The Hollow Between the Stairs

It began on a Tuesday, not with a scream or a cold draft, but with a creak. My name is Elowen, and for the past six months, I’ve been seeing a boy. Not a ghost, not a dream—he’s as real to me as the splinters in the banister of our century-old farmhouse. My parents think I’m grieving, that losing my twin brother last spring unhinged me. But I know what I see.

We moved to this house in March, a sprawling wreck of timber and slate that my father inherited from a great-uncle no one spoke of. The renovation was slow, and the stairway to my attic room was still just bare planks, gaps showing the dusty crawlspace below. That’s where I first saw him—a boy, maybe seven, with hollow cheeks and eyes that seemed to swallow light. He was crouched between the floor joists, his fingers wrapped around a rusted nail. He smiled, but it wasn’t a child’s smile. It was a fissure in his face, revealing blackened teeth.

I told my father that night, but he just patted my shoulder and said, ‘Old houses play tricks, Ellie. Remember when you thought you heard your brother’s voice in the walls?’ I remembered. I also remembered that my brother’s voice came from the same crawlspace. But I said nothing.

A week later, I found a drawing on my pillow. It was a stick figure girl with a noose around her neck, and below it, the word ‘BENEATH’ in shaky letters. The paper was damp, smelling of earth and rot. I confronted my mother, but she dismissed it as a prank, perhaps from a neighbor kid. Yet when she held the paper, her hand trembled, and she quickly burned it in the fireplace.

The boy grew bolder. He would dart across my peripheral vision, always at the edge of the stairwell. I heard him humming a lullaby that I didn’t recognize, but the melody seeped into my bones like cold water. One night, I left a glass of milk on the landing as an offering, a silly gesture. By morning, it was filled with black soil and a single white button.

Desperate, I researched the house’s history. In the county records, I found an old newspaper from 1927 tucked between ledger pages. The headline read: ‘FARM BOY DIES IN SILO ACCIDENT.’ The boy’s name was Thomas, aged seven. The article mentioned he had been playing near the house when he fell into the grain silo. His body wasn’t found for three days. I felt a chill crawl up my spine as I recalled that the silo’s foundation was directly beneath the stairwell.

That night, I decided to confront him. I waited on the top step, the bare wood groaning under my weight. As the clock struck midnight, a whisper rose from the gap below: ‘Ell-owen.’ I peered through the slats and saw his white face upturned. ‘Why do you hide?’ I asked, my voice quivering. He pointed a grimy finger at a loose board beneath the second step. ‘Your brother is not in the walls. He’s in the ground with me.’

I felt a surge of anger and grief. ‘That’s not true,’ I snapped. ‘My brother is gone, but he’s not with you.’ The boy tilted his head, his neck making a sickening crack. ‘He came to visit me,’ he said, ‘but I wouldn’t let him leave. Now he’s my playmate. Would you like to stay too?’

I ran to my room, slamming the door, and shoved a chair against it. For the rest of the night, I heard the sound of scratching beneath the floorboards, as if something was clawing its way up. By morning, it had stopped. I cautiously opened the door and saw a small mound of dirt on the landing, topped with a faded photograph—my brother’s school picture, face down.

I knew what I had to do. I grabbed a shovel and went to the silo foundation, now a pit of rubble and weeds. My parents had warned me not to go near it, citing structural danger. But I didn’t care. I dug until my hands blistered, and then I hit something solid. A small wooden box, rotted and crumbling. Inside, I found a child’s teeth and a clump of dark hair, bound with a strip of cloth that matched my brother’s favorite scarf.

I stumbled back, retching. Then I heard the boy’s voice, clearer than ever, right behind me: ‘You found us. Now you can join.’ I spun around, but there was no one. When I turned back, the box was empty, and the dirt mound on the landing had grown into a figure—a small silhouette that merged with the shadows. I slammed the door, but I could still hear his humming, coming from every corner of the house.

My parents think I’ve lost my mind. They whisper about sending me to a doctor. But I know the truth: I never had a choice. The boy was always there, waiting beneath the stairs, and now, he’s waiting for me to take the final step. I only hope that, somehow, someone else reads this and knows they’re not alone. Because down in that hollow, between the planks, there’s a place that never really empties—and it’s hungry.