The Floorboards’ Chorus

My sister Lena, who is twenty now, asked me to tell her story because she still can’t bear to type it out herself. It happened three summers ago, when she was seventeen and I was already married with two kids. We lived in a rambling old Victorian house our parents had converted into two flats – Mum and Dad upstairs, Lena and I (before I moved out) in the ground floor. The house was on a quiet street that dead-ended at the woods, and it had this peculiarity: the stairs and landing were made of thick, ancient pine, and every step had its own distinct groan, like a choir of old men complaining. You could tell who was coming up just by the rhythm of the creaks.

It was a sweltering July afternoon, around two. Lena was in her bedroom, which was at the top of the stairs on the left. She had the door shut and the telly on, some reality show. She remembers the exact moment because the announcer said something about the temperature. The windows were open, and she could hear the cicadas buzzing outside. Then, over the noise, she heard it – a creak on the landing. Not a random settling of the house. This was a footstep, slow and deliberate, right outside her door. Then another. And as the second creak faded, she heard the front door – which was directly opposite the bottom of the staircase – open and close. The door had a distinctive click-thud, like a heavy latch. She’d heard that sound a thousand times.

She froze, thinking it was me, maybe with the kids, coming for a surprise visit. But that didn’t make sense – I always called ahead. And Mum and Dad were at work. She muted the telly and listened. There was no sound on the stairs. No footsteps climbing. But the creaking on the landing continued, as if someone was walking back and forth. Slowly. Then it stopped. Lena sat there, heart thumping, for what felt like an hour. Finally, she got the courage to crack the door open. The landing was empty. She peered down the stairs – the front door was shut, the chain was on (Mum insisted on it), and there was no one. She checked the other rooms – nothing. She called Mum, who told her it was just the house settling, old pipes, whatever. But Lena knew what she heard.

Over the next two weeks, it became a regular occurrence. Every few days, the same thing: the creaking on the landing, always around two in the afternoon, always followed by the front door sound. But one day it was different. She was lying on her bed, reading, and she heard the creaks start. Then she heard a whisper – a soft murmur, like someone talking just under their breath. She couldn’t make out words, but it was definitely a voice. And then, the worst part: she felt the air change. The room got cold, and she felt that unmistakable prickle on the back of her neck, like she was being watched. She looked towards the door, and she saw the handle turn. Slowly. Then back. She screamed, and the handle flew back to its original position. The creaking stopped.

She told me about it that evening, crying. I tried to reassure her, but I had the same prickle myself. That night, I came over with the kids, and we stayed in her room on a mattress on the floor. Nothing happened while we were there. But the next week, I had to work late, and Lena was alone again. At 2:02 PM, the creaking started. This time, it was different: it was also happening on the stairs, as if someone was coming up. She heard the front door open and close with a slam. Then a heavy footstep on the bottom stair, then the second, the third. She was in her room, frozen. The footsteps climbed steadily, pausing at the top. The landing creaked. Then her bedroom door slowly slid open. No one was there. But on the floor, just inside the doorway, there was a damp handprint.

Lena moved in with me the next day. We told Mum and Dad, who were skeptical but agreed to have a priest come and bless the house. The priest found nothing. But the day after Lena left, the creaking stopped. We thought it was over. But three weeks later, I was at Mum’s house alone, going through old boxes in the attic. I found a photo album I’d never seen. It had pictures of the house from the 1980s, when a woman named Margaret lived here with her husband. She was a nurse, and she died in the house. The cause of death was listed as ‘complications from a fall on the stairs.’ I turned the page, and there was a picture of the landing, taken from the bottom of the stairs. In the background, on the landing, there was a faint, translucent figure of a woman in a nurse’s uniform. She looked like she was walking, and her mouth was open as if speaking. I showed it to Lena, and she pointed at the figure’s hand – it was missing a finger. The same handprint on her floor had had a missing finger.

Now, we don’t talk about it much. But sometimes, when I’m alone in my own house, and the floorboards creak, I think of Margaret. And I wonder if she’s still trying to tell us something – or if she’s just angry. Lena still refuses to go back to that house, and I can’t blame her. But the most chilling part came a month later. Lena called me, her voice shaking. She said she was cleaning her room in my house, and she found a photograph. She’d taken it with her phone a week ago, a selfie of her and me in my back garden. But in the background, at the kitchen window, there was a woman’s face. It was blurred, but it was there. Lena had seen it too. We deleted that photo, but we haven’t been able to shake the feeling that Margaret didn’t stay in the old house. She followed something – or someone – out. And she’s not done with us yet.