Start of a Story

It was a cold and stormy Halloween night, the rain was beating down heavily in large waves of droplets and the thunder crashing loudly echoing around the thick dark forest making the sound all the more louder. Far in the distance you could hear the howling of wolves, a mournful sound, crying to the moon and the hoot of an owl hidden in a nearby tree only adding all the more to the already terrifying sounds of the storm. The occasional sparks on lightning illuminated the forest lighting up the twisted and gnarly faces of the old trees giving the impression of people looking out of them directly at you. From here I could see it all, stood at the old cracked and dusty window, I could observe the whole thing protected from the raging storm outside. Protected but not yet safe. Stood here in the dilapidated old house that stood alone surrounded on both sides by trees isolated from the rest of society. A house that I managed to find and take shelter in when this storm first began. Bare and barren the house stood damaged and worn, crumbling with broken windows and a roof which had several slates missing from it. A rough wooden door with its black paint all chipped and faded, which jammed as you tried to open it, and an old and rusty bronze door handle that was stiff with age. The inside was no better than the outside with bare wooden floors where the floorboards creak with every step you took and the furniture was all moth eaten and torn. The lights here didn’t work so I managed to make do by finding some old candles in one of the kitchen draws, lighting them I had placed them around the room. They provided little light in this large house seeing as there were only four of them. The light didn’t quite manage to reach the corners of the room, the patches of dark protecting whatever was hidden there.