The Nun in the Dark

It was Ava’s first week in Willow Creek, a quiet, fog-covered town buried deep in Indiana. She had moved there for a fresh start, a slower life, and a clean break from the noise of the city. Her aunt had left her a small cottage near the edge of town, close to the woods. The place felt old and forgotten, like time moved differently there.

Ava kept to herself, but curiosity pulled her out one Friday evening. At the gas station, a group of local teens stood around smoking and daring each other to do stupid things. When they saw her, they called her over.

“You just moved here, right?” one of them asked.

She nodded.

“You know the old church on the hill?”

They all turned to look at the dark silhouette of a building just beyond the treeline. St. Agatha’s Church. Its spire leaned like it was trying to fall. The windows were black. The trees around it were twisted and bare, even in summer.

“It’s haunted,” said another. “They say something crawls inside it at night.”

Ava laughed, trying to play along.

“Bet you won’t go in,” one of them challenged.

“I will,” she said.

She should have walked away.

That night, around 10:30, Ava stood at the foot of the hill, alone. The wind howled through the trees. Her phone battery was dying, so she brought a flashlight. The climb to the church was steep. Every step forward made her stomach sink deeper.

The front doors creaked as she pushed them open.

Inside, it smelled like wet wood and rotting fabric. Dust filled the air. Pews were broken and scattered. Torn Bibles lay open on the floor. The ceiling had caved in at the center, and vines hung like ropes from the rafters.

She stepped carefully, her flashlight beam flickering.

Then she heard it.

Crawling.

It wasn’t footsteps. It was something soft, fast, and too smooth to be human. It came from behind her.

She froze. The sound grew louder. A wet scraping across the floor.

She turned.

And saw her.

A woman in a shredded nun’s habit. Her limbs were too long, bending backward like an insect’s. She moved on four thin legs, her body jerking like a puppet on invisible strings. Her face was pale, stretched, and wrong. Two glowing eyes stared straight into Ava’s.

The thing didn’t speak. It just kept crawling forward.

Ava couldn’t move.

Then the nun opened her mouth, and a sound like wind through broken glass whispered, “You shouldn’t have come alone.”

Ava dropped her flashlight and ran.

She didn’t scream. She didn’t look back.

She reached the church doors and burst into the night.

And that was the last time anyone ever saw her.

When the teens returned the next morning to prove she hadn’t gone, they found the church door wide open. Her flashlight lay just inside, cracked. Her phone was never found.

The police searched the hill and the forest for days.

Nothing.

No footprints. No signs of a struggle. No body.

The case went cold.

But the townspeople still whisper about the girl who disappeared.

Some say if you stand near the church at night, you can hear crawling just behind you. Some say you’ll see a pale woman in a nun’s dress watching from the broken window, her eyes glowing like fireflies in the dark.

No one dares to go in anymore.

Not even on a dare.

To Be Continued......

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