There was an old house at the edge of the village that everyone avoided. It wasn’t broken down or haunted-looking, just oddly quiet. The windows were always closed, the lights never on, and yet people said they sometimes heard footsteps from inside late at night.
A family moved in one year. They didn’t believe in any of the old talk. For the first few weeks, everything was normal. Then small things started to happen. The mother would find chairs moved when she woke up. The father swore he heard the front door opening around 3 a.m., but nothing was ever missing. Their daughter, the youngest, said there was someone in her room who kept asking her to “come play downstairs.” They thought she was just imagining things.
One night, the father stayed awake to prove it was all nonsense. Around three, he heard soft humming from the hallway. He thought it was his daughter, so he got up quietly and walked out. The humming stopped. He went to her room and saw her fast asleep. When he turned around, there was a faint reflection in the window, just behind him. A woman, standing completely still, smiling faintly.
He spun around, but there was no one there. The next morning, they packed and left. They didn’t take anything, not even their clothes.
The house is still there. And if you pass by at night, some people say they can still hear humming from inside, soft and steady, like someone waiting for a child to wake up.
Stake-Vantherman