I lived in the same family home up until I was nineteen years old, and that was only because I was in a bad car accident the week of my eighteenth birthday and I had to quit my job because of it. I always knew that I wanted to get out of our home as soon as I could. The things that I experienced and witnessed in that place were things that nobody should ever have to put up with. I would not wish the horrors of my family home on my worst enemies.
I spent years trying to forget the things that happened to me in that house. I tried therapy for a while but all the therapists I saw were convinced that I was making things up because of underlying trauma. One straight-up thought I was possessed and suggested an exorcism. If only they knew that we’d already tried that when I was seven.
I gave up after the fifth therapist, and that’s when I accepted the fact that nobody would be able to help me.
At first, I tried the easy route. I decided that I wasn’t going to think about it. I was going to go about my days, acting as if nothing had happened. As if I had never lived in that house at the end of the cul-de-sac.
It worked; for a while at least. But soon, the nightmares came.
At first, they were pretty normal. I had nightmares that someone was chasing me down a long hallway, and no matter how fast I ran, I couldn’t reach the brightly lit room at the end of the hall. Every single time, I awoke covered in sweat and out of breath, as if I actually had been there, running away from some unseen danger. The anxiety that I got from this dream so so real; it was hard to tell whether or not it was something that I was actually experiencing.
Another recurring nightmare that I had involved a dark figure that attempted to sneak up on me from behind. In this dream, I was ten for some reason, and as I went about my day I would see a large, looming black figure in my peripheral. It would get closer and closer until I turned around to see that there was nothing there.
As the day progressed in the nightmare, I grew more distracted by things such as cartoons, coloring books, or the giant zoo animal floor puzzle that I was obsessed with as a child. I wouldn’t notice the thing until it was right next to me.
Somehow, I knew that I needed to stay alert. I knew that if I didn’t pay close enough attention, then the thing — whatever it was— would get me. Every time I caught myself being too distracted by something, my heart would begin to hammer in my chest and I struggled to breathe as I tried to figure out if that thing had gotten to me yet.
This nightmare, like all the others, always ended the same; I got a little too engrossed in whatever cartoon I was watching, and the figure managed to reach me. I didn’t notice its presence behind me until it was able to wrap its large hands around my face and cover it completely, prohibiting me from breathing, seeing, or screaming.
When I awoke from this one, my lungs would be burning for air. I would take giant gulps of air until I was able to regulate my breathing and lower my heart rate down to normal.
Every single time I dream, it’s a nightmare, which means that every single time I wake, I feel like I’m dying.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that ignoring the things that I’ve witnessed isn’t going to do me any good. And so, this is my new plan. I’m hoping that by sharing all of the horrors that I faced in that house, I’ll be able to set them free from my mind, and maybe, I’ll finally sleep in peace.
I only hope that in my search for peacefulness, I don’t disrupt yours.
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Grandma’s Bedroom
One of the more mild things about my family home was my grandmother’s old bedroom. There were plenty of empty rooms in the house, as the house was quite large (about double the size of all the others on the street).
One of the bigger rules was that we were not allowed to trespass into anyone else’s room, regardless of whether they were alive or not.
Grandma’s old bedroom was by far the easiest to sneak into. All of the other rooms required picking a lock or hunting down the keys that were hidden all over the property. Grandma’s room, however, was usually open.
Sometimes, I would wake up in the middle of the night and make my way down the hallway towards the staircase and down into the kitchen for a glass of water. A few of those nights, I awoke to find the door to Grandma’s room wide open, the soft light spilling out into the hall. At times there was soft piano music coming from inside the room.
Once I saw that the door was open, the dryness in my throat would be forgotten immediately, and I would run into the bedroom, no matter the hour. Inside, I would find all of Grandma’s porcelain figurines dancing on the large wooden bookcase.
The collection of small rabbits would jump across the shelf, scurrying around each other, their bodies making a soft thumping noise against the wood.
I would stand in front of the shelves and watch them for hours, my eyes jumping from the porcelain rabbits to the porcelain children who would dance along to the music. Now that I think about it, there wasn’t a piano or a stereo of any kind in that room, and I’m not quite sure where the sounds came from, but it wasn’t something that eight-year-old me worried or thought about.
Someone would always catch me in the room.
Without fail, I would snap out of my trance to find an adult pulling me out of the room. Depending on who it was, this was also accompanied by some yelling, swearing, and the occasional smack to the back of the head.
I never understood what the bad thing about that room was, and as I got older, it lost its appeal.
It wasn’t until I was twelve that I realized why everyone has such extreme reactions to finding me in that room.
It was a Saturday morning and I was sitting in the living room with a bowl of cereal as I waited for my favorite cartoon to start. As I sat there, shoveling spoonfuls of colorful, sugary cereal into my mouth, my aunt Chelsea walked in front of the TV three times.
Finally, she stopped in front of it, completely blocking my view, and bent forward until she was at eye level with me.
“Are you listening Kira?” She asked.
I blinked at her, confused because I had not, in fact, been listening.
She sighed. “I said, have you seen Peter? Do you know if he went to the grocery store with your mom?”
I shook my head ‘no’. I hadn’t seen Peter at all that morning, which, in hindsight, was odd. And I also wasn’t sure if he had left the house or not. I had been far more preoccupied with my cartoons.
Long story short, Peter had not gone to the grocery store with my mom.
They found him in Grandma’s bedroom. The reason no one had checked, was because the door was closed this time.
My aunt Chelsea and my mom finally started to get worried later in the morning and began looking into all of the bedrooms.
That’s when they found Peter, who had rapidly dehydrated and starved to death. He was sitting in front of the wooden shelves, his dry, bony face frozen in the same smile that he wore as he watched the figurines dance to the music.
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The Family Portrait
One of the scarier things in the house was the giant portrait that my Grandfather had ordered to be painted. It included him, my grandmother, my mother, aunt Chelsea, and uncle Roland as a baby. My grandmother sat in a large cushioned chair, holding uncle Roland who wore only a pair of diapers, knitted baby booties, and a matching hat.
To her left stood my grandfather, who wore a black cowboy hat that cast a harsh shadow over half of his face, and a nicely ironed black button-up shirt. Next to him, stood aunt Chelsea, who wore a pink strawberry print dress with shiny white shoes. The buckle on her left shoe was broken, and the frilly pink socks that she wore were uneven, with one pulled up a couple of inches higher than the other.
The only person smiling in the portrait was my mother, who wore a white blouse under patched overalls along with a pair of dirty sneakers. She grinned widely, showing off her missing front tooth.
Upon first glance, this was a relatively normal family portrait.
However, whenever the sun would begin to set, the orange glow from outside would light up the painting, and every time it did, it would light up all of grandpa’s face, including the part that was usually covered by the shadow caused by the hat.
I would avoid the living room at this time. The newly illuminated half of Grandpa’s face never failed to give me nightmares. It was blackened and rotting; with flies and worms crawling in and out of the holes by his cheekbones. All the muscles in his jaw were visible, and his eye was bright red.
I still don’t know what caused this. But cousin Yuri once said that she thought the painter was a demon.
Considering the things I’ve witnessed; I’m inclined to believe her.
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Grandpa’s Grave
This is not something that I witnessed first-hand, although I did see most of the events that led up to the aftermath.
My grandfather died a few years after Roland was born. He had gotten sick, it was cancer, but by the time they found it, it was much too late to do anything about it. My grandmother had decided to bury him on their property, and his grave is located towards the very back of the property. It was hidden behind a lot of overgrown weeds and shrubbery, as no one is allowed to visit the grave.
When I was thirteen, uncle Roland suddenly became obsessed with the fact that his dad’s corpse had been decaying in the backyard. He wouldn’t stop talking about it, going as far as to claim that his father spoke to him in dreams. My mom and aunt Chelsea tried to calm him down, but it didn’t work. Nothing could break his obsession with the grave in the backyard.
I remember following him out there once. I’m still not sure how he didn’t hear me trampling through the dead branches as I walked behind him until we reached the grave.
I hid behind a bush as I peeked behind it, watching as uncle Roland walked around the tombstone a few times.
I remember looking at it and seeing the engraving.
Here lies Albert C. Trinity
Loving Father
You will be forever missed.
I watched as Roland whispered to himself. It was much too quiet for me to hear, and I almost got up and walked back to the house. But then, I heard Roland shout in shock and then gasp.
I turned my attention back to him and noticed him staring at the tombstone. I looked too and blinked a few times to make sure that I was seeing things right.
The engraving now read:
Here lies Albert C. Trinity
Get me out of here.
I’m not dead Roland.
I stared at the words, reading them over and over again. Uncle Roland knelt down and dug his fingers into the ground.
“Dad? Is that really you?” He cried.
I glanced back at the tombstone, which now read:
Here lies Albert C. Trinity
Yes, of course, it’s me.
Get. Me. Out. Now.
At this point, Roland started sobbing. He was a blubbering mess as he tried to speak through the tears. I watched as he began to dig frantically, pulling at the grass. When he realized he wouldn’t be able to dig more than a few inches with his bare hands, he got up and ran right past me.
Once he was out of sight, I got up and walked over to the tombstone. The engraving had changed once again.
Here lies Albert C. Trinity
Soon I’ll be free.
Soon we will be together once again.
I ran back towards the house and saw Roland in the shed. I stopped on the back porch and watched Roland walk out with a shovel and make his way back to the grave.
It was at this point that I decided the situation was really none of my business, and I went back into the house and continued going about my day as usual.
When aunt Chelsea came home, she shouted for Roland to help her carry in the groceries. When he didn’t reply, she asked me where he was.
“He’s outside,” I told her.
“Well, go get him.”
I did what she asked, and began to make my way towards my grandfather’s grave in search of my uncle.
When I reached the grave, my heart stopped.
Roland had managed to dig all the way down to the casket, and there was a pile of dirt to the left of the hole. To the right, was Roland’s body. He was missing large chunks of flesh from his face, neck, arms, and legs, and he was no longer alive. Inside the hole, the casket was open and empty.
The engraving on the tombstone read:
Here lies Roland Trinity
What a shame.
He was delicious.
I have dozens of memories from all of the years that I spent living in that house. I could tell these tales for hours. There are only the three that scratch the surface.
I don’t know what was going on in my family home, or why my parents and aunt Chelsea refused to leave it. I only know, that I’m glad that I left, and I’m glad that I don’t have to experience these things in person anymore.
I only wish I could erase the memories from my mind.