Dos
1005 Words
“What happened, Maria?” Iphigeneia asked when Maria returned to the kitchen.
“You were right,” Maria replied. “He was already asleep. I didn’t want to wake him—but he stirred. He opened one eye.” She hesitated. “A pale blue eye, clouded over, like there was a veil on it. He looked… unwell. Then he closed it again.”
“Then let him rest,” Iphigeneia said gently. “If he’s sick, sleep is the only mercy.”
Maria nodded, though uneasily. “I still feel guilty. Leaving him here alone in this villa while I work in the city.”
“Well,” Iphigeneia said bluntly, “it’s not exactly easy to find a job out here in the ‘probinsya’.”
“I know,” Maria replied softly. “But still… he’s my only family now.”
“Well, we’re here,” Iphigeneia said, trying to lift the mood. “You can take care of him while we stay.”
“Yes,” Maria said, as if the word carried more weight than it should. “Are you finished eating?”
“Just about. I’ll clean this up.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Maria said quickly.
“It’s fine—”
“No,” Maria snapped. “Leave it.”
Her voice rang sharply against the tiled walls.
Iphigeneia froze, startled.
“I’m sorry,” Maria said at once, lowering her voice. “I didn’t mean to complain. Just… leave everything. The ‘kasambahay’ (maid) will attend to it in the morning. Come. Let’s go upstairs. We both need rest.”
…
Iphigeneia lay awake in the unfamiliar bed long after Maria had left her room. The sudden outburst replayed itself in her mind. Maria had always been composed, even gentle. Fatigue, she reasoned. Grief. Anyone would be strained under such circumstances.
Yet the villa itself would not allow easy reassurance.
The longer she lay there, the more she sensed an atmosphere that seemed to press upon the chest, heavy and damp, as though the very air were saturated with old sorrow. It was not merely the musty smell of age. There was something ‘miasmic’ about the place—an odor of extinguished candles, of incense long burned out, of prayers spoken too late.
When they had arrived earlier, she had noted the villa’s appearance: its excessive antiquity, the discoloration wrought by centuries, the stone walls furred with lichen and minute fungi, hanging like pale cobwebs from the eaves. And yet, despite the evident decay, the structure endured intact—as though held together by stubborn will rather than mortar.
It reminded her of the haunted houses of literature and legend she had studied at college, such as, “The Fall of the House of Usher”, Bluebeard’s forbidden chamber, and the whispered ‘kwentong-bayan’ of her childhood, where ancestral homes concealed sins behind locked doors and sealed walls.
Still, she reassured herself.
Tomorrow she would explore. Be a tourist. She had heard the coast was beautiful nearby, the sea luminous at dawn. With such thoughts, she finally drifted into sleep.
She did not sleep long.
A sound woke her—soft at first, barely distinguishable from the wind and rain that battered the villa. She sat up, straining her ears. During a lull in the storm, she heard it again: a faint, deliberate scratching, coming from the wall near the antique closet opposite her bed.
The grandfather clock ticked steadily. Three in the morning.
“It’s nothing,” she murmured, lying back down.
But the sound returned—louder, more insistent. The scratching grew frantic, then broke into a muffled cry. It sounded like sobbing—thin, desperate, and close. Then, without warning, it swelled into a single, unbroken scream: raw, elongated, and utterly unhuman—a wail that seemed torn from the throats of the damned, echoing with anguish too vast for any living body.
Iphigeneia sat bolt upright, her heart pounding.
“ ‘Diyos ko…’” (My God) she whispered.
Perhaps a cat had become trapped within the walls. Or rats—‘malalaking daga’, disturbed by the storm. Old houses were full of such things. She told herself this, though the scream had carried a quality no animal should possess.
Resolute, she rose and approached the closet. The room was dim; shadows pooled thickly in the corners. Peering behind the wardrobe, she noticed a portion of the wall that looked strangely out of place—freshly plastered, the surface uneven, as though hurriedly done.
Something had been sealed there.
She pressed her hands against the heavy wood and began to push.
Before the closet could move more than an inch, a tremendous bang erupted outside her door.
She screamed.
Rushing to the door, she grasped the handle—it swung open at once. Maria stood there, pale and glistening with sweat.
They went into the room, and sat on the edge of the bed.
“What was that noise?” Iphigeneia demanded. “That bang—it shook the hallway.”
“It was nothing,” Maria said quickly.
“Nothing doesn’t sound like that. And you seem stressed and sweating. What happened?”
“I couldn’t sleep,” Maria replied, avoiding her gaze. “I was… exercising.”
“At three in the morning?”
“Is it?” Maria said absently.
“You should sleep. We need to rise early.”
She turned to leave.
“Wait,” Iphigeneia said. “Earlier, I heard scratching behind the wall—near the closet.”
Maria stopped.
“What kind of scratching?”
“Like something trapped. Maybe rats?”
“Rats,” Maria echoed, after a pause. “Yes. Probably rats. Don’t worry. I’ll deal with it in the morning.”
She left before Iphigeneia could say more.
Alone once again, Iphigeneia returned to bed. She pulled the blanket tight around her shoulders and closed her eyes, praying the house would remain silent.
Behind the wall, something stirred.
- Writer
