who died in this room. And he wants me to know the truth. I’ve started to see him more clearly now. His crown is broken, his clothes are torn, and his eyes hold sorrow, not menace. Last week, I finally gathered the courage to clear the floorboard and look at the photograph again. I turned it over, and the writing had changed. It now said: ‘He was murdered. Avenge him.’

I don’t know what to do. I’m just a kid, moving into a house with a past. But I feel him now, a constant pressure, a presence that follows me even to school. And that face, that king, he’s not going away. He wants something, and I’m afraid that if I don’t find out what it is, he’ll never let me go. I’ve started to research the history of the house, the land, the old records. There’s something there, I’m sure of it. But every time I get close, the lights flicker, and the whispers grow louder, and I wonder if I’m ready for the truth. I know I’m young, but I’m not imagining this. This is real, and I need help. I need to know how to communicate with him. I need to know how to set him free, and maybe, set myself free too.