The Guesthouse

by Abbie Frost

  There was a long silence. Hannah couldn’t stop fidgeting and thinking of the evening ahead with nothing to drink, wondering how long it would take for the weather to clear. The only thing to do was to keep occupied, so she turned to Mo.

  ‘If Sandeep’s resting and we’re trapped inside, do you fancy carrying on exploring the house?’

  Chloe grinned. ‘Yes, please.’

  Mo stood up and stretched. ‘Sounds good. I can’t face sitting around doing nothing.’

  ‘Just be careful,’ Rosa said, as Chloe ran to Hannah and grabbed her hand.

  ‘We won’t go anywhere dodgy,’ Hannah said with a smile, suddenly realizing how long it had been since she had last thought of Ben, last logged into social media. Even if this place creeped her out, she had to admit the break was doing her good.

  Lucy came with them as they headed towards a closed door along from the kitchen, which they hadn’t been through before. Hannah expected it to be locked, but the door swung open to reveal a smaller version of the drawing room. A soot-stained little fireplace crouched in one corner, empty bookshelves lined the walls, and the scuffed and dusty parquet flooring smelled of wet paint. Hadn’t the website said this was a room guests could use?

  Hannah walked towards the grimy window and rubbed it with her sleeve, but outside the thick fog smothered everything in a wall of darkness. She rubbed her arms and tried to pull across one of the long red velvet curtains, showering herself in dust. The fabric at the top was threadbare.

  ‘This must have been the library. What a shame.’ Mo picked up one of the few remaining books scattered on the shelves and ran his hand over the cover. The only other bit of furniture was a set of wooden steps designed to access the top shelves.

  As they left the room and closed the door behind them, there was a depressed silence. Hannah wasn’t sure what she or any of them had expected, but not this dull and rundown room.

  Then Chloe pointed along the hall. ‘Look.’ She hurried over to a dark heavy-looking door, and Lucy called out for her to wait.

  But Chloe held it open for the others with a smile. ‘Ooh, this looks better. A whole other section.’

  The door led into a corridor that stretched away into darkness. Hannah groped on the wall and found an old-fashioned light switch. When she pressed it, the bulb buzzed and a faint glow flickered against the green paint on the walls, giving the place a strange watery shine. They walked cautiously along to the end and found another solid-oak door secured with a heavy padlock. Chloe held up her iPhone and used the torch to illuminate a sign:

  Danger. Closed to Guests.

  ‘Maybe it’s where they store the paints and stuff for the renovation,’ said Lucy.

  Mo pointed at another door to the left. ‘No sign here.’ He opened it to reveal a bare wooden staircase that wound steeply up into the house. ‘Aha, the back stairs, I read about these. They lead to the old servants’ bedrooms, I think.’ And without looking back he bounded into the dark.

  They followed him up the steep stairs, Chloe’s iPhone illuminating the narrow passage’s rough whitewashed walls. Hannah held out her hand, but Chloe just smiled at her and shook her head.

  ‘I’m OK. This is so cool.’ They paused on the little landing halfway up beside a small window. There was no sign of Lucy coming behind them.

  ‘The stairs must go right up to the third floor,’ Hannah said. ‘This landing seems to be on the same level as our bedrooms.’

  They both looked out the window through the mist to the garden below, and Hannah felt Chloe’s cold arm tremble against her. Mo’s footsteps creaked on the floorboards above them.

  They walked up the stairs and entered a labyrinth of empty rooms. There was no carpet here, just worn bare boards, no heating either. This was probably the way it had always been for the servants, bleak and unforgiving.

  Stepping into one room, they went over to a tiny window in the corner, barely big enough to see through. These rooms would be dark even in the daytime, oppressive even in the summer.

  ‘I don’t like it up here,’ Chloe said.

  ‘Nor me.’ They both jumped as Mo poked his head round the doorway and grinned.

  ‘Don’t do that!’ Chloe said, half-laughing, but half-scared.

  ‘Imagine these rooms furnished.’ Mo came to join them at the window. ‘They would have been pretty nasty even then: hard single beds, a wardrobe, and a couple of chests for clothes if you’re lucky.’

  There was a long pause as they stood lost in their own thoughts. A floorboard creaked nearby. And, without a word, they headed together for the stairs.

  After dinner Hannah went straight to her room. She took a chair and wedged it against the door, with her suitcase in front of it. Anyone who managed to move the chair would fall over the case. She checked and double-checked that the window was locked, the curtains closed. Then she made herself a cup of hot chocolate and tried to read.

  She was heavy with exhaustion, but her mind wouldn’t relax. A long soak in the bath might help, so she went to the bathroom, turned on the hot tap, selected one of the scented bath oils and poured it into the tub.

  Once it was full, she undressed and stepped into the fragrant water, easing herself down into the bubbles and wedging a thick towel behind her head. The fidgeting she’d been struggling with all day gradually subsided. She smiled and thought back to her last glass of vodka: a whole twenty-four hours ago.

  She closed her eyes and the warm suds began to soothe her mind as well as her body. Her thoughts wandered to all the strange things that had happened since she checked into The Guesthouse. Once she had been to the village to ask about her dad, she could head straight back to London, she decided. A flicker of guilt as she realized how far away Ben now seemed. But her mother and Lori were right: to function properly again, she needed to let him rest.

  She closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind, focusing on the delicate smell of the bath oil, enjoying the silence. Until darkness enveloped her and she drifted into sleep.

  A creak from the bathroom door and she was suddenly alert. The door swung gently open, letting in a wall of cold air. She tried to turn her head, but couldn’t move.

  It was happening again. She had to wake up, had to get out.

  Above her pulse racing in her ears, she could make out another sound. Shuffling, something shuffling through the door and into the room. The dark figure again, its breathing loud in the quiet room. She tried to turn, but couldn’t move. The door closed and they were alone together.

  And that suffocating smell seemed to wash over her in waves, making her sick.

  She tried to whimper, but nothing came out. A floorboard creaked right beside the bath and she tried to scream.

  Complete silence.

  And then a great weight pressed down on her from above. She sank deeper into the water, her head submerged, and she slipped quietly to the bottom of the bath. A sudden thought came to her as she lay there, perfectly still: suck in great lungfuls of hot soapy water, end it all before it’s too late. But it was already too late, because there was something in the water with her.

  About to touch her.

  Chapter Thirteen

  She jolted upright, her arms slipping on the sides of the bath. Coughed soapy water out of her lungs, gasped in air. Her head had been underwater – she had nearly drowned – and the water was now cold. The harsh taste of soap burned her lungs as she spat into the bath. Climbed out of the tub, shivering as she wrapped herself in one of the towels. The bathroom door was open. Had she left it like that?

  Out in the bedroom, everything was the same, nothing had been disturbed. She dressed quickly, trying to get warm. It had only been a bad dream.

  And bad dreams were her oldest friends. She’d been having them for years, for as long as she could remember, long before she checked into this bloody guesthouse. They had just never been so vivid, so detailed.

  And she couldn’t remember anything like that smell. It made her want to be sick, made her want
to drink vodka after vodka to burn it away.

  She huddled in bed, grabbed her phone and earbuds, and called up some peaceful, relaxing music. After a while her eyelids began to droop, so she plugged in her phone and switched off the lamp. Maybe now she would be able to sleep without dreams.

  A loud bang woke her, and she sat up quickly. The heavy darkness of midnight settled all around her.

  It would be a window crashing down again, or something thudding to the floor in one of the other guest rooms, some piece of this ancient house crumbling and falling apart. Whatever it was she wasn’t going to let it keep her awake.

  She rolled over and lay there, listening, until she heard something else. This time it was a sound she couldn’t identify. A scratching, like nails on bathroom tiles, or rat’s claws on wood. Then it seemed to be rattling, wood tapping against wood, a window frame shaking in the wind.

  She remembered the way Rob had pointed up at the window. The image of a little girl, hand pressed to the glass, tears running down her face.

  She sat up and turned the light on. This was all in her head, probably just the first day or so without alcohol taking its toll. But she had to find out for sure, had to prove to herself that those noises weren’t real, or she would never get back to sleep.

  This time she pulled on her trainers and her parka over her pyjamas. She reached for her iPhone: it was dead, out of battery. Somehow the cable had fallen out again, so it hadn’t charged. Shit. She threw the phone on her bed, then thought better of it, and plugged it back in. Stepped out into the corridor and listened to the silence.

  But as she tiptoed towards the stairs, a tiny noise came along the corridor. Faint and distant, but definitely there, an insistent sound.

  The sound of a little girl crying.

  This time she was in no doubt. There was no sound like it; the sobbing of someone in desperate need of help. She listened at each of the occupied guest rooms, considered waking up the others, but decided against it. What if they couldn’t hear it? What if they thought she was losing her mind? The low light at the end of the corridor wasn’t on, but the wind had picked up outside, clearing the fog and leaving just enough moonlight for her to see in the dark. It didn’t seem to be coming from the family room, so it wasn’t Chloe. Could it be a woman rather than a child? Surely not the calm and collected Lucy?

  She walked to the end of the other wing, her body shaking with cold and with fear. And for a few moments she was almost certain she would trace it to the little room right at the end. But as she got closer, the sound grew fainter.

  There was only one place left to look: downstairs. Darkness enveloped the hall, but a thin grey light trickled through the tall windows. She stared down from the railing into the eerie shadows below and thought about the walk across that bare echoing hall. She pulled her parka closer round her.

  Even as she decided to head back to her room, she found her feet taking her across the landing and down the stairs. Drawn onwards by the sound of a child in distress, by a little one who needed her.

  And as soon as she was in the hall, she knew with terrible certainty where the sound was coming from: the narrow corridor with the padlocked door at the end.

  She opened the heavy oak door and peered into the pitch-black tunnel. There were no windows and she groped for the light switch, the bare bulb flickering on but hardly penetrating the darkness. As she slowly crept along the corridor towards the sound, she felt like a diver feeling her way along a deep undersea tunnel.

  She reached the end, her breathing loud in the confined space, and pressed her ear to the padlocked door. Tried pulling and shaking the padlock, but it was no good.

  She stood there, panting, wondering what else to do.

  And then the crying stopped.

  Feeling suddenly exposed, alone in that greenish light, she spun around to stare back down the corridor.

  Silence – a deafening silence all around her. Nothing except her own respiration and the pounding of blood in her ears.

  But maybe there was something else. It was the flickering greenish light that did it, of course, but she almost imagined she could hear water. Not running, but swirling behind the door. As if there was a lake or a river back there, as if behind this door was a whirlpool where her nightmares were born.

  Her insides lurched as something tugged at the edges of her memory. Something terrifying hovered, not behind the door in front of her, but behind a door in her own mind.

  She had no idea how long she stayed like that – frozen – pressed against the dark wood, listening to the swirl and whisper of whatever was on the other side, fighting the urge to remember. But eventually she found herself stumbling back along the corridor and out into the hall.

  Panting heavily, she shut the door and leaned against it, wishing she had a padlock to keep it secure. To keep a lock on her own mind. Because if it opened, what other nightmares would crawl out into the light?

  Still shaking, she crept across the hall. Something had happened back there, some ancient memory had stirred and all she knew was that it had nothing – and everything – to do with her life with Ben. She had loved him so much and yet she had sabotaged their relationship, pulled it apart from the inside. She couldn’t remember when those bad dreams had first started, but she knew when they had begun to get worse: when she began to distance herself from her friends; when the drinking had started too. Started so she could pretend she wasn’t haunted, haunted by something she couldn’t name because that would mean confronting it.

  Ben had tried to help, tried to talk it through with her, which had only made her more frightened. Until, finally, she had driven him away. That’s what she had done, sought out an escape route.

  She paused at the bottom of the stairs. No, none of this was real. It was brought on by withdrawal symptoms, her craving for alcohol – she’d heard about this happening – vivid hallucinations after going cold turkey.

  Then a tiny sound made her look up.

  And there, at the top of the stairs, stood a tall dark figure.

  Chapter Fourteen

  She grabbed the bannister to steady herself.

  Lucy came running down to her. ‘Hannah, is that you? What’s wrong?’

  Colours and shapes blurred around her, the whole house seemed to bend and buckle. She sat heavily on the stairs and Lucy crouched beside her. ‘Shit, what happened? Are you OK?’

  Her voice felt raw. ‘I heard a noise … it woke me up. I thought it was … a child crying.’

  Lucy touched her arm. ‘You’re freezing. Let’s get you warm.’ She helped her up and into the kitchen. ‘Sit here by the Aga.’

  They pulled hard chairs close to the warmth, Hannah hugging herself, still shivering, Lucy sitting beside her, elbows on her knees. Hannah felt herself starting to calm down. Nothing had happened, it was just her mind playing tricks.

  Eventually she was able to look at Lucy in the light of the kitchen. She realized how pale she was, how frightened. She seemed so young without her earrings and her make-up, so exposed.

  ‘Did you hear it?’ Hannah’s voice shook, almost praying the answer would be yes.

  There was a pause, then Lucy shook her head. ‘I only heard you downstairs. Where did you go?’

  Hannah looked away. ‘That padlocked door down the corridor.’

  ‘I came out when I heard a door opening and closing downstairs,’ Lucy said. ‘No lights were on and I thought someone had broken in. Fucking terrified me.’ She looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘I did hear a fox scream a couple of times in the night. It’s a seriously creepy noise – maybe that’s what you thought was crying.’

  She was trying to reassure her, just as Ben used to do, but it was no good. Hannah shook her head. ‘It wasn’t a fox.’

  ‘Well, let’s stay here for a while and listen. If there is anything, we’ll find it together.’ Lucy put a hand on Hannah’s shoulder.

  They listened in silence for a while, but the house was quiet, no sounds even from the pipe
s or creaking wood. Eventually Lucy stretched her arms above her head, her legs out in front of her, and yawned.

  ‘I’m shattered, think I’m going to fall asleep, even on this bloody uncomfortable chair.’ Another yawn. ‘So – let’s talk – to keep ourselves awake. I’ve told you why I’m here on my own, but what about you?’

  And in the low light of the kitchen, by the warmth of the Aga, Hannah found herself spilling out most of the story, the bits about Ben at least. Lucy listened patiently and when it was over she reached out and held Hannah close for a long moment. A great weight fell from Hannah’s shoulders and she felt tears begin to fall. She cried as she had never cried before, not even when Ben was holding her tight. Not even when Ben died.

  Lucy tore off a piece of kitchen paper for her. ‘It’s all right. You’ve had a bad time – been through a lot – and, to be honest, I’m not sure this is the best place for you to be at the moment. It gives me the creeps.’ She brushed a strand of hair from Hannah’s damp cheek.

  ‘I know, you’re right. But there’s something I need to do here first.’

  Lucy frowned and leaned back in her chair. ‘Really? What do you need to do in a rundown old guesthouse?’

  ‘Well, not so much the house – it’s the area.’ She took a moment. ‘My father used to live near here. My parents broke up when I was four or five and I don’t remember much about my dad.’

  ‘Are you planning to visit him?’ Lucy’s voice was soft.

  ‘I can’t do that. He died five years ago.’

  ‘But you know where he lived?’

  Hannah shook her head. ‘Just that it was in the Fallon area.’

  Lucy yawned again and a shadow passed across her face. ‘Why don’t you head to the village tomorrow? Find people who knew him, get it – whatever it is – out of your system, then we can all leave. I don’t fancy another night here to be honest.’

  She stood and stretched, her black silk dressing gown falling open to reveal a sliver of pale, perfectly toned stomach.