Welcome Home

The house needed fixing up, not to mention there was a faint but foul smell that hung in the air. The stains on the old beaten up walls that were torn with flowered wallpaper didn’t really help the situation become any less eerie. The stairs creaked slowly on each step, not to mention 1 step was missing about half way up, the railing was not sanded at all, the wood protruding in every imaginable direction, eagerly waiting to bury into an unsuspecting hand. Why did these two want to buy this disaster of an estate?
As the couple traveled up the 23 staired staircase, they viewed the second story and its many rooms that each had a dusty lit doorway, signifying that all the doors were ajar, all the rooms desperately hoping to lure the couple in side them through the dusty entry. After examining each torn apart and destroyed room, they finally came to an entry way that had French doors with polished gold handles. The doors were wide open, and a king sized bed was seen to the direct left of the entry way, up against a tattered wallpaper covered wall. The wallpaper was torn and shredded, but the bed was in perfect condition. A four posted bed with a red drape covered a neatly made dark red comforter with a white sheet seen underneath. The pillow cases were a bright red satin material, glimmering in the light coming from the 6 paneled window about 3 quarters down the right side wall next to the bed.
They noted the bed and both silently wondered why it was so beautifully made, then cautiously moved into the nearby master bathroom, which, as they were not expecting, was just as grungy as the rest of the mansion. On the right side of the bathroom, the shower was a wreck, the curtain hanging limply by merely 2 rings. The curtain, which they imagined was once white, was now a musty brown color, and smelled horrid. They then simultaneously turned around to notice a large polished bathtub which was filled a quarter high with a light brown fluid. They were rather intrigued by the mysterious liquid when they both saw a solid red drop fall directly into the slightly filled tub. They remained still, their petrified eyes glued to the bathtub in awestricken wonder, when another red drop fell into the light brown liquid, permeating its color and ripples throughout. They slowly lifted their now heavy heads and stiff necks to look at the ceiling which was quite low above them, only to find a red bead forming in the exact location above which the previous two hand landed. It was getting fuller and fuller until gravity pulled it down, and it seemed to the couple the longest amount of time a drop of any substance could take to fall.
After it had fallen into the tub that was filled with the mystery liquid, they both hustled frantically out of the master bedroom and to the remaining flight of stairs. After 13 excruciating steps that were filled with fear and anxiousness, they reached a small landing that led to one single black door with an old rusted gold key lock doorknob. Slowly the doorknob was tried, but it unfortunately was locked. 3 fierce kicks later, the black door had been kicked in, it now relying on 2 hinges to keep it upright. The room was humongous, and filled with massive black shelves that were filled with bags among bags that were filled with similarly shaped figures, however they were hard to make out, for the only light was coming from a small window, 3 feet in diameter, at the very back of the room. The smell that lingered in the air was unbearable, and they realized it was the smell they had encountered throughout the house, this time to a more intoxicating degree. Harmoniously in step, they moved farther into the dimly lit room, holding their noses tightly so they did not suffer from the lingering unnatural smell.
Then the door was spontaneously slammed shut, the window was covered by a dark blind removing all light from the foul smelling room. After a few unsure and scared seconds of darkness, 3 florescent lights turned on above them, but they were so far into the middle of the enormous room, the door was no where in their immediate sight. They followed a long dusted passage way between the shelves when they noticed a bare emaciated foot sticking out from underneath a stained ant tattered canvas. They nervously turned a corner when the sound of sloshing was heard underneath their trembling feet. They slowly looked down, seeing the dark crimson of blood flowing from underneath them. Mesmerized by the flowing of the blood they continued to look down rather than ahead when they ran into something blocking their path. Looking up, they saw a cadaver hanging from the ceiling with a sign that was written sloppily in dark red. The last thing the couple saw was a sign that merely said “WELCOME HOME”.