The Whispering House

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The house stood alone at the end of Willow Street, shrouded in darkness and ivy. For years, children dared each other to go up to the door, but none ever did. Its windows were like vacant eyes, staring out blankly at anyone who wandered too close. Most people believed it was abandoned, but some knew better. They’d heard stories—stories of whispered voices drifting through the cold, empty halls late at night.

Claire Parker hadn’t heard the stories, not until it was too late.

She needed a place to stay, and the rent was ridiculously cheap. The

landlord, an older man with a perpetually worried expression, warned her about the house. He mumbled something about "noises" and "unexplained events," but she brushed it off as superstitious nonsense. How bad could it be?

The first night was uneventful. She unpacked her belongings and settled into the small, dusty room on the second floor. The only sound was the creaking of the old house as it adjusted to the wind outside.

But by the third night, things began to change.

Claire woke up at exactly 2:13 a.m. to the sound of soft murmuring. At first, she thought it was the wind, but as she strained to listen, the noises became clearer—voices, low and indistinct, as if coming from the walls themselves. She got up and moved around the room, pressing her ear against the wooden panels. The voices seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.

“Hello?” she whispered, her voice trembling.

The murmuring stopped.

She exhaled in relief, but then, a single voice—sharp and clear—whispered back: “Leave.”

Claire stumbled backward, heart racing. She scanned the room, expecting to see someone standing in the shadows, but she was alone. She tried to convince herself it was her imagination, that she must have been dreaming. She didn’t sleep the rest of the night.

The next morning, she mentioned the incident to her landlord, expecting him to laugh it off. Instead, he looked at her with a sad, knowing expression.

“I told you,” he said quietly. “The house... it doesn’t like visitors.”

Claire decided she wouldn’t be scared off that easily. She was a rational person, after all. There had to be an explanation for the voices. Maybe it was old pipes, or the wind, or something else entirely.

But the voices didn’t stop. Every night at exactly 2:13 a.m., the murmuring began again, growing louder and more agitated with each passing night. Soon, it wasn’t just voices. She heard footsteps—heavy, dragging footsteps—moving up and down the hallway outside her door. One night, she woke up to find her bedroom door ajar, though she was certain she’d locked it.

And then came the knocking.

It started faintly—just a light tap-tap-tap at the edge of her consciousness. She tried to ignore it, burying her head under her pillow. But the tapping grew louder, more insistent, until it seemed like it was right beside her head.

Furious, Claire jumped out of bed and flung open her door. “Who’s there?” she yelled.

Silence.

She turned on every light in the house, searching every room, every corner. But she was alone. The knocking had stopped.

As she stood in the middle of the living room, trembling and on the verge of tears, she heard it again. This time, it came from the basement.

Slowly, Claire descended the creaking stairs, clutching a flashlight in one hand. The basement smelled of mildew and dust, and she could see her breath fogging up in the chilly air. She shone the light around, revealing stacks of old, rotting boxes and a crumbling stone wall at the far end.

And then she saw it: a small, wooden door she hadn’t noticed before, half-hidden behind an old shelf. It was painted a deep crimson, and something about it felt wrong. The knocking came again, louder now, almost desperate.

With shaking hands, Claire reached for the doorknob and twisted it. The door swung open with a creak, revealing a narrow, pitch-black tunnel. The smell of decay wafted out, making her gag.

“Hello?” she whispered, voice barely audible over the pounding of her heart.

Something moved in the darkness—a shadowy figure, its form just visible at the edge of the flashlight’s beam. Claire froze, rooted to the spot as the figure began to shuffle forward. And then she heard it—soft, broken sobs, echoing down the tunnel.

“Please…” a voice whimpered, no longer sharp or threatening, but filled with pain. “Help me…”

Claire took a step back, then another, her mind screaming at her to run. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. Something about the voice—so desperate, so full of anguish—compelled her to stay.

“Who are you?” she asked, tears brimming in her eyes.

There was no answer. The shadow halted, and then, with an inhuman speed, it lunged forward.

The flashlight flickered and died, plunging the basement into total darkness. Claire’s scream was cut short as something cold and solid wrapped around her wrist, yanking her into the tunnel.

The last thing she heard before everything went black was a soft, familiar whisper: “Leave…”

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The house on Willow Street still stands, silent and empty. If you press your ear against the walls at night, some say you can still hear Claire’s voice, whispering from the darkness.

“Please… help me…”