Curse Of Crossing Chapter 4

Curse of Crossing

Chapter 4

Elizabeth

I cannot believe what I’m seeing! I hold on to Ben’s hand and his arm as tight as I can. I do not know what he is seeing, but I am seeing almost a mirror image of myself. Only she is wearing a long, straight, grey, wool-looking skirt with a white, long sleeved blouse with a tall collar and a bow in front. She has on black stockings and boot like shoes. Her dark hair is pinned up in an intricate chignon at the base of her head. Her whole appearance reminds me of pictures I have seen of people from around the late 1800’s to early 1900’s. She looks very regal and she is looking right at me like she knows me. The biggest problem that I have right now, I can see through her! She is not actually walking on the ground. It looks as if she is floating above it.

By the way Ben is acting; he is seeing something very similar. We are both staring at the wall with the shelves. My see through twin walks over toward the wall. She stands there for a moment, still looking at me, as something clicks behind the shelves. The shelves start to swing out slightly revealing a hidden room in the cellar. Then the lady smiles, holds up her hand in a small wave, turns and walks into the hidden room. The shelf wall, door, or whatever it is closes behind her.

I stand there for a moment totally dumbfounded. I don’t know what to say or how to react. Ben must be feeling the same thing because when I look at him, he is staring blankly at the shelf wall with his mouth slightly open.

“Did you just see what I saw?” I finally croak out as I’m tapping Ben on the arm over and over.

“Depends on what you saw.” He finally blinks and looks down at me.

“I saw a woman that looked exactly like me, but she was wearing clothes from the early 1900’s. I could see through her, she floated as she moved, then there was a clicking sound, the wall swung out, and she just disappeared into a room behind that shelf.” I point a very shaky hand toward the shelf wall.

“Okay, not exactly what I saw, but close. I saw a man that I could see through too. He was wearing a three-piece wool suit, with a black tie. He looked just like me except for the clothes. He walked over to the shelf, took that little broom off of the shelf, dusted one of the squares on the floor, just in front of the shelf, pull up the panel, pull something inside of it, then the click, and he walked through the opening after the shelf wall swung out.”

We both stand there and stare at each other with very wide eyes and complete ‘holy crap’ looks on our faces.

“Should we follow them?” Oh how I hope and pray he says no.

“I will do anything to find my parents. I’m still not sure what I really saw.” He doesn’t sound very convinced though. “I’m up for it you are.”

“Yeah, sure.” I wonder if my voice sounded as shaky to him as it did to me just now.

“Okay, we’ll flip the latch to open the wall, but we’ll pull something into the opening to keep it from closing. If anything feels the least little bit weird, we’ll get out of there immediately.”

“Deal.” I hold on to his hand a little bit tighter. Now I’ve got a white knuckle grip on him.

Together we walk toward the shelf. Ben stoops down in front of it and I stoop down with him.

“Wait, are you sure about this?”

“It’s the only lead we have right now. Maybe we both saw what we did for a reason.”

“Okay, go ahead.” I push the button on the small LED light on my key chain and shine it over toward the shelf. Ben just looks at me and smiles.

I watch as Ben reaches down to a pull up the panel in the floor. He looks down into the panel, reaches in and feels around for a moment, then pulls on something. I hear that same click as before, and the wall swings out wide.

Ben stands up and looks down at me. He tries to smile a reassuring smile but even as cute as he is, the reassurance stuff is not working. He lets go of my hand and pulls a heavy crate over to the opening so we can hold the door open.

“Okay, let’s do this.” He says as he motions for me to step into the room.

“Yeah, let’s do this.” I grab hold of his hand again and step into the room. Ben pulls the crate with us until it sets firmly in the opening. I shine my little light around.

The room is about the same size as the other part of the cellar that we just came from. There is a huge, old, cherry dining table in there. It takes up almost the entire length of the room. There are lots of papers piled upon it and a large, silver candelabrum with three white candles sitting right in the middle of it.

Ben lets go of my hand as he walks further into the room and around the table.

“Sweet!” He shouts from across the room.

“What’s sweet?”

“I found a box of matches. Hang on.” I hear him strike a match and see a little flame jump to life in his hands. He holds the match over to the candles and lights each one of them. “Now, that’s a little better.”

The room glows a brilliant yellow from the flickering candles, but we can see a little better now. I shove my keys into my pocket. Can’t lose those. Ben and I start to rummage around through the papers on the table.

“Wright family tree?” Ben says as he holds up a large piece of paper that looks to me like an old brown paper bag.

“Wright family? Could that be my Wright family?” I move around to stand beside of Ben and look at the paper he’s holding. Some of the names look familiar to me, then I spot my grandmother’s name. “That’s my dad’s mom, Evangeline.” I tell him pointing at her name.

“Why would your family’s family tree be in a hidden room of the cellar of a house that is supposed to be owned by my family?”

“I have no idea.” I tell him as I continue to look around at some of the other papers on the table. “Look there’s more. Looks like letters addressed to a Miss Josephine Wright. I can’t tell who they’re from though.” Ben moves around to look over my shoulder.

As we are standing there looking through the papers I find more letters to Josephine. There is also a leather bound book that looks to be a journal that was Josephine’s as well. The longer I stay here and look at all of these things though, the more I feel a deep, deep sense of dread come upon me.

“Um, Ben, I’ve got a bad feeling about staying here any longer. Can we just take all of these papers back up stairs and get out of this creepiness?”

“I was just thinking the exact same thing.” Ben grins slightly as he starts gathering up some of the papers.

I work quickly and grab as much as I can. We walk back out of the hidden room, pull the crate out of the way, and watch as the wall slides shut again. We walk up the stairs into the hallway and then out into the sitting room we came through first. I lay all the papers I am carrying down on the sofa, and even though I am wearing a sweater, I cross my arms over and start rubbing my upper arms with my hands.

Ben lays his arm load of papers down on the sofa beside mine. He comes around in front of me and places his hands on my arms and starts rubbing them too. “Look, I want to stay here and look around longer. I know this place is freaking you out a little bit, so why don’t you take me back to my car. I’ll come back here and do some more digging around. And you can take all of those papers we found back to your mom’s office. That way you can dig through them where it’s not so weird.”

“Ben I don’t like the thoughts of you being here alone. We already know the place is haunted. We are both getting weird vibes from just being here. What if something happens while you’re here alone?”

He pulls his cell phone out of his back pocket, waves it in front of me, and smiles. “I have this. I’ll be ok. Come on, let’s get you out of here.”

I wish I could be as optimistic as he seems to be, but I have a funny feeling about letting him come back here alone. Of course, I have an even funnier feeling about staying here any longer myself. And the funny is not the funny ha-ha kind either. Reluctantly I nod my head at him. We gather up all of the papers that we found in the cellar, put them in the trunk of my car, and head back into town. I pull up in front of my mom’s office, right behind Ben’s car.

“Be careful, ok?” I plead with him. “If you need anything, call me. I will either be here or at my dad’s. Since most of the paperwork is from his family, I may take it to him to see if he can make any sense of it. Either way, I’ll have my cell with me and can be to you in just a couple of minutes.”

“I’ll be fine. You’ll see.” Ben smiles as he gets out of my car. He turns around just before he closes the door. “I’ll call if I find anything.” I smile back at him as he closes the door and walks to his car.

He gets in, makes a U-turn and drives back in the direction that we just came from. As he passes me he waves. I wave back and try to muster a little grin. As I watch his car go out of sight, I can’t help but wonder why I have this sinking feeling like I’m never going to see him again.