When I was little I was afraid of the top floor of my grandmother's house. I didn't love the basement because it was dark and dirty and empty except for the furnace, the washing machine, and maybe some boxes or other things of little note. But I wasn't afraid. I was perfectly fine on the first floor, which held the kitchen, the bathroom, and the dining room. It also had a creepy little bathroom near the back door with an ancient toilet and a really tiny sink. It was old and dingy, but I wasn't afraid. The second floor had a small bedroom where Aunt Bridgie slept, a big bedroom that Nana and Kathleen (her daughter) shared, and a living room. I was fine there.
But when you went upstairs to the third floor, there was a two by three foot rectangular hole in the ceiling. A metal ladder was bolted into the hall and led over the stairs to the hole. I was never up there. It was black. I touched the ladder on occasion with the intention of climbing up and looking around, but I never made it past the second rung. I am assured by both my mother and aunt that there was nothing up there but old clothes and photographs, but never, not even as an adult living there, did I seriously consider exploring. Over the course of my life I have dreamt of the hole in the ceiling. In these dreams I have found brightly furnished pleasant rooms with staircases leading to shabbier rooms, with ladders leading to storage rooms, with ladders leading to dark, foreboding, horrible secret hiding places complete with the preserved remains of murder victims from past generations.
But the attic wasn't the problem. If I left it alone, it left me alone. There was something wrong with the whole apartment, especially the hallway. When I lived there I felt perfectly safe. I slept for ten months in the front room, which I had strong reservations about. When I was 18 the family gathered downstairs for some occasion. My cousin Gavin, who I only saw a few times a year, was about 15. He was sent to the upstairs kitchen to get ice from the freezer. After he was gone for an unreasonable amount of time I was sent to find Gavin and the ice. I found him waiting for me on the bottom step. "It's about time you came," he said. "I'm not going up there alone." I looked at him questioningly and together we ran up two flights of stairs, grabbed the ice, and tore back downstairs. A few hours later, his sister Geraldine, who was about 25, and who I saw only once or twice in a year of two, came over. She suggested we go upstairs to get away from everyone. Gavin and I settled on the sofa, while Geri sat on the floor a few feet away. The cat, Lance, was sleeping curled up on the floor. We got to talking about how we were all scared of the third floor for as long as we could remember. We talked about the attic. We talked about our hunchbacked grandfather who lived up there alone until his death about ten years earlier. We agreed that the hall made us queasy and that there was something not right about the front room. As we talked about the front room, the cat jumped up with a yowl, fur up, and stared into the darkness of the front room. The three of us bolted through the door and thundered downstairs. That was enough of that.
When, four years later, we were offered the upstairs apartment, I immediately said no. BP, with dollar signs in his eyes, a healthy measure of common sense, and no experience with the third floor, talked me into it. Rent free is a good deal. But truthfully, in the ten months we lived there we were 99% incident free. There was just one problem on one morning.
I was alone in the house. Nana and Kathleen were away on vacation. BP had gone to work. I was in the bathroom doing my hair. I heard footsteps in the hall. I went into the hall and listened. Nothing. I returned to the bathroom. I heard footsteps in the hall. I stopped, looked, and listened. I unplugged my curling iron, grabbed my purse and jacket, and went to work. Something was present and walking in it's apartment. I was not going to get in the way.
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