The Light in the Attic

It arrived on a Tuesday, folded once and slipped into an envelope with no return address. The paper was yellowed and smelled faintly of lavender and dust. My name was written in perfect cursive on the front: Eleanor Wren. No title. No address. Just my name, as if the sender knew I'd find it regardless of where it landed.

Inside was a single line:

“The truth is in the attic. Go before the moon wanes.”

There was no signature, no date—just those twelve ominous words. I might have dismissed it as a prank, but something about the handwriting sent a chill through me. I recognized it. My grandmother’s.

But she’d been dead for twenty-one years.

I had no reason to return to the old family home in Thistlewood Hollow. After my grandmother passed, my parents sold the house to a quiet man who, rumor had it, never turned on the lights. The home stood at the edge of the forest, gray and leaning, its shutters drooping like tired eyes. I hadn’t seen it since I was twelve.

But the letter wouldn’t let me go. That night I dreamed of the attic, even though I’d never seen it. My grandmother had kept it locked—always. “Too many memories up there,” she’d say.

So by Thursday, I found myself driving the winding forest roads, past weeping willows and rusted signs, toward Thistlewood Hollow. I hadn’t packed. I hadn’t told anyone. It felt like a secret mission.

When I pulled up to the old house, I half expected it to be gone. But there it was, hunched beneath storm clouds like it had been waiting for me.

The front door creaked open with a gentle push. No lock. No alarm. The air inside was thick with the smell of old wood and something faintly sweet—lavender again.

I called out, but no one answered.

The place was exactly as I remembered. The plaid couch with cigarette burns. The cuckoo clock that never told the right time. The photo of my grandmother holding a baby—that baby being me.

There was no sign of the man who supposedly lived there now.

Only silence.

Only shadows.

I made my way to the staircase and climbed, floorboards moaning beneath me. At the end of the hall stood the attic door. It was open.

My heart thudded.

I stepped inside.

The attic was a time capsule. Dusty trunks lined the walls. Cobwebs clung to the wooden beams. A single bulb dangled from the ceiling, flickering like a heartbeat. I pulled the chain. Dim light flooded the space.

There, in the center of the attic, was a rocking chair. And in it—sat my grandmother.

At least, that’s what I thought. The woman looked just like her: same bun of white hair, same floral dress, same tiny gold locket she always wore. But her skin was gray as ash, her eyes wide and unblinking.

I opened my mouth to scream, but no sound came out.

Then she spoke.

“I knew you’d come, Ellie.”

My knees buckled, and I grabbed the edge of a trunk to stay upright.

“You’re not real,” I whispered.

She smiled. “Real enough.”

“You… You died. I saw the coffin. I was at your funeral.”

Her smile faded. “I did die. But death is not the end for some of us.”

I took a step back.

“Why now?” I asked. “Why bring me here?”

She gestured toward an old chest. “Open it.”

I hesitated, then knelt. The latch opened with a click, and the lid creaked upward.

Inside were dozens of letters—each addressed to me. Each in her handwriting.

“I wrote one every year after your birth,” she said. “In case I couldn’t stay with you. I had secrets, Eleanor. Dark ones.”

My hands trembled as I picked up the top letter.

I read the first letter aloud:

“My dearest Eleanor,

If you’re reading this, I’m gone. But I need you to know the truth. Our family has a gift. Or a curse. We see the dead.”

My throat closed up.

“You saw him too, didn’t you? The man with the hat? He watches us in the mirrors.”

I dropped the letter. A sudden coldness crawled up my spine.

I had seen him. As a child. A tall man in a black hat, always standing in the background of mirrors. I told myself it was just imagination.

But she’d seen him too.

“What does he want?” I asked, my voice barely a breath.

“To return,” she said. “He was bound by our blood. He tried to use me once. But I trapped him here.”

“In the house?”

“In the mirror.”

I turned slowly toward the attic mirror propped against the far wall.

It was covered by a sheet.

“Don’t,” she said sharply.

But I was already walking.

I lifted the sheet.

The glass was black—like obsidian. My reflection didn’t move. It just stared at me, mouth slightly open, eyes vacant.

Then, behind me, the man appeared.

Tall. Thin. Face pale as parchment. Hat like a funeral mourner’s.

I spun around.

Nothing.

When I turned back, the mirror was empty again. Just my reflection, trembling.

“I can’t hold him much longer,” my grandmother said. “The seal is weakening.”

“What seal?”

She held up her locket. “This binds him. It must never leave the house.”

My eyes darted to the chain around her neck. It pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat.

“Take it,” she said. “Hide it far from the mirror. If it breaks, he walks free.”

I stepped forward, reaching out.

But the attic floor groaned—and then gave way.

I crashed through the rotted boards and landed hard in the upstairs hallway, gasping for air. My shoulder burned. My vision blurred.

I looked up.

The attic door was closed.

I scrambled to my feet and rushed back up the stairs.

Locked.

No matter how I pulled, it wouldn’t open.

I ran outside to get help—but the house was alone, swallowed by fog. My phone had no signal. No cars. No wind.

Only the whisper of my name on the breeze: Eleanor…

That night, I slept in the car, unable to leave, too afraid to stay inside. At dawn, the fog lifted. I returned to the house, but the attic remained sealed.

Then I noticed something odd: my grandmother’s photograph was missing from the wall.

In its place, was a photo of me.

In the attic.

Wearing her locket.

Sitting in the rocking chair.

Smiling.

For weeks, I tried to forget. But the dreams wouldn’t stop. Always the attic. Always the mirror. Always the man.

I began to research. The town library held old records of my grandmother—Marigold Wren. In 1963, she was accused of witchcraft by a neighbor. Disappeared for three days. When she returned, the neighbor was dead.

They said she was never the same.

Eventually, I went back to the house with tools. I pried open the attic. Empty.

No rocking chair. No trunk. No mirror.

Only a faint lavender scent in the air.

I live in the house now.

I don’t know why. Maybe I’m waiting. Maybe I’m guarding it.

The attic is locked again.

The locket is around my neck.

Sometimes I hear footsteps above me, even though no one’s there.

Sometimes I catch a glimpse in the mirror of someone standing behind me.

And every full moon, a new letter appears on my bedside table.

In her handwriting.

Reminding me:

“Do not trust the man in the hat. Do not break the seal.

And whatever you do…

Don’t look too long in the mirror.”