Harrowmere's Gift

When I was ten and my brother Sam was eight, our family moved into a sprawling estate nestled deep within the fog-draped hills of Harrowmere Vale . The house—known locally as Willowspire Hall —was ancient, its weathered stone walls cloaked in moss that shimmered faintly under the pale moonlight. To us kids, it felt like stepping into a dream. Every groaning floorboard seemed to hum with secrets, every shadow hinted at untold stories. But none of those whispers prepared us for her .

We called her Miss Eleanor—not because we knew her name, but because "Miss" sounded polite, and "Eleanor" carried an air of quiet grace. She wasn't frightening, not at first. In fact, she seemed almost tender. Some mornings, we'd wake up to find small trinkets left on our dressers: a smooth river stone, a delicate feather, or once, a tiny wooden bird carved so intricately it looked ready to flutter away. We laughed, convinced Miss Eleanor had left them as gifts. She wanted to befriend us, to share her world.

But then there were the other things—the subtle changes in the house that made you pause and wonder if your eyes were playing tricks on you. Like the armchair in the study. It sat near the window, its worn velvet upholstery faded from decades of sunlight. When we played nearby, absorbed in games or books, the chair would creep closer to us. At first, it was barely noticeable—a few inches here, a foot there. But sometimes, when we least expected it, the chair would end up right beside us, as though someone invisible had nudged it into place.

"Miss Eleanor just wants to join us," Sam said one evening, his voice tinged with wonder rather than fear. He patted the armrest affectionately before pushing it back against the wall. I didn't argue; after all, what harm could come from a ghost who brought presents?

As the months passed, however, Miss Eleanor grew bolder. One night, during a howling storm, Sam woke screaming. I rushed to his room to find him sitting upright in bed, clutching his blanket tightly. On his bedside table sat a porcelain cup filled with water—water that shimmered unnaturally under the flickering lightning outside. Neither of us remembered leaving it there.

"She put it there," Sam whispered, wide-eyed. "She said I'd get thirsty."

I tried to laugh it off, blaming the storm for jangling our nerves. But when I returned to my own room, I discovered an identical cup waiting for me. The liquid inside smelled faintly metallic, like rust mingled with rain. My stomach churned, but I couldn't bring myself to throw it away. Instead, I hid the cups in the attic, hoping to forget about them.

Years later, long after we'd outgrown Willowspire Hall and moved away, curiosity gnawed at me. While visiting Harrowmere Vale for a college research project, I stumbled upon an old archive of local history. Among brittle newspaper clippings and faded photographs, I found something that froze my blood: a grainy black-and-white photo of Willowspire Hall's interior, dated 1874.

The caption read: "Tragedy Strikes Harrowmere Vale: Widow Claims Lives of Two Children Before Ending Her Own."

Beneath the headline was the photograph—a haunting image of the very same study where Sam and I had spent countless afternoons. And there, hanging lifeless from a beam, was a woman in a tattered gown, her face obscured by shadows. Below her, toppled onto its side, lay the armchair. Its placement was unmistakable—it mirrored the exact spot where Miss Eleanor used to drag it when she wanted to be near us.

A chill swept through me as I read the article. The widow, identified only as Eleanor Marlowe, had lived alone with her two young children following the death of her husband. Neighbors described her as reclusive, prone to fits of despair. Then, one fateful night, she lured her children to bed with promises of warm milk—and poisoned them both. Overcome with guilt, she hanged herself in the study, using the same rope she'd once knotted to rock her babies to sleep.

My hands trembled as I closed the book. Suddenly, fragments of memory clicked into place: the cups of water, the persistent armchair, the eerie sense that Miss Eleanor always hovered too close. Had she truly been trying to care for us—or was she reliving her darkest moment over and over again, mistaking us for her lost children?

That night, as I drove back to my dorm, the radio crackled with static. A sudden gust of wind rattled the car windows, and I swore I heard a faint whisper behind me.

"You'll get thirsty…"

I slammed on the brakes, heart hammering wildly. Turning around, I saw nothing—but in the rearview mirror, reflected dimly in the glass, was the silhouette of a woman holding a porcelain cup.

And this time, I knew exactly who she was.