The Hollow Wardrobe

We called it the Ridge, a crumbling house perched atop a granite outcrop that jutted from the woods like a rotten tooth. To reach it, you had to navigate a long, winding dirt road that snaked through thick pine and oak, and if you weren’t looking for the rusty mailbox half-swallowed by ferns, you’d pass it by. The house itself was a Victorian relic, with a gabled roof and a wraparound porch that sagged in places, and it came with a deep, natural cave behind the cellar and a hill that rose steeply from the backyard, its top bare of trees, giving a clear view of the surrounding forest. We moved in when I was nine, fresh from the city, and my parents were determined to make it a home.

The first oddity began within a week. We heard scratching in the attic, a rhythmic, deliberate sound like claws on wood. My father, a practical man, dismissed it as squirrels and set traps. But the scratching continued, indifferent to peanut butter and spring-loaded bars. He tried knocking on the ceiling with a broom handle, but the sound only paused, then resumed, as if mocking our efforts. My mother, who had a too-vivid imagination, started sleeping with a lamp on.

Then came the cold spot. Dad was watching TV one night, alone in the bedroom, when a draft swept through the room, despite the windows being sealed. And then, unmistakably, the mattress dipped as if someone had sat beside him. He turned, expecting to see my mother, but found only empty space. The dip slowly rose back. He didn’t sleep that night.

A few days later, my parents were organizing the walk-in closet, which was cavernous and smelled of mothballs. They found a cardboard box, old and water-stained, filled entirely with gray ash. Mixed in were small, burnt bone fragments and a tarnished silver locket that refused to open. My father, disgusted, threw the entire box into the trash burn pile out back. That night, I heard him arguing with my mother about moving back to the city, but she was adamant we’d stay.

The worst came on a moonless night. My parents were in bed, the room lit only by the pale glow of the television. A scratching sound started again, but this time from inside the closet. The door was ajar, and a dark shape stood in the gap—tall, thin, with limbs too long. Both my parents saw it at the same time. It began to run toward them, impossibly fast, and then it passed through the glass door that led to the balcony, shattering it into a cascade of glittering shards. My mother screamed. Dad threw a book, which passed through the shape as if it were smoke. And then it was gone, leaving only the cold breeze and the sound of tinkling glass settling.

The next morning, the closet door was open, and the locket from the ash box lay on the floor, now open. Inside was a tiny photograph of a woman with hollow eyes, and a lock of hair, gray and brittle. We never spoke of it again, but that night, I heard scratching from my own closet. I never opened it. I moved my bed to the center of the room and slept with the lights on. But sometimes, when the house was quiet, I’d hear the locket click open and closed, as if something was trying to get out.