It was a chilly autumn evening when Claire first laid eyes on Cedarwood House. The large, old mansion stood on the edge of the forest, its towering windows and weathered stone walls giving it an eerie but captivating presence. Newly married, Claire and her husband, Tom, had purchased the house as a fixer-upper, hoping to turn it into their dream home.
From the moment they moved in, strange things began to happen.
The first sign came on their second night. Claire awoke to the sound of soft whispers, as if someone was talking right outside their bedroom door. She nudged Tom awake, but he brushed it off as her imagination. Determined to ignore it, Claire drifted back to sleep, though the unsettling feeling never left.
A few days later, while unpacking in the living room, Claire found an old photograph tucked behind a loose brick in the fireplace. It was a faded black-and-white picture of a young woman standing in front of the house.
She looked familiar, but Claire couldn’t quite place her face. There was something unsettling about the woman's eyes—cold, lifeless, and staring directly into the camera.
That night, the whispers returned, louder this time. They echoed through the halls, growing in intensity. Claire sat up in bed, heart pounding, and listened. They weren’t words, exactly—just the sound of someone, or something, breathing and murmuring just out of reach. She crept out of bed, grabbing her phone as a makeshift flashlight, and tiptoed toward the hallway.
As she stepped out of the room, the whispers stopped. The air grew colder, and a sudden chill ran down her spine.
Claire felt a presence behind her, but when she spun around, the hallway was empty. She hurried back to bed, shaken, but still unsure if she was just being paranoid.
The following day, Claire told Tom what she had experienced. He laughed it off, telling her it was probably just the wind or the old pipes in the house.
But Claire couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong—deeply wrong.
That evening, while Tom was working late, Claire heard footsteps on the second floor. At first, she thought Tom had come home early, but when she called out, no one answered. She walked up the stairs cautiously, her heart racing. The footsteps continued, slow and deliberate, as if someone was pacing back and forth in one of the bedrooms.
When she reached the top of the stairs, the sound stopped. Claire stood frozen in the hallway, her breath catching in her throat. That’s when she saw it—a figure standing at the end of the corridor. A woman, dressed in a long, old-fashioned dress, her face obscured by shadows.
Claire blinked, and the figure was gone.
Panicked, she raced down the stairs and called Tom, begging him to come home. When he arrived, Claire was in tears, telling him about the woman she had seen. Tom, trying to calm her down, suggested they spend the night at a hotel, just to get away from the house for a bit.
But the woman didn’t stay behind.
That night, Claire had a vivid dream. She was standing in front of Cedarwood House, just like the woman in the old photograph. The air was thick with the smell of smoke, and the sky was dark with clouds. As she looked up at the house, the front door creaked open, revealing the woman from the hallway, her pale face illuminated by an unnatural glow.
The woman spoke in a cold, hollow voice, "You’re not welcome here. This is my home."
Claire woke up in a cold sweat, her heart racing. She could still hear the woman’s voice echoing in her mind. That morning, she decided to do some research on the house’s history. What she found sent chills down her spine.
Cedarwood House had been owned by a woman named Eliza Granger over a century ago. Eliza had lived there with her husband, but their marriage was far from happy. One night, after a violent argument, Eliza’s husband set the house on fire, trapping her inside. She had died in the flames, and her spirit was said to haunt the house, seeking revenge on anyone who dared to live there.
Claire realized the woman she had seen in the hallway and in her dream was Eliza.
Determined to leave the house for good, Claire and Tom packed their bags that night. But as they were about to leave, the front door slammed shut with a deafening bang. The temperature in the room dropped, and the lights flickered. The whispers returned, louder than ever.
"You can’t leave," the voice hissed. "This is my home."
Terrified, Claire and Tom raced for the door, but no matter how hard they pulled, it wouldn’t budge. The air around them grew colder, and the feeling of being watched intensified. Claire felt a hand brush against her back, cold and weightless. She turned, and there stood Eliza—her eyes filled with rage.
"You don’t belong here," Eliza growled, her voice barely human.
In a final act of desperation, Tom grabbed a fireplace poker and smashed a nearby window. They scrambled through the broken glass and out into the cold night air, leaving Cedarwood House behind.
The couple never returned. Cedarwood House still stands, but it remains abandoned, a dark presence lurking within its walls. Some say, late at night, you can still hear the whispers of Eliza Granger, warning intruders to stay away from her home.