The Weeping Fig

I’ve been renting the ground floor of an old Victorian house on Juniper Street for about eight months now. The landlady, Mrs. Halloway, lives upstairs with her adult son, but they keep to themselves. At first, the place felt charming—high ceilings, creaky floors, and a big bay window that overlooked the overgrown garden. But after the first few weeks, I started noticing things. It began with the sound of sobbing, faint and muffled, coming from the walls at night. I told myself it was the wind, or the old pipes, but the sound always seemed to come from the same spot: the corner of my bedroom, where an ancient weeping fig tree pressed its branches against the window.

Then the nightmares started. Every night, I’d dream I was standing in that corner, unable to move, while something behind me breathed slowly. The dreams were so vivid that I’d wake up gasping, my sheets soaked in sweat. One night, I woke to find the bedroom door wide open, even though I knew I’d closed it. And there, in the hallway, I saw a man—tall, thin, wearing a black suit—standing perfectly still. He had no face, just a smooth, pale oval where his features should have been. I blinked, and he was gone. I convinced myself it was a trick of the light, but after that, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched.

The worst part, though, is the figure by the window in my mother’s room. My mother has been bedridden for years, and her room is at the back of the house, facing the garden. We set up her bed so she could look outside, but the weeping fig’s branches have grown so thick that they block most of the light. I keep a small lamp on her nightstand, always on, because she’s afraid of the dark. But even with the lamp glowing, I can see her—the hanging woman. She appears just above the lamp, her bare feet dangling at eye level, a faded floral dress swaying as if caught in a breeze. Her head is tilted at an unnatural angle, like a broken doll, and the upper part of her body is indistinct, as if she’s standing in a fog. She moves slowly, back and forth, like a pendulum, and sometimes I swear I hear her whispering my name.

At first, I thought it was my imagination, a trick of my tired eyes. But last week, my mother asked me, ‘Who is that woman by my lamp?’ I froze. I hadn’t mentioned her to anyone. I tried to laugh it off, saying it was just a shadow, but my mother’s face was pale and serious. She said, ‘She’s been there for months. She wants something from you.’ That night, I decided to investigate the weeping fig tree. There was something about it that drew me, even though the feeling in my chest was pure dread.

I went out to the garden armed with a flashlight. The tree stood in the corner, its gnarled roots breaking through the cracked pavement. As I shone the light upward, I saw something glinting in the branches—a tarnished locket, so old that the chain had fused with the bark. I pulled it free and opened it. Inside was a tiny photograph of a woman with dark hair, wearing a floral dress. I turned the photo over and read the inscription: ‘To my dearest, until death do us part.’ My hands trembled. I recognized the dress—it was the same one the hanging woman wore.

I went back inside and asked Mrs. Halloway about the locket. She grew pale and refused to speak, but her son, a man in his forties with hollow eyes, finally told me the story. Decades ago, the house had belonged to a haberdasher named Thomas Finch. His young wife, Amelia, had gone missing, and Thomas had hanged himself from the weeping fig tree. No one ever found her body. A week later, I found a loose floorboard under my bed, and beneath it, a bundle of moldy letters. They were love letters from Thomas to Amelia, written in a manic, obsessive hand. The last one read: ‘If I cannot have you, I will have your memory forever.’

Now, every night, I feel the woman’s presence more strongly. She no longer stays by the lamp—she sometimes appears in the hallway, or at the foot of my bed. The whispers have grown louder, and I can almost make out words. Last night, I woke to find the lamp in my mother’s room flickering, and she was standing in the middle of the room, her head tilted, her dress swaying. She pointed a long, pale finger at the weeping fig tree outside the window. In the moonlight, I saw the branches twist into the shape of a rope. And I knew, with a sickening certainty, that she wanted me to join her under that tree.

I haven’t slept in two days. The whispers are constant now, a rising tide of voices all saying the same thing: ‘Come to the tree.’ I don’t know how much longer I can resist. The locket is around my neck now, warm against my skin, and I can feel her drawing me closer. I’ve started writing this down because I think it might be my last chance to tell someone what’s happening. If you find this, please, don’t stay in this house. Don’t look at the weeping fig. And whatever you do, don’t put on the locket. She’s waiting for you, too.