A spade in the basement

There was a strange sound coming from the basement. She had heard it before but never looked into it. Maybe it was an old washing machine stored down there, or even a pet rat. People have weird habits and she didn’t want to seem indiscrete. Walden on the other hand didn’t seem to care, or even notice at all for that matter.

They had been together for over a year when Walden lost his job and they decided to move into his grandparents’ old house. In a city Elizabeth had never even heard of before, let alone be able to find on the map.

She loved him too much to say no.

But then it all began.

The strange coincidences – the postman who was also the plumber, the electrician and the Mayor. The snooping around by every one of the 200 inhabitants of that town. The ‘lights out’ policy at exactly midnight. The rooster crowing every morning, despite the fact that no-one owned a rooster, or even a coop. The fact that all the old people from that village seemed to disappear overnight. And most of all, the fact that no one found any of this unusual, unnatural or in any way concerning.

Not even Walden.

Elizabeth was beginning to feel insane. The simile of a fish out of water was too small to describe what she was going through.

Since they moved there the world as she knew it turned upside down. As if she was in a parallel universe and everything was reversed.

And lately those noises in the basement were becoming all the more frequent, louder and more intense.

She had mentioned it to Walden but he dismissed it as some casual thing you hear – like a bird chirping in the morning (which you never did over there), or a ferret digging a hole (ditto).

So she decided to take things into her own hands. She was going to go investigate the basement.

She took a torch and opened the door. Unsurprisingly, it was creaking. It was also very dark down there and smelled moist and humid. She turned on the flash light but couldn’t really make out anything.

She reached for her cellphone in her pocket, but coincidentally and most conveniently she had left it upstairs in the bedroom.

She was alone.

Or so she thought.

She felt a flicker, as an object moved next to her. She shunned the torch but as soon as she saw the face of her co-visitor she dropped the flashlight and ran for the door.

Why was Walden in the basement, wrapped up in dirt, with a spade in hand? And why had he not told her anything?

Was she living in a horror film or simply a haunted house? Because it appears you never know anyone or anything well enough.

Also part of Daily Prompt: Choose Your Adventure

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