The Hollow Below

In the autumn of 2009, I moved into a crumbling Victorian house with my fiancé, Elias. We had been drawn to it by the low price and the promise of solitude, nestled on the edge of a dense forest in upstate New York. The house had once been a bed-and-breakfast, but it had been abandoned for decades, its grandeur faded to peeling wallpaper and sagging floors. I was a freelance illustrator, and I worked from home, so the solitude was a blessing. Elias worked in the city, an hour’s drive away, and left early each morning, leaving me to the creaking silence of the house.

From the start, there was something wrong. The house had a strange layout, with a narrow staircase that led to a door that opened onto a wall, and a room in the attic that was always cold, no matter the season. I tried to brush it off as old-house quirks, but I couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched. I began hearing noises at night—the sound of heavy furniture being dragged across the floor above my bedroom, even though the attic was empty. I would lie awake, staring at the ceiling, listening to the groans and thuds, and I would tell myself it was just the house settling.

One day, as I was unpacking a box of old books in the study, I noticed a small, loose floorboard near the fireplace. Curious, I pried it up and discovered a hidden compartment containing a leather-bound journal, its pages yellowed and brittle. The handwriting was elegant but faded, and it was dated 1908. The journal belonged to a woman named Clara, who had lived in the house with her husband, a doctor. Her entries started out mundane, but they soon grew darker. She wrote of a ‘presence’ in the house, something that lived in the walls and spoke to her in whispers. She described a ‘hollow below the house’—a space she was convinced was a portal to another realm. The last entry, dated a week before her death, said: ‘It has taken my husband into the hollow. I must follow to find him.’

I should have thrown the journal away, but I was fascinated. I began researching the history of the house and discovered that several people had died here over the years, all under mysterious circumstances. A builder had fallen from the roof, a maid had drowned in a bathtub, and a previous owner had been found dead in the basement, his body covered in strange marks. The local library had a section on ‘The Hollow House,’ as it was called, and I found an old newspaper article that mentioned a ‘subterranean chamber’ beneath the property, sealed off by an earlier owner after a series of bizarre occurrences.

Night after night, the sounds grew louder. I started seeing things in my peripheral vision—a shadow that moved too quickly, a figure standing at the end of the hallway. Elias thought I was working too hard, but I knew it was real. I began to lose sleep, and my work suffered. I was drawing the same image over and over: a dark opening, like a well, surrounded by roots and stone. It was as if the house was speaking to me, guiding me to something.

One evening, while Elias was away on a business trip, I decided to explore the basement. It was a damp, claustrophobic space with dirt floors and stone walls. I had never been down there for long, but now I was determined to find the source of the haunting. As I swept my flashlight across the walls, I noticed a section that seemed newer, covered in a different type of brick. I knocked on it, and it sounded hollow. I found a loose brick and pulled it out, revealing a dark tunnel just large enough to crawl through. My heart pounded, but I couldn’t resist. I took a deep breath and crawled inside.

The tunnel sloped downward, and after about twenty feet, it opened into a larger chamber. The air was cold and musty, and the beam of my flashlight revealed a circular room with a stone floor. In the center was a pit, about six feet in diameter, and from it rose a faint, sulfurous smell. I peered into the pit, but I couldn’t see the bottom. It was a bottomless void. I felt a dizziness, a pull, as if the pit was calling to me. I staggered back, but the pull was strong. I could hear whispers from below, voices that seemed to speak my name. I backed away, crawling out of the tunnel, and I collapsed on the basement floor, gasping for breath.

After that, the house became unbearable. I could feel the pit’s presence everywhere, a constant pressure at the back of my mind. I tried to tell Elias, but he dismissed it as my imagination. He said the house was old and creepy, and I needed a break. But I knew I had to leave. I started packing, but every time I tried to leave, something would happen: I would lose my keys, or the car wouldn’t start, or I would get a sudden, paralyzing headache. It was as if the house was preventing me from escaping.

On the night before I planned to leave for good, I woke to a loud crash from the basement. I got up, my heart racing, and grabbed a flashlight. I didn’t want to go down there, but I felt compelled. I crept down the stairs, and the basement door was open. The tunnel entrance was wide open, and from the pit, I could hear a voice—Clara’s voice, whispering, ‘Come down, we are waiting.’ I knew I was losing my grip on reality, but I couldn’t stop myself. I crawled into the tunnel and reached the chamber.

The pit was now emitting a faint, blue light. I looked down, and instead of darkness, I saw a spiral of stairs descending into a vast, underground city, lit by torches. The architecture was ancient, alien, with arches and pillars that seemed to twist and writhe. And there were figures moving among the buildings—humanoid but wrong, with too-long limbs and heads that tilted at unnatural angles. One of them looked up at me, and its face was a mask of agony. It opened its mouth, and a high-pitched scream filled the chamber, sending me to my knees. I clamped my hands over my ears, but the sound was inside my head. I felt a hand on my shoulder, and I turned to see Clara standing beside me. Her eyes were black, and her skin was like parchment. She said, ‘You came. Now you can never leave.’

I don’t remember how I got out of the basement. The next morning, I woke up in my bed, with no memory of the night before. But I felt different—heavier, as if something had attached itself to me. Elena, my best friend, called to check on me, and I told her I was fine. But I wasn’t. I could see the pit everywhere, reflected in mirrors, in the glass of the window. I could hear whispers throughout the day. I stopped painting, stopped eating. I spent my days staring at the wall, trying to block out the voices.

Elias came home, and I tried to act normal, but he could see something was wrong. He asked me what had happened, and I broke down, telling him everything. He listened, and to my surprise, he said he believed me. He had been having nightmares too, he said, of a house beneath the house, and something calling him. We decided to sell the house and leave immediately. But when we tried to pack, the house fought back. Doors slammed shut, objects fell from shelves, and the temperature dropped. The whispering grew louder, until it was a constant drone.

We made it to the car in a blind panic, but the engine wouldn’t start. We looked back at the house, and in the upstairs window, we saw a figure watching us. It was Clara, and she was smiling. Elias grabbed my hand and said, ‘We have to go back and seal the tunnel.’ He had a plan. He had seen a supply of cement in the basement, and we could use it to block the tunnel and the pit. I felt a surge of hope. We went back inside, armed with a bag of cement and a trowel.

We descended into the basement, and the tunnel entrance was still open. I could hear a low hum from the chamber beyond. Elias started mixing the cement, his hands shaking. I kept watch, my flashlight beam trembling over the darkness. As we entered the tunnel, the humming grew louder, and the walls seemed to close in on us. When we reached the chamber, the pit was glowing again, and the figures from the city were ascending the stairs, their screams now a chorus. Elias poured the cement into the pit, and it started to froth and bubble, as if something was fighting back. We worked frantically, sealing the tunnel, brick by brick, until it was done.

Finally, the house fell silent. We stood in the basement, covered in dust and sweat, and for the first time in weeks, I felt a sense of peace. We left the house that day, and never looked back. But as we drove away, I glanced in the rearview mirror, and I saw the house in the distance, and on the porch, a figure stood. It was Clara, and she was waving. I blinked, and she was gone.

We moved to a tiny apartment in Albany, and I tried to put the experience behind me. But I still have nightmares. I wake up screaming, and I can’t remember why. Sometimes, I think I hear the whispers, just at the edge of hearing, calling my name. And at night, if I look out my window, I swear I can see a faint blue glow in the distance, pulsing like a heartbeat. I know the pit is still there, still waiting. And I know that one day, it will call me back.