The Abandoned House

by Kaetlin
(South Africa, Cape Town)

About two years ago my mom's friend had a party at his house in Misty Cliffs. We were invited and I took my friend, Kerryn, with. It was a great party. We swam, drank cocktails, and danced. About an hour before we were to leave, Kerryn noticed the neighbour's house for the first time.

It was old, run down and the front door flapped open in the wind. We asked my mom's friend, Daniel about it. He said the owners had deserted it about 4 years earlier. Of course, we were warned not to go there, but Kerryn and I love a good scare in an old abandoned house!

When everyone had moved inside for the birthday cake, we stayed outside. I threw an old rope that I had found in the back shed over the wall and into the garden next door. The wall wasn't high, only about 2 metres, and we slid down the rope one after the other easily. We had to pick our way across the overgrown lawn, and through some brambles that had sprung up.

There was a funny little shed thing next to the house, and we decided to go there first.

Nothing exciting, some old paintings and writing on the walls. We went to the house, and I cautiously pushed the door open. It creaked, and a huge gust of wind blasted us from the other open door across the landing.

I chickened out.

"Kerryn, this is scary!" I said to her, but she pushed me forward into the house. We stepped inside. The whole place was still completely furnished, with very dusty couches, and chairs.

We walked around a bit in silence and made our way to the staircase. It creaked as we walked up. Very spooky!

At the top were all these paintings of animals, mostly birds. There was only one window with a small crack of sunlight shining through. It was pretty dark. This time Kerryn moaned that it was creepy up there. I was about to agree to go down, when right in front of us, one of the bedroom doors opened a crack!

We stood there frozen in horror, clutching each other, and watched as the door opened more and more. A little girl in a green dress came out and looked us straight in the eye. This "deserted" house had someone besides us in it!

We couldn't make out the girl's features in the dark, but then she came forward, I screamed at her hair and skinny arms. Without thinking, I turned and fled down the stairs, screaming. I ran straight out of that house, not even looking back for Kerryn.

I tore through the brambles and weeds, and came to the rope. I tried hauling myself up, but I couldn't. Kerryn came, but she too couldn't get back up.

"Help!" we started calling. "Help!" Daniel came running and with his help we managed to get back over the wall.

Now, I know why we were warned not to go to that house, and from now on Kerryn and I will never do that again!