Why do the families in houses 3, 7, and 11 never interact with their neighbors, and what's behind those identical basement renovations that all happened the same week? Which units have been 'under repair' for months with no visible workers, and why do residents move out in the middle of the night without forwarding addresses? What connects these houses through tunnels that don't appear on city utility maps?
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Houses are like people - some you like and some you don’t like - and once in a while there is one you love.
― L.M. Montgomery, Emily Climbs
The row houses loomed tall and foreboding, their red brick facades blending into the foggy night. As I walked down the cracked sidewalk of Row 21, an otherworldly silence hung in the air. No light or sound came from the tightly-packed homes that crowded both sides of the narrow street.
Peering through grimy windows revealed darkened interiors shrouded in shadows. Everything was covered in a fine layer of dust as if abandoned long ago. Yet the front doors were whole, untouched by weathering or vandalism. It was as if the residents had vanished in an instant, leaving behind only specters of their former lives.
I approached the stoop of Number 13 cautiously. The stairs groaned under my weight like a pained wail. Turning the knob released a gust of stagnant air from within, smelling of dust and something faintly chemical. Flicking the switch did nothing - the power lines had long been cut. I drew out my phone and tapped the flashlight, its feeble glow doing little to ease the encompassing gloom.
Inside, remnants of ordinary lives lingered - furniture outlines in dust, yellowed newspaper clippings on the walls. Yet an air of wrongness pervaded it all. A dark stain was splattered on the entryway floor, its edges indistinct as if part of some hasty exodus. Worst were the scrapes and gouges scored into the wooden banister, climbing the staircase to some unknown threat above.
A creak sounded behind me and my light fell upon a small handprint on the wall, far too small to be human. As twin pairs of phantom eyes regard me from the darkness at the top of the stairs, I fled that place of echoes and vanishing souls, unsure of what lurked still within the brick shadows of Row 21.
