2What do you think an abandoned house looks like? Do you picture things coming to pieces? Mold creeping up walls, shuttered windows, brick exteriors overgrown with ivy?
Hudor House, address 207 Magnolia Lane, isn't any of those things. It is small and neat and suburban, with beige walls and a trimmed green lawn.
Like every other house in the neighborhood, the local paperboy delivers a newspaper to its doorstop each morning. Nobody's lived in it for sixty years, and yet the rolled-up newspaper is always absent by the time the sun's fallen.
The real question, I think, is how long it's been around for. I know it was here when I was born and I know it was here when my parents were born. You're thinking that there are records of these things, right? The thing is, I don't believe that house was built, not in the way that normal houses are.
The first time I was inside Hudor, I was ten years old.
It happened on a weekend, on a summer evening when it was too hot to go out, but I did anyway, riding my bike in lazy circles around the neighborhood. There wasn't much to look at, and I guess that's why I noticed the man standing still on the sidewalk. When I say standing still, I do mean still – he looked frozen in place. Like someone had pressed pause on him.
I can't tell you exactly what his face looked like, but he was handsome, dressed sharply. I remember thinking that he looked like someone I had seen on TV, or maybe in one of the old black-and-white movies that my parents loved so much.
I walked up to him – or was I still on my bike? Either way, once I got within ten, fifteen meters, he snapped into animation.
Press play.
He smiled at me. His teeth were white and straight. Now that I was closer, I could see that though I'd been right about him being handsome, he also looked out-of-date with the way his hair was styled. He turned around and walked up to his house before disappearing inside.
I'd never paid attention to that particular house before then. It looked like any other in our neighborhood. But now I could see that there was one difference: tacked over the door was a gleaming bronze plate that read HUDOR.
I saw that the man had left something where he was standing – a wallet, one that looked like my dad's, grainy brown leather with a buttoned strap. Without thinking, I picked it up and ran up to the door, taking wide paces. The wallet was cold in my hands despite the warmth of the day. I rang the doorbell and listened to the tinkling of the wind chimes hanging from the veranda roof.
I scuffed my shoes back and forth on the blue welcome mat as I waited, until the man's voice came shouting from somewhere inside the house: "Come on in!"
I didn't hesitate to go in. I was in the safety of my own neighborhood, and any whisper of danger was beyond me. Plus, the man had looked so normal, and he had dropped his wallet. It was the right thing to do.
When I stepped inside, the first thing I noticed was the smell that filled the room – it was savory and warm, like something simmering in a pan. I breathed it in deeply. The layout was the same as my house, but the furniture looked nicer, if a little bit old- fashioned, and the floors were polished hardwood instead of shag carpet.
I walked through the foyer and into the living room. "Hello? I have your wallet. You dropped it outside," I said.
"Oh, thank you for returning it, dear," said a new voice from behind me. I swiveled around, startled.
The voice had come from a woman – a glamorous-looking woman around my mom's age, with lips as red as her permed hair and nails. She was sitting on a couch with book in her hands. As she looked at me, she set the book down on a coffee table, next to a crystal ashtray that glinted under the warm lights.
"That's my son's wallet, isn't it?" she said. "He's very forgetful. You can leave it with me." There was a weird quality to her voice. I didn't know the right word for it, but it seemed... fuzzy at the edges, if that makes sense. Being out in the heat for too long did funny things to my hearing sometimes.
"Um, yeah, he dropped it outside," I said, holding out the wallet to her. She stared blankly at me, her smile locked, hands folded in her lap. When she made no move to take
it from me, I awkwardly set it down on the table and turned for the door, feeling unsettled.
"My goodness, sweetheart, are you leaving so soon?" I froze. "I'd hate to let you go without repaying you. Why don't you join my son and I for dinner?"
I started to stammer out an excuse about my curfew, but she interrupted me, extending her arms in a welcoming gesture – at least, that was probably her intention. "I'm afraid I overdid myself with the cooking, and I'd hate to let all that food to waste. It's really my pleasure."
Alarm bells were going off in my head. "I don't think I'm supposed to –"
Just then, the man I'd seen earlier walked into the room, and I almost sighed with relief, glad I wasn't alone with her anymore. He looked at the woman, then at me, his expression half-amused. "Mother, have you found us a guest for dinner?"
His presence calmed me down, and I realized how rude I was being, making such a rush to leave. He'd called her mother, but as I looked between the two of them, I thought the woman seemed too young. She was in her late thirties at most, and he looked around twenty. They didn't look too similar, either; his features were dark and angular, while she was pale and blue-eyed.
But I knew better than to ask – you weren't supposed to talk to people about stuff like that, my parents had told me. And though I hadn't realized it before, I was hungry. My stomach was rumbling, and I didn't want to wait for dinner at home. That delicious smell was still hovering in the air. If anything, it'd gotten stronger.
"Yeah," I said. "Dinner sounds nice." Soon as the words had left my mouth, I frowned. I was forgetting something. "But my mom... I should call her."
When the woman shook her head, her glossy red hair caught the light. "I'm good friends with your mother, dear. There's no need. And besides, dinner's getting cold. I'm so glad you've decided to join us."
"You're friends with my mom?" I asked. That couldn't be right. I knew all my mom's friends, and I'd never seen her before.
She was silent for a beat, then smiled. "We see each other at church. Ask her if she knows a Marjory; I guarantee you, we're very good friends. Come to the table, now."
Before I really knew what was happening, I was being ushered to a seat at a long mahogany dining table. "Take a seat," Marjory exclaimed. The table could've seated ten more people, but the three of us sat at clustered at one end. The food was already set – three plates covered with silver cloches, three sets of cutlery, three crystal glasses filled with ice water. My eyes roamed over the polished dome of the cloches. I'd never seen them outside of fancy restaurants.
Wait, a voice in my head whispered. The table's already set. Why is the table already set?
Maybe I would've listened to that voice, but the hunger in my stomach had grown to a grumbling crescendo. Had I even been hungry before I'd entered the house? It didn't matter - the smell of whatever was wafting out from under the cover of the cloche was too good to ignore. The weird thing is, I couldn't even describe what it smelled like. It wasn't like any specific food. All I knew was that it was good, hearty and warm and alluring, and I wanted more of it.
Marjory lifted the cloche off my plate. The aroma was overpowering now. I stared down at the meal in front of me.
It was a thick T-bone steak. Gravy oozed off the sides and pooled on the china plate, with grilled vegetables and potatoes on the side. I could feel my mouth watering. I couldn't remember the last time I'd had steak, and it had never looked this good.
I glanced up at Marjory and her son. Their plates were uncovered, but they hadn't touched the food; both of them were smiling and still, as if they were waiting for me to eat first.
I would have, too. I wanted nothing more than to eat, but as my hand darted out to clasp the fork, my elbow toppled the crystal glass, sending a wash of ice-cold water over the table and into my clothes. "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry!" I stammered, my face hot even as my skin tingled from the cold.
"Oh, it's no worry at all –" Marjory started to speak, but I wasn't listening. I'd already ducked underneath the tablecloth, looking for the fallen glass. I spotted it, all right, lying on its side next to my feet. But that wasn't all I saw.
The floor was moving.
I blinked. Was I seeing things? No – the floor was moving ever-so-slightly, its wooden surface heaving upwards as if it were a balloon being inflated, then softly sagging down. Like lungs, I thought deliriously. The movement was so subtle that I might have missed it if I hadn't been roaming the whole floor with my eyes in search for the glass, but now, it was undeniable. It must have been some sort of trick, some kind of optical illusion.
The whole thing happened in a span of seconds. I sat up hard – bump. My head had hit the underside of the table. More carefully now, I shrank out from under the cover of the tablecloth, shaken. My appetite, so ravenous just moments before, was gone. It was like something had shifted in the air – maybe it was just the shock of the cold water, but I felt more alert. More awake.
They were both looking at me with unperturbed expressions. Marjory turned to her son and said, "James, dear, would you go grab a new glass from the kitchen? And some napkins."
"Of course I will." James smiled. Earlier I'd admired his teeth from a distance – white and straight, the kind of teeth I wished I had. Now that I was sitting across the table from him, I felt my stomach drop. His smile wasn't just straight. Now I could see that the top and bottom rows were solid, flat planes of pearl white - like two strips of ceramic. My mouth went cotton-dry as my eyes edged over to Marjory. Same smile. Same teeth.
His smile lasted a beat too long. Then he was standing up, walking to the kitchen. I hadn't realized I'd been holding my breath until he was gone.
The icy sensation felt like it was spreading. I forced myself to look at Marjory. She wasn't blinking. Her eyes were still, the lids never shuttering over her glassy blue irises, like doll's eyes. And her skin – it looked hard and smooth, I realized, completely unblemished. How had I not noticed earlier? How could I have missed the plastic quality of their faces? My stomach felt like it was twisted in knots.
"I need to go," I blurted. I shot out of my chair. I was ready to make a run for it.
"No!" Marjory shrieked. Immediately she seemed to regain her composure, her features smoothing back into a pleasant mask. "You haven't even eaten a bite yet. Why don't you sit back down –"
I took a step back, and Marjory's hand shot out in a blur of movement. One moment she was reaching for me, and the next pain was shooting up my arm. I yelped
and looked down to see Marjory's fingers curled around my forearm, tighter than a vice grip. Blood beaded around her red nails as they dug deeper into my skin.
Terrified, I kicked at her with all my strength. Crack! My foot made contact with Marjory's calf, and she crumpled to the floor. At that moment, I heard it: a guttural, groaning shudder that ran through the entire house, like the walls were gasping for air. For one split second, I saw Hudor House as it truly was, and I will never forget the sight.
The walls, the polished wood floors, the mahogany table – they were all crumbling, eaten away by rot and mold. The rich smell of cooking food was suddenly acrid in my nostrils. My skin turned to ice as I took in the sight of the food I'd almost eaten: the steak was gone, replaced by a mass of gelatinous pink goop that was melting into sludge, bubbling at the edges.
The worst sight was Marjory herself; her body was charred black and flaking ash, the white of her skull visible where the flesh had burned away entirely. Her one good eye was the same terrible, pale blue, staring at me from its caved-in socket.
Before the scream had even left my throat, the house shimmered like a mirage and was restored to the picture-perfect scene it had been moments before. I turned and ran as fast as I could, and if Marjory was pursuing me – well, I didn't stop to check. My legs carried me through the front door, and only when the burn of my muscles forced me to stop did I realize I'd run down the whole street.
I stared down at the five crescents on my arm left by Marjory's fingernails. The blood had been smeared during my frantic run. I had to get back home, but that meant going back in the direction of Hudor House, and I had no intention to do that.
I took the long way, circling around the whole neighborhood, still in a daze. I couldn't understand what had happened. I walked slowly, letting myself warm up in the fading evening heat, but I still felt cold by the time I got back home.
Mom and Dad were waiting for me at home. I threw myself onto a couch without greeting either of them, and Mom raised her eyebrow at me.
"How was your bike ride?" she asked me in an accusatory tone, and I groaned. I hadn't even realized that I'd left my bike behind.
"I lost it," I said sheepishly. That got dad's attention, and mom was about to say something when she noticed the cuts on my arm and started making a huge fuss, demanding to know how I'd hurt myself.
I took a deep breath and decided to start from the beginning. They were my parents – if I couldn't tell them, I couldn't tell anyone. I began with the man and his wallet, but they cut me off when I told them about going into house 207.
"Ashley," mom said in a gentle tone. "Nobody lives in 207. It's not even for sale."
A look of confusion flitted across dad's face. "Well, there was that couple, wasn't there? I thought I remembered..." he trailed off when mom pinned him with this odd look – it was almost like her eyes went all unfocused for a split second, and then suddenly the same dreamy look took over dad's features, and that was it. According to my parents, nobody had ever lived in 207 Magnolia Lane.
Shortly after that, they seemed to just... forget. They didn't bring up the cuts, the bike, any of it. I knew something was up, but I wasn't going to push my luck.
In the following few days, it was like it had never happened. A few times, mom would catch another glimpse of the scars on my arm and she'd start to look concerned, but that same dreamy look would take over and she'd turn away without saying anything. I began going out on my evening bike rides again, though I would take the long route to avoid going anywhere near 207. As days turned into weeks, my fear subsided, but I kept up the habit.
It wasn't that I thought it'd never happened – the memory of it all was clear in my mind. Part of it was the realization that it couldn't hurt me as long as I didn't go back in. But the main reason was that I was eleven years old, and somehow, that made it okay. I didn't go insane or start seeking out answers. At age eleven, the part of me that believed in monsters and ghouls was still alive, and in some twisted way, that let me accept the events of that day, crazy as they were.
I never looked too deeply into it, but I learned that the house on Magnolia Lane was uninhabited – it always had been. I never looked into the neighborhood disappearances that cropped up when I was in my sophomore year of high school. I never asked, never brought it up to my parents again, never spoke of it to my friends.
It's been about fifteen years since then, and to be honest, up until last week, I hadn't thought about the house in a decade. Maybe you're wondering why I'm writing this now, so long after it all happened. Well, it just happens that for the first time since I was eleven, I'm going back to Hudor House. Why?
Because last week, my parents left me a voice message, and I was too busy to listen to it.
Because last week, my parents told me they'd been invited to a housewarming party at the neighbor's house. 207 Magnolia Lane, to be specific.
Because last week, my parents walked through the doors of Hudor House, and they haven't walked back out.