The Bewitched House

As the leaves are rustling across a newly barren landscape, the Sanders family is preparing for their evening meal. Seated at the dinner table, six-year-old Chad is imagining how he is going to eat all of the candy that he had collected earlier that evening. The father is seated at the head of the table, reading the

Salem Times, 14 year old Kelly is across from Chad, text messaging her best friends, Sarah and Emily. Kelly's father, finishing the daily news, glances over at Kelly. " Put that thing away," he demanded. "You know I don't like you doing that at the table." For a moment, Kelly acts as if she had not heard her father's demand. "I said put it away" echoed her father. Kelly looks over to him with a look of pure repugnance. "It is bad enough you didn't let me go out with my friends tonight, and now you are telling me that I can't even talk to them?" asked Kelly. "I know it is terrible," said her father. "Now put it away." With a sigh, she said goodbye to her friends and lays the phone on the table next to her empty plate.

Suddenly, her mother burst through the door, a huge plate of pasta in hand. "Here we go" she exclaims. She hands the pasta to Kelly's father and then sits down. He takes some pasta and then passes it on to Kelly. As she finishes with the pasta and passes it to her mother, she once again asks her parents if she can go to her friends Halloween party. She receives the same answer. "No." For the rest of the meal, Kelly just sits there pushing her food from one side of her plate to the other. When dinner is over, she grabs her phone and darts to her room. She then revives her conversation with her friends that she was forced to eat for dinner.

She decides to tell her friends that she would be able to attend the party. Disappointed she says goodbye and turns off the phone. By this time, the rest of the family has gone to bed and are asleep, but Kelly lay awake in her bed thinking of all the fun her friends must be having. Suddenly she hears laughter outside her window.

She rises and glances down into her front yard. What she sees shocks her, her two best friends, Sarah and Emily, are standing there, peering into her window. She quietly opens her window and asks them what they are doing there. They say that they could have any fun without her at the party and that they were there to take her out for some fun. Kelly decides that this would be the perfect thing to get even with her parents. She hurries to her closet and gets dressed.

Kelly tiptoes past her parents' room, down the stairs, and out the front door. Her two friends greet her and they quickly take off down the street. As they are walking, they decide that they are going to their friends Halloween party. They are now half way to their destination. They notice that there is someone coming down the street at a rather rapid pace.

Due to thick fog, the girls could not quite make out who this person was. At first, the girls are frightened. However, when they finally realize just who it is, they all let out a sigh of relief. It is a boy that they go to school with, Mark Samson. Mark has a reputation of being a troublemaker, so the girls have no idea what to expect from him. Mark greets the girls. He tells them that he is on his way to meet a friend and asks if they would like to join him.

The girls think it over and finally agree to go with him and reluctantly follow him down the dimly lit street. They walk foe what seems to be an eternity. When they finally reach their destination, the girls look with a look of pure astonishment on their faces. Before them stands an enormous abandon house. This is not just any old house though. This is one of the most famous haunted houses in all of Salem. This is that Williamson sister's house. The Williamson sisters were some of the first witches put to death in Salem in the 1700's.

The girls are very frightened just by the look of the house. After looking around for a few moments, Mark notice that his friends is not there. He cannot believe that he did not show. He removes a flashlight from his pocket and starts toward the house alone, leaving the girls behind. Kelly yells for him to come back. He turns and faces the girls. "What is the matter," he asked, "Are you afraid to go in?" The girls quickly rely "No."

At this moment, not thinking that he actually would, the girls dare him to go into the house. To their surprise, he agrees. Trying to get him to change his mind, the girls tell him that he would have to stay inside for one full hour. Again, he agrees. Mark pulls his flashlight back out and heads for the house.

When he reaches the front of the house, he notices that the front door had fallen into the interior of the house. He slowly makes her way over the rotting wooden floorboards. Once inside, there was nothing around him but darkness. He quickly switches on the flashlight. Curious, Mark begins to make his way deeper into the house.

Astonished that he actually went in, the girls start to wonder where is going. They also begin to second-guess the dare they had issued minutes before. They decide that they would see if he could make the full hour.

When the hour was up, the girls all approached the house, flashlight in hand; they make their way to the front door. There is no sign of Marl anywhere. In unison, they call out Mark's name. No answer. They repeat this process several more times. Still no answer. At this point, the girls all begin to get very nervous.

After a few minutes, the girls decide that they are going to get help. Thinking that Mark had just gotten lost in the house, they tell their parents that they could not find their friends. Angry that their children had gone out of the house, they decide no to report anything until morning.

When they finally do file a report about the disappearance, it too late. The police find Mark's mangled body in a bedroom on the third floor in the house. Kelly, Sarah, and Emily each tell the police what happened the night before. Not having any evidence, the police close the case. The girls cannot believe that they let him go into the house. They decide that they are going to go to the house and try to find some answers. They meet at the house at noon three days after Mark's death.

They all make their way to the room where Mark had been found. To there horror, There stood Mark. They could see right through him. He begins to laugh devilishly and began to run toward them. Just then, Kelly rose from her bed, screaming. She realized that it had all been a dream. Then, she heard laughing outside her window.