Dead End Street

An old legend comes to life for a group of young boys

The house seemed to smile. Not a smile that had once adorned the faces of the three children standing in front of it. It was a sinister smile. A smile of warning. A smile of threatening. A smile that said ‘if you enter, I will slowly, deliberately, and enjoyably eat you’.

1574 Gainsborough Street was the neighborhood “haunted house”. It sat lonely at the end of a dead end street. Two weeping willows drooped in the front yard, giving shade and creating a spooky ‘do not enter’ aura. The paint was peeling off the walls, the shutters were cracked and falling off. The previous occupants had long since abandoned it, and, for some reason, the city never tore it down, only condemned it.

There were a lot of rumors circulating Pike’s Township about 1574 Gainsborough Street. One of which being the patriarch of the last family to live there, the Jenson family, snapped one evening and took an axe to his wife and two daughters, then hung himself in his office.

Among the favorite reasons for Mr. Jenson’s breakdown with the Pike’s Township gossips was Mrs. Jenson’s torrid love affair. Every day at 1:15, the postal carrier would come to drop off the mail. Supposedly, everyday at 1:45 the mail carrier left with a kiss and a wave, leaving a smile on Mrs. Jenson’s face. It was their favorite rumor to spread since the Jenson’s mail carrier was a woman.

After the Jenson family left Pike’s Township, the house went to rot. Obviously, with the rumor circulating, selling it was impossible. Years upon years ate away at the house’s once illustrious appearance at the end of Gainsborough Street. Rumors upon rumors added to the ambiguity of the house. With each year that passed, 1574 Gainsborough Street transformed little by little into the haunted houses of countless legends. 

And so, bearing all this in mind, Mikey, David, and Jason stood on the cracked, crumbling sidewalk in front of the Old Jenson Place. A look of foreboding struck the faces of each child. A sinister chill crept up Mikey’s spine. He shook noticeably with fear.

“I don’t know about this guys,” he said, not able to take his eyes off the house looming in front of him.

“Stop being a chicken,” Jason replied harshly. “Tommy Dickinson would have the whole school laughing at us if we don’t take him up on his dare.”

“I’d rather have the entire school laughing at me than be dead, Jason,” David said looking at the house and shuttering with the same fear as Mikey had.

“It’s just a house, guys,” Jason said taking the Polaroid camera from around his neck. “I didn’t sneak into my parents room and steal this for nothing. Tommy wants proof that we went in, and he’ll get it. You guys can come with me or not, but I’m going in.”

Jason held the camera up and snapped a picture of the front of the house. The print slid out of the front of the camera like a child sticking out his tongue. He grabbed the picture, and without a look, slid it into his back pocket. He put the camera back around his neck and set off up the walkway leading to the front door. Mikey and David gave each other apprehensive looks and followed Jason.

Each worn, wooden step of the porch creaked with strain as each of the three boys tested their durability. The porch was strewn with dirt and weeds that had made their way up the stairs to inhabit a new home. In the far corner, an old, faded, white rocking chair was swaying lazily back and forth in the soft afternoon breeze. Mikey refused to look at it, for fear of seeing something, or someone, sitting there that shouldn’t be.

The front door stood solid in front of them. As the three boys stood, staring at the gateway to the unknown, it seemed to loom over them like a gargantuan redwood. The red paint was chipping away; the brass of the doorknob starting to rust. A perfect portrait of the effects of time and weather.

Jason reached out and felt the cool brass under his fingers. He turned his wrist, but the knob didn’t budge. He gave another twist, adding a swift kick, but the door refused to move.

“Damn it,” Jason swore under his breath, and turned back to his friends. “It’s locked.”

“Okay,” Mikey sighed with relief, “time to go home.”

“Not so fast,” Jason said, as Mikey and David turned to head home. “We’ll just have to find another way in.”

Jason pushed past his friends and bounded down the steps two at a time. He cut a path through the waist high grass, passing under one of the willow trees on his way to the fence surrounding the backyard. The chain link was rusted, and falling apart in several places, one of which Jason took advantage of, and climbed through to the backyard, followed by Mikey and David.

The backyard wasn’t completely dissimilar to the front yard, but had its own distinctive spookiness. Instead of willow trees, a single oak stood in the center of the yard, providing shade for the entire yard. On one of the lower branches swung an old tire swing. The rope holding it up was fraying, ready for someone to come for a swing and receive a broken tailbone. Opposite the tire swing was a sandbox. Grass was growing through the sand, but a perfect square still broke the sea of waist high grass where the sandbox resided.

Jason raised the camera and took a quick snapshot of the desolate backyard. When the picture slid out, he again stuffed it in his back pocket. With his friends following in his wake, Jason tore through the backyard jungle to the back door of the house. It was almost identical to the front door, other than the different style of doorknob.

Jason tried this knob, but with the same results as the first, and he let out another swear.

“I think that’s a sign, Jason,” David said, his voice shaky.

“I think we’re just going to have to try harder,” Jason replied trying to look into the nearby windows. “Someone give me a boost.”

Mikey shook his head as he cupped his hand for Jason to use as a cradle. Jason put a heavy, red high top into Mikey’s hand and straightened himself. Mikey put all his strength into lifting Jason to the window two feet above their heads. Inside, Jason saw nothing but an old kitchen. A thick layer of dust had settled over everything, and the appliances were from a time long before Jason or either of his friends were born. Next to the fridge sat a high chair with a stuffed puppy dog sitting in it.

“Do you see anything?” David called up to Jason.

“Doesn’t look haunted to me,” Jason replied, and gave Mikey the signal to lower him. Once his feet were flat on the ground again, he brushed the dirt off of his shirt and smiled. “This is going to be easier than I thought. We just have to find a way in.”

Jason cut back through the grass toward the back door. Halfway to the door, he tripped on a small rock jutting out of the ground. He sprawled out into the grass, the wind knocked out of him. He curled up in the fetal position, gasping for air. Through a break in the grass, Jason could see the outline of a small window leading to the cellar. He jumped to his feet, air rushing back into his lungs.

“There’s a window down here,” he called to his friends. He pried the rock that he tripped on out of the ground.

“You can’t break the window,” Mikey said, looking around the yard for any onlookers, “it’s illegal.”

“Yeah,” Jason replied sarcastically, “I’m sure someone is going to notice the broken window in a house that hasn’t had anyone living in it for years, and that’s covered up with grass.”

“I agree with Mikey,” David said.

“Big surprise,” Jason said, and hurled the rock through the window. The crashing of the glass on the cellar floor echoed through air like a gunshot. “Too late to argue now.”

Mikey and David sighed as Jason slid through the cellar window and plopped down on the cellar floor. The glass crunched under his feet.

“It’s a little dark down here, but it’ll be okay,” Jason called out from the cellar to his friends. “I can see the stairs.”

Mikey and David slid down behind Jason reluctantly. The cellar wasn’t unlike any other cellar. It was poorly lit, musty and dirty from the years of neglect. Boxes upon boxes were stacked around the room, each marked with a permanent marker labeling each boxes’ contents. At the foot of the stairs, a Raggedy Anne doll sat, staring straight ahead, its button eyes staring blankly into space, but seeming to follow the three boys as the walked by.

The stairs moaned with stress as the three boys made their up into the kitchen. Jason immediately snapped a picture of the room and put it in his pocket with the others. He walked to the fridge and opened it, finding nothing but an old box of baking soda.

“See,” he said, shutting the refrigerator door and looking around the kitchen, “there’s nothing to be scared of. Just some old dusty junk.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Mikey replied giving David a nervous glance. Neither could shake the feeling of uneasiness that emanated from the house.

Jason turned and walked into the foyer. The front door to his left, a flight of stairs to his right. Straight ahead was the living room.

“Tommy wants pictures of the bedrooms where the family was supposedly killed,” Jason said, looking up the stairs nonchalantly. “If you two are really that scared you can stay here and wait for me.”

“Don’t take long,” David said, and Mikey nodded his head in agreement.

“Girls,” Jason said derisively, and walked up the stairs.

Mikey and David stood in silence for several minutes while the sound of footsteps and photography echoed through the house. With each passing second, the two friends grew ever more nervous. Each afraid that the longer they wait, the more likely something bad will happen.

“I don’t like this house,” Mikey said, breaking the silence.

“Me neither,” David replied.

“Should we leave?”

“We can’t leave Jason…” David replied. After a moment’s thought he looked at Mikey pleadingly, “…Can we?”

Mikey didn’t answer right away. He couldn’t help but want to run from the house, screaming.

“No,” he said eventually. “If we leave him here, he’ll tell Tommy and then we’ll be the laughing stock of the whole school and Jason will be a hero. I’m not going to live with that. I’ll have to change schools.”

“That’s a good point,” David said, shrugging his shoulders. “I can’t stay here much longer though. I don’t care what happens. I heard the hot lunch program over at 3^rd Street is pretty stellar.”

Before Mikey could answer, both boys realized that Jason’s footsteps had stopped and the clicking of the camera was non-existent. They exchanged a scared look.

“Jason?” David called out, but with no reply.

“Should we go check on him?” Mikey asked.

“I’m not going up there. He’s got to be messing with us,” David said, his voice shaking with fear.

“Jason?” Mikey called after his friend, “Stop messing around, man. It’s not…”

Mikey wanted to tell his friend that the joke wasn’t hitting home, and that he should just finish up so they could leave. He couldn’t. His throat tightened in fear as the sound of footsteps came from the living room behind him. Mikey turned to David whose face was stricken with terror. As far as they knew, there was only one way to go between floors and they were standing in front of it.

The footsteps were slow and deliberate, each one screeching a warning to get out while they still could. Unfortunately for them, their legs couldn’t, wouldn’t work even if they were on fire. Their only option was to stand and face their approaching doom.

Around the corner, a ghastly apparition slowly appeared. With each step, the ghoulish figure came into sight little by little. Once it stood full in the entry way to the living room it let out a hollow, ghostly moan.

“Daaaaaaaaavvvvvvvvvviiiiiiiiiiddddddddd,” the apparition called out in it’s horrid voice, “Miiiiiiiiikeeeeeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyy.”

David and Mikey let out a terrified screech at a pitch only the neighborhood dogs could hear. David scrambled with the lock of the front door, as the ghost came closer and closer. The rust made it tougher than it should have been, but he managed it open and flung the door almost off its hinges.

David and Mikey went barreling down the street, screaming the whole way. The apparition followed slowly onto the porch and let out a chuckle. Jason pulled the stark, white sheet over his head and let it fall to the porch.

“Couple of chickens,” he said to himself, chuckling again. He hopped down the stairs and walked to the middle of the sidewalk leading to the house. He decided to pull the pictures out of his back pocket and give them a look. He wanted to bask in his victory before he went to Mikey’s house to tell him that he, Jason, was the ghostly apparition, and that he had found another set of stairs around the back of the house leading down to the living room.

The first picture was of the front of the house. Nothing special. Next was the backyard, then the kitchen, the foyer, the upstairs hallway, and the bathroom. So far nothing to get excited about. Tommy Dickinson was going to be disappointed. Jason flipped to the next picture in the stack. He stood, frozen in terror, and what he saw.

The picture depicted the Jenson’s children’s room. As Jason stood in the doorway taking the picture, it wasn’t any different than any other bedroom he’d ever been in. The picture told a different story. The two girls lay in their beds, each of their heads detached from their bodies, torsos half severed, and blood sprayed across the room.

Jason’s hand shook as he flipped to the next picture. Instead of seeing the master bedroom the way he had just seen it, he saw Mrs. Jenson lying on the floor in a pool of blood, decapitated. Mr. Jenson stood over her, axe in hand, staring at her cold, lifeless body without compassion.

Jason could feel the warm run of urine down this leg as he turned to the next picture. Not surprisingly, he found the picture to be different than he wanted it to be. A chair lay tipped over on the floor, and Mr. Jenson hung from the ceiling fan by an extension cord. Mrs. Jenson’s head was hanging from his death-gripped right hand, a look of terror frozen on her face.

Jason dropped the pictures into the grass, but couldn’t move. He didn’t want to turn and face the house, but couldn’t make his legs move to save his life. Suddenly, the sidewalk began to curl under his feet, rolling him up like a concrete tongue. It drew him back into the house, screaming, and the door slammed behind him. The house began to rumble. The door opened and a single red high top flew out, landing on the sidewalk in front of the house.

Afterwards, there was silence, and 1574 Gainsborough Street smiled on.