The Last Room at the End

The night before the long weekend, I found myself standing at the edge of my grandfather’s farm, the gravel crunching under my boots as the last of the sun bled out behind the pine ridge. My cousin Elias and my sister June had come with me, our parents thinking it would be good for us to spend time with the old man before the property was sold. But I had a different reason. I had been dreaming of the farmhouse for weeks, always the same dream: a dark hallway, a door slightly ajar at the end, and a sound like a child humming a lullaby. I never told anyone, but the dreams felt like a warning.

The farmhouse itself was a three-story Victorian that had stood since the 1870s, its bones rotting quietly beneath fresh white paint. My grandfather had moved to a care facility months ago, and the place had been left to gather dust. The three of us drove up the long dirt road, headlights cutting through the fog that always seemed to settle on this part of the county. June was excited, chatting about ghost stories she’d heard from the locals. Elias was quiet, his eyes fixed on the dark windows as we pulled into the yard.

We let ourselves in with the spare key under the welcome mat. The air inside was cold and stale, with the faint smell of mothballs and old wood. The power had been turned off, so we lit a few oil lamps and carried them through the rooms. The furniture was draped in white sheets, making everything look like a graveyard of shapes. We chose the largest bedroom on the second floor, a room with a bay window that overlooked the orchard. We set up our sleeping bags on the bare floor, the floorboards creaking with every step.

After eating cold sandwiches and sharing stories, we lay down in the dark, the only light coming from the moon through the window. The house settled around us, groaning and shifting like an old ship. I was just drifting off when I heard it: a faint hum, melodic and childlike, coming from the hallway. I sat up, my heart thumping. June was already asleep. Elias was still awake, his eyes wide.

‘Did you hear that?’ he whispered.

I nodded. We both listened, but the sound faded. Elias said it was probably the wind. I wanted to believe him, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was coming from the last room at the end of the hall. The room we had peeked into earlier, but the door had been locked. My grandfather had always kept it locked, saying it was a storage room, but I remembered a small key in his desk drawer.

We decided to check it out, me with a flashlight, Elias behind me. The hallway seemed longer than it should have been, the floorboards uneven. We stopped at the door, and I inserted the key. The lock turned with a click, and the door swung open with a groan. The room was small and empty, except for a single rocking chair in the center, facing the window. On the chair sat an old porcelain doll with cracked paint, its eyes staring blankly. The humming started again, louder now, coming from the chair. The doll’s head turned slowly to face us.

We ran. We didn’t stop until we were back in the bedroom, the door slammed shut. I could hear the humming continuing down the hall, growing fainter, but then it stopped right outside our door. We didn’t sleep the rest of the night, huddled together, listening to the silence. Just before dawn, I heard a voice, soft and young, coming from just outside the door: ‘Play with me.’

We left at sunrise, never looking back. I didn’t tell anyone about the key I had taken, or the doll I had grabbed from the room as we fled. I keep it in a locked box in my closet. Some nights, I still hear that humming, coming from the box. And sometimes, when I open my eyes in the dark, I see a small shadow at the foot of my bed, waiting for me to play.