Lock

"As you can see, the skirting boards are all as they were when the house was originally built in the 20's, a beautiful shade if I might add. Although, if you have a problem with the decor, I'm sure anything can be replaced relatively easily. I know a fantastic carpenter that would be-"

"It's fine," Val cut the realtor off, "I don't really care. Can I see the master bedroom?"

The realtor forced a smile and made her way to the staircase. Val noticed that she walked with confidence, slowly ascending the spiraling steps up to the top floor. Her skirt was slightly too short, showcasing goosepimpled thigh to Val and making her extremely uncomfortable. She followed slowly, unable to stop watching the realtors swaying hips. Chill Val.

"It's a complete steal," the realtor continued talking, unaware that Val had been ignoring her in favour of awkwardly staring at the lining of her underwear through her skirt, "the family that had it before you moved for job prospects, so were eager to sell as quickly as possible. I mean, with a house like this..."

The realtor trailed off as they reached the top landing. Choosing instead to walk quickly along the long hallway and to the final door, which she swung open with more speed than she had anything else in the entire tour. She beckoned for Val to enter the room, but stayed at the door herself.

"Here we are, the master bedroom," the realtor said, her smile tight and tense. It was a beautiful room, if not made slightly cramped by the sloping ceiling. Val wandered over to the windows and trailed her finger through the dust settling on the window sill. The realtor clearly noticed Val's dissapointment, since she rushed over and wiped the rest of the dust off with her hand.

"I'm sorry," she said, "no one's been in here since the previous tenants moved out. Their cleaner was slightly superstitious, I suppose, so it rarely was cleaned by anyone but the tenants themselves."

"Superstitious?" Val smirked, "isn't that a little cliche? What're you gonna tell me, there's ghosts?"

The realtor forced a laugh, "obviously not!"

"What's in the other rooms on this floor?" Val asked.

"I'll show you!"

And so the tour continued, concluding when Val saw the lavish study room on the second floor and decided instantly that she'd take the house. The realtor sighed a sigh of relief and got in her car, leaving with a check and a genuine smile.

---

Val moved in three days before christmas, bringing her meager supply of furniture and posessions from the flat she had rented previously. She spent a few days rearranging furniture, trying to figure out a way to make the space look like her own but ultimately coming up short. She found herself staring at her bookcase, a deep sadness pressing on her chest when she imagined Michael's substancial book collection alongside hers. But that was the past, not the present or the future, and ultimately she ended up binge watching romcoms and eating a 14" pizza to herself. She tried to forget the past had ever existed in the first place.

When she unpacked she was amazed to find a large walk in cupboard in the master bedroom that was quickly filled with a litany of useless junk that she'd gotten out of her parent's attic - christmas decorations and the like. No other cupboard in the house had as much space, and she was pleased to feel like she was being productive by filling it, despite the fact that she'd taken nothing out of the boxes they'd come in.

She passed out on her sofa that night, and when she woke up she found that she'd apparently knocked over her bottle of wine while sleeping. A dark red bleed on her white carpet that wouldn't come out no matter what she tried would haunt her for the rest of her life, and she ended up smashing the wine bottle against the counter in pure frustration. Most of the day was spent unecessarily angry over her own stupid mistakes and inability to function as a regular human being, apparently. It ended with her eventually locking herself in the cupboard in her bedroom, greatful of the complete darkness and slight draft.

For Val, the dark was almost endlessly comforting. It was a way of avoiding existance. When she was in the dark, she could pretend nothing else existed besides the sound of her own breathing and the aches in her bones if she sat still for too long. She'd always begin to panic and then turn all the lights off, letting perfect dark envelop her like a cool blanket. However, in that moment in that cupboard on that day, she felt her anger be displaced by a strange fear. She stood there for a few minutes longer, trying to quell it, before she eventually turned the light on in the cupboard.

There was a lock on the inside of the door, one she hadn't noticed when she was bringing boxes in. A lock on the inside of the door? she thought, her hand brushing over it. It was remarkably creepy.

A quick google suggested that perhaps it used to be a bathroom and had been converted into a cupboard, hense the lock on the door, but she wasn't so sure. The lock had been at the top, not near the handles. Unable to figure it out, she settled on the bathroom thesis and tried to put it to the back of her mind. She fell asleep in her own bed for the first time since she moved in, long after she'd gone to bed. Her mind was racing, trapped thinking about that lock.

When she awoke, her clock read 4.00am on the dot, and there was someone walking up the stairs.

At first she thought it was nothing, but as the slow methodic thumping of the echoing footsteps drew closer she began to panic. She knew there was no way she could get out without going down the staircase or killing herself without jumping out the window, but after a moment of raw fear she remembered the cupboard and quickly grabbed her phone and locked herself in. The lock slid smoothly into place just as the door to her bedroom opened.

She stood frozen, the darkness enveloping her like a blanket leaving only the sounds of her own breathing and slow, deliberate footsteps around the room. Her bones began to ache, the footsteps stopped right outside the cupboard door.

She checked her phone, too terrified to call anyone in case she was heard but unable to regardless. No signal. How typical. After what felt like hours, Val heard birdsong, and the footsteps retreated back downstairs. Her signal returned, and she immediately called the police.

When they arrived they found no evidence of breaking or entering but encouraged her to call again if she had any issues.

And she did, every night for three months. Because every night, she heard that climbing, and every night she had no signal, and every night she hid in that cupboard.

She eventually concluded that she was crazy and went to a therapist, who suggested she felt somehow guilty for Michael. They also suggested she move out of the house, as did the law enforcement and her mother. But she had no money, and the realtor wasn't picking up the phone, and Val didn't know the first thing about property law. So she got used to locking herself in the cupboard, she even started writing in there in her spare time.

Eventually she got cocky, and when she heard the footsteps stop outside the door she'd try and talk to the owner of them only to get no reply. It became a chore, really, just something she did every night at 4am. The only real downside was that she was falling asleep at 8pm every night because of all the early mornings.

The footsteps never came when she slept downstairs, or when she had friends over, but she lived in a sort of constant worry that one night the footsteps would come and she wouldn't be able to lock herself in in time. Weirdly, the downstairs cupboards were lockless, but every room on every other floor had at least one lockable compartment, which led Val to believe that the people that lived here before her had a similar problem. Google provided no answers, and the locals were distant whenever she mentioned where she lived. She found herself feeling like she was living in a budget horror movie, and one night she wasn't going to wake up.

Val lived this way for a year and a half, before one night she climbed into the cupboard as usual to find a glaring issue.

The door wouldn't lock.

---

"As you can see, the skirting boards are all as they were when the house was originally build in the 20's, a beautiful shade if I might add. Although, if you have a problem with the decor, I'm sure anything can be replaced relatively easily. I know a fantastic carpenter that would be-"

"Oh don't worry about it!" James said, "can I see the master bedroom?"