By Katie Arminie

I hate it when Dad leaves my little sister and me home without a babysitter. The house is so big and spooky. He doesn’t like to spend money on things like lightbulbs. He is strange since Mommy and his divorce. At least it is still light out. Soon we will lock ourselves into Dad’s room, where there is a bathroom, and watch television until he comes home. Right now, Sissy is in there watching the Muppet Show and waiting for me to go get some pop. I ran down the hallway to the kitchen, but there is none left in the frig.

Now I have to walk out towards that creepy room where we used to have big dinners in. It’s funny thinking of that, it’s so different here now. I wish my parents’ friends and our family were here now: my uncles, aunts, grandparents, Judy and Paul and their bratty kids. The house feels so sad, empty and watchful like it hates us. Every time I walk by that room, I see a dark face out of the corner of my eye. I never go in there, but the dusky male head seems to be peeking out at me as I cross the living room stairs. I’ve never seen it full on, only in my side eye.

The lower half of the house is terrifying too, but I’ve never seen anything there. Although there is a weird, small door that goes into a small space behind the coat closet. My neighborhood friends say a small demon lives inside. I think I hear scratching. It’s all in my head! I have to be brave… Only dumb babies believe in ghosts or whatever that thing is.

Sissy is a baby, even though she isn’t, and that’s why I have to go get the pop. It’s so cold down there and hard to see, but I know exactly where I’m going and where the pop is stored by the corner of the small, concrete room. I’m just not going to turn my head towards the thing upstairs. It’s not like it will be chasing me or anything. It just wants to watch me as a warning. I wonder why it doesn’t have a body and why it is so dark and blurry with afro like hair. Kid’s stuff… It doesn’t exist! Stupid Boogieman crap!

This is it! I’m running towards the stairs. Don’t look, don’t look! The terror in my throat is worsened by the pounding in my heart. It will follow me if I don’t look! I turn my head to the side and there it is. I turn my head to face it, because that’s impossible as I trip on the step and fall to the landing, hurting my leg.

Nothing was there, but my heart knows the truth: There is something evil in this house mocking me, knowing I’m an unwanted child in this large, empty, divorce filled house. If I make it downstairs without being caught by whatever lays down there waiting, I still have to go back up these stairs past the room. Sissy is depending on me, waiting in the well lit room, lonely as she watches The Muppets. If I don’t get the pop, it’s like I’m admitting to myself and Sissy, that we are abandoned in a haunted house by our own father, so I stumble as I run.