The Weeping Hollow

My life before the move was unremarkable, a quiet existence in a dusty Kansas town where the only mysteries were the cornfields that seemed to breathe at night. I never believed in the supernatural, not truly; such things were for fiction and the gullible. But that changed the autumn I inherited my great-aunt’s house in the hills of West Virginia, a place locals called ‘The Weeping Hollow’ for reasons I would soon discover.

The house was a Victorian relic, its gingerbread trim rotting like old teeth. The first night, I blamed the wind for the whistling that curled around the eaves, but it was too rhythmic, almost like a child’s sob. I woke to find my bedsheets on the floor, torn as if by claws, and thin scratches weeping red lines across my forearms. No memory of the act, just the sting.

Days passed, and the house revealed its secrets. A little girl in a tattered nightgown would stand at the top of the stairs, her face a blur of sorrow. She never spoke, but when I climbed to meet her, she’d vanish, leaving a cold spot that chased my spine. An elderly man, perhaps her grandfather, would materialize in the kitchen, wringing his hands as if in silent apology. I learned from a neighbor that a family had died there a century ago – a fire that took the girl and the old man, who had tried to save her.

It was bearable at first, a strange but gentle haunting. But then the house changed. The sobbing grew louder, more frantic, and the scratches came nightly until my skin looked like a roadmap of pain. I found myself gasping for breath, my throat constricting as if an invisible hand choked me whenever I entered the closet where the girl’s cries originated. I had to leave, but not before I understood the truth.

One evening, I found an old journal in the attic, written by the grandfather. He described a curse: a malevolent spirit, hungry for life, that would possess the house and feed on its inhabitants. The girl and he had tried to contain it, but they failed, and now it sought to break free through me. ‘It uses the child’s voice to lure,’ he wrote, ‘and the scratches are its claws, marking you as its vessel.’

I fled that night, but the visions followed. I moved to a sterile apartment in a city, hoping to escape. Yet I began to catch glimpses of my late friend, Marcus, who had died in a car accident years ago. He would appear in mirrors, his mouth moving soundlessly, his eyes filled with the same terror I felt. He pointed, always toward a door that didn’t exist in my apartment, and I knew it was a portal to that hollow place.

The final straw came when I saw the girl standing in my closet, no longer crying but smiling. She reached out a hand, and I felt my throat close completely, the same suffocation as before. I realized that the scratching was not a warning but a bond, and the girl was not a victim but a guide, leading me to become the new keeper of the curse.

Now, I write this from within the Weeping Hollow, my memories fading like the old photographs on the wall. The scratches cover my entire body, and I can hear the grandfather’s voice, apologizing for what I will become. When the next person moves here, I will be the one to greet them, with a child’s cry and a gentle touch that leaves marks. This house does not let go, and neither do I.