The Haunting
Admiral Biscuit
It took about a week to get partially settled in. Inside the house, I'd unpacked most of the must-haves and arranged them once, and in some cases twice. It always looks like there's more cupboard space in a kitchen than there really is. I hadn't found a proper wardrobe yet, but a pair of broom handles and some twine made a serviceable enough closet, and with my extra bed sheet hung over the front broom handle, it actually looked fairly tidy.
I didn't have a dresser, either, but stacking some of the extra wooden crates on their side was enough to organize things for the time being. I took the rest up to the attic, where they joined a few leftover boxes from the former occupant. Since I had plenty of room up there, I wasn’t too worried about cleaning up their stuff.
When I looked back at my handiwork, it made me chuckle. In some ways, it was kind of like a college dorm room or a first apartment. Poor guy chic.
Outside, it was too late in the year to do any yard work besides basic maintenance, enough to make the house not look abandoned. I didn’t have a lawnmower, so I contracted most of that out to an enterprising foal with a strange tow-behind reel mower.
He left one patch unmowed, and when I asked him why, he said that it was a flower garden. I didn’t want to admit that I couldn’t tell the difference between bloomless flowers and weeds, so I just nodded. I think he knew, though.
That would be something to look forward to in the spring. I’d bought my bank repo early in the spring, and was quite pleased to discover that the former owner had planted tiger lilies all around the back porch.
I met lots of new ponies during that week, and did my best to keep their names straight. Fortunately, most of them had built-in mnemonics; most pony names and cutie marks tended to track pretty well, although there were a few exceptions to that general rule.
Everypony was a little bit friendlier now that I was living in town. I hadn't really noticed it in the big city, but in a small town like Haywards Heath, everypony knows who lives there and who's just visiting.
That did throw me for a loop the second day. I guess it must have taken most of the first for my name to get all the way around town; after that, everypony knew who I was before I'd even introduced myself.
•••••
There were still noises at night that I hadn't gotten used to, and every now and then I'd be half-asleep and certain that I'd just heard a door creak open, and once I thought I heard faint singing.
I hadn't wanted to get out of bed right away—most likely, it was somepony at the pub who'd had a few too many, although the pub was the opposite direction. Maybe it was some pony down the street singing a lullaby to a foal.
I eventually got curious enough to get out of bed and go to the window. I stuck my head outside, and strangely, the singing seemed to get a bit fainter.
Pony houses didn’t have wall sockets or overhead lights, and I’d gotten enough used to the arrangement of my house to not need lights to go through it. I couldn’t quite pin down where the noise was coming from—did pony burglars sing while they worked? That was a really dumb thought, but just the same I thought I ought to investigate. Creaks and pops and bumps and rattles in the night were one thing, but singing was a whole different matter.
My lizard-brain insisted that I ought to have a weapon for self-defense, and the best bet was in the kitchen. Cast iron frying pans were fine weapons, after all.
The singing got fainter as I went downstairs.
I managed to bash my head on an open cupboard door, and for just a moment I was ready to rip it right off its hinges, but then I remembered since I owned the house, I was going to have to fix it if I did.
The pans were on neat hooks behind the stove, and I grabbed the biggest one, twirling it around in my hands.
I’d intended to go back upstairs, but glanced out the kitchen window. Out in the yard, about where the flower garden was, I thought I saw a bit of light. Some faint apparition moving among the stalks, just far enough away that I couldn’t quite piece it together.
Back on Earth, sodium and mercury lights always played tricks with vision at night, but ponies didn’t have those, so that couldn’t be what I was seeing. Moonlight remained constant, and while it was giving some illumination to my yard, I was sure that it wasn’t the cause of what I was seeing.
But what was? St. Elmo’s Fire? Swamp gas? Neither of those things seemed likely, and looking around at my neighbor’s houses didn’t reveal any sources of light that might be causing whatever it was that I was seeing.
Since I was appropriately armed, I went down the hall to the back door and opened it, then took slow steps down the back stairs into the yard. I heard a bit of rustling, surely just the wind, and the strange ghost-light I was seeing vanished deeper into the flowerbed.
The grass was cold on my bare feet.
I walked deliberately to the stalks, but there was nothing there. Whatever I’d seen was gone. I wasn’t willing to go into the flowerbed, not at night, not when I had bare feet and I didn’t know what I might step on, or what might be there, hiding among the stalks.
I could have scared it off—probably had.
A bit of movement above me caught my attention. It was a pegasus, flying past at just above rooftop level, and I all of a sudden felt like a fool. No doubt, I’d heard a pegasus singing earlier. And then in the backyard, that could have been a white cat or an opossum I’d seen out the kitchen window. I’d scared it off once I’d opened the back door, and it had fled.
But there was still a nagging doubt at the back of my mind. I knew what I’d seen, what I’d heard. The singing—if it had been a pegasus, why would it have gotten fainter when I stuck my head out the window? And whatever had been in the flower garden looked bigger than an opossum or feral cat. It had seemed almost pony-sized.
•••••
A few night later, I was laying in bed when I heard muffled hoofsteps above my head. For a second, I thought I was imagining it, then I heard it again, accompanied by soft, melodic giggling.
I’d taken to keeping my frying pan by my bed, just in case, so I grabbed it, jumped out of bed and dashed down the hallway. The trapdoor to the attic had a long string—long enough that a pony could pull it without stretching—and then bolted up the attic stairs.
I dropped back down almost instantly, thinking it might be some kind of a trap, and I stayed with my head just below the attic floor for a few moments before remembering that if some kind of malevolent nocturnal spirit wanted to do me in, it could just as easily murder me in my sleep.
The noises were still going on. If anything, they were a bit louder, so I stuck my head back up and looked around. I didn't see anything in the attic. It was dark, of course, but I had the idea that a ghost, if it existed, would be kind of glowy. Like what I’d seen in my garden.
Besides, now that I had my head stuck through the trapdoor, it sounded like the noises were still coming from above me.
After boosting myself up into the attic and accidentally stepping on a toy from the box the previous occupant had left behind, I determined that the noises were in fact coming from my roof.
I was utterly convinced I was going to catch the ghost in the act, and I was sure that it didn't know I'd been in the attic, so I bolted down the stairs and into my backyard, my attention completely focused on that moment of satisfaction when I'd see it with my own eyes, thus proving that I wasn’t crazy.
What I hadn't considered was how I was going to get a good look at my own roof from two stories below. I could only see half of it from the backyard, and that half was completely ghost-free.
I could see the rest from the front yard, though. I ran around the corner of the house as quietly as I could, and there was a white, almost-glowing pony shape on the roof. Vindication!
Until I got all the way around front, and realized that what I was seeing were actually a pair of teenage pegasi making out on my roof.
I also realized that I was standing in the middle of the street in my skivvies.
Given that the ponies in Haywards Heath are all habitual nudists, it surely wasn't that big of a deal, but it still felt wrong, and after shooing off the pegasi, I sheepishly made my way back into my house and went back to bed.
I was still convinced that there was something in my house, but I knew I was going to have to be more careful and coy in order to figure out what, and this time I wasn't going to jump the gun.
*shakes pan* "Get off my roof, you hooligans!"
Oi! This house is occupied! Go find a cloud!
Lets go snog on the old haunted house down the road. Whys it haunted? Cos teenagers like to go snog on the roof at night and make weird noises.
Indeed they are! Just ask Conker the Squirrel.
Well our ghost is being nice here I think. I wonder what she thinks of her new house mate?
9272912
I always remember it as Peach’s ultimate weapon from Mario RPG.
It hasn't even made a confirmed appearance yet but just from the story image alone I ship it.
Just head down to Barnyarnd Bargins and buy a couple of "Ghost B Gone" ghost traps. Should solve the problem in a day or four. ...or no money back!
9266815
Thank you!
9266909
Yeah, given that Big Mac can drag a house and Cheerilee can kick her way through the front wall of the boutique, locks do seem kind of pointless. At best, they’ll stop foals.
9267304
If they’ve got thinmints, I’d buy filly scout cookies by the truckload.
img00.deviantart.net/73b4/i/2016/261/7/c/cookie_scout_fillies_by_dm29-dai3p2p.png
9267836
What you’re thinking won’t happen here.
I’ve already done that in a short, and it ended with the protagonist getting frostbite in a certain sensitive spot. Which I think we can both agree is what would happen if you hooked up with a ghost.
9267995
9273027
It's amazing how many problems can be fixed with an liberal application of alcohol !
Just singing? No. A full musical number about all the loot they're going to score, complete with backup singers and a dance break, on the other hand...
9273069
Holland Marsh is a little farming stretch about 45 minutes North of Toronto. Does that count?
9273057
I lived there for two years in Peace Corps. And it really depends where you are. I was up in rural Northern Cape, where it’s all cinderblock houses with corrogated steel roofs. There you had lots of carts and very few cars in the village. On the other hand this would be more like Kwazulu Natal or Limpopo with all the thatch and the temperate climate. And then the cities in South Africa are exactly like American ones, except that they feel subtly off because the plants and birds are all wrong.
On the other hand it’s also very different than this Equestrian village. That’s why I was trying to figure out why it reminded me so much when it isn’t really alike. Where I was it’s easy to tell where all the yards are because everything is fenced off (not that it helps much with the goats, they walk straight through barbed wire fencing like it’s not there) and the grass is scraped up carefully to keep away both snakes and wildfires. Which are constantly burning during spring and fall somewhere or other. You’ll look over, see 20 foot flames off in the distance, shrug and move on. Also there’s no indoor plumbing but everyone has electricity. And the village taps run dry for at least part of the day every summer.
So yeah, more notable for the contrast than similarities. I could go on. I was just thinking.
9272868
#Equestriaproblems
Seriously, though, how many other places are teenagers making out on your roof an issue?
9272876
Exactly! Nobody wants to have teenage pegasi making out on their roof.
9272891
I have a feeling that there are a lot of self-fulfilling prophesies in Equestria.
9273131 Oops, sorry! It was just a turn of phrase. I wasn't implying that this would be a dark fic at all.
9272912
In actual fact, cast iron frying pans are brittle and thus might not make as effective a weapon as one might think. Good for one hit, to be sure, but after that things can get sketchy.
And I can’t believe I have this bit of knowledge, but I’ve actually been witness to a cast iron frying pan getting broken when used in a manner not intended.
9272918
The without spoilers answer is that she’d probably be happier if she didn’t have a new house-mate.
9272941
Well, yeah, it’s good and heavy and a fine blunt object for at least one hit. Who’s got lead pipe lying around these days, after all?
9272977
Also in Smash Brothers for the N64, and my personal favorite weapon in that game. Not so much because of its effectiveness, but the sound it made . . .
i.pinimg.com/originals/de/ad/9a/dead9af1ef5915f975edc49caf80036a.jpg
9273152
Hey! Don’t laugh!
I open up this story and the first thing I see is a ghost saying boo! You know how terrifying that is???
9272989
9273006
I don’t know why, but I imagine those would be sticky traps, and you’d have to clean the ghosts off them.
9273056
According to Homer Simpson, “Alcohol, the cause of--and solution to--all of life’s problems.”
9273068
With, of course, the victim of the robbery also having a moving solo number about all the things he’s about to lose.
9273067
What, you mean onto the pony planet?
9273094
Does it have a windmill complete with an actual miller? If not, no.
9273155
I’ve never seen that, which actually sounds like a shame now.
9273188
Either grab a spatula (the no-stick kind) or just chunk the whole thing in the trash. Easy-peasy.
9273194
That updates at least twice a year.
Although it’s totally true I’ve been slacking off on it. And in fact, the new chapter is forthcoming fairly soon--next couple of days, probably. Pre-readers have been through it, and I’m in the final editing process at the moment.
9273181
But she’s adorable! If I was going to be haunted by something, I’d want it to be her.
9273163
Not that I’m opposed to dark, but I generally don’t write it, with the obvious exception of Mares.
"Hey you kids! Get off my weathervane!"
Well if he grabs for the ghost, but only manages to goose its rear end, well then he could end up with a hand full of sheet!
9273193
With Cat-folk tread, we are ponies who steal...
9273211 Oh! I still haven't read that, based on the blunt-force trigger warning, but now I'm going to have to.
9273266
Just be aware that the blunt force trigger warning isn’t there lightly. It’s very much not a happy story, and the more you think of the implications, the darker it gets.
9273260
i.ytimg.com/vi/mZ6yysp8RrI/maxresdefault.jpg
9273168
You're not wrong.
Frying pans aren't as effective as people make them to be, given cast iron shatters and steel dents and warps, but they do buy enough time to get something real, like the steel bat I keep under my lounge.
Came here to make a “Human yells at pegasii to get off his roof” and got royally sniped.
9273180
Better than the golf club to be sure.
"No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone." - Shirley Jackson, The Haunting Of Hill House.
Good book. The 1963 film adaptation "The Haunting" is very good.
9273287
If it's an old iron skillet it's pretty good.
9272989
Even Ghosts have needs.