The Pinewood Bedroom

Ever since I was a child, I’ve felt a pull toward the old family cabin in the woods, the one my grandfather built before I was born. I spent summers there, listening to the wind through the pines and the creak of the dock. But after my grandmother passed, the cabin sat empty for years, and I inherited it. I moved in last autumn, hoping to find peace and a connection to my roots. I never thought I’d find something else.

The first night, I had a dream so vivid it felt like a memory. I was a young woman in a long dress, running through the same cabin, but it was different: the walls were bare wood, the furniture was heavy and dark, and the air smelled of oil lamps. I was fleeing something, my heart pounding, and I could hear it behind me, a wet, slithering sound. I woke gasping, drenched in sweat, the terror so real I couldn’t move for a minute. The room was silent, but I knew something was wrong.

A week later, the noises began. At exactly two in the morning, I’d hear footsteps in the hallway, the slow creak of the front door opening and closing, and sometimes heavy breathing right outside my bedroom. The first time, I lay frozen, praying it was just my imagination. The second time, I forced myself to get up and check. The house was empty, but the front door was ajar, letting in cold air. I hadn’t touched it. I began going to bed early, deliberately sleeping through the hour, but anxiety gnawed at me during the day.

Then my sister and her boyfriend needed a place to stay. I offered them my bedroom, moving my things to the basement to give them privacy. The noises stopped, and I slept soundly for the first time in weeks. But when they moved out a month later, I chose to stay in the basement, feeling safer there, away from the main floor. The noises returned, this time closer. I’d hear scratching on the basement door, and once, I swear I saw a shadow under the crack that had a shape like a hand, dragging itself along.

I started researching the history of the cabin. Old records showed it was built on the site of a logging camp, and a woman named Abigail Pinewood had been found dead in the woods behind it in 1902, her body never fully recovered. The details were vague, but one story stuck: she had been running from something, and her diary was found, with a final entry that read, ‘It comes at two. It wants my place.’ I realized the dream was hers, and that I was somehow connected to her, perhaps through blood, as my grandfather had mentioned a distant relation.

Now, I can’t sleep. The basement is cold, and every night at two, I hear it, the same wet, slithering sound from my dream, coming down the stairs. I’ve bolted the door, but I know locks won’t stop it. Last night, I felt a hand on my leg, cold and wet, and I woke to find my skin raw, like it had been scraped. In the morning, I found scratch marks on the basement door, deep grooves, as if something had tried to claw its way in. I’ve decided to leave, but I know it won’t let me go easily. It wants me to take her place, to run, to become the next ghost in the pinewood bedroom.