Halloween Short Story
The thumping stopped, and then…
By Cat Rigon | Posted 10/11/08 | Updated 10/4/24
Even Dum-Dums know where to get good Halloween candy.
I bit my lip; my parents watched my face as they showed me the building. The building stood atop of Mount Mouniatis, it was built in the art deco style but the facade was moldy and crumbled to reveal a dirt wall. We were going to live here, this disintegrating old hotel. They planned to renovate it, and restart the mountain hotel industry.
The inside was worse than the outside, I cringed inside, but my parents were so happy. Together we took a tour of the workings of this ancient hotel. The Villagers pillaged the interior, animals had begun to inhabit the rooms; bugs crawled across the walls and floors. Smells came from the walls, and communist propaganda scattered through the whole building. Altogether there were 83 rooms, a pool, 100 acres of Cypriot mountainside, 3 goats, pigeons galore, and bugs. I was revolted. Limassol was two hours away, I could not just ask Laura to come pick me up. I was alone with my family in a crumbling building.
Our first night had approached quickly; the beds had been set up by the Philippine workers and a roasted chicken had been ordered. I lay in my bed; it was next door to my parents on the third floor. I could hear the bugs crawl on the floor and tried to dull the sounds by playing Ella Fitzgerald. The bugs got louder though, the bugs gathered together in the corner of the room. I got up to scare the bugs away; as I approached the bugs scattered to the holes in the floor. A dead half eaten pigeon lay on my floor, the bird's face was meat bearing, but the feathers were nonexistent. I screamed.
No one was there to react to my yell.
The parents had gone to town to get dinner.
A loud thump came from the attic; I stood still too frightened to move. The thumping noise became rhythmic. I stood, blood pumping rapidly, noises pounding in my ears, a scratchy feeling up my pant leg.
The thumping stopped.
It crashed through the ceiling and lay on my bedroom floor unconscious or dead. Debris fell from above, red leaflets, planks of wood and plaster. A teenage boy covered in nothing but bird feathers, lay with a trickle of blood running from his mouth. He was dead. A wrenching smell issued from his body, my body dropped next to his in a faint.
Next story: Pride's a Sin
Copyright ©2008 Cat Rigon, Plano East Senior High. All rights reserved.