The Haunted Traveler December 2017 Edition

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acting differently, aware that Samantha was the only person in the house tonight. Sheba
had had no interaction with anybody all day, as Samantha had been in college.
The temperature in the house had dropped. She threw on her silk dressing gown with
an embroided S in white Ribbon. She felt guilt about not studying, but she had done
seven hours today and her mind would be more alert first thing in the morning.
So for tonight, a Hitchcock film, some popcorn and a carton of black cherry ice
cream. She headed into the kitchen and had to hit the light on, funny she normally
always left lights ON in the house. The kitchen window was wide open, no wonder it
was so cold. Sheba circled the garden smelling the ground, totally absorbed.
The urban fox, she thought. Sheba spent her days in a consistent tango ballad with
different creatures. Of a night the fox played around the garden and of a day, one lone
Magpie seemed to taunt the dog by tottering on the ground, only to suddenly fly off,
just as Sheba drew near, poised to pounce. The dog, seemingly sluggish, although her
tail wagged with vigour, trotted into the kitchen and straight into her basket.
Samantha closed the window, locked the back door, throwing the keys on the side. She
sprinted up the stairs, to generate some warmth. The thermostat was switched on to
heat up the house for the night. Samantha never normally felt the cold at all. The house
was a little like Times Square, always electric, always busy.
In her room she started to dry her body, putting her hair up in a towel. She felt
suddenly as if someone was looking at her. A penetrating gaze making all the hairs
on the back of her neck stand up. Instinctively, she looked to the window, but as she
thought, the wooden blinds were closed. She would close the blinds without thinking
as soon as she arrived home and was going to get changed. The woman opposite next
door but one was infamous in the street gossip, for flaunting her naked ample torso in
front of the window day and night, for all to see. Some said the only thing missing from
her room was a red light.
She opened the blinds and looked into the front garden. The pink red sky brow drew
a line across the clouds emphasising the storm filled heaven. A rain was going to fall this
evening. Samantha hoped so; there was nothing better than being in bed and listening
to wet bullets bounce off the window panes.
Samantha walked into each of the two other bedrooms, flicking the light on and
looking around, opening wardrobes and cupboard doors. She stood at the top of the
stairs, whistled and called out, “Sheba.” The Alsatian came straight away stopping at
the foot of the stairs, looking up. She smiled, “good girl”, the dog lay at the foot of
the staircase, awaiting further commands. Yet, still the feeling of someone else being
present in the room would not leave her. She dismissed it, as being her imagination
working overtime. The revision this week had been on the poetry of Edgar Allen Poe,
perhaps assisting her paranoia. That bloody raven again, bloody Evermore.
Samantha had never felt a presence in this house, not like in her Aunties in Aigburth.