Lonely Street The Read online

the room and her eyes widened as she saw Mr. Teddy standing on his own two legs.

  “Mr. Teddy?”

  “Come here Sarah,” Mr. Teddy demanded waving his hand to follow.

  Sarah started walking slowly to the bear as the closet door opened slowly. Sarah, now scared, said, “Stop. You’re scaring me.”

  She continued walking to the closet.

  “Follow me,” Mr. Teddy said.

  Sarah walked into the closet. Her eyes took a minute to adjust as she looked around the dark room for the teddy bear. The closet door slammed behind her and she started to cry, still looking around the room. She rotated her head to the far corner and saw mist coming from the floor. She walked to see what was causing the sudden gust of moisture. As she stepped forward, a figure appeared more and more. She was halfway to the figure as a woman with a long white dress dragging on the floor as it walked. Sarah looked at the face and screamed.

  The lady’s face (it looked more like a human skull) was covered with deep cuts. Her nose looked like it was punched crooked. The hair dangled anything but neat. The misty apparition was actually going bald, a little, and its neck looked like it had been strangled, or hanging. The ghost had pale skin and looked more like an abused pet than a woman. Or a dog tore her face to shreds.

  “Don’t scream.” The ghost suggested. “It’ll hurt less.”

  The lady slowly walked toward Sarah as it broken a smile on the white face. Sarah ran to the door behind her and tried to open it.

  “Help!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. “Help!”

  Sarah looked behind her to see the ghost had massive fingernails...or claws. Sarah screamed until the claw-like nails pierced her back. The nails dug deeper and deeper as blood poured out of the cut.

  Sarah was dead within five minutes.

  “Did you hear screaming,” Andrew asked. “The only person in this house other than us is Sarah. She’s up in her room, so chill. It's probably an owl,” Tom answered.

  “Didn’t know owls lived near here.”

  Tom reached out for the black remote on the wooden table. He knew the controls like the back of his hand. He turned the volume up.

  “Well, I’m hungry,” Andrew said.

  “Well, go get some grub. You know where the kitchen is.”

  Andrew stood up and walked toward the kitchen. He opened the door and turned on the light. The boy opened the closet door and saw the cookies. After grabbing the cookies, he turned around to see the drawer open. Knives sprang up as if on a trampoline and shot towards Andrew. The terrified boy ducked, screaming (or whatever that whimpers was).

  “Tom! Tom!”

  “Andrew. For Pete’s sake. You know where the food is!”

  One knife barely missed Andrew and went into the red wall.

  “Andrew! What are you doing in there? Throwing the knives?”

  Andrew ran to the door, dodging knives on the way. He reached the door a pushed on the door. It didn’t budge. He pushed and pushed until he didn’t have any strength.

  “Help!” he called, still pushing on the door. He changed his motive and pulled. And it opened. Andrew ran in the living room.

  “Dude, you look like you saw a ghost,” Tom said.

  “Because I did,” Andrew said his eyes wide.

  Tom stood straight up when he saw the kitchen door open by itself. The noise of the cartoons was silent. He blocked out the noise with worry and fear. He back up slowly as a knife missed his head by inches. Tom screamed at Andrew to follow him... and quick. They ran to the front door but it was locked. They pushed (and pulled) but to no avail.

  The two boys ran up to Sarah’s room, panting. Tom opened her closet door and looked inside. Sarah’s limp body lay on the bloody carpet, scaring the friends.

  “Oh no.”

  Tom didn’t know if he said it or his friend did. He slammed the door and ran to the bookshelf. He pulled it aside until he couldn’t move it any farther. Not knocking like before, he opened the hidden door. He waved his hand at Andrew to urge him to follow.

  When they were both in the hole, Tom moved the bookshelf back to the original spot. He closed the door he opened and waited.

  “I thought it was just a legend,” Andrew admitted. “My brother, you know Frank, told me this story about a ghost. The story goes that a married couple who lived in this house got into a fight on their anniversary. The husband beat the wife to death and cut her face with a knife. He then hung her on the lamppost. The one that never burns out. The owners, who bought the house, lived here a couple years. Ten years after the murder, they saw the wife in mirrors, the television, and the windows. The baby child wanted to go to the streetlight to see a woman. He got dragged off to the Whitman's field. The parents then died ten days later. They had cracked necks. The next owners experienced the same thing, ten years later. The same thing happened to the next owners, ten years later. The next owners thought their child had an imaginary friend at the streetlight. The boy got dragged off to the same field. The mother chased after her son but he was dead. When she was walking home, she died. Her head was bleeding. The doctor said a rock killed her.”

  “Whoa,” Tom said, surprised. He never heard a sadder story than that. He didn’t have much time to be surprised. The bed room door creaked open as the ghost walked in.

  “Little children.” She said. “Come out, come out wherever you are.”

  Tom tried not to breathe heavily when the ghost stopped talking. He tapped Andrew on the shoulder to get his attention. Andrew jumped, almost hitting his head on the small ceiling. Tom pointed down the narrow passage and started crawling.

  “What are we doing,” Andrew whispered.

  “I’ve been scaring Sarah in these walls for years. There are other ways out. Trust me.”

  They continued to crawl through the halls. They would turn every so often and stop to listen. They did this for a couple minutes until Andrew heard a noise. Someone or something was talking. But what was it?

  “Dude... Dude.”

  Andrew looked at Tom and realized the noise was Tom!

  “Dude my parents will be home any time now. They’ll help.”

  “What’s wrong, honey?” Tom’s dad said.

  “Oh Rob. I think we have to get home,” Tom’s mom answered.

  “Why?”

  “I got a text. I’ll read it to you,” Susan offered. “‘Know you’re worried. Don’t. Having real fun with Sarah. Please don’t come home.”

  “He’s just kidding. We haven’t even had dessert yet.”

  “Okay. We’ll stay. But right after we eat, we’re going home.”

  The ghost put Tom’s phone down on the green counter. It’s been a miracle she could even use it. It looked at the wall. It heard the noise of talking. Then crawling. Talking. Something living in the wall was doing the same pattern over and over. The ghost walked to the corner with the noise. She took out the knife she was keeping and stabbed the wall and sliding the knife into a square to look in.

  It was the two boys!

  “Dude! I see a light,” Andrew said. “No! You can’t die on me like this. We’ve come so far,” Tom yelled silently.

  “No. I see a light,” Andrew pointed to the cut in the wall.

  “Oh no... Run. Or crawl fast.”

  They crawled as fast as they could. Tom, no able to talk from fear, pointed to a handle on the wall with a flashlight by it. He quickly opened it and collapsed on the bathroom floor. He quickly stood up, also pulling his friend onto his feet, and ran. Tom looked behind Andrew, but saw... nothing. They were ahead! They ran to the phone, dialed Tom’s parent’s number and waited.

  Bbbeeeeeeeepp... Bbbeeeeeeeepp.... Bbbeeee-

  “Sorry. This number cannot be contacted. Press one for help. Press two to try again. Press three for-”

  “Hello.” a creaky, old voice welcomed the caller. “I missed you while you were hiding in the wall. I’m upstairs on the phone in this nice bedroom. If you come up here, then I’ll end your miserab
le lives quickly. If you don’t... well you’ll die a slow and painful death. And remember. Don’t scream.” And the phone call ended.

  The two boys looked at each other with scared eyes. They slowly rotated their eyes to the ceiling. Noise thumped and pounded on the floor as the ghost paced back and forth. Waiting.

  “We need to get out of here,” Andrew recommended.

  “No duh, Einstein.”

  They ran to the front door after they grabbed a chair. Tom was the lookout as Andrew started banging the door’s glass windows. He cracked one end of the window and continued bashing it.

  Andrew ran to the basement and later came back with a hammer and gloves. He smashed out the first window and reached over to turn the doorknob. He could almost reach it. He even stood on his toes!

  “I’ll get a chair,” Tom said. He dashed to the kitchen.

  He was carrying the chair back when he heard a phone call. He dashed for the phone, thinking it was his parents. But thinking isn’t knowing. A creaky voice was on the other line.

  “Hello small child. You haven’t come and joined the fun. I know people would die to have fun with me. I’ll give you one more chance. You. Not your friend. I’ll give you a minute to come up here. If you don’t... You know the answer.”

  The car was at a steady fifty miles per hour speed. Tom’s parents were worried. Not about Tom, about what he was doing to the poor girl. They were driving over the regular speed limit by at least twenty miles an hour. The two grown-ups were thinking to themselves about the lovely dinner and dessert they had that night.

  “Honey.” Susan said, noticing the speed of the car. “You’re going