Charlotte Baines loves exploring abandoned places. Be it houses, amusement parks or forgotten neighborhoods. But she never expected this.
A Place Of Remembrance.
The abandoned house was creepy and eerily familiar, though I didn’t know why at the time.
My friend Darla Gates and I liked exploring these forgotten places. But for the most part, I’ve never been affected by them.
Sure most old places have that creepiness about them.
Especially when you see a painted portrait hanging on the wall, and the eyes seem to follow you. But that was the least of it. The house was down right chilling.
“Hey Charlotte do you want me to take some pictures of everything?” Darla asked.
“I guess so”. Though I answered her my thoughts were elsewhere. “I know this place, but how?” “Why?” I tried to shake the feeling and just move on. But the further I went, the stranger this place felt.
Walking through all of the debris, I kicked something hard.”Ouch!” “What the?” My train of thought stopped midway as I bent down to see what I had just kicked.
An old rusty safety box. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that inside was a picture. Odd, just one single picture.
Now why would someone put a single photograph inside a safety box?
I stood there staring at it, as if I somehow expected it to talk to me.
The picture itself was disturbing to say the least.
A face, frozen in place, with a hideous smile. I don’t know what it was about this picture that captivated me, but I was suddenly startled back to reality whenever I heard a loud crash and scream.
“CRASH!” “AHH!”. Then I heard running. First one end of the hall, then to the other.
I dropped the picture on the floor and saw it disintegrate right before my eyes. I didn’t have time to process what had just occurred.
When Darla rushed into the room, holding something in her hand.
I went up to her and saw that she was actually shaking.
“What’s wrong Darla?” I asked.
“Y-you, p-picture,f-found” She stuttered. “Huh?” “Darla I cant understand you”. She finally came out of her shock mode and repeated herself. “I found a picture of you Charlotte.” She told me.
“What are you talking about Darla?” “I’ve never even been here before.”
“Well, here’s a picture of you plan as day”. Darla replied.
She held up the picture and sure enough I was in it.
Though the photograph looked very old and the clothes were from another time period. 1940’s.
“Yeah, that looks like me alright.But…..
“Charlotte you don’t look so good, what’s wrong.”
“N-not sure, but we should leave now.” I replied.
“Yeah I think you’re right Charlotte, let’s get out of here. This place creeps me out.” Darla answered.
As we headed for the front door things went from uncomfortable to the bizarre. Darla was standing on the porch waiting, but I was still inside the house.
“Well come on Charlotte let’s go, I want to get out of here before it gets dark.” Darla insisted. I was nearly out the door, when this odd feeling came over me again. Only this time was different.
Something on Darla’s face told me things were bad because she turned and ran from the house so fast- pictures still clutched in hand that she didn’t notice; I wasn’t behind her.
“Whew!” at least we got out of there huh Charlotte?”
No answer. Darla turned to ask why I didn’t say anything. “Why? don’t you say something Char?” “CHARLOTTE!”
Darla turned back toward the house to find out where I was. She got to the front walkway and stopped. The outside of the house had changed. It no longer looked run down and old. In fact it looks Ed lived in.
Darla couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
“That’s impossible, how could this have happened?”
She walked up the steps and then looked inside the front wind.
Her mouth dropped, that’s when she noticed there were people inside.
“They weren’t there a few minutes ago.” She thought to herself.
She also noticed the clothes everyone had been wearing- 1940’s style.
She saw her friend Charlotte inside, but she wasn’t grownup, but a young child. Lost in her thoughts, at first she didn’t notice the little girl pop up in front of her.
“WOAH!” Darla jumped back and nearly fell.
The little girl came running outside. “Are you okay Ma’am?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.” Darla replied.
“I’m awl fully sorry I scared you, my name is Charlotte.”
“What’s yours?” The little girl asked.
“I’m Darla Gates, I was looking for my friend but I must have made a mistake. Came to the wrong address.
“You wanna come in? Mama made some homemade peanut butter cookies and”…
“No thanks, I’d better be going.” Darla answered.
“Well okay Darla.” “Be safe, Happy Halloween.”
“Yeah, you too Charlotte.”
Darla walked away having the strangest feeling, she knew that she had just experienced something out of the ordinary.
She turned to take one last look at the house, but all she saw was a deserted wreck.
The house was abandoned once again. Darla also had still been holding the picture in her hand.
“Huh?” “I didn’t notice that before.” She said to herself. There was some fades words on the picture.
“To my best friend Darla Gates- Thanks for bringing me back to a Place of Remembrance. Your friend Charlotte Baines.
Fantasy
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