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He got more than a house - for better or worse
This is my first foray into Erotic Horror. Although there are horror/evil elements, in the end it's a romance, with a heavy paranormal theme. I wasn't sure if this went in Erotic Horror, Non-human, or Romance. Let me know if I got it wrong.
This is a long, slow-developing, complex story. Very long, approaching novel length at 56,000 words. You might want to check out the number of pages before starting. It's more than a couple of hours read. Thank you in advance for your patience.
Thanks to PatientLee, Dakota_Lynn, and my Writing Group for their valuable input, perhaps making a confusing read almost readable. They're also responsible for eliminating almost a quarter of the length.
This is an entry in the 2013 Halloween Contest.
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For four years I'd driven by that old house. It was high on a hill, hidden by the ancient trees around it. You could occasionally glimpse one of the four towering chimneys through a break in the foliage, but even in winter I could barely make out the silhouette of the building.
It was only a few hundred yards off the interstate. Twice, my curiosity had gotten the better of me, and I'd tried to get closer to it. The sheer cliff where they'd cut through for the highway, made any approach from the west impossible, so I searched for adjacent roads. After a few hours of wasted effort, it was clear there was no avenue up to the house proper. Studying the latest street maps, I could find nothing that got me anywhere near the hilltop.
I didn't know why I was so drawn to the place, but it was always on my mind, a compulsion. I studied surveying maps and asked around the nearest town, several miles away, but couldn't find out any more about it. I researched properties for sale and old tax records, all to no avail.
There was a history to the house, and old records, but everything seemed to end around the 1930's. I ran into a blank at every turn. The more of a challenge it proved, the more stubborn I became. My obstinance was both a blessing and a curse.
The place was well off the beaten path, in backwoods Virginia, and I was only out in the area every couple of months or so, when working with a rural customer. More often than not I just drove past, staring up at the mystery. Straining to see just a little more, something to assuage my curiosity.
Finally my patience surrendered to my obsession. I planned a day excursion, and one fine morning I parked my car at what I thought was the nearest and most likely access point, sprayed on an extra helping of Deep Woods Off, and started hiking in. It was hard going, no trail to speak of, which surprised me. Places like this were always targets for neighborhood kids to hang out and get in trouble. Perhaps the scarcity of local population, combined with the difficulty of access discouraged it.
The route couldn't have been much more than half a mile at best, and yet the thick undergrowth and vicious thorns kept me at bay for nearly 2 hours. I fought through, determined, clingy vines grasping at my legs, immense deadfalls abruptly blocking my route, hidden thorny branches shredding my skin, unsurpassable thickets forcing me deeper into the woods. After a few hundred yards I was exhausted, silently cursing the dark foreboding woods that sought to deny me my goal. The woods opened up to larger, more sedate forest giants that silently observed my implacable progress, before closing in again as I reached the top of the hill. When I finally broke free into the open, the manse stood before me, magnificent and sad at the same time.
It was huge, beyond my expectations. Three full stories, with 2 large chimneys on each end of the house, maybe 15 feet apart. The building was stone, five window openings on the end facing me, stacked 2-2-1, now just gaping holes in the side of the building.
The front was impressive, with a wide double doorway in the center, bracketed by two window openings on each side. On the second and third floors there had been five windows each. Now just dark smudges on the ancient façade.
The original porch was long gone, but with some effort I climbed up the front into the entrance. I was holding my breath, eager to view the interior for the first time, my mind adrift in the contemplation of the wonders ahead of me. The first sight was a punch in the gut.
Decrepit ruin and rot, devastating in its completeness, that was my reward. It was well lit, the light from the window openings flooding it, and daylight streaming down from above. Looking up, I could see the sky through the three intervening ceilings and the roof. Portions of the floors were still intact, as were many of the joists, pillars and beams. I carefully maneuvered my way along the walls, to see some of what lay hidden from view. Each step was an adventure, the soft rotted wood eager to pitch me into the darkness below, if I strayed from the safety of the joists.
Soot blackened walls, and charred beams told me a fire must have destroyed the place. From the look of things it was the worst on the third floor and attic, with the ground floor somehow surviving with the least ruin. Significant damage, but not the hollowed out shell the top floors had become.
I made it most of the way up the stairs to the second floor before the creaking of the rotted wood underfoot had my heart racing too fast to continue. When a board disintegrated underfoot, compulsion yielded to common sense, and I gave it up as too dangerous. I had peeked over the top into the floor space above, but it was difficult to tell where rooms had been. In a few places, hints remained of what might have been walls, but fallen detritus from the floor above made even that a guess at best. The devastation was near complete. Carefully working my way back down, legs trembling, I retreated from the house, my curiosity only further inflamed.
From the outside the place was majestic. The stone looked perfect, the proportions ideal. The outline of the steeply pitched roof and those 4 fantastic chimneys against the sky were breathtaking. I walked around the building, still at a loss for how the exterior walls could look so solid, with so little inside to hold them up.
There was a 30 yard area surrounding the house, where the trees had not yet dared to trespass. The grass and clover intermixed, on the peak of the hill, where the decrepit mansion now stood. I could only imagine what it must have looked like in its glory.
I wondered if it was possible to restore it to that glory.
I knew I wanted to try.
* * *
It took me six months of effort to track down the ownership of the property. It was considered unimproved, the House not even showing up on paperwork. Fifty year old businesses exchanged land ownership, their actions hidden behind the corporate veil.
Actually contacting the owner proved almost as difficult. The House had become my hobby, taking over much of my free time, occupying my thoughts. I made countless phone calls, mailing in public information requests, spending hours and hours at the local courthouse and records room.
Eventually my stubbornness won out. I found myself in a senior home halfway across the country, nervous to finally meet the person who I believed was the actual owner. I glanced around the room, dizzied by the combination of opulence and decay. The furniture, wallpaper, artwork, were so different from the nursing homes I was familiar with. Nothing modular or modern, it spoke of a different age, and a different class of clientele. At the same time my senses were assaulted with a variety of smells conflicting with each other. Bleach, mildew, urine, dust, and an overall mustiness that was depressing. The curtains were inexplicably closed blocking out the sunlight, leaving vague shadows in its place.
One of the assistants wheeled out an elderly woman in a wheelchair. She looked like she might have been around at the turn of the previous century. Her gray hair, or what was left of it, was carefully combed back. She had makeup on, an elegant dress, and jewelry. She had clearly made herself up for my visit.
"Mrs. Madison? I'm Jack Thompson. I hope you don't mind my coming to speak to you."
She giggled. The sound seemed out-of-place, coming from her. "Mind? Of course not. It's not every day that a lady has such a handsome young man come to call. Would you like some tea? Ralph would be happy to get us some."
"That would be very nice. Please."
"I'm so glad you've come by. I don't get many visitors these days."
"I'm very happy to be here. You're not an easy woman to find, Mrs. Madison."
"Beverly, please. Mrs. Madison sounds like my mother-in-law. I shouldn't be that hard to find. I'm afraid I've been cooped up in here for nearly 20 years now."
Cooped up? I could understand that feeling. I would want out of that environment, given any chance. "Would you like to go outside? It's a beautiful day out."
"Do you think we could?"
"I don't see why not, Beverly. Why don't we have our tea out on the lawn?" I'd seen several tables outside, and thought it would be pleasant to be outdoors. Far more pleasant than where I stood.
"That would be divine."
I guided her wheelchair out the door, taking the ramp out to the spacious front lawn, and steered her to an open table with some shade. I parked her there, briefly wondering why more people weren't outside on such a gorgeous day.
"I'll be right back with our tea," I told her.
"Thank you, Jack."
