Her Picture

It was August 3, 1999 and my family had just moved into this colonial house originally built in 1853. It was one of the first subdivision-esque communities in northern New Hampshire at the time and my dad, being the history aficionado he is, fell in love as soon as he saw the memorial emblem on the side of the house. We didn't know what made the house so special aside from its considerable age, but the house itself was quite magnificent so my parents eagerly accepted the rather cheap $550,000 price and we quickly moved in.
I was always a shy kid and, especially with my weight problem during this time, never really socialized or got to know my community. This was the fourth time I had moved since I started school, so I never really understood the point of socializing if I had to say goodbye to those people anyway.
All things considered, my first few weeks there were surprisingly enjoyable. I loved walking around the neighborhood and investigating my new surroundings, playing with the neighborhood pets as they were let out by their owners, and just being "the good kid" in the community. I wasn't used to so much attention, and actually feeling loved was quite exciting.
After a few weeks, I grew familiar with the area and decided to do some exploring of the house. I was checking every nook and cranny, looking for old books, spiders, whatever weird stuff I could find. I found a couple old coins, some dusty abandoned corners that no one else noticed, and other such trivial discoveries; none of which I payed any attention to. The only thing that really caught my eye was a hidden door I had found in the kitchen.
I viewed this as my discovery, so I always kept it to myself. It was hidden behind the fridge and no one really noticed it. I was able to move the fridge away from the door. I only did so when I knew I would be home alone, as to not be discovered. The door was locked so I couldn't get past it, but just investigating it was exciting. It was very dated compared to the rest of the house; a knocker as a doorknob, aged, and extremely dense wood. The whole nine yards.
My parents told me that they were going out on a dinner date, and that they would trust me for the night. I decided that, this night, I would finally crack the code of the mysterious door and see what lies past the horizon. As soon as they left, I set to work.
My parents loved watching TV shows and movies about crime; therefore, there were a lot of scenes explaining how to pick locks. I tried swiping the lock with an old BlockBuster card my mom had, to no avail. Grunting about the hard work ahead of me, I straightened a paper clip and began plucking at the lock. After ten minutes, I grew frustrated at my failure and slammed the paper clip into the lock as hard as I could. For some reason, that alone cracked the lock and opened the door.
The door creaked loudly as I slowly pushed it open. An odor filled the kitchen area as more and more of the hidden room became exposed. I still can't exactly put my finger on what it was; it seemed to just reek of age. Even though the kitchen was brightly lit, the area behind the door was purely black; almost as if the basement was sucking up the light and destroying it as the waves came into contact with the secret room. I grabbed a flashlight and shone it into the abyss to find a decayed flight of stairs with a broken rail. In the very distance, I could barely make out a decrepit floor that seemed stained by something, but I wasn't sure.
I felt a captivating feeling of discomfort and anguish as the aura of the room flooded me. Something told me to turn around and run, but I had already come too far. Terrified and apprehensive, I took my first step into the abyss that would soon become my new home.
The stairs bellowed below me with every step I took. I became wary of the possible reality that the staircase wasn't sturdy and eaten away by termites and that I would go plunging through the wood at any moment to my injury or death. Determined to push on, I rushed to the bottom of the stairs and slammed my feet against the cold ground.
I shone my flashlight around me to reveal the details of this secret room and, to my astonishment, the room was extremely fancy. The floor was made entirely of marble, the walls had fine art on them, veils were hung from the ceiling as decoration, and the room was lined with gold. There was nothing in the high class room aside from the paintings. For some reason, the room reminded me of an old time barbershop or something. It seemed too nice.
Noticing that there was a hallway in the corner of the room, I walked over to it. As soon as I arrived at the passageway, I noticed a distinct change in the quality of the decorations. The hallway was just a dull grey all around, made with cheap rock, and no decorations whatsoever. Getting to this hallway made my knees shake... I really wanted to turn back then. But I couldn't. I knew what I had to do.
I began stepping down the hallway. The hallway wasn't very big to begin with. Despite this, it continued to grow smaller and tighter as I walked more, seeming almost to be slowly collapsing into itself. I thought I had found the mother lode; this was a secret passage that obviously extended past the house. There had to be something really good at the end of this tunnel. Maybe treasure, ancient remains, maybe even Heaven. I had to find out.
Just when the tunnel almost became impassable due to how insanely tiny it was, it quickly opened up into a room about seven feet wide by forty feet long. The room was creepy to say the least; spider webs with egg sacs littered the room, cockroaches seemed to have found a new world order here, and the walls themselves were stained and cracked. Three particular cracks lay side by side on a side wall, almost looking like claw marks. At the very end of the room, in the center of the back wall, was a picture frame.
Advancing to the picture, I grew more and more terrified. I finally mustered up the courage to lift my flashlight and gaze at the picture that stood before me. I raised my flashlight and literally felt the life flush out of me as my eyes met the picture.
The picture seemed to be of a woman. She had been brutally tortured and beaten. She bore a chelsea grin extending all the way to her ears. Her left eye was missing, her hair had been burned off, her upper lip had been cut off and removed revealing her entire gum line (which was also clearly plagued with extremely severe gingivitis), and the rest of her entire face was covered in blood, cuts, and bruises as well. What was most disturbing, however, was her skin. It varied in hue; sometimes a human peach, sometimes a moldy green.
It seemed as if her skin began to grow a fungus and that said fungus was causing her skin to rupture. Numerous boils plagued her complexion and it almost seemed like her skin was peeling or melting off. Someone had carved a haunting smile into the side of her neck, eerily similar to her Glasgow smile. On the other side of her neck, coming down to the top of her torso, were carved the words "I AM A FUCKING WHORE".
No matter which way I moved, the picture seemed to follow my every move. Horrified and freaked out, I dashed out of the room and tore down the hallway at full speed. I ran into the fancy room and darted up the stairs, slamming the door behind me and quickly pulling the refrigerator over it. I felt like I was being stalked. I soon realized that, in a way, I was; one of the spider webs had caught into my hair and a family of 100 freshly hatched baby spiders and their mother were making a new home in my locks. I grabbed a can of raid and brought that family to their end quickly.
It was night by then and my parents had just gotten home. I quickly washed my hair and said hello. They asked me what I did and I told them that I just read a few books, took a walk, played with a few of the neighborhood kids, and just relaxed. I went to bed shortly after that, tossing and turning throughout the night. After what seemed like hours, I finally dozed off.
The next few days were fine, the horror of that night seeming to fade away. I went back to playing with the neighborhood kids a lot, just walking around, being myself. I completely forgot what the girl looked like, almost as if it never even happened.
One day, I was showing a new friend of mine around my house. He thought the house was awesome, looking at every little thing like it was magical. He made a mess in my room, of course, but he's a bit of a spaz so I expected it. Once I finished showing him the upstairs rooms, the living room, and the dining room, he darted into the kitchen to grab something to drink. Too tired to follow him, I just gazed out of the window. Suddenly, I heard him exclaim that he had found a door and as soon as that rang out, I heard the scrape of a refrigerator against tile. I screamed at him to stop, but he was too fast and he ran down.
I followed him, and he was astonished by the beauty of the fancy room. He looked at all the beautiful paintings, danced around the room, and acted as if he was in an old time movie. I could feel that anxiety again. I didn't like being down here. I told him to come upstairs, and he obliged.
When we got upstairs, I noticed that he had a piece of paper in his hand. He must have grabbed it while dancing around. I asked him for it. I opened it up and saw that it was a hand written receipt for a super durable window, one that could not be broken, along with concrete blocks, drywall, cement...
And then I noticed the extra note on the bottom of the receipt.
"The bitch can look at whoever she wants to. I don't care how cute she is. She will never get out."
I told my parents and they called the police. The police came and they busted the wall down, only to find a dead girl, beaten, tortured, and brutalized, hanging from a noose, facing an unbreakable window, with a Glasgow smile on her face.
The original owner of the house was captured and charged with murder.
Category:Mental Illness
Category:Photography