The Whispers Beneath the Floorboards

There’s a moment just before sleep when the mind begins to drift, hovering between the real and the imagined. For Elara, that moment had become the most terrifying part of her day. Because that was when she heard them—the whispers beneath the floorboards.

It started on a rain-soaked night, when the storm outside thrashed like an angry god. The old farmhouse, inherited from her late grandmother, groaned against the wind. Elara had moved in only a week ago, seeking solitude after a painful breakup, thinking the countryside would bring her peace. But the house had other plans.

At first, she thought it was just the storm. The creaks of wood, the moans of old beams shifting. But then, the whispers began. Soft, like the breath of someone speaking into her ear.

“Don’t go down there.”

“It’s waiting.”

“We never left.”

Her body froze in bed. She clutched her blanket tighter, telling herself it was only her imagination, a leftover fear from childhood. But night after night, the voices returned. Each time, they grew clearer.

By the fourth night, she could distinguish multiple voices—male and female, young and old—all tangled together like a choir of despair. Their words weren’t random anymore; they were instructions.

“The floor beneath the kitchen… pry it open.”

Her heart hammered against her ribs. She didn’t want to listen, but something deep inside—a mix of dread and curiosity—drove her. At sunrise, she stumbled into the kitchen, her bare feet pressing against the warped wood. One of the planks, just beneath the stove, looked different. Darker. As if stained.

She didn’t open it. Not yet.

That evening, she called her friend Marcus, a rational man who laughed off ghost stories. “You’re just lonely,” he said over the phone. “That house is playing tricks on you. Old wood, drafts, rats—take your pick.”

She wanted to believe him. She really did.

But that night, the whispers came back angrier, sharper.

“We told you. Open it. Open it. OPEN IT.”

The next morning, trembling, Elara fetched a crowbar from the shed. Her hands shook as she wedged it beneath the plank. With one hard pull, the wood snapped up, releasing a stench so foul it sent her staggering back. Rot. Decay. Something that had been waiting too long in the dark.

Inside the hollow cavity lay bones. Small ones. Human. She gasped, covering her mouth. Tiny skulls, fragile as porcelain, stared back at her with empty sockets. Three of them. Children.

Her stomach lurched. She stumbled out of the house into the daylight, vomiting in the grass. Memories of her grandmother surfaced—the way she always locked the basement door, the way neighbors spoke about her in hushed tones. Elara had thought it was all superstition. But now…

She called Marcus again, her voice breaking. “There are children’s bones under my floor!”

But when the police arrived, the bones were gone. The cavity was empty. The stench was gone. The officers exchanged looks, politely skeptical, and left with thin smiles that told her they thought she was unraveling.

That night, she didn’t sleep. She sat in the kitchen, crowbar in hand, staring at the hole in the floor. Midnight came. And so did the whispers.

“Thank you for finding us.”

“Now you must stay.”

“Join us, Elara. Beneath the floorboards.”

The house groaned. The floor shifted. And for the first time, she felt it—not just heard it. The boards beneath her bare feet rippled like the surface of water. Something reached up. Cold, skeletal fingers brushed her ankle.

She screamed, but no one heard.

By the next morning, the farmhouse was empty again. Just another abandoned relic in the countryside. But if you stand in the kitchen long enough, when the wind is just right, you can still hear her voice.

“Help me… I never should have opened it.”