Mark Davis was finishing cooking while his wife, Emma, was changing out of her work clothes. The pan of Irish stew was bubbling along nicely, even the carrots, the stubborn orange critters that they were, were soft and cooked through. He heard something coming from the living room. He stopped stirring the pan and listened. It sounded like a child was playing in the next room. As they had no children, the sound was really quite disturbing. It actually sounded like a little girl was in the living room, playing and singing. Was a neighbourhood kid messing around in their house? 

He threw open the door, ready to tell the naughty child to get out. He stared in confusion. The room was empty and suddenly quiet. He shrugged and returned to the kitchen, telling himself it must have been kids in the street that he had heard. As he got stuck in to the cooking, adding more gravy granules to the thick, he still felt strange about the sounds. It had really sounded as though the noise was coming from inside the house. He shook his head, and busied himself with the cooking. 

By the time his wife entered the kitchen, commenting on how lovely the stew smelled, Mark had all but forgotten about the weird noises.

A few nights later, just as he was drifting off to sleep, Mark heard a voice. The voice was loud in the quiet dark of the bedroom.

‘Get out! You don’t belong here!’ 

He sat up in bed, breathing hard. He nudged his wife lying next to him.

‘Did you hear that?’ He asked,

‘Hmph?’

‘A voice telling us to get out.’

‘I didn’t hear anything. You must have dreamt it.’ Emma said. ‘What type of voice was it?’

‘It sounded like a little girl was shouting at me.’ 

With his heart still pounding, he lay back down, nestling his head into the pillow. Maybe everyone had weird things happen to them, maybe that was just life. Maybe you couldn’t explain everything, and maybe you weren’t supposed to. Perhaps Emma was right and he had dreamed it, the voice coming from his subconscious, rather than something sinister or supernatural. 

One evening as they were watching television, Emma half-turned and spoke.

‘I think we might have rats or mice in the attic.’ She said. 

‘Really? Have you found droppings?’ 

‘No, but this afternoon, I heard a noise. I think it must be rats.’

‘What did you hear?’ He asked.

‘It sounded like footsteps, like someone was running up and down the landing. When I checked, there was nobody there. They say that’s what a sign of a rodent infestation.’ 

Mark said nothing, reeling that Emma was hearing things too. It made it more real, that it wasn’t just his mind, his over-active imagination, playing tricks on him.

One morning, he tripped at the top of the stairs. He had to grab onto the bannister, and just about managed to stay on his feet. Shaking from having almost fallen down the stairs, he paused for a moment. That had been a close-call. He could have broken his arm, leg or worse. He looked back to see what had caused him to trip.

On the top step, glinting in the morning sunlight spilling in through the window, was a child’s roller-skate. He flinched as though he had just been struck. He called out to his wife downstairs. When she appeared at the foot of the stairs, he told her to come here. With a confused look on her face, she hurried up the stairs to see what was distressing him. He explained that he had nearly fallen down the stairs, that something had tripped him.

‘Look at what made me trip.’ He said, pointing. 

They both turned to look at the top step. There was nothing there.

‘What am I supposed to be looking at?’ Emma asked.

‘There was a kid’s roller-skate. It was there, I swear.’ Mark insisted.

‘I’m late for work but we’ll talk tonight, okay?’ Emma said.

Mark nodded as his wife rushed off to the office.

All that day, the image of the roller-skate at the top of the stairs stayed with him, haunted him. He flinched at the word. Haunted. Was that what this was? Was their house haunted? Were they being haunted? Something strange was going on, there was no doubt about that. 

That evening, as they dined on chilli con carne, Mark detailed the events of that morning once more. He knew it sounded crazy, that Emma must think he’d lost his mind. Emma listened in silence as he explained. Once he was done, he waited to hear what she made of it all. She placed her fork down on the side of her plate.

‘I believe you, love, I do. I do not think you’re crazy.’ She said.

‘I’m so relieved to hear you say that.’ Mark said.

‘I have seen things too.’ Emma said.

The relief that had felt left him. He felt as if a bucket of cold water had been thrown over him. 

‘Go on.’ He said.

‘The other night, when I got home from work, as I came in the front door, a child’s ball came bouncing down the hallway towards me. Just as it reached me, it vanished, faded away to nothing. As I stood there trembling, I heard a little girl laughing.’

Mark stared at his wife in horror. She had seen and heard these strange things too. He couldn’t quite find the words to say. Suddenly the world he knew, the life they had been making together, none of it seemed to make sense any more. Emma nodded trying to process everything that was going on in their home. 

‘We’ll keep an eye on things.’ She said. ‘We will keep talking about it, and see where we go from here. If things get too strange then we’ll go and stay at my sisters.’

Mark nodded, that sounded like a plan. He sighed. Yes, at least they had a fall-back plan. If things got really weird, then, like in an American horror film, they can pack up and flee their house until all this blows over.

‘Okay.’ He said.

They next day, when he returned home from work, and went through to the living room, he discovered he was not alone. There was a ghostly apparition in the room. Standing there, staring right at him, was a little girl in a blue dress. He could see through her, could make out the armchair behind her. It was as though she was there, and yet not there all at the same time. He stood still, couldn’t move. She slowly raised an arm and pointed at him. And then she vanished.

Mark crumpled to the carpet in complete shock and distress. His fingers were trembling. He couldn’t take all this. Their house was haunted by a little girl. This wasn’t something that happened in real life, it was like something from a horror film. Some of his friends knew people who had seen ghosts but it was always a friend of a friend who saw something, never anyone he actually knew personally. 

By the time Emma came home, Mark had composed himself. He was drinking a cup of tea at the kitchen table. Emma came in, plonking her handbag down on the work-top and asked how his day had been.

‘You are not going to believe what’s just happened.’ Mark said.

Emma joined him at the table, took hold of his hand and spoke, her voice barely a whisper.

‘You’ve seen her too, haven’t you?’ 

She explained how she had seen the girl in the blue dress that morning as she was leaving for work. The ghostly figure had actually watched from the upstairs window, as Emma had driven away.

‘I’m not sure I can take much more of this.’ Mark said.

‘I know. I’ll have a word with my sister tomorrow. I’ll see if we can stay there for a while.’

Mark nodded. He flinched at the sound of a motorbike tearing down the street outside. When he realised it was only a vehicle outside, not anything more sinister he laughed. Emma smiled at him.

‘We’ll be okay, love.’ She said.

Just over an hour later, they had just finished eating their meal of pasta Bolognese when they heard voices coming from the living room. Mark felt sick. They moved slowly towards the door, both terrified of what they would find on the other side. Holding Emma’s hand tightly, Mark opened the door and they peered inside. The ghostly little girl in the blue dress was in the middle of the room looking at them. She beckoned them to come forward.

Mark and Emma shuffled forward into the living room, nearer the apparition, quite unsure what was happening. Mark was wondering if this was a group hallucination, if both he and Emma were seeing things, when the little girl spoke.

‘They are here.’ She said. 

Suddenly, the little girl wasn’t the only ghost in the room. A man and woman appeared behind her, both spectral and ghostly. Mark sensed they were the little girl’s parents. What had happened to the family and why were they haunting his house? 

‘Why are you here?’ Mark asked, Emma squeezing his hand tighter than ever.

The girl’s mother leaned forward and spoke, her voice distorted as though they were conversing on a bad telephone line.

‘What year is it?’ The woman asked.

‘It’s 2012, of course.’ Mark replied.

The woman shook her head.

‘That year was well over a decade ago. The last occupants of the house, Emma and Mark, died in a fire that gutted the place. We are the new occupants.’ She said.

‘What?’ Mark said. ‘No, this is all wrong. I don’t remember any fire.’ 

‘I remember now.’ Emma said, sadly. ‘There was a fire, love.’

Mark turned to his wife. 

‘No, please, no.’ He said.

Emma was fading away. He could make out the bookshelf behind her. She was the ghost. Emma went to speak, to say something to her husband, but she faded away like smoke on the breeze. Mark reached out a hand to her, noticing his limbs were now ghostly transparent. 

The little girl turned to her parents.

‘They’ve gone.’ She said.

By Chris Platt

From: United Kingdom