The Farmhouse

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. Emma paused at the thought, musing at the words that had surfaced. Standing in place she looked down at the ground reflectively, her gaze falling to the dew covered vegetation blanketing the forest floor. It was spring, and yet, a brown mat of dead leaves covered the path, crunching and squelching underfoot as she walked with her dog, Scotty. He had paused alongside her when she stopped, head cocked to one side inquisitively while her thoughts began to take her in a new direction. Living alone back at the farmhouse she was used to the one-sided mental banter she had begun to have, her thoughts flitting conversationally from one place to the next. No longer fixated on the cabin, her attention was now on Scotty.

“Who’s a good boy”? she asked him rhetorically handing over a treat. At just over a year, he was an obedient companion, and the only reason she was able to somewhat comfortably walk these woods, day or night.

As he took the treat from her hand she fell deeper into thought, nearly meditative now as she began to recall the day she had picked him. A young boy and his father had been pulling a little red wagon up the dirt road leading to her property. Inside was a wooden milk crate emitting the mewling, and chatter of baby animals. Emma had only just returned to the family farm then. Her mum had passed years before, leaving it to her and her brother, but without anyone living there to maintain it, it had fallen into disrepair.

One day, fed up with her life in the city, she had received a call from their financial advisor telling her to either fix it up, or sell it. She had quit on the spot and returned with the intent of repairing it enough to sell for a profit, and start a new life with whatever she could make from it. When she arrived, she quickly found it was worse than she had anticipated, but without any other options, she committed to making it work. At the time she had only been there a few days, but still remembered how grateful she had been seeing the father, and boy that day. The house had seemed bigger, menacingly bigger than she had remembered. The quiet, dense woods that bordered her home somehow seemed louder, especially at night. Any company, any break from the heavy, silence of the house, was a welcome one.

She recalled looking down into the crate, and seeing the chubby little dog with floppy ears and a triangular tuft of light brown fur. It had looked like he was wearing an ascot, and that was what she named him, but eventually Ascot became Scotty. She laughed an affectionate little laugh at the memory, and the noise came out harsh and jarring against the cold, still silence of the woods. Startled from her thoughts, Emma began to take in her surroundings, a little disoriented to find that night was starting to creep in. Though the sun was still relatively high in the sky, out here in the woods you could always tell when the sun was dropping, the shadows grew longer.

Emma looked again at the cabin in the distance, the windows dark, the siding weathered. The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window she thought, and for the briefest of moments, she could have sworn she saw the flickering of light in the window, before turning to walk home.

Night was now aggressively hugging the walls of the farmhouse, a gentle wind pressing on its frame. The creaking sounds were inconsistently surrounding her, in a throbbing unpredictable chorus. Were those footsteps upstairs? Someone knocking on the walls? Something in the basement? How can something so quiet sound so loud? Emma thought with frustrated anxiety.

Scotty was near the fire, and Emma was at the window looking out to the expanse of darkness encircling the property around her. This had become a nightly ritual, yet she promised herself after every sleepless night that she would no longer participate. “There is nothing out there,” she demanded to herself.

Emma had never been afraid of the farmhouse as a child, but then again, she had never been in it alone. Back then it had been filled with the sounds of family. Infact, she thought to herself, you used to fantasize about being here all alone. She laughed aloud at the voice in her head, musing at how antagonistic she sounded. “Well,” she said defensively “you would’ve too! Mom and Dad always arguing in the kitchen, Brent always sulking in his room, and never a moment’s peace sharing a room with Ava!” She winced at the sound of her sister’s name; she couldn’t remember the last time she had said it out loud.

Not since that day, she answered herself, the cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window echoed again in her mind. She sighed, but that wasn’t completely true. She had said her sister’s name one other time, in fact it had been the evening she had gotten Scotty. They had been in the kitchen, her debating whether she was going to feed him scraps of chicken when he’d started to growl. At first, she mistook it for begging, and had bent to him slightly, firmly saying “no,” when his growls turned quickly to barks aimed at the open screen door behind her. Chills had rippled their way up her spine as she turned to look, and that was she thought she saw her. On the tree line, a young girl, for just a second. She tried to call out, but it was no more than a whisper. “Ava?” she had said, but the figure disappeared so quickly, she was left wondering if she had really seen anything at all. The barking stopped and Scotty’s tail was wagging, so she told herself it been no more than a trick of the mind, the tail of a deer, or some other animal that Scotty had sensed.

She saw her then in the recesses of her memories, Ava, as she had looked that day in the woods. She was standing within a few paces of where Emma had stood today. Why had I gone walking there? Emma wondered with a worrisome furrow along her brow. She hadn’t been on that path since the day it happened. Not even when everyone in town had been combing the woods looking for Ava. She had refused to go near the cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years she thought, “STOP IT” she shouted, frightened by the volume and harshness of her own voice.

Emma stepped away from the window, Scotty looked up at her from the fire. Beginning to pace, and without control she began picturing Ava again, standing outside the cabin in the burgeoning dusk.

“The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window,” Ava had said, standing with her back to the cabin. Ava had smiled up at her, pulling from her pocket a long-tapered candle.

“Dare me to put it inside?” she asked.

“No,” Emma cried out, her small childish frame shaking then as the night rolled in. “Let’s go back before mom throws a hissy fit.”

The sound of a striking match, and Ava’s face was lit from below, turning the face before her into a sinister caricature of her sister. She began to walk away from Emma, down the overgrown path leading to the cabin. She called one last time, turning coyly to look over her shoulder, “the cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the ..." And with that she had been gone, Emma herself had turned away from her sister intending to walk home without her, as a bluff. She had only heard the whisper of leaves rustlings, following the abrupt ending of the sentence. When she turned back to look for her, there was no movement, and the forest had gone silent.

Emma’s eyes refocused on the present moment; she was breathing heavily from the memory. Scotty had brought her back, his haunches were up, and the hair on his back was spikey, a low guttural growl rumbling from somewhere deep in his throat.

“Scotty?” Emma squeaked out.

The dog’s large head was low, defensive, and positioned like he was about to spring. Emma stepped back, and repeated his name again, this time a little louder, and a little calmer, dogs can sense fear, right? she thought.

In a moment he was lunging, sailing past her, coming to a stop as his claws scraped against the glass of the window behind her. A deafening roar of thunderous barks ignited the silence.

Emma had fallen back in the exchange, tripping into the sofa, unsure of what had happened. Then she saw her, it was Ava. She stood on the porch looking into the house, she was thin, taller, and her clothes were tattered in wisps around her. The figure looked almost holographic, trembling with quivering motion, and even though Emma couldn't see her eyes, she was sure it was her. Before she was able to fully process what she was seeing, her sister sprinted from the window, down the porch, and toward the woods. Emma sat collecting herself, as spittle sprayed from Scotty’s muzzle, and his claws, scraping at the window, were drowned out by the reverberant thuds of her deeply beating heart. The sound was in her ears, all around her, and without any thought she set off after Ava.

Scotty was still pressed to the window when Emma threw open the door, but she heard him as he started running behind her. His footsteps skittered to a halt as his paws hit the porch. He first began to whimper, but as distance grew between them, he began to howl.

“Ava,” she called, entering the tree line, cold branches hitting her in the face and chest, “it’s me, it’s Emma,” she screamed. She could no longer see Ava, but instead could just see wisps of white clothing coming into view in pockets of clearings up ahead. Emma could feel cool tears on her cheeks, her chest burned, she was beginning to cramp, but she was still running.

To her left she heard Ava say “a candle burned,” and when she turned her head, she tripped on a root, tumbling to her knees on the leafy ground. A twig snapped to her right and she saw more wisps of tattered clothing on a bony arm disappearing behind a tree.

“Ava?” she called quietly. Emma had known the path well once, but now everything looked different, distorted. The sounds of the forest were confusing, words seemed to float around her from all directions mingling with the ghostly low wail of the wind through the trees.

Leaves crunched behind her, and Emma turned to see Scotty on the path a few meters away, she inhaled deeply with relief. He stepped forward, and Emma squinted, the way he was moving seemed off. "Scotty?” she asked, uncertainty in her voice. “Scotty, are you hurt?” His legs seemed to unhinge slightly as he stepped, bending at odd angles. When he found his footing, his joints audibly cracked. He broke the silence with a bark, and though she couldn’t place why it sounded wrong, she thought she could hear the undertone of a tinny screech like the brakes of a train against the metal rails. He took another jerky step forward, and the moonlight spilled across his face, Emma stared for just a second, her heart pounding so loudly, it washed out all sound once again. The eyes in the face looking back at her were human eyes.

Another branch snapped nearby, and Emma jumped to her feet ignoring the pain in her ankle, she began to sprint along the path. She turned slightly to see if Scotty had broken into a run but he was no longer there. Emma herself kept running, fear, excitement, and adrenaline were all competing in her body as she hurdled, and ran through the woods.

“Ava,” she called slowing to a walk. She wasn’t thinking, just moving as she turned from the main path to the overgrown walkway leading to the cabin, “Ava, it’s me Emma,” she was audibly crying, “Ava, I’ve missed you so much,” she called.

She heard noises all around her, but she ignored them. The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but tonight, a candle burned in the window.

Am I saying that she thought, or is it coming from the woods?

There was a long-tapered candle in the window, throwing a small semi-circle of light in the woods. In the trees were dozens of twinkling pairs of yellow eyes.

“Ava,” she called again, leaves crunching up ahead on the path as a shadowy figure darted from view.

Emma made it to the door, it was barely closed, but all of her muscles burned, and she struggled to push it open. Ava stood there, awkwardly tall, and unnaturally thin, candle in hand. Emma’s mind flashed to all the times she had wondered what her sister would grow to look like. Was this how I had pictured her?

“Ava,” she called, pure emotion in her voice, “I found you,” she cried. Ava turned her head to look over her shoulder, as she had done walking away from her that day. Emma thought is she hurt, how come her neck is bent like that?

Ava’s knees were bending, and cracking as her joints moved jerkily, just like Scotty’s had. Over her shoulder, in a voice that seemed to echo and waver, Ava said, “the cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window,” before bringing the candle to her peeling rotten lips, and extinguishing it.