With his hand lingering on the doorknob, Peter turned around, looking at Olivia Odell's expectant -and angelic- face to give him newfound courage. When she saw him staring she smiled, batting sea glass blue eyes. Two blonde braids curled around her full breasts. Peter's heart sped up just by looking at her. His choice was made. Olivia Odell had dared him to break into the most sinister house in town, and he wasn't going to disappoint her; simple.

Peter took a deep breath and swung open the door. The doorknob was cold; touched by a thousand spirits who had entered before him. A dry, decrepit smell like a dead grandmother's moth-devoured clothes flooded his nose. Putting a sleeve to his face, Peter continued inside. Go up the stairs, and steal one of the old books, Olivia had said. 

The stairs were at the back of the dark, peeling house. He passed a table with crystal glassware and porcelain plates, waiting for company that would never arrive. Leaving the dining room, Peter stepped into the kitchen. A ripe stench hit his nose and he gagged, swallowing down rising bile.

Rotting on the scratched wooden floor was a young boy's mutilated body. The dead boy was Peter Mcarthy. It was him.

The brim of his cowboy hat -he had dressed up as a ranger for Halloween- was covered in fuzzy green mold. His stiff fingers were clutching at his blue, cracked lips. While he stared, a maggot burst through the brown of his eye, chewing ravenously. White goo splurted out like a popped pimple. 

Terrified, he stepped back from his body and thunked into solid flesh. Turning around, Peter came face-to-face with a wispy old man. His mouth was a gaping, screaming hole, and his eyes stitched shut in two large X's. With a scream, Peter stumbled towards the door, forgetting about the dare and the stupid book Olivia wanted. His foot caught on an upturned plank, and he stumbled, hands spread to stop his fall. Except his fall didn't end. He passed through the floor like it was gelatin, plummeting into an abyss of nothingness. 

Peter fell with nothing to accompany him but darkness. The last thing he remembered before his eyes sewed shut and his mouth opened in an eternal scream was a sinister voice.

"Open the door and the curse will keep you in its clutch forevermore." The rasp of the voice made his veins turn into intricate webs of ice. Everything went black.

With his hand lingering on the doorknob, Peter turned around, looking at Olivia Odell's expectant -and angelic- face to give him newfound courage. When she saw him staring she smiled, batting sea glass blue eyes. Two blonde braids curled around her full breasts. Peter's heart sped up just by looking at her. His choice was made. Olivia Odell had dared him to break into the most sinister house in town, and he wasn't going to disappoint her; simple.

He stepped inside for the 1,987th time.