Flashback It Was A Dark And Stormy Night; Jan And

Flashback It was a dark and stormy night; Jan and Rhea were in their parents’ room. They were idly lying on the bed, waiting for their parents to come home. “Big Brother,” Rhea said while pulling on Jan’s sleeve. “What is it, Rhea?” replied Jan. “When will Mommy and Daddy come home?” Rhea asked. “I don’t…” Jan stopped, and then started a new sentence, “Did you see that?” Rhea cocked her head to one side and asked innocently, “See what?” Jan slowly turned to look at his sister. He had a scared look. “What is it, Big Brother?” Rhea asked in a scared tone when her brother didn’t say anything more. Jan gulped then said in a shaky voice, “I saw something move outside the room…” “Maybe it was just something flying by outside the window?” Rhea suggested, panic starting to get to her voice. “Yes, that must be it.” Jan said, trying to convince himself. The two laid a little closer to each other. They were trembling. Both of them jumped when they heard two pairs of feet walking. Jan shot up and looked around the room. Rhea slowly pulled herself to a sitting position. “Hello, Kids.” A strange voice said. “W-who a-a-are y-y-yo-you?” Jan said, trembling. “Don’t be scared, Jan… and you too, Rhea.” Another strange voice said. “How d-do you know o-our n-na-names?” Rhea demanded, trying to sound brave but still trembling. “Ah, that’s because we were friends with your parents once.” The first strange voice said. Jan and Rhea seemed to have calmed down now. Jan said, “Is that so? And do you have any business with our parents?” “Yes.” The second voice said. The two kids looked at each other. Rhea then said, “What is it, then?” “I’m so sorry, but that’s something you don’t need to know.”

“Oh, okay then. Then, could we just know your names?” Jan said. “I’m Merissa and this is Paul.” The first voice replied. “Nice to meet you, Merissa.” Jan said. “You, too, Paul.” Rhea said. “But then…” Merissa stared. “It’s not so nice to meet you.” Paul finished. The two strangers suddenly grabbed the two kids. A few blocks away, Rommel and Juliet were coming home in their car. They were talking about the presents they’ve gotten for the kids when an earsplitting scream suddenly filled the air. The sound came from the residence of the Gee’s. Rommel stepped on the gas and they were out of the car in mere seconds. Rommel and Juliet ran in to their house, screaming, “Jan! Rhea! Are you alright?” “We’re fine.” Rhea said, running to her father’s arms. “Where’s Jan?” Rommel asked his daughter. “He’s cleaning up the game we were playing!” Rhea answered cheerily. Rommel carried Rhea to the living room. Juliet followed a little behind. Sure enough, Jan was cleaning up a board game. Rommel put down Rhea and helped his son put the things away. When they were done; Jan said, “Mom, Dad, can you please tell us a story?” The parents looked a little confused but Rommel still answered, “What about then?” Jan thought for a second then said, “Something about haunted houses, please!” “Are you sure you want that, sweetie?” Juliet said a little worried. Jan and Rhea answered in chorus, “Yes, please!” Rommel sighed then said, “Alright then. Why don’t we sit first?” The kids ran to sit on the floor. Rommel and Juliet sat on the sofa. Rommel cleared his throat, “I’ll… well, we’ll… tell you something about an experience we had had when we were still in College.”

“You see, we were doing a group thesis. We rented a house somewhere so that we could do our work in peace.” Juliet said. “But, peace didn’t want us.” Rommel said in a grave voice, “We were ten when we started, but in the end, there were only two left. That would be me and your mom.” Rommel and Juliet waited for their children to respond. When they didn’t, the two of them got a little worried but they still continued the story for their children’s curiosity’s sake. “We rented that house for four weeks. But during the first two weeks, a whole lot of accidents happened. In the first week, two of the people we were with got into accidents.” Juliet said. “In the second week, one of the two died. It was an accident, but it was still scary.” Rommel said, hugging Juliet tightly with one hand. Juliet hid her face in her husband’s body. After a few seconds, maybe minutes, Juliet took her face out and said in a weak voice, “When that happened, we got out of the house and rented another on the other side of the street. We wanted to know if there was something weird happening in the first house we had rented.” Rommel sighed, maybe in relief or in grief, “We took turns to watch the house; this went on for another week. On the first night of our fourth week, there was heavy rain, just like today.” Juliet had a scared look on her face when she said, “We saw Paul, the one who had died the previous week.” “He walked slowly; when he got to the door, everyone huddled to see if it was really him. And it was.” Rommel said. “We were all happy, of course. But, at the same time, we were freaked out, terrified!” Juliet said. A few seconds of silence went by, Juliet said, “Rommel, I’ll just let you tell the rest of the story.” Rommel had an understanding expression when he nodded. He turned to the kids before saying, “Do you want to continue the story?” The two nodded without hesitating. “Paul said, in a voice that was a little different from the voice he had had when he was still alive, ‘Get away from here now; hurry!’ He had an urgent voice, too. We all wanted to follow his orders but then something drew us back to the

original house we rented. It had become a very beautiful white-coated house. It looked like it had just been built. We couldn’t stop ourselves; we wanted to see what was inside this strange yet beautiful house. No one even argued when we decided to check the house out. When we got inside the house, it was beautiful, too. But when the door was shut by the strong wind, everything suddenly became rotten. We were all scared, certainly. We tried to organize teams to look for a way out. One after the other, though, the people we were with died. The first was hung because of a loose wire. The second tripped and hit the cracked tiles of the kitchen counter. The third fell from the second floor to the first due to a hole on the second floor flooring. The fourth hit a mirror and the mirror shattered along with his head. The fifth tripped while going down the stairs. We were down to four, we also had found an exit. Juliet went out first, I followed. When we were outside, however, the exit was suddenly closed by a plank. We heard two screams but we didn’t wait to know what had happened anymore. We started running back to the main street, to look for someone, anyone who could’ve helped. When we were on the main street, we saw a cop and told him everything. We went back to the house and found it in its beautiful form again. The cop said they’ll investigate it the following day. And they did, but they didn’t found anything. Not even a single corpse of any of our friends. We grief about it every now and then, that experience had taught us a lot.” When Rommel had finished telling his story, the kids were no longer on the floor. Two decaying bodies stood on the spot where the kids had been instead. Juliet shrieked in horror, Rommel was barely able to say the words, “Merissa! Paul!” Merissa smiled a wicked smile; Paul was just staring at Juliet. Juliet was trembling uncontrollably on her seat. Rommel, on the other hand, was halfway standing. “You had left us for thirteen years, Rommel, Juliet,” Merissa said. “I told you to get out of there…” Paul said. “But, because you didn’t, you guys will have to come with us.” Merissa said, ignoring Paul’s interruption. “Where… and what about our kids?” Rommel said.

“Oh, they’ve already gone ahead.” Merissa said with a devil’s smile on her face. “What?” Juliet exclaimed. “Yes, they’ve gone to that complete hell before you two. But don’t worry, we’re going there too. Because we belong there, in that beautiful white house that turns to hell.” --END--