House

Bellevue House sat on a ledge at the end of Wiching Road. Everything about its halls exuded mystery, borderline on paranormal. The Bellevue family had been the targets of neighborhood harassment campaigns for many generations. Yet, the descendants never left their home and their community.

This perplexed the people of their Kansas community and, sensing a threat, the people of the town gathered with torches on their lawn one night.

It was the evening of Great Grandfather Bartholomew Bellevue's passing. The family had assembled in the common room for their ritual ceremony of the passing of one life to another existence.

A piercing a car horn had intentionally disrupted the ceremony to announce the arrivals outside. Fifteen year old Genesis Bellevue, the youngest of Bartholomew's great granddaughters, decided that she should take it upon herself to alleviate a situation. She was young and adventurous enough that she had known a few members of the community. (The townspeople had learned her address because she had entrusted the information to a schoolmate who had turned out to be the mayor's son).

At the sound of the disturbing car horn, Genesis rushed for the door to try to bet the townspeople away from their latest gambit; that the people of Bellevue House were in a state of morning that evening.

The disruption of the car horn and subsequent shouting of the town locals had ended any such opportunity for the youth. Her mother, father, grandmothers, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, and cousins had all heard the disruption to their ritual practices and none of them had appreciated it.

A piercing wail from inside the house answered the gathering townspeople. That was enough to cause the mayor to glance about in confusion. The piercing light emanating from Bellevue House had been all that it had taken to cement the villagers' fears and send them scrambling for the hills.

The self-destructive spell of vengeance had cost the older Bellevues their powers and existence and had caused them to fade away to nothing. Genesis, the Bellevue whom had meant to keep the peace, had been lost in the blast and was no more either. The Bellevues were relics of a prejudiced past; Bellevue House stood out over the ledge by the water as a monument to be sneered at from afar, or for ill-meaning youngsters...

***********************************************************************************************

They were called the "MYSTERIES CLUB" and were a group of middle-schoolers. They thought of themselves as the "in" group of Martin Hills School. A few on the outside of the group shared that opinion and wanted in as part of the clique that they understood little about. Inclusion was fine with the Mysteries Club; with a catch...

Seven bicycles raced up Wiching Road and stopped outside of Bellevue House. Only two of the bicycles were to stop at the forefront of the house. Keith Witterling and Ana Roos were the only two pre-teens who needed to be at the foreboding locale of Bellevue House that day. Judson Pierce and four of the other established members of the MYSTERIES CLUB had only come with to see for themselves that the young hopefuls had gone through with approaching the old house.

"Ring the bell!" Judson shouted from his place on his bike as Keith and Ana had both dismounted their own transportation but now stood frozen on the house steps.

"C'mon; open the door!" Heather Willan badgered from her permanent place by Judson's side. "We've all done it!"

"We'll be right behind you too!" Jonathan Beck added.

Carolyn and Thomas Paine simply sat on their bikes and smirked derisively. Ana was ready to turn back; Keith didn't appreciate the audience offering to follow them in and he didn't much like Ana's sudden cowardice either. The others were members of the MYSTERIES CLUB; that meant that they had already been through Bellevue House once, according to their own rules for membership. Besides, they were all still perfectly fine to tell the tale.

"You just ring the bell if you're so scared." Keith hissed at Ana before the scrutiny of their potential new friends. "I'll do the hard part for you."

Keith had been wrong about Ana's trepidation against trespassing and had suggested cowardice as paralyzing her. That was enough that they both marched up the steps simultaneously. Neither of them saw the knowing wink exchanged between the members of the MYSTERIES CLUB. Furthermore, the sound of the doorbell was enough to mask the sounds of the five older teenagers turning their bikes around and pedaling away for a Malt Shop trip.

Keith was still unaware that their "new friends" had left them high and dry and Ana had done what was asked of her. All that he had volunteered for was to creak open the door; that was it. They had never even been asked to enter the home. This was easy!

Keith pushed the door experimentally. It creaked compliantly and slowly opened.

Keith and Ana were only aware of the piercing wail of morbid rage for a moment. The flash of blue could only blind the two kids for a second. Then, they felt nothing ever again. The MYSTERIES CLUB had already ridden away for the day, surviving to see another day and living in the personal knowledge that none of them had ever been the ones to ring the bell, and certainly not handle the door, of Bellevue House...