The Third Floor Tenant

In the autumn of 2011, my wife Lena, our two daughters, and I moved into a renovated Victorian on the outskirts of a small New England town. The house was a fixer-upper, but it had charm, and the price was right. We were excited to start fresh.

Two weeks in, I was the one who experienced the first oddity. It was past midnight, and I was reading in bed while Lena slept. I heard what sounded like a child’s footsteps running down the hallway outside our bedroom door, then a soft giggle. I assumed it was our younger daughter, Mia, who was five and prone to sleepwalking. I set my book down and went to check on her.

Her room was at the end of the hall. I opened the door quietly, expecting to see her out of bed, but she was sound asleep, her small chest rising and falling under her quilt. I smiled and tucked her in again, then returned to our room. As I climbed back into bed, I felt a pressure at the foot of the mattress, like someone had sat down. Then a cold draft passed over my legs, and my book slammed shut on its own.

I froze. Lena stirred and mumbled, ‘Are you okay?’ I didn’t want to alarm her, so I said I was fine and that I must have been hearing things. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that we weren’t alone.

The following week, the incidents escalated. Our older daughter, Emily, who was nine, complained that a ‘ghost boy’ would come into her room at night and tickle her feet. We dismissed it as a vivid imagination, but then Mia started waking up with small bruises on her arms and legs. Lena and I exchanged worried glances, but we attributed it to her being a tomboy.

One night, I decided to stay up to catch whatever was happening. I sat in the hallway on a chair, the house silent except for the creaks of an old home settling. Around 2 a.m., I saw a small shadowy figure dart from the bathroom into Emily’s room. My heart raced. I rushed over and threw open the door. Emily was sitting up in bed, wide-eyed, pointing to the closet. ‘He went in there,’ she whispered.

I yanked open the closet door. Nothing but clothes and toys. But on the inside of the door, someone had scratched a message: ‘I was here first.’ I felt a chill run down my spine. The handwriting was childlike, but the words were chilling.

The next morning, we found a photograph in the attic that the realtor hadn’t mentioned. It was a faded picture of a boy, maybe six years old, with a cap and a sad smile. On the back, in pencil, was written: ‘Samuel, 1897. Lived in room 3.’ We had three floors, and the third floor was a finished attic we used for storage. Could he be referring to that room?

Desperate for answers, I researched the house’s history. It turned out that the original structure had been built in 1890, not 2010 as we thought. The renovations had been done by the previous owner, who had died in a fire that was ruled arson. The fire had started in the attic, and a child’s body was found among the remains. His name was Samuel.

That night, I went up to the attic alone. The air was thick with dust and the smell of old wood. As I rummaged through boxes, I heard a faint sobbing. I followed the sound to a far corner, where there was a small door I hadn’t noticed. It was locked. I forced it open and found a narrow crawl space. Inside, on the floor, was an old toy train and a torn teddy bear. I felt a presence behind me. I turned, and that’s when I saw the boy, his face pale and his eyes hollow. He pointed at me and whispered, ‘This is my room. You need to leave.’

I stumbled backward, tripping over a box, and fell. When I looked up, he was gone. I ran down the stairs, my heart pounding. I told Lena everything, and we decided to move out. But as we started packing, we realized that the house wasn’t ready to let us go. Doors would open and close by themselves, objects would fly off shelves, and we could hear the pattering of little feet at all hours.

One evening, I saw the boy standing at the end of our bed, just like the stories people tell. He didn’t say a word. He just pointed to the attic. I knew then that he wanted us to give him a proper burial. We found the old records and located an unmarked grave in the corner of the town cemetery. We arranged for a reburial with a small ceremony.

After that, the house fell silent. The disturbances stopped. But sometimes, late at night, I swear I can still see a small silhouette in the corner of my eye, and I wonder if Samuel is at peace or if he found a new friend in the family that moved in after us.