Writer's Journal

On Michaelmas, when there’s no visible moon, you can get into the Old House. It’s the only time the doors are unlocked and opened, and they remain open until nine people have come in. Then they close up, locking tight, until a winner is selected.

Sure, it’s haunted. That’s kind of the point. You’re supposed to go in and wait things out. That’s how you win.

There are rules to it, though. Like the aforementioned Michaelmas thing.

The First Rule is that nine, and only nine, people can enter the Old House at the same time. If eight people are inside, and a pair of conjoined twins try to enter, the door will simply keep slamming until they aren’t conjoined.

The Second Rule is that only strangers may share the house at any given time. If you personally know someone currently inside, then the door will slam in your face. Generally, it’s held to be first-come, first-served.

The Third Rule is that you can only ask for the prize once. If you ask twice, then it will surely be denied to you.

The fourth rule is that you must come as silently as possible. No cars, no motorcycles, no scooters. You walk. If there’s a thunderstorm, you can ride a bicycle, but nothing else.

The Fifth Rule is that you are not allowed to sleep in the Old House. If you try, chances are you’ll not wake up. This is the only rule broken every time.

I remember hearing about a winner back in the middle of the last century. The police found him sitting on the steps in front of the Old House.

He sat there, staring forward, grinning as he sang a song in the most beautiful tenor the police had ever heard. His left sleeve was empty, red, and wet.

“Sir, sir, are you alright?” a policeman asked.

He stopped singing, and turned his head towards the policeman, and said:

“The flies are bothering my stump.”

They wrapped him in a blanket, and walked him to the car. The doctor capped the stump, and left it. Throughout the whole operation, his patient was singing sections of Carmen under his voice.

One other time, a girl of no more than sixteen won, she was found walking along the road, placing a hand on each tree. She had been struck blind, but she was smiling. Two years later, she went off to Brown University, and she eventually became a prestigious lawyer.

No one knows what happens to the losers. They’re just gone, afterward.

And no one tells what sort of contest is held, whether the winner must kill the losers, or if they just stay awake as long as they can, the sleepers gradually disappearing.

No one knows.

But every (roughly) eight years, eight people vanish, and one reappears bearing the scars of the experience.

And a bright, cheery smile.

The next one’s in six years, the house will probably be hungry, by then.