Beneath the Foundation

Chapter 2

School had released for Summer, and we all had big expectations for the months ahead. We had recently moved into the house near the newly formed railroad tracks. It's a nice place for sure. Two stories and four bedrooms along with a pool we hardly used. The house had been renovated not long before my dad purchased it. A fresh coat of red paint glimmered from the sunbaked heat of the summer, and the roof looked immaculately laid. These are details I had noticed coming from our small apartment. A family needs a house, even one with secrets.

The halls zigzagging through the house held fresh carpet, and the tiles in the kitchen looked like they had been power washed to a glorious shine. All new appliances came with the house as well. It all seemed so fantastic. I was only about twelve at the time, so the concept of money and house purchasing was a bit beyond me, but even I could understand this was all far too nice for us. It all felt so manufactured at the time, but I guess that was kind of the point.

"Jesus, they weren't kidding when they mentioned a deal we couldn't pass up." My dad had mentioned when we walked our first tour of the house, and he was right. They had to be crazy to have something like this on the market. Affordable enough that a family of 'humble means' like us could weasel our way in.

I don't know the specifics of how much the house had sold for, but no way was it at or above market value. Take this all with a grain of salt mind you. I was, as previously stated, a dumb ass kid at the time, but dumb ass kids get things right occasionally, and on this occasion, I had gotten more right than I thought at the time.

So, we moved in. Just my mom, my dad and me. As functional and white bread American as it can be. All that was missing was a golden retriever named Spot. We did have a cat though, not trying to get ahead of myself here, but the info just keeps pouring back, named Jasper. Dad named him, knowing him, I'm guessing he just used some name generator.to

The master bedroom was located on the second floor. Across the hall from there was the first bathroom, followed by the coat closet. On the main floor housed the kitchen/dining room, and the living room. The living room unfortunately did not come furnished, but we had a fair amount of furniture left over from our apartment that it all kind of filled itself out. After the living room, there was a narrow hall leading to my room. A smaller bedroom, big enough for all my stuff to fit. My stuff being a bed, work desk and my computer.

The hall leading to my room always sent a chill down my spine. There were no windows leading to the outside world, so the only light came from an old-timey pull string light, located about five paces into the hall. So, at night when it got dark, you'd be fumbling around trying to find the damn thing to light your way. I don't think I have to tell you how such a hall could illicit some primeval fear in a twelve-year-old brain. Normally, I'd just try to leave the closet light in my room on to form some kind of lighted path, but my parents being the sticklers they were, it often was off by the time I came home. Jasper usually liked to hang out in my room on the edge of my bedframe. Dad was known nationwide for his snoring, and mom was always up and about for one reason or another. All I usually had going on was the occasional nightly gaming session on the PC with a bunch of nerds who I knew I would never talk to in person.

We moved sometime in early January and got fairly settled by Spring. I started school a little later than we would have liked, but all my credits carried over, so it was fairly harmless.

Now, a thing you probably already understand, but I'll reiterate here, is that scrawny kids who spend most of their free time attempting to reunite the clans of Azeroth, don't usually have a stellar time making friends. And I assure you, my case isn't any different, but I made by well. Met a couple guys likewise interested in the same guff. I had the occasional sleepover. Kid shit, you get the gist. During some of the later gaming sessions we had at my place, the creepiness factor of the house always seemed to exponentiate to a fair degree. The ambient noises of the trees, the abrupt kick of the AC going into high gear, and even the occasional assault of snores coming from the master bedroom late at night. Maybe it was our dumb little kid brains making sense of it all that we put little thought into them. After a while, the sounds and bumps in the night became just muffled background noise.

Now, I can't really blame a lot of what happened on myself. I was just a kid after all, no one's really expecting you to use the senses god gave you to weed out the unnatural. The events that occurred in that house, and the thing living beneath the foundation were an act of God, as far as I'm concerned. But to this day I still must wonder. How long had those noises been going on for before I started to notice them, and when did they change?