Lily's Demons

“The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window.”

The old mansion across our house had laid bare for almost 30 years now or so my family says. The land was filled with overgrown weeds with dust and cobwebs forming a thin layer covering the whole building. I remember the family that lived there, a cute couple and their little daughter, Lily. She had blue eyes and red hair, the type of red that made other kids call her ginger, but I didn't see her that way, I liked her. She was five, and I was a year older than her. We hung out with other kids our age and whenever we play house she would always be my wife. She had the most beautiful smile and an astonishing way with words, I admired her. She would tell us the most wonderful stories and the scariest ones too. One of them was called the haunting of Lakewood; she always started that one with her eyes open wide as she begins to tell the story, “There was a cabin in the woods, it had been abandoned for years, but one night a candle burned in the window….” She was only five but when she spoke we all listened. Until one day we heard she died in her sleep. I asked mom what had happened, but mom said she was gravely ill. I remember her parents moving out a month after her death, that was when rumors started to spread that the girl saw ghosts and that must've killed her, also that was the reason her parents left because that house was haunted. As people carried on with these beliefs, it didn't take time for bad things to start happening in our little town. Another kid died a few blocks away from mine, and another, and another. The deaths had the same pattern, they all had died in their sleep. Parents began to take their kids away in fear that they might just be next. And that was how we all left Havenston.

It has been over 30 years, I am in my early 40s, no wife, no kids, and I stand here now looking at what used to be Havenston. A new sign had been put up, it spelled ‘NEW HAVEN’ in bold catchy letters, people had occupied other houses because most people had sold theirs many years ago, but my dad did not sell ours. In fact, my parents had come back to Havenston/New Haven about five years ago, and they have lived there somewhat peacefully according to them. I stand here looking at the place I grew up in, I stand here looking at the houses. They all looked new and well renovated, but there was something different. This house across ours, Lily's house; It laid there as if locked in time, it looked the same. For a moment I imagine Lily emerging from the door and running to hug me, I imagined how she would’ve looked now if she were alive, how magical it would be just to see her again, that beautiful smile, or how warm it would feel to hear her telling me how she missed me like she did when we played house. I was lost in another world when the sound of a car horn jerks me out of my daydream.

“Get off the road man,” the driver says, driving off, playing very loud music in the car. It was then that I realised that I was on the road. I had gotten off my uber and stood there instead of crossing to my house. I got a hold of myself and crossed.

“Good for nothing teens,” I muttered to myself.

Nearly 3 weeks had passed since I came back and almost got killed by a teenager driving recklessly in the street without care, but New Haven was not the same. Its people were more vibrant, I do not know whether to feel sad about what this place reminds me of or to be happy for the people living in it now. All I knew was that I am here, a middle aged man still living with his parents because it gets lonely in Maine and people are happy but deep down I'm not. I walk the street, seeing my childhood play itself in front of me. It's beautiful for sometime, then it gets sad in a matter of seconds. We could've had it all if not for all that happened, but as it is now, I'm beginning to think that nothing paranormal actually happened, all those stories of ghosts killing the kids were just fabricated lies. However, it still doesn't sit well with me.

A few days back, I have been having this nightmare of a dream that seems quite familiar to me. In this dream, It's noon and I'm just waking up, I walk out of my room to my parents room and they weren't there. I look for them all over and I in the dream I wouldn't be able to find them, then I'll go back to my room. The whole house will become dark. I would usually stay up there looking out of my window across to the old mansion. I see the lights in the house turn on and off, flickering from one window to another then it would stop at one window, Lily's window. I see two shadows moving inside the house, one looked like the shadow of a small girl and the other I couldn't describe. It had a slim body and long arms with talons for fingers. I couldn't see any of f their faces, they would set a table and light a candle, placing it by the window. The girl would place two plates with food for both of them, then they would prepare to eat, but something wasn't right. They start talking, and to my surprise I could hear them, there was a third plate there. In a moment the girl would ask, “why don't we eat yet?” her voice was familiar. The creature would smile and say, “would you be a darling to dish out some food for he that watches us.” And both of them would turned to face me. Immediately in the same dream, I find myself being chased by an entity that looked like the one with the little girl, I run into the woods as it chases me and I find a cabin there. I run to it for safety but as I try to enter, the door wouldn't open. The same little girl would appear by the window with a candle, laughing at me, I could hear her voice, it was familiar. I would beg her to open the door for me but she wouldn't budge, till the creature gets close to almost getting me then I wake up. Bt I'm still in a dream. I walk out of my room to my parents room again and they weren't there. I looked for them all over and I couldn't find them.

“Mom....dad....” I would call but no answer.

I'll go downstairs to the living room then I would hear their voices, they were always sitting in the balcony having tea with someone. I would go out and call them again but they won't answer. Then this person sitting with them would get up and gouge their eyes out and look at me. It had turned to that creature I saw before. I run back in, screaminging, screaming, it gets fainter and fainter, then nothing. I wake up now in reality, I go to my parents room, and they're fast asleep.