The hinges creaked as I slowly opened the door and peaked into the darkness. Though the room was closed off, a small breeze blew across my face. The first thing I noticed was the smell. I suppress my gag reflex and shine the flashlight into the room. It's completely empty. I keep calling it a room, but in reality, it's a small walk in closet. I've lived here for a couple months and have yet to move anything into this small area. It's the stain and the scratches that hold me back. And the smell. On the floor at the foot of the door, there is a dark brown stain. I've tried to clean it up...I've even painted over it. Twice. Yet it keeps coming back. And the scratches. The back side of the door looks like an animal has attacked it. Long scratch marks all up and down the wood. Every time I open this door, small pieces of door lay on the floor. Fresh wood. I was only in the house for a week before I heard the scratching for the first time. Midnight. I awake and I notice the air is cool. Considering it's mid July and the highs have been breaking 97 degrees, I find this to be an unsettling feeling. I walk across the hallway and enter the spare room...and I can hear the scratching. It take me only a second to realize it's coming from the closet. I turn on the overhead light and walk towards the door. I consider myself a level headed individual not easily spooked by the things that go bump in the night, but the hairs on my arms and neck were standing on end. I reach for the door knob and silence. The door won't open. Something on the other side is holding it closed. Having yet to open this door, I wasn't aware of the secrets that it held. It wasn't until the next morning that I was able to get the door open and saw the stain and wood chips and smelled the smell. It didn't take me very long after that to install a deadbolt on the outside of the door which I've locked every night since.

What does one do when confronted with a situation like this? I went to the local library and did some research to see if the house had been involved in anything weird in it's history. You watch enough horror movies and your mind wanders to all the possibilities. Maybe someone was killed in the closet, maybe it's buried on sacred Indian land, or maybe the developers built the house on a cemetery and didn't move the bodies. My mind's been racing trying to find the answer. The other possibility is that I've snapped and am now creating a reality that adds significance to my rather mundane life. It's this reason that I have yet to invite anyone else into this mystery. I continue to go to work and hang out with my friends, but come night time, I engage multiple deadbolts throughout my house effectively cutting off that one room. I've got a box full of garlic, one full of silver (even though I don't have any idea on how to melt it into bullets), I've got crosses and holy water and anything else that I've ever seen about evil spirits. I even went as far as sprinkling salt around my bed...but after a couple days that was a bit messy so I swept it up.