“Do we really have to live in the middle of nowhere?” my little brother Zach whined.
I glanced at the driver, my sister Hannah, whose eyes were fixed on the road. “Yes, Zach. This is the best place for us to live. It’s dad’s hometown.”
“Mom’s hometown is better,” my twin brother Emmett chipped in.
My mother had recently killed by Jonathan Smith, the man who replaced my father at work. She had bitten his jugular, making him bleed to death. The police said she killed him first and released that information to the public. That marked the beginning of our suffering.
People had kept leaving trashy notes and letters in our mailbox, writing mean words on our walls, shouting them to us whenever we left home. These included biters, zombies, dogs, wolves, and vampires, among others.
It was as if they had forgotten that Jonathan had kidnapped my mother for a month. The same people who had sympathized and helped us look for her were now shunning us. But in all honesty, sometimes I thought it was crazy that mother had managed to kill him that way. She must have been extremely desperate.
Some people sympathized, especially the women who were close to my mother. One of them, Mrs. Calling, had helped us deal with lawyers, rent out our house, and escape out of the town. Now we were on our way to dad’s hometown. Hannah said she was going to create dad’s dream project. She was going to renovate the family resort. We needed to invest money. Since she was our legal guardian, we had no choice but to obey.
“We have no choice,” Hannah said. “Maybe it won’t be that bad. I’ve lived there, and it was quite nice. Besides, after everything we have been through, we need some peace and quiet.”
It was pointless trying to reason with her at that moment, so I turned to my phone. Zach and Emmett talked about a game that had recently been released. Why a 17-year-old was playing the same game with a 5-year-old was beyond my understanding.
I stared out of the window, watching physical features as we drove by them, my mind lost in thought. I didn’t think I would ever get used to it. Not having a mother. My mother had always been there and was a big part of my life. She was always doing things for us, making us happy, sacrificing herself to where she barely rested. Even when Hannah begged her to hire help, she refused, although we could afford it. She said it was her job, so we had not bothered to learn so many things. I didn’t know how to do a lot of things.
I glanced at Hannah, who now had a frown on her face. Hannah was now stepping into mom’s shoes, but she wasn’t like mum. She couldn’t be the person mum was, so we were all trying to adjust. In the past week, she had taught all of us how to cook. It was hard, but we were trying since we did not have other options.
“We’re almost there,” Hannah said as we branched off the main highway. “We shall go check out the place now, but we’ll spend the night in a motel. Aunt Zora said there’s need for a lot of renovation.”
“Why don’t we sell it and start a different business?” I inquired. “It looks like no one lives in this place.”
“You spent little time with dad. You barely knew him, but I did. It was dad’s dream to reopen this resort, but he decided to first make money to provide for the family. He wanted to retire to this place. Dad scarified his dreams for ours. All I want is to make his dream come true. I know he’s watching us.”
“Why didn’t mum do it?”
“She didn’t want to, and she was busy raising all of you. Satisfied?”
“Everybody relax,” Emmett said, as a four story building came in to view. It was a top of a small hill.
“Is that it?” I asked.
Hannah nodded, a smile lighting up her face. Yes, that’s it. It’s beautiful, isn’t it?
“Uhhmm, beautiful is not the word I would use,” I said, staring at the building that direly needed a paint job.
“It’s nice and a great location, too. Good for business.”
“Was it functioning when you lived here?” I asked, suddenly curious about the place. My father had died five years when I was 12, so I still had memories of him. However, they were very few, because he was always busy. Back when they lived here, he had more time for himself and family. I was 4 and Hannah was 13 when they left.
Hannah shook her head as she took a turn and started driving uphill towards the house. “It had been closed a long back then.”
“Why?”
“It probably wasn’t making as much as expected. It made great grandpa broke, I guess.”
We all tumbled out of the car as soon as it stopped outside the building whose gate had been removed. The first thing I did was stretch myself. Having travelled for twelve hours, I needed it. We could have got a plane ticket, but Hannah was proving to be quite stingy. She said we needed to watch out for spending until we made proper budgets so that we didn’t waste away the money left for us.
“It’s locked,” Zach shouted. He had rushed to the door immediately.
“Here’s the key.” Hannah said, throwing it to Emmett who caught it. Emmett handed it to Zach, who went to open the door.
“Who is that?” I asked Hannah when I saw a man walking towards us. He was a middle-aged, tall, burly man with a stern face, the type you see in western movies. The tall boy following him stopped at the gatepost, leaning against it.
He was wearing all black and even from afar, I could see that he was really handsome. He just stood there, staring at us. I raised my eyebrows at him, wondering what his problem was. He continued to stare, as if daring me to do something.
“Hannah Colman,” he said, proffering his hand to my sister, who had stepped out of the car after seeing him.
“Raymond Morgenstern.”
“I saw a car headed this way, and I came to find out who it was.”
“It’s just us. These are my siblings, Emmett and Emilia.” She looked around. “Where is Zach?”
“He went inside.”
I think I saw a weird expression on Mr. Morgenstern’s face, but decided I must have imagined.
“Alone?” he asked.
“He’s five,” I said. “He’ll be okay.”
“Let’s go in. He can’t be alone in there.”
What’s wrong? Is the building haunted?
Zach, he called.
Over here,” we heard Zach’s voice. Mr. Morgenstern rushed to the room where he was in. Zach was staring at a cluster of bones in one corner of the room. “What bones are these?”
“Come on. You will come back tomorrow after a clean-up has been done.”
“Did some people get in?”
“Some windows are broken so people and animals can enter. but don’t worry, leave the keys with me and I will have it worked on.”
“Those bones,” Zach said.
“Lets’ go,” Mr. Morgenstern said, practically shoving us outside. I couldn’t help but think there was something wrong with the house.
Hannah seemed mildly uncomfortable, Zach curious while Emmett was busy scrolling through his twitter feed.
The strange boy was still standing where we had left him.
“Who is that?” I asked.
“Bradley Lightwood, local teenager.” Mr. Morgenstern said. “I will see you all tomorrow.”
We piled into the car while Hannah and he had a chat.
“That was strange,” I said.
“They looked like human bones,” Zach said.
There are so many animals in these words, Zach. I don’t think they were human bones.
But they were. I think an animal ate a person in there.
Okay, Zach. I said, feeling unexplainable chill. I was already scared, and his theories did not seem like they would calm me down. “We shall know more soon enough. Let’ just hope the motel is good.”
“Mr. Morgenstern knows something.”
“Mr. Morgenstern is the mayor, and he was dad’s friend. He would let me know if there was a need for worry. You are all just tired. Get some rest. Things will be clearer tomorrow.”
The town was not so bad, although it was still tiny compared to most. I had expected it to be some old rundown place, but it actually seemed to be okay. In movies, when people go to small towns, they stay in rundown motels. This one was pretty good. If you could forget that some people had probably used the bed for some activities, you could enjoy the stay.Our aunt had invited us to stay at her house, but we did not want to be a burden. We had meals at a nearby restaurant and went to bed. Hannah, who was sharing the room with me, slept soundly while nightmares plagued me all night long. At one point when I was awake, I heard howling. Since it was a woody area, I figured it was wolves. I had heard howling before when on a tour, but this sounded different. Too real, loud. Despite that, I got some quality sleep towards morning.“Leave me alone,” I told Hannah when she woke me up.“I’m going to the resort site to see what needs to get sorted out,” she said.“Are we not going together?” I
That night, I slept better than the previous one. Hannah, on the other hand, didn’t seem to have had a good night as she was grumpy. I noticed she was disturbed.“What’s wrong?” I asked as I slipped a white blouse over my head.“Mr. Morgenstern does not want me to renovate the resort. He thinks it’s not a good idea.”“Why?” I was one of those who did not approve of her idea but seeing her so down made me feel concerned. I would have been the happiest if she, on her own, abandoned the idea. But, being forced to abandon by some other people was not fair.“There are things I have not yet told you about the resort.”“Yeah, I suspected so. Let me guess, they’re not good things.”Hannah shook her head. “That’s right, but I need this. This is the only thing that connects us to our father.”I sighed. “What’s wrong with that resort? Why was it closed all those years ago? Were people killed in it? Those bones, were they human?”“I will tell you,” she said, standing up. “I will narrate everythin
Zach continued to cry for over thirty minutes while I tried to comfort him in vain. At some point he stopped crying and I figured he had probably slept off. I didn’t mind that I was in the same situation. I was more worried for my innocent brother. I started shouting “help” as loudly as possible but no one came to save us. After sometime, I gave up and stayed silent, left with no other option.Being alone made me think of my mother’s death, a subject I had successfully avoided for a long time. I had kept myself busy to avoid thinking of her and now I had all the time in the world. I was starting to feel the emptiness she had left behind. Mama was who I rushed to whenever I felt overwhelmed. Her hugs were the best and never failed to make me feel better. Had she been alive, we wouldn’t be in that shanty town. We would be back home, living life the way it should be, not stuck in some pit in the middle of nowhere. Suddenly, I heard whistling. I stood up and listened attentively before
The doctors found nothing wrong with Zach. As for me, I had to have a minor surgery to remove part of a thorn that had lodged itself in my leg. I ended up limping on my third day in town. If I had a choice in the matter, I would have left the town immediately. But first, I needed to figure out what was going on. I wanted to leave but not without answers. There was something mysterious about the town and I knew that if I left without finding out, I would always wonder what it was.We settled in well at home. Hannah liked what we had done with the little space provided to us. We had managed to find a place for everything we had carried with us and made sure to organize them neatly. I knew that sooner or later, the organization would crumble and everything would go back to being a mess. When my siblings started looking around for their stuff, they would put everything in disarray.On the third day of arrival, a letter arrived. It was addressed the Colman children. At any other time, I wo
“What does it say?” I asked Hannah, unable to take the suspense anymore. Hannah glanced up and turned her eyes back to the letter in her hand. She continued to peruse through it before sighing.“It says a lot,” she said and handed the letter to Emmett who was next to her.“Give it to me,” I told Emmett who was just holding it. He gave it to me without resisting. Zach was chewing food while staring at us. I was surprised he had not yet started bombarding us with questions.“Should I read it out loud?” I asked Hannah, throwing a glance at the youngest member of our family. I needed to know if there was any information in the letter that was not appropriate for him.Dear Hannah, Emilia, Emmett and Zach. I hope you’re well, adjusting and moving on from the terrible things that have happened to you. I know this is a very tough time and I don’t want to make it harder but there are things I cannot keep from you because you deserve to know them in order to be safe.On the other hand, there
By the time we reached outside, some of the other residents had gathered near the protestors who were chanting, “Do not reopen”. As we walked towards them, Emmett and Zach decided to go and stand near the residents while Hannah and I went to face the protesting group.Even as we approached, they continued to chant, their lips moving in sync. The chanting grew louder when we stood right in front of them. There was a woman with huge dreadlocks wearing a black t-shirt with a huge drawing of a skull and crossbones at the front. She seemed to be the leader.Hannah and I remained silent, waiting for them to stop so that we could have a decent conversation. But they never stopped. When I had heard enough, I yelled. “STOP.”Suddenly, the group became silent and stared at us in anticipation. The woman with dreadlocks stepped forward. She was very tall and big boned. Those characteristics made her very much intimidating but I knew she would not dare to try anything in front of so many people.
Hannah and I watched as Bradley walked towards us in calm, collected strides. His frame, covered in black garments, looked taller than before. My heart rate was slowly skyrocketing as I watched the hottest man I knew head towards me. I had fantasized about running into him and my chance had arrived.“Who are you and what are you doing in our home?” He asked.“I believe you already know who we are,” I said. We were the newest family to move into the town and he had seen us on that first day at the resort. Surely, Mr. Morgenstern had told him about us.“Sorry about my sister,” Hannah said. “We haven’t met. My name is Hannah Colman. Your father and I spoke yesterday and he agreed to let us have some flowers from your garden, with the help of the florist who will be arriving soon.”“Okay,” he said and walked away.“Rude,” I said.“Not more than you,” Hannah lashed back.I rolled my eyes. “If Mr. Morgenstern is his father, why is his name Lightwood?”“He’s adopted,” Hannah informed me.“Oh
We returned to the resort and found Emmett and Zach lounging on a bench on the balcony of the ground floor. Zach was playing a game on Emmett’s phone while the latter was looking through some house plans.We passed them without a word and made our way to the flower garden where Hannah started to sort through the soil she had dug up the previous day.“We have to get rid of anything that is not soil,” she told me as she collected grass stems and put them in a growing pile. “We get rid of all the rubbish and grass residue. Once everything is gone, we shall begin planting.After watching her for a few seconds, I grabbed a pair of black gloves, squatted down and started removing everything that was not soil. Hannah was doing it without the gloves but I thought gardening barehanded was not healthy. In science class, I had learnt of several microorganisms and germs. I was sure the soil contained most of those.The work was going fairly well until I saw an earth worm. I screamed out loud befo