Grenshire was a town time had abandoned.
It sat buried deep in a forgotten corner of the countryside, where roads turned to gravel and streetlights gave way to shadows. The town existed more in rumor than on maps, nestled between pine-choked forests and a river that hadn't flowed right in decades. People who lived nearby avoided it. Not because of what it was.. but because of what it used to be. Once, it had been a bustling mining hub. Now, it was a skeleton of itself. Buildings leaned on each other like drunks at last call. Paint peeled from storefronts in long strips, windows were darkened with dust and spider webs, and the only sounds were wind and whispers, neither of which ever carried good news.
At the very edge of this ghost town stood a house, crouched on a lonely hill like something waiting to pounce. It had no official address. No one sent mail there. No one ever visited. Children used to dare each other to walk past its gate at night. None of them ever got further than the rusted fence before sprinting away.
The house looked like it had been forgotten by the world, and then punished for surviving.
Once a grand Victorian home, it now sagged with rot. Time hadn't been kind. The roof was crooked, missing shingles like a mouth with broken teeth. Vines twisted around its porch columns like strangling hands. The steps groaned under their own weight. One shutter dangled by a nail, tapping morbid lullabies against the siding with every gust of wind.
The paint, once a soft shade of cream, had flaked into a diseased yellow-gray, like old flesh bruising under pressure. The windows were rarely opened, but behind them, faded curtains hung like the last breath of something that didn't want to be there anymore.
Inside, it was worse.
The air was thick, like it had weight. Like you weren't supposed to breathe it. Every surface wore a skin of dust, every floorboard had a voice. The scent that lingered was a cocktail of mildew, iron, and something that had died long ago but never quite finished decomposing. The silence in the house wasn't peaceful, it was predatory. It watched you. It pressed against your back like a cold hand, reminding you that you were never alone, even when no one else was in the room.
And it was in this haunted carcass of a home that Sophia lived.
Sophia was barely five when the screaming started.
She had been born in that house. Raised in it. Watched it fall apart year after year just as steadily as her world did. But she hadn't always known fear. There had been a time, a short and shining time, when laughter echoed through the hallways. When sunlight had poured through the high windows and painted the floors gold. That light belonged to her mother.
Marianne.
She had been warmth in human form. She wore yellow dresses in the summer and smelled like honey and soap. Her laughter made birds fall quiet just to listen. She sang while cooking, sang while cleaning, sang lullabies in the dead of night. Her voice was the only thing that could soothe the crying walls of the house.
Sophia remembered brushing her fingers against the silk of her mother's scarf, watching it ripple in the wind like magic. Marianne told stories about places beyond the town, places where snow didn't rot into mud and the trees didn't twist like corpses. Places full of light and color and safety.
But those stories stopped abruptly.
It happened in winter. A storm was building. Sophia remembered the thunder rumbling in the distance like a warning. Her mother was moving strangely that night; hurried, pale, frightened. She had packed a small bag. Her hands trembled as she zipped it up.
Her voice was barely a whisper when she knelt beside Sophia and said, "We're going away, baby. Just you and me. Far, far away."
She never said from who. Or why.
Sophia just nodded. Trusting. Hopeful.
The house groaned suddenly, like it had just exhaled a secret.
The door burst open downstairs. The cold wind howled inside. Sophia heard footsteps: Heavy! Stomping! Furious! She didn't know whose. She only knew they weren't supposed to be there yet.
Her mother's face drained of color.
She pushed Sophia into the pantry. "Hide, Sweety. Don't make a sound.. okay.. momma will be right back, whatever you do, DON'T COME OUT".
Sophia watched through a crack in the door.
The kitchen filled with noise—shouts, the crash of plates, a scream that sounded like it had claws. And then… the silence. That unnatural, awful silence. The kind that feels like it has teeth.
Sophia peeked.
Her mother was on the floor.
Still.
Very still.
There was blood.. too much of it. Pools of red spreading across the linoleum, soaking into the rug, clinging to the counters. Sophia didn't scream. She didn't move. She just stared, wide-eyed, her little hand pressed to her mouth to keep her sob inside.
The shadow of someone passed across the kitchen, but Sophia never saw the face. Only boots. Mud-caked, heavy boots stepping through her mother's blood.
Then they were gone.
Sophia stayed in that pantry for hours.
The next day, she was told her mother had "gone away." That she had "left them." But no one ever explained the screams. Or the blood. Or why the pantry door had been locked shut when she finally tried to come out.
From that day, something broke in the house.
The silence grew thicker. The walls no longer whispered, they watched. And Sophia… changed.
At just three years old, she had started helping her mother with little chores, sorting socks, picking up broken toys, wiping spills. She used to feel proud when she was praised. But after that night, it was no longer about helping.
It was survival.
She was handed a mop nearly as tall as her. Richard told her to scrub until the floors shone. Told not to ask questions. Told not to cry. Her hands blistered, her knees ached. But she cleaned. She folded. She ironed. She was taught to cook eggs, and when she burned the first batch, she was slapped so hard her ear rang for two days.
She had a doll. Just one. A porcelain thing with glassy eyes and a ribbon around its neck. Her mother had given it to her on her third birthday. After her death, the doll remained her only companion. Over time, a crack formed down its cheek, and one of its eyes stuck open wider than the other—forever startled.
Just like Sophia.
No friends. No birthday parties. No laughter. Only chores. Only rules. Only silence, and the constant, creeping dread that she might be next.
Outside the house, Grenshire continued its slow decay. But inside… Sophia learned to become invisible.
She walked softly. Spoke less. Kept her eyes lowered. She memorized the creaks in the floorboards to avoid them. She could predict moods from the sound of breathing. Her fingers learned to clean blood from tile. Her nose learned to distinguish between old food and something worse.
And the house never let her forget.
It moaned in the cold. It sighed in the heat. Sometimes, in the dead of night, she swore she could hear footsteps above her, despite no one living on the top floor.
Sophia stopped asking questions.
Stopped dreaming.
Stopped hoping.
She was becoming part of the house, another relic, another trapped ghost.
But ghosts don't stay quiet forever.
And neither would Sophia.