Last year, my husband and I bought a house. It was pretty cheap, on account of it being pretty small and off the beaten track. We thought we’d gotten a good deal—until the basement caved in.
It happened in the middle of the night. I woke up at 3:30 AM to a loud crash that caused the windows to rattle. Terrified that someone had broken in, my husband Roger and I grabbed our mace and combed the entire house.
It was Roger who found it first.
“Diane!”
I found him standing at the top of the stairs, looking pale. He pointed down—to where our basement floor was simply… gone.
“What the fuck?” I whispered.
Both of us were too scared to go down the stairs. But upon closer inspection we noticed it was really only half the floor missing. The area behind and around the stairs seemed intact, while beyond the stairs was a huge hole that seemed to go down at least ten feet. We couldn’t see the bottom from the dim light the basement bulbs cast.
The next few hours after that were devoted to frantically calling our home insurance and having the police/fire department come. They told us this had actually happened a few times before in our area. Apparently a lot of smaller mines here went unregistered during copper mining in the 1600s. People just built homes over them without even knowing.
While I’m thankful for their help, the firemen and police officers were honestly a little rude. They immediately cordoned off the basement and wouldn’t let us get anywhere near it. “It’s really dangerous,” they said—but that didn’t stop them from going into the basement. They were down there for hours.
Insurance would most likely cover the repairs, but the house would be unsafe to live in until it was fixed. Thankfully our elderly neighbor, Gertrude, offered for us to stay with her. “I could use some help around here, anyway,” she said with a smile.
It was almost midnight when we got into bed, exhausted from a day of moving and calling contractors. But just as I pulled the covers over me, I realized—
“Shit. I forgot my rings.”
I don’t sleep with my engagement or wedding ring on. And in the chaos of everything, I forgot to bring them over.
“Rings?”
“My engagement and wedding ring. They’re still on the nightstand!”
“You can get them tomorrow,” Roger grumbled.
“What if the house collapses before then?”
“It won’t.”
“I’ll just go over there quickly and get them.”
“Now?”
I nodded. Then I got out of bed, pulled on my jeans, and started downstairs.
The house was quiet. Gertrude had already gone to sleep. I snuck out as quietly as I could, then raced across her lawn and into ours. Ran up the porch steps, pushed the key into the lock, and swung the door open.
The house was completely silent. Still. Dark. It was weird seeing everything so… empty. I mean, I’d arrived to an empty house before, but not in the middle of the night like this.
I flicked on the light and went upstairs.
I walked into the bedroom, grabbed the rings off the nightstand, and turned around. Started for the stairs—
Creeeeaaaak.
I froze.
Is someone in the house? I glanced around, clutching the rings to my chest. Then my eyes locked on the front door. I’ll run down the stairs and out the door. They won’t get me. They won’t—
Creeeaaak.
I whipped around.
It was the bedroom door. I was just in there. No one’s in there. I frowned, watching as it pushed open another inch–*creeeeeaaaak–*and then stopped.
There was a draft coming from somewhere.
I went downstairs and looked around—and immediately noticed the problem.
The basement door was open.
One of the firemen must’ve left it open. I walked towards it, slowly. Even though I knew it was just a simple mistake, my heart was hammering in my chest. I grabbed the edge of the door and started to push it closed—
Drip.
The sound was soft. Like a tiny drop of water falling from our basement and hitting the floor of the mine below. Unable to stop myself, I turned to look down.
The stairs descended into the darkness. I could barely make out the concrete floor, and the jagged edge where it gave way to the mine. My hand tightened on the doorknob.
I wonder how far down it goes.
In all the commotion from earlier, we didn’t get much time to really inspect the damage. The fireman kept us far away from the basement opening, telling us how dangerous it was. How it only took one wrong step…
I rummaged in my pocket and found a bobby pin. I held my breath, and threw it in. One-one-thousand… two-one-thousand…
Three seconds passed before I heard the light tink of it hitting rock.
My physics is rusty, but I don’t think that mine is only twelve feet deep, like the officer told us.
My heart pounded faster. I pulled out my phone and turned on the flashlight. The light didn’t reach the bottom. Just some wet, glistening rock near the top of the hole. I could see one of our plastic storage bins, spilling out childhood drawings and stuffed animals into the hole. The breeze blew up from the basement, softly fluttering through my hair.
“Echo,” I called down.
My blood ran cold.
I dropped the rings. Clink, clink, clink as they bounced down the steps. They settled at the bottom of the stairs. For a moment, I hesitated. Then I grabbed the door and slammed it shut.
Because—I swear—mixed in with the overlapping echoes of my own voice, there was a second voice. Something that I could tell, on a primal level, did not belong to me.
I ran out of the house and back to Gertrude’s. Locked the door and snuggled in bed. Roger is already asleep, and I don’t want to tell him about it anyway. He’ll just think I’m crazy. He doesn’t believe in any kind of paranormal stuff, and there’s no way there’s just some random person hiding down in our sinkhole.
Right?
I’m in bed now, (hopefully) safe at Gertrude’s. But what should I do? Should I go back to the house now? Or maybe in the morning? Not that the light helps—the basement doesn’t have any windows. It’ll still be as dark as ever.
I mean, the safest and smartest thing would be to not go back at all.
But I can’t just leave my engagement ring and wedding ring there. They’re right at the bottom of the steps. It would be easy to just go down and grab them without even getting too close to the mine at all.
What should I do?