Haunted Hearts

Chapter 1

Be strong for Mia, I thought to myself.

The clock struck midnight. A shiver raced down my spine, unsettling the very core of my being, as an almost imperceptible whisper slithered from the depths of the desolate, forsaken attic.

It had been four days since our reckless dalliance with the ouija board, and now, these ominous murmurs crept insidiously into our reality. Blurring the line between the living and the dead.

Dishes, glasses, plates would fly off the shelf. Whispers and voices could be heard trapped in the walls whenever there was no other sound in the house.
And even if this scared us, it also made us have hope. All of these unexplained things meant something more.
Something else.

Were we unwittingly beckoning forth the spirit of our departed father, or had we stumbled upon something far more malevolent in our quest for answers?
Despite the tales of spectral horrors that haunted our thoughts, our morbid curiosity compelled us further. Heedless of the abyss into which we were slowly descending.

"Maybe we should try it again," Mia shrugged, as I finished washing the dishes. Each one of them from a different set that we gathered over the years.
I took one of our three apples, trying to subside the starvation I still felt. Even after having dinner.

"For what? The spirits are definitely not happy about us messing with them," I replied, slicing the apple, trying my best to look at ease for my little sister's sake.

In the wake of our father's death, he left us not with comforting memories but with a mountain of unpaid bills, casting us adrift in a sea of financial ruin. With nothing but the echoing emptiness of our home and the specter of imminent homelessness looming overhead, desperation gnawed at our very souls.

I toiled relentlessly, juggling two jobs to stave off the impending abyss, while Mia, with her delicate hands, sought solace in selling her paintings, still hoping to paint over the cracks of our shattered existence. Yet, as the weight of our father's debts threatened to crush us, we turned to the forbidden whispers of the ouija board, desperate to seek guidance from beyond the grave. To learn if there was a plan for us.

According to Mia, there were still just too many questions unanswered. Little did we know, our cries for help would awaken something far more sinister, as the shadows of our once-safe haven stirred with malevolent intent.

But as the darkness closed in around us, I thought to myself, 'Who cares, we are leaving this house anyway,' it won't take long before the landlord kick us out once he realizes: we haven't payed him for this month's rent.

I didn't know why I bother honestly.
The house stood with exhaustion, its whole facade sagging under the weight of neglect and time. Each creaking floorboard and crumbling brick whispered tales of hardship and despair, bearing witness to the struggles of its impoverished inhabitants. The roof had so many holes. Holes that were patched with tattered tarps and makeshift repairs. Holes that leaked torrents of rainwater into the pale floor, where mold crept insidiously along the cracked walls like a silent invader.

Windows, once proud givers of light, now stood shattered and boarded up. Sometimes even letting the snow in; their glass long gone— shattered by misfortune. The paled wooden floor, littered with debris, groaned beneath each weary step, threatening to give way beneath the weight of existence.

In the corner of the living room we had a broken sofa, its once vibrant cream color faded to a dull sick-gray, with several stains. Stains that were there even before it arrived to our lives. Nearby, a rickety table with wobbly legs served as the family's makeshift dining area.

In the kitchen, the sink dripped incessantly, its rusty pipes protesting with each agonizing drop, while the stove, its burners blackened with neglect, stood silent and cold, unable to provide even the simplest meal. Cooking soup or pasta, which were our regular meal, turned out to be an impossible task.

My eyes stopped scanning the empty house and focused on Mia's big blue eyes who were staring at me with a huge hunger for answers that I did not have.

I hated this feeling.

I had to be the bigger person even if it drained all strength from me, I couldn't let Mia see me crumble.
I couldn't let her worry.
I couldn't let her drown with me.
She was too sweet.
Too gentle.

I gathered the courage to swallow my own misery and flashed her a smile, "you finished with that painting from earlier?"

"Yes! You have to see it, it's—" she replied, while suddenly being interrupted by another ominous thud that echoed from the far reaches of the attic. Mia jolted to her feet in terror, and my knife slipped from my grasp.

"It's nothing— it's just rats," I tried to reassure her, while doing my best to listen to the noises. Maybe if I payed closed attention to them, I would understand them better.

"You know it's not rats," Mia whispered, eyes completely focused on the ceiling.

The attic seemed to reverberate with the eerie sound of furniture being rearranged, a perplexing occurrence considering its emptiness. In fact, our home was devoid of any furnishings at all. Despite my curiosity driving me to investigate, the noises always ceased upon my approach. Faced with this inexplicable phenomenon, we opted to ignore it, even as the unsettling sounds intensified with each passing day.

With trembling lips, I uttered aloud the haunting thought that had plagued my mind: "Perhaps they just want me dead."
In the suffocating darkness of our haunted sanctuary, the words hung heavy.
And that was when the sound upstairs stopped.

Mia's voice cut through the darkness, her face illuminated by the feeble flicker of the candle's light, casting some dancing shadows across her delicate features. "You don't mean it, do you?" she implored, her eyes haunted by a silent plea.

I met her gaze, the pale visage of her face, the skeletal frame that barely held her upright, the dark circles beneath her blue eyes. All reminders of the toll our desperate circumstances had taken. "Of course not," I murmured, forcing a smile that felt as hollow as the darkness surrounding us.

At nineteen, burdened with responsibilities far beyond my years, and Mia, just fourteen, trapped in a world that had already stripped her of her innocence. We clung to each other in the face of an uncertain future, praying that the authorities wouldn't come knocking, threatening to tear us apart.

Mia drew closer, retrieving the fallen knife with a tremulous hand, her lips curling into a fragile smile. "Once we contact father, it will all get better," she insisted, her voice trembling with a hope that seemed as fragile as glass.

I nodded, though doubt consumed my mind, uncertainty clawing at my heart. How could I tell her that I didn't really had any questions for father, there was nothing to be asked. Nothing I wanted to know.
I only had complains.

The ouija board lay before us, we haven't touched it or moved it since our little episode.
But it served us as a reminder.
This weird portal to the unknown, a beacon of false hope in the suffocating darkness. Perhaps the spirits would hear our desperate pleas, perhaps they would offer salvation from our wretched existence.

Or perhaps, in our desperation, we had invited something far more sinister into our lives. But as Mia's hopeful gaze met mine, I dared to believe, if only for a fleeting moment, that maybe, just maybe, we could find the peace we so desperately sought between the shadows that threatened to consume us.