The Faint Smell of Cinnamon

I was twelve, spending the weekend at my mom’s place in the old apartment building on Elm Street. My mom had moved there after the divorce, and the place always smelled faintly of cinnamon, which I thought was weird because she never baked. But that weekend, the smell was stronger, like someone had just spilled a bottle of the spice on the radiator.

I was asleep on the pull-out couch in the living room, the glow from the kitchen light casting long, distorted shapes across the floor. At around 5 a.m., I woke up to a voice, clear and close, right next to my ear. It said, “Leave this place.” The voice was low, almost a whisper, but it sounded like it was coming from the empty armchair across the room. I froze, my heart pounding. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to convince myself it was a dream, but I stayed awake, too scared to move, until exhaustion claimed me again.

An hour later, I woke to the sound of footsteps. They were slow, deliberate, crossing the kitchen linoleum. Through the doorway, I saw a tall, dark figure, but it wasn’t my stepdad, who was thin and always wore a bathrobe. This figure was bulky, with shoulders that seemed to block the light. It moved not toward the bathroom but straight toward me, each step creaking the floorboards. I opened my mouth to shout, but only a croak came out. Then I screamed, “Mom!” The figure halted, then dissolved, melting into the shadows near the door.

My mom burst in, flicking on the overhead light. She had a frantic look, her hair disheveled. I told her everything through sobs. She sat on the edge of the couch, her face pale, and said, “We’ll talk about it in the morning.” She didn’t turn off the light; she just sat there with me until I drifted off.

In the morning, the cinnamon smell was gone, replaced by the stale odor of cigarettes from the neighbors. My mom made me a bowl of cereal, then sat across from me, her hands wrapped around her coffee mug. She said, “You’re right, the house is haunted. I’ve known since we moved in, but I didn’t want to scare you. I’ve seen it too, a shadow figure, always in the corner of my eye, always when the cinnamon smell is strong. It doesn’t want us here.” I felt a chill run down my spine, but then she added, “But it never hurt me, just scared me. I’ve been trying to ignore it, but maybe we need to do something.”

That afternoon, she called a medium, a woman with long silver hair who smelled like lavender. She walked through the apartment, her eyes closed, pausing in the kitchen. She said the spirit was a former resident who had died in the building, a man who was possessive of the space. He didn’t want anyone new there. The medium performed a cleansing, burning sage and chanting. The cinnamon smell intensified, then vanished, and a window slammed shut on its own.

The medium left, saying she had crossed the spirit over. For a few days, the apartment felt lighter, the air cleaner. But on the next weekend, when I came to stay, the cinnamon was back, thicker than ever. I didn’t hear the voice that night, but I woke to see the shadow standing at the foot of the couch. This time, I didn’t scream. I just watched it. It pointed a long, dark finger toward the front door, then slowly faded.

I told my mom, and she finally said, “I think we should move. I can’t keep living like this.” We moved to a small house on Maple Street, leaving the apartment behind. The cinnamon smell never followed us. But sometimes, late at night, I catch a whiff of it, and I know that shadow is still there, waiting for someone else to leave the place it still calls home.

Years later, I found out that the apartment building was demolished, and the ground was paved over for a parking lot. But I still get a chill whenever I pass that spot, and the faint smell of cinnamon lingers in my memory, a reminder that some places don’t let go easily.