Hall House
Trying my hand at flash fiction.
“Where does this lead?”
“Nowhere good,” the fair-haired boy said.
“Why do you think that,” Jennie asked.
“Creepy old vacant house with a secret passage,” Tan said. “That never ends well.”
Kevin pointed his flashlight down the narrow passageway behind the wall. He flipped his blonde locks out of his eyes and peered into the darkness.
“Why are we even here,” Jennie wanted to know.
“You know why we’re here,” Tan reminded her. “That stupid bet.”
“Shhh,” Kevin put his fingers to his lips.
“What is it?”
“I hear something,” Kevin claimed. “Whispering.”
“Oh, great,” Tan said, his straight black hair looking blue in the dim light. “I always thought it was a joke or something. Don’t tell me Hall House is really haunted.”
“Come on, you two,” Jennie, always the voice of reason, interjected. “It’s not haunted, Kevin is just imagining things. We set up this creepy mood and now we’re . . . .”
“Leave this place,” the whisperer said.
Kevin looked at Jennie wide-eyed, “Told you.”
“Let’s just give up and get out of here,” Tan suggested.
“No way,” countered Kevin. “I’m not losing this bet. It’s probably Josh trying to scare us so we lose.”
“Fair point,” Tan conceded.
“All right, let’s just get the thing and get out of here,” Jennie said.
“Okay. Where do you think it is?” Kevin asked.
“I have no idea. If it was me, I’d keep it in my bedroom,” the thin, dark-haired girl offered.
“Leave this place,” the whisperer again.
“All right, let’s go upstairs and forget this passageway,” Tan said.
“There are so many rooms, where do we start?” Kevin said.
“Kid’s room. Don’t you think that’s where you’d find it.”
“I guess.”
“We searched like four rooms already and nothing,” Tan pointed out.
“Look, there it is,” Kevin said. “But I wonder how Josh knew this kid had it.”
“Let’s go and find out,” Jennie said. “I’ve had enough of this place.”
“Here, we found it. Now you owe us a hundred bucks,” Kevin said to Josh.
“No problem,” he said, turning the baseball over in his hand, looking at the autograph, handing them five twenties.
“What’s the real deal, Josh?” asked Jennie.
He looked at them, tilting his head to the left a little.
“Well, the truth is, that house isn’t haunted at all. The old guy who lives there took my baseball one day when I was walking home. I was throwing it up in the air and catching it and I missed. It rolled onto the lawn right up to his feet. ‘My property, my ball,’ he said to me and he took it. My dad gave me that ball and it’s signed by Mike Schmidt. He was a pitcher for the Phillies back in the day, it’s a World Series ball. I had to think of some way to get it back.”
“Wow, Josh. You had us break into someone’s house to get your stupid ball,” Kevin shook his head.
Josh shrugged, clutching the ball, his knuckles turning white.
