Steve entered the house, fumbled around in the darkness for a moment, and somehow found a functioning light switch that suddenly flooded the old Victorian home with a garish, bright white light that seemed intrusive and oddly out of place.
The house, now illuminated, was a beautiful work of art... many years past its prime and showing the signs of decades of neglect.
The family all gasped wordlessly as they looked around the huge, once ornate and decadently plush entry hall to the mansion.
Cobwebs and dust were everywhere. Paint and wallpaper were cracked, chipped, fading, and peeling. Exposed wood on the floors and furniture looked badly aged and brittle. But the furnishings themselves all looked to have been luxuriously expensive. Antique chairs and sofas dotted the enormous room. Gilt framed oil paintings of somber, old fashioned looking strangers lined the walls. A large, badly frayed oriental rug lay draped across the center of the hardwood floor. Shelves of dusty, moldy-smelling leather bound books stood along one wall of the room. A distant corner housed a dilapidated, upright piano, badly in need of repair.
“What a dump,” muttered Alan.
“Watch your mouth,” whispered Janet in a hushed voice. “This was somebody's home. And it's still full of beautiful antiques.”
“Yeah, but it's all just junk now,” mumbled Megan. “And it's giving me the creeps.”
The entire family had felt an ominous shiver of fear pass through them as they entered the home. Megan was just the first to vocalize the nervous, disconcerted feeling.
“At least we have someplace to spend the night,” said Steve in a loud voice. He seemed determined not to be awed or intimidated by this strange place. “Now be respectful of course. Don't deliberately break anything or vandalize this stuff. But there's nothing... erm... there's nothing to... uh... to be afraid of.”
As if challenged by Steve's loud voice and fearless facade, an eerie spectral presence in the house suddenly made itself known – a heavy, framed wall mirror detached itself from the house, slowly hovered over near the family, and without warning crashed to floor leaving an array of shattered glass fragments at their feet.
“What the hell just happened?” asked Steve in a nervous, unsteady voice.
“I don't think we're alone here,” whispered Janet.
“Let's get out of here!” hissed Alan urgently.
But before anyone in the family could move, something happened...