Visitors In The Night

Visitors In The Night
A short story

By Michelle Krogh




Emily Smith sat inside her beautiful new home listening to the wind and rain beat frantically against the front windows. This was the first time she’d ever purchased anything all on her own. After a long dreadful divorce from a short and even more terrifying marriage, she’d won something of her life back. Although she was only twenty-six, she felt much older than others her age. The experiences that she lived through in the last two years had made her older than she really was. She was very thankful that her scars were mostly on the inside. Many people told her in spite of the battering; she was still an extremely attractive woman. Her slightly wavy, strawberry-blonde hair cascaded down the middle of her back. Tiny freckles spread across her small pert nose. Her cheeks were the color of rose petals. Her eyes the color of the clearest blue sky. Often she’d been told that this was her best feature. As she listened to the driving rain relief poured over her as she told herself she’d finally escaped from that life of hell. Probably just in time too before her ex could do more than just take her looks.

Using the money that the judge awarded her in the divorce settlement the first thing she did was buy this charming little two-bedroom cottage. It was far out in the woods in Lake Tahoe California. Once the Realtor told her just how low the price was, she knew she’d be a fool if she passed it up.
Sitting by her fireplace, she added another log before the flames went out. The room was so comfortable and warm. In its center, she’d positioned a sofa with matching love seat; three shaggy white throw rugs offered splashes of brightness and insulation over the polish-worn hardwood floors; its walls had surrendered their sameness to several paintings her mother had labored over for her.

As soon as she’d fixed the fire enough to keep it going for a few hours she felt like treating herself to a hot steamy mug of hot chocolate. As she went to the kitchen to make her hot chocolate, a loud pounding came from her front door.
“I hope that’s only the wind making a branch bang against the door,” she thought. Chills ran up her spine as she heard the thumping continue.
“Oh god, who could be out there,” she thought?
Several frightening thoughts ravaged her imagination on who could possibly be out there knocking on her door in the middle of the night in this weather. Just last week her ex-husband told her she would never be free of him. Having been his human punching bag for over two years and remembering how possessive he was, she truly believed he would try to keep his word and come looking for her. With fear coursing through her making her hands shake she went back to the living room to grab the fire poker. Never again was she going to allow anyone to hurt her. Feeling the cold steel in her hands she pulled it close to her body. She was ready for what might be outside as she came to the front door.

Glancing out the peephole to make sure there was actually someone there she noticed a young man barely into his twenties standing there.
“Who’s there?” she called from her side of the door.
“I’m sorry to bother you but my car broke down about a half a mile down the road, can I please use your phone to call a towing company?” the man asked her.
With severe apprehension, she opened the door only about an inch holding the poker right next to her. She took in his appearance as he stood on her porch. Wearing a black leather jacket, blue jeans, and a red baseball cap, he was violently shivering from being totally drenched.
“What did you say?” she inquired.
“Ma’am, I’m real sorry to bother you, but like I said before, my car broke down and I really need to use your phone.”
She noticed that the storm seemed to be getting worse even as they were standing there.
“Are you alone or do you have someone else out in the car?” and she tried to peer out the door and around him to see if anyone else was hiding in the shadows.
“No one else is with me, Ma’am. I was on my way home from work when my car began to act strange.”
Although she still felt reservations, she let the young man inside. She led him to where the phone was in the kitchen. Watching him like a hawk as he made his call. He stood there for a few minutes after dialing before replacing the receiver back into its cradle. There doesn’t seem to be anyone there. They must be out in the storm.” He told her.
Although she was still a bit uneasy about this man, she began to feel a little guilty about his situation too.
Could I offer you a cup of coffee or something else to drink?” she asked.
“A cup of coffee sounds like heaven right now Ma’am.”
She turned toward the counter to put on a fresh pot.
“If you don’t mind, please call me Emily. Ma’am makes me sound so old.”
“Sure Ma’am, I mean Emily. Where are my manners? My name is Joey Melrose, pleased to meet you.”
She felt the hair stand up on the back of her neck. Vaguely she remembered that name from somewhere. She just couldn’t seem to grasp onto it though.
“Do you live very far from here?” Emily asked, maybe a little too nosily .
“Actually I must be honest with you. I live fairly close by.”
“Oh, I thought the closest house was a mile up the road,” she said.
Silence was the only answer she received. Okay, fine then don’t answer me,” she thought crossly. “How would you like your coffee?”
She waited a moment to see if he were going to answer her. When still no answer was forth coming she turned around to face him.
The room was totally empty. She knew if he’d left she would have heard the front door open.
“Maybe he needed to use the bathroom,” she thought.
She left the cup on the counter before going to check the window to see if he went back outside.
Not seeing anything but the trees blowing, she went to check the bathroom. Visions kept trying to creep into her mind of him being some rapist or killer.
“Terrific, I’m going to give myself a coronary if I keep thinking like this,” she thought.
Noticing that the bathroom was dark she quickly surmised he was not there. The sound of her heart pounding from her fear was deafening. Perspiration began to trickle down the back of her neck.
“Joey, if you’re still here would you please come back out before you scare the hell out of me!” she said and quickly fought the panic that was rising up inside her.
Cautiously she crept back into her bedroom. She turned on the light and began checking in the closet and under the bed to see if he were hiding in there. Once she completed her search only to have found nothing amiss she checked the other room.
It was the same thing in the spare room. She was the only one inside the house now.
“Well, were the hell did that boy go, she thought?”
She decided that perhaps he did leave through her front door after all.
“Well that was awfully rude of him to just up and leave like that!” she said in exasperation.
Pushing a strand of her strawberry blond hair out of her face she made her way back into the kitchen, she bent over to grab the coffee off the counter to pour it down the sink. Instead of it being full of rich black liquid, it was completely empty.
“For Pete’s Sake, what is happening here!” she yelled.
“I’m so sorry Emily. I’ve just been so lonely for so long.”
The sound of his voice was directly behind her. Gasping in surprise she turned around. No one was there in the room with her. She was utterly alone.
“Great, I get a divorce and lose my mind all in the same week,” she mused aloud .
A cold feeling came over her unlike anything she had ever known. It brushed her shoulder and then fell away again.
Then from out of the empty air, a voice spoke to her.
“Promise me that if someone else comes knocking on your door you won’t open it tonight. Next time you’ll not like who you let in.”
“I don’t understand what is going on here!” she said.
“Am I imagining all of this from an overload of stress?” she thought.
A thin outline, a shadow, was standing next to her. “I can only materialize for short periods of time. If I over do it, as I’ve done tonight, I will be as you see right now, or totally invisible.” The disembodied voice said to her.
“Sit down over on the sofa and I will tell you the story of who I am.”
She did as he asked only because her knees were shaking so badly, she felt as though she were going to keel over.
“In 1957 I was staying here one weekend with my best buddy to do some hunting. My father owned this place and told us it would be alright. We went out in the woods a little ways to see if we could spot any deer. That is when it all went bad for Me.” He paused a moment and then continued.
“My friend and I had stumbled across some maniac while he was in the process of killing a young girl. We both stood frozen in shock for a moment. Only when the bastard looked up and saw us did we both run for our lives. The shotgun became too hard to run with and I ended up dropping it along the way.”
“What happened to your friend?” she asked.
“I guess I must have out ran him.” He said.
“As I reached the cottage I heard a shot back in the woods.”
“I didn’t know if that shot was from my friend, or the killer. I soon found out as the killer came walking out of the woods and headed straight for me”
“Turning, I fumbled with the door handle trying to get the hell inside. That was when everything got a whole lot worse for Me.” Emily waited for him to continue.
“He shot me in the middle of my back. I could feel numbness from below my shoulders all the way down.
The killer brought me in the house. He tortured me for three long days. On that third night I heard a noise outside the front door. Guess he heard it to, cause he went to investigate.” He stopped again and Emily waited for him to finish to story.
“I can remember seeing him as I laid up on the table. He was stepping outside, when a blast from a shotgun took his face clean off.”
“My friend was laying on the porch with the shotgun, dying. I’m guessing he found my shot gun in the woods. It must have been closer to the house then I realized.” Then the man looked at Emily. His eyes eerily glowing in the firelight.
“You see, the killer thought he was dead so he left him out there to rot. In the end we all died from our injuries before anyone came to check on us. This cottage has been sold repeatedly since then.”
“No one likes it when visitors come to them at night,” he said.
Now Emily remembered why his name sounded so familiar. The Realtor did mention this house did have a nasty past with it. She probably was too excited to remember that little tidbit though.
“So, are you going to leave now too?” he asked her.
“After finally getting some semblance of my life back I’m not going to let something like a lonely spirit scare me away,” she thought.
"Nope, this is home sweet home, ghosts and all," she said.

THE END