The Whispering Walls

The Whispering Walls

Secrets of the 7th Room

It was the summer of 1996 when Ayesha and her family moved into the old colonial house in Murree. Her father, a government officer, had been transferred again, and this house was one of the government quarters—spacious, surrounded by pine trees, and eerily quiet.

The house had seven rooms, a small attic, and a creaky wooden staircase that led to a long corridor upstairs. The locals called it Haveli Saat Kamray Wali—The Mansion with Seven Rooms.

Ayesha was fifteen, curious, and loved books. From the moment she entered the house, something about the seventh room—locked and sealed—pulled her in like a magnet.

"That room's not in use," her mother said quickly when Ayesha asked. "It’s just storage—your father says it’s unsafe."

But Ayesha knew when adults were hiding something. And this house… it whispered.

---

Chapter One: The Locked Room

On the third night, when everyone had gone to sleep, Ayesha heard it. A faint tapping—tap… tap… tap…—coming from the ceiling. She froze. Then came a whisper, almost like a sigh.

She grabbed her torch and stepped out into the corridor. The moonlight spilled through the high windows, casting long shadows on the walls. The sound led her toward the seventh room.

She stood before it—an old wooden door with iron hinges, its keyhole covered with cobwebs. As she placed her ear against the door, a chill ran down her spine.

"Help… me…"

She stumbled back, heart pounding.

---

Chapter Two: The Journal

The next day, Ayesha began investigating. She visited the local bookstore and bought an old map of the town. To her surprise, their house was marked with a note in faded ink: Seventh Room – Don’t Open.

She searched the attic and found a dusty trunk. Inside was a journal wrapped in a torn shawl. The name on the cover: Zehra Iqbal – 1947.

Zehra. Ayesha’s heart skipped. She flipped through the pages, each one filled with strange entries:

> “The whispers have begun again.”

“I saw the shadow behind the mirror.”

“I locked the door. I must never return. The wall remembers.”

The last entry was dated August 13, 1947:

> “If anyone finds this… read Surah Baqarah daily. It calms the voices. The 7th room holds the answer. But beware—some secrets want to stay buried.”

---

Chapter Three: The Neighbor's Tale

Ayesha decided to speak to their neighbor, old Begum Rukhsana, who had lived in the area since before Partition.

“Zehra?” The old woman’s eyes widened. “Yes, she lived there with her parents… Strange girl. Kept to herself. Her father was a British officer.”

“What happened to her?” Ayesha asked, breath held.

“No one knows. One day she vanished. Her parents said she went to Karachi, but… we used to hear things at night. Screams. And after she disappeared, that room was locked. No one dared open it again.”

She paused, then added, “They say the room remembers grief. And it holds what should have been forgotten.”

---

Chapter Four: The Unseen

That night, Ayesha opened her Quran and began reciting Surah Al-Baqarah softly in her room. As she recited, the whispers in the corridor grew fainter.

But at 2:00 a.m., her door creaked open. Her little brother stood there, eyes blank.

“She’s waiting in the 7th room,” he whispered. “She says you can see her now.”

He turned and walked back to bed like nothing happened.

Ayesha clutched the journal. The walls weren’t just whispering. They were remembering.

---

Chapter Five: The Secret of 1947

The next morning, Ayesha found a hidden compartment beneath the seventh room's window from outside. Inside it was a rusted tin box, with another note:

> “To the one who listens. I tried to protect them all. But I failed. The truth is behind the wallpaper. Find the name. Set me free.”

With trembling hands, Ayesha waited till evening, when her parents were out. She picked the lock with a hairpin. The door creaked open.

The air was icy. Dust filled her lungs. The room was untouched—just a broken mirror, a chair, and a large painting on the wall… but something was wrong. The wallpaper was peeling at the edges.

She tore it off, and behind it was a message scratched into the plaster:

> “They buried her name. But her soul stayed. Zehra was never alone in this house.”

---

Chapter Six: The Other Girl

Behind the painting, Ayesha found another journal, thinner, written in Urdu.

This was not Zehra’s.

> “They say I don’t exist. That I’m just a servant. But he hurts me. I told Zehra. She promised to help. The Englishman… he locked me here. Zehra tried to stop him. He silenced her too. Now we are both part of this house.”

Ayesha dropped the journal. The whispers in the room rose again, more intense now—pleading, begging.

“Help us…”

---

Chapter Seven: The Ritual

The next day, she confided in her grandfather, who was visiting from Lahore. A former religious scholar, he listened patiently.

“There are memories trapped here,” he said. “But some can only be set free by dua and truth. We will perform a cleansing. But you must uncover the full truth first.”

That evening, Ayesha went back into the room one last time. She placed both journals on the chair and began reciting Surah Al-Baqarah out loud.

As the last verse echoed, the broken mirror flickered… and two silhouettes appeared behind her.

One wore a scarf, eyes full of sorrow. The other—a girl no older than twelve—smiled faintly.

They looked at her, nodded… and vanished.

The room suddenly felt warm. Peaceful.

---

Chapter Eight: The Freedom

A week later, Ayesha and her family moved to another house.

The seventh room was never locked again. Her father reported it as a storage area, but nothing odd happened again.

Ayesha wrote down everything in her own journal and left it inside the drawer of the seventh room—along with Zehra and the unnamed girl’s diaries.

“Some secrets,” she wrote, “are not meant to stay buried. But they must be remembered… so they never repeat.”

---

Epilogue

Years later, when the house was being renovated, a construction worker found three journals in an old drawer.

One belonged to a girl named Ayesha, who had vanished from records.

Only her story… and the house… remained.

The End