1 A hitchhiker, a house, and sausages

It was on his way to Eaton Secondary School that Charles Corbyn first distinguished the bleak yellow protrusion aside the dusty field road. It was not much of a car; at least not alike the cars people prided themselves with at West-Eaton, but a vehicle that was in a low-grade but adequate state. It must still have been another mile ahead of him but even with the rolling of the landscape one could look quite far ahead. They weren't hills. They were too small to be called hills. But they were the only protrusion in the otherwise flat scenery and thus the locals had proudly dubbed them the Eaton Hills. Beside, along and beyond stretched fields of grass and wheat and barley, and calm, cud-chewing bovines lay languidly beside the grids of barbed wire. A line of pines ran along the horizon, suggesting a forest, silhouetted against the grim, cloudy heavens. It would rain later on, Corbyn knew, and he would rather be on paved road when it did. He had no desire to be stuck in the mud all afternoon.

The trouble of the unfortunate traveller stranded on the side of the scant, dust-ridden road seemed to be of another kind. Charles Corbyn slowed down and rolled down his window.

"Do you need a hand?" He enquired. The man looked up at him. His hands fidgeted with the brim of the hat be held against his belly, and you could see the sweat in the hair that stuck to his forehead. His upper lip was damp.

"Why, yes, that would be most kind."

The man did not cut an impressive figure. Nor did he appear disagreeable. His soft exterior and charming affability suggested a boorish but correct individual, most likely working an office job.

Charles simply parked in the middle of the road. There would be no other passer-by. "Well, then. Let's have a look, shall we?" He said as soon as he slammed his door shut.

"Ah— yes, you see, I never quite understood English cars, you know. They are rather unusual."

"Unusual?"

"Yes, unusual." The man said. He regarded the horizon as if waiting for something to breach it. "Many unusual things here."

Charles bent himself over the bonnet. "You're not from around here, then."

The voice behind him seemed to startle. "Oh! No— no, I am. I am, actually— in a way," Charles looked back at him and an awkward smile made its way onto the man's visage as he gestured feebly over his shoulder. "I grew up in Henningston. That's but a few miles up north."

Corbyn straightened, wiping his hands on the handkerchief he pulled from his pocket. Elena would berate him again, he knew, when she would see the state of it. "Really now? How nice. I live near Eaton," he stuck out his hand, "Charles Corbyn. How are you."

"How are you," Corbyn's hand was taken but pressed only briefly, "Joseph Bates. A pleasure," Bates then pointed and nodded towards the engine, "how is she?"

"We'll have a mechanic come and look at this, I'm afraid. My skills are limited."

Bates's face fell. "Oh— oh, how unfortunate." He then waited, anticipating the proposal he hoped and knew was coming. His eyes darting from his feet, to the road, to Charles, when it did not come at once.

"May I offer you a lift?" Charles Corbyn said.

"I'd hate to inconvenience you."

And yet you are, Charles thought. "Oh, no. Not at all."

"Well, in that case. Gladly."

"I was on my way to Eaton Secondary. To attend the fair. My daughter started there only this year." Bates explained as they were a few miles further down the path. They would soon be on the main road.

"Yeah, my son goes there too." Charles said.

"I saw the sticker. What year is he in?"

"Year eight."

"A big man already!"

Charles smiled, and something akin to pride nestled itself over the underlying feeling of agitation. "So he likes to think. My wife teaches the tenth years."

They arrived at the school at half past one, when the sky was completely overcast. Bates disappeared in the crowd after a brief goodbye, presumably looking to call a mechanic.

At once Mrs Emerson appeared, as if beget out of thin air. She greeted him, and began, with her habitual eagerness and sway, to gather some students and have them carry out the contents of his trunk. Varicoloured decorations and cool boxes disappeared towards the enormous striped tent pitched across the green yard.

Charles leant his lower back against the car, his hands in his pockets, conversing with Mrs Emerson, till she remarked: "would you do something for me?"

"Sure?"

She smiled. Then turned serious, and, in a conspiratious tone, told him of her grievances. While she talked, her voice took on a tense quality, and she began fluttering her hands about, before clasping them firmly on her stomach, until she forgot them, and they continued dancing about once more.

"—and it's got an ill repute. And they haven't been answering their friends." Mrs Emerson repeated for the third time.

"Alright," Charles shrugged and sighed, "It's probably nothing. But alright."

"Very good. Listen, I'm not going to call Angie and Claire nice girls. I detest the way that's always a thing they say," Mrs Emerson exhaled heavily, "no, they aren't nice girls, but they're both smart and sensible. They always tell people where they're going. They certainly wouldn't have gone into an abandoned house. And they'd have told you where to stick it if you tried to make either of them do something they didn't want to." She went into the pocket of her varicoloured pants and unfolded an address. Some kid's spidery handwriting became visible on the brown recycled paper.

Charles accepted it and looked up. "Alright. I'll just have a look there then."

Mrs Emerson shook her head in exasperation, folding a hand over her chest, "They say junkies stay there," she huffed.

Charles made a noncommittal noise as he closed the now empty boot of his car. "Will you tell Elena where I've gone?" He said as he walked round to the front, "I'll be back before they've lit the barbecue."

"I will. What happened to the chicken sausages, by the way? I didn't see them."

"Elena will be bringing them. She got them yesterday."

The drive was fifteen minutes. Charles silently berated himself for the ease with which he had accepted undeniably tiresome labour, that would most likely be proven redundant.

He passed a little Anglican church and the house appeared. One could easily make it out without ever having seen it before, and it stood practically amidst an otherwise pleasant neighbourhood. It was a five bedroom, detached residence — a Victorian porch with a roundabout quaint little tower and a tiled roof that sloped down severely. Though there was nothing about the exterior that really stood out, Charles Corbyn couldn't help but feel like there was an unwelcoming air to it as he regarded it from behind the steering wheel. He parked right before it's low ironwork gate. There hung a subtle suggestion in the air. A submission that wasn't quite rot but felt equally disturbing.

Something was wrong with the house.

The residence appeared so seceded that it almost seemed as if it had been ostracised from the other residences in the neighbourhood; as if the houses themselves spent the last few decades slowly creeping away from it.

Charles frowned as he slammed his car door and walked up to the low hedge that was overgrown with thick, wet ivy. Behind him, the screen of the GPS kept flickering: "Arrived At Destination."

Something was very wrong with the house.

If Mrs Emerson was to be believed, nothing had ever happened here. It was simply a large house in a respectful area that had been empty since the early 70's. No one wanted to live here. The last few families that had moved in had left soon after and most people in the neighbourhood had accepted that the place was disturbing. And so it remained empty. Even kids and teenagers, who were usually expected to be the first to investigate an empty house, finding the rumour of ghosts more a perk than a disincentive, stayed away; but for the odd gadabout or junkie, if the occasional din at night was to be believed.

The garden was overgrown. As was the front veranda. Charles stood regarding it at the grated gate for a few minutes before pushing it open and walking down the overgrown driveway and slowly venturing round the back of the house. It made for a dreary picture of desolation. The windows where barred by steel framework of the same colour as that of the gate, the paint faintly chipped. He found a scorch of blackened earth against the east wall, where a fire must've been held; spread around the vicinity were abandoned beer bottles and the scattered belongings of some tramp. Charles continued his way round the house, searching for a point of entry, until he was back up front, the overgrown veranda staring at him.

"There's nothing in the garden."

Charles was more than a little embarrassed at the sound he let out. Honestly, he'd been quite distracted by the open framework over the windows and hadn't registered that the little front gate had opened once more. Elena was a welcome appearance of smiling radiance against the frame, ankles crossed. She put up a hand and put her sunglasses on her head as she approached and presented her cheek.

"Didn't know you were part of the neighbourhood watch, now." She added as Charles kissed her cheek, followed by a chaste peck on her lips.

"They needed someone to take a look. What happened to the kids' sausages?"

"If all is well, they're being roasted at this very moment. And if we leave, say, now,"— she made a show of regarding and showing him her watch—"we might even be on time to partake ourselves."

"I'm just going to go have a look inside. Then we'll leave."

"You should leave the ghost hunting to the children in the neighbourhood."

"I'd wish you'd take this a bit more serious—" he made a vague gesture towards the house—"I'd rather have us be careful."

"The girls probably just took off to spend the day with their lover."

"They're fourteen and fifteen."

She shrugged. "Young love," Elena said and moved towards the house, a slight, unconcerned swing in her step and seemingly convinced Charles wasn't going to return to the fair without having had a look about. "I have a few couples in my class as well. It's very endearing."

Charles Corbyn headed up the few frontal steps after her, making sure not to dirty himself on the clustered ivy. The very moment he crossed the threshold, Charles halted. Once more he remarked an unpleasant taste to the air, something left out too long, forgotten and festering in the dark. Something with a craving, a desire. Something corrupt that shouldn't be here. But when he remarked on it, Elena just shrugged.

"It's not a sound structure," Elena said as she wandered further into the hall, stopping to consider herself in a broken mirror with an amused expression. "I wouldn't be surprised if the roof might collapse."

Charles knew Elena wouldn't understand. He was aware not everyone was sensitive to it; but some people could feel it on the back of their neck and know something about a space to feel off. And this house felt very off indeed. He almost asked for Elena to step outside, then at least he'd know she'd be safe, but Charles knew she would just smile, slip her hand in his and reassure him. There's nothing here but dust and damp walls, she'd tell him. Charles shook his head. Perhaps he should have listened to her. Perhaps they should've gone back to the fair.

Charles turned to tell Elena as such, feeling slightly sick somehow, and saw her disappear behind the doorway at the end of the hallway. He lingered in the hall for another moment before making up his mind. Charles followed his wife into the house, submitting to the distinct feeling of entering the stomach of a beast.

The abandoned drawing room stretched out before Charles Corbyn in all its grim despondency. Dark layers of ash and grime lay thick and darkened the once white sheets that veiled the sparse furniture, ready to puff into choking clouds at the slightest disturbance. An impressive mantel stood against the eastern wall, an empty picture-frame on its shelf. A broad empty archway gave way to the kitchen and the dining room beyond. It felt sharp, ugly, and almost sweet with putrefaction.

"So what's supposed to happen in a haunted house?" Elena now asked him as she spotted him standing in the doorway between the hallway and the drawing room, and she tugged open a broken armoire and peered inside. "Bleeding walls, screaming at night, moving chairs, that sort of thing?"

Unsettled, Charles let his gaze wander around, to the dark corners of the room, perhaps expecting the house to reveal any unwanted thing that might be crouching there. He felt some disquieting shift in the air, a subterranean chill rising to prick the hair on the back of his neck.

"No, of course not, I just thought I would find the girls here. Drunk. Or worse. I wouldn't put it past a few to stash their filth in a place that—" distracted, Charles moved from the drawing room directly into the kitchen. Where he stood as if tased. Nothing. There was no specific place from where the poor atmosphere was emanating from. It was the same no matter where he stood, as if the house itself had picked up an ill air. It was almost a physical thing, like walking through wet vines and leaving them curled sticky and unpleasant on his clothes. Charles disliked the feeling immensely. He stared at the twisting room, its meandering walls concealing the approaching source of the reek. It was eerily quiet. As if the walls chose to lock out all sound. Outside, Charles could see leaves stir, but the wind had fallen still.

Most of the kitchen furniture was gone. There was the cooking island and a few chairs, the cupboards and cabinets, and an old and empty fridge-freezer, whose door hung open to expose a grubby and spiderwebbed interior. The room was grim, and damp, and the temperature held between warm enough to suffocate and cold enough to send one's fingers numb. There were nicotine stains on the counter and the windowsill, and old rings of coffee on the steel ribbed draining board next to the sink.

Elena went to stand in the middle of the kitchen, with crossed arms, swaying in a way that felt bored.

"What a waste of space," she remarked.

He hummed his accord, absentmindedly. There was something he was missing here, something that was wrong that he simply wasn't noticing, no matter how he searched the room. The feel of it, the smell of it — it didn't feel like the whole of the thing, it felt more like a symptom, something layered over and over by a presence he didn't find.

They headed down the dining room.

The oppressive atmosphere was tangible now, and affecting his nerves more than he'd liked to admit. He felt light-headed, skin prickling unpleasantly. He was either going to have to ask Elena for them to leave, or he was going to have to head outside for a few minutes of air before they continued. The two girls weren't here. They perhaps never had been here. Charles turned to tell Elena as much. She was walking leisurely up and down the room behind him, and then halted, registering Charles's discomfort, and she moved closer to him, as if wishing to reassure him. Something about that was wrong.

She smiled at him. A shiver crawled up his spine, a prickle at the back of his skull. Her heels made firm noises on the wooden floor.

Charles was suddenly reminded of the teenage girls. What was it their teacher had said? Not the sort of girls to go into a strange, abandoned house that had a bad reputation. What reason could they possibly have had to come inside? Unless it was at the request of someone they trusted. Someone they would have followed inside without question.

Someone who made them at ease.

Charles Corbyn's headache was unpleasant now, and he felt like he was breathing cold fog.

Charles couldn't remember Elena's step ever being so loud. He swallowed again, wishing to leave immediately.

"Charles, dear?" She said.

The room went instantly cold, as everything inside Charles screamed 'protect yourself', and for a moment he didn't know why.

—𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘳.

The softness of fifteen years of marriage, the teasing edges, the deep affection, the indulgence in putting meaning into something. The patience that said, 'I'm here for you.'

It held none of it. It was all missing. There was no feeling in it at all. It was as flat and as dead as the sound of her heels on the floorboards.

Whatever was behind him...

...it wasn't his wife.

A primal aversion that lurked trapped in his hindbrain finally teared apart at the seams, and robbed all the oxygen out of his next breath. His innards felt as if they had turned to liquid. Charles stared at the wall as the thing that looked like the woman he loved moved closer, with a swaying step that knew it was supposed to be a woman but had never lived as one.

"Just wondering if there's someone upstairs." Even to his own ears, Charles sounded distracted.

His throat was parched.

Charles turned just a little, enough to keep the thing in the room with him in view. His heart thundered in his chest and he was vaguely aware of it, as if he was observing anyone else but himself. And wondered whether he was having a heart attack.

The thing smiled.

Terrified, automatically, Charles felt himself smile back. Horror and dread overtook his stomach. He was breathing shallowly. A whimper escaped him. He opened his mouth. Closed it again.

Then he broke into a run.

Corbyn threw himself through the open doorway and down the hall and something went down his back as he clutched the front door and looked down the empty passage. There was dust and rotting wood and Charles shoved his entire body against the front door and still it wouldn't give and it was nearing. It was nearing. He couldn't see it. And the whole building knew it.

It was nearing and it was shaking with excitement.

The sound of distress that came out of his mouth wasn't human. The door gave at the third shove. Charles fell rather than stepped out on the porch, and he didn't look back. Didn't dare to. Knowing he would see something there and knowing he might freeze where he to see it, and he stumbled down the steps of the veranda and raced down the lawn. And as he reached his car and fumbled with the keys behind the steering wheel, he imagined sometimes reaching out and grabbing at him, and as he drove off he left the house standing there. In silence. The door back in his frame. Charles picked up his phone from the passenger seat, and dialled Elena.

His wife answered on the second ring.

"Charles, dear?" She sounded as if she'd just lifted something and put it down, voice breathy but pushing for something clearer. In the background there was carnival music. Children cheering and shouting. Charles squeezed the telephone until it creaked. Hearing her voice was a relief so strong it left him gasping air. How did it take him so long to realise?

"I'll be back soon," he said. "Save me a plate." And he was suddenly desperate for it.