17 Mar The House on Black Hollow Road

They called it the Crowder House. A sagging, three-story mansion at the end of Black Hollow Road, hidden behind gnarled oaks and a wrought-iron gate that hadn’t swung open in decades. No one knew who had built it, or if anyone had ever lived there. All anyone knew was that kids who dared each other to go inside never stayed long.

Matt, Tommy, and Lucas had spent all summer talking about it. It was their last night before high school started—one final chance to prove they weren’t little kids anymore.

“We go in, take a picture in the main hall, and get out,” Matt said, standing at the rusted gate. The moonlight made the house’s windows look like empty eye sockets.

Lucas hesitated. “What if it’s not empty?”

Tommy scoffed. “Ghosts aren’t real, dude. You’re thinking of the Murdoch House.”

Lucas shuddered. The Murdoch House was a whole other legend—kids said a farmer killed his family there and burned it down. But Crowder House? The stories were less clear. Just that people went in and didn’t want to talk about what they saw.

Still, backing out now wasn’t an option. Matt shoved the gate, and with a groan, it gave way just enough for them to slip through.

The porch sagged under their weight as they climbed the steps. Lucas glanced over his shoulder. The road was empty. Their bikes leaned against a tree, waiting for them to come back.

Tommy pushed open the front door, which creaked but didn’t resist. The air inside smelled stale, like dust and something worse underneath. The floor was coated in dirt, but no footprints. If anyone had been here, they hadn’t left a trace.

Lucas turned on his flashlight. The beam swept over a grand staircase, its banister warped with age. A chandelier dangled overhead, its crystals webbed with dust. Matt pulled out his phone.

“Let’s get the picture and bounce.”

As he lifted the camera, a click echoed through the house.

Lucas spun. “Was that you?”

Tommy shook his head.

A door at the end of the hallway was open now. They were sure it had been closed when they walked in.

Matt swallowed. “Let’s just go.”

But Lucas took a step forward.

“Dude!” Tommy hissed.

Lucas pointed. “There’s a light.”

Faint and flickering, like candlelight, coming from beyond the door. The others saw it too.

Tommy grabbed Lucas’s arm. “This isn’t funny.”

“I didn’t do it,” Lucas whispered.

Something creaked above them. Footsteps. Slow, dragging.

Matt was already moving. “Nope. Nope. We’re out.”

The three of them bolted. Lucas barely had time to register that the front door was closed.

Matt reached it first and yanked at the handle. It didn’t budge. “It’s locked! It wasn’t locked before!”

The footsteps above grew louder, coming toward the stairs. Lucas dared to glance up.

A figure stood at the top.

Its shape was wrong—off. Too tall, arms too long, fingers that curled and flexed in ways they shouldn’t. It had no face, only a smooth, blank surface where its features should have been.

It stepped down, and Lucas screamed.

Tommy and Matt slammed their fists against the door. “HELP! LET US OUT!”

Lucas turned his flashlight off. He wasn’t sure why—some instinct, some primal part of his brain telling him if it can’t see you, it can’t find you.

It didn’t work.

A whisper filled the space, not in words, but in feeling. It slithered into their ears, cold and wet, sinking into their skulls.

Matt stopped pounding. His shoulders slumped.

Lucas shook them. “Wake up!”

The thing reached the bottom step.

Lucas grabbed Matt’s phone from his frozen fingers. He lifted it.

The screen showed the hallway behind them. But in the reflection—they weren’t alone. Pale figures filled the space, crowding the walls and the ceiling. Dozens of them, their faces just as blank as the thing walking toward them. And they were reaching out.

Lucas did the only thing he could—he took the picture.

The flash lit up the room for a split second. Then, the door behind them slammed open.

They tumbled out onto the porch, gasping for air, the night cold and sharp against their skin.

The house loomed behind them, silent. Matt scrambled to his feet and grabbed his phone from Lucas.

The screen was cracked, but the picture was still open. It showed the three of them in the hallway. But they weren’t alone. Dozens of pale hands gripped their arms, their legs, their shoulders. Faces loomed behind them, pressing too close.

And in the center of it all was the thing with no face, staring right at the camera.

Matt threw the phone into the bushes. “We never talk about this. Ever.”

None of them argued.

They grabbed their bikes and rode, never looking back.

And behind them, in the darkness of Crowder House, the door creaked slowly shut.