At the airport Ardwyn was able to easily move through the crowds by having all of his stuff packed into just one carry on bag. His mom followed behind him, taking the day off from work to be at the airport.

“You know this trip will do you good,” his mother said, much more relaxed than previously. “Your father works a lot, so you will have the whole house to yourself. You can do your homework, work out, and anything else you like.”

Ardwyn wore a hat and sunglasses. Surrounded by tourists, and the crowds of people moving hastily to their destination he felt the energy of the commotion. There was something refreshing in the air, a journey to a new start in his life.

Of course, he would miss his life down here, his mother, his friends. But he could always come back. Besides, the feeling of easing the stress on his mother, being a single parent and raising him, was somewhat of a relief.

They walked up to the airlines counter.

“Boarding pass, please,” a woman said, and ripped off the side of his ticket. “Are you checking in any bags?”

“No,” Ardwyn said. “Just this.” He pointed to his carry on bag.

“Okay, Gate 20,” she said. “Have a good flight.”

They walked through the passageway to the security checkpoint, where his mother couldn’t go any further.

“I love you, Ardwyn,” she said. “You stay safe up there. Don’t get into any trouble. Don’t give me a heart attack.”

“I will, mom. Don’t worry.”

“And tell your father I said, hi.”

“Okay, mom.”

“You can come back down here for the summer, when you’re out of school.”

“Sure,” he said.

“And one more thing, Ardwyn,” she said and looked at him sternly.

“Yes?”

“Promise me one thing,” she said.

“Okay,” he said.

“Promise me that you will work really hard to do good at school. Your future depends on it.”

“Promise,” he said.

“You really promise?” she said.

“Yes, I promise,” he said and waved her off goodbye.

The flight was three hours. Ardwyn had a window seat, with the seat being unoccupied next to him the entire time during the flight. The experience was quite relaxing. It was the first time that Ardwyn had been on a plane by himself.

The stewardess came by, smiled and offer him a selection of food menu choices.

“Orange juice and crackers, please,” Ardwyn said.

He stretched out, and put on a movie on the back of the seat in front of him.

He wondered about his life back home. How quickly things can change. The friends he had, now gone. How easy it was to take things for granted, and like ghosts, everything that previously was remained just a memory.

Shortly after he fell asleep.

Getting off the plane, he spotted his father in the crowd waving at him.

“Ardwyn!” his father yelled. “Right here!”

His father was older, in his sixties. Ardwyn was his only son, whom he had much later in life than most parents. His hair was gray, and others could have easily mistook him for Ardwyn’s grandfather.

He let out a warm smile when he saw Ardwyn. “How was the trip?”

“Great,” Ardwyn said, somewhat awkwardly. It was the first time he had spoken to his father in years.

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“I parked in garage C,” his father said. “That way.” He pointed.

Ardwyn followed his dad through the airport.

His father asked, “So, how is everything? How is life down there?”

“Fine,” Ardwyn said, being at a loss for words.

“You know, I miss the warm climate in the south. Up north we have these snow blizzards, temperatures get below freezing.”

Ardwyn nodded.

His father continued, “But the house has a nice fireplace. Will keep us warm and cozy.” He turned around to Ardwyn, and looked at his t-shirt. “You’re going to need some winter clothes. I brought a jacket in the car. At this time of the year the temperatures already start to drop.”

In the south, where Ardwyn was from, the sun was a thing to be taken for granted, even in the winter.

When Ardwyn stepped out of the airport, he immediately noticed the change in the weather. The skies were darker, grayer. The air was colder. A cold breeze hit him in the face and he immediately felt the shrill cold penetrate his body.

“My car is just right around there,” his father said. “So, how is your mother these days?”

These days. Ardwyn knew his father and mother hardly talked since the divorce.

“She’s doing well. She works a lot,” Ardwyn said.

“That’s understandable,” his father said. “I work a lot too. That’s life.”

They walked up to a silver SUV. His father pressed the key and the car beeped. He helped Ardwyn put his bag in the back.

“What kind of music do you like?” his father asked as they sat in the car.

“I’ve been playing trombone in the school band,” Ardwyn said. “We have been playing a lot of jazz.”

His father turned to a jazz station. The soft horn section accompanied by piano filled the air.

Ardwyn thought of Michael. He would call him when he had a chance. Update him on his new life. Some part of him missed band class. Playing music on a regular basis, practicing something constant, and slowly getting better, especially in the company of friends, was a unique feeling Ardwyn didn’t expect to have had grown on him so much.

Ardwyn let out a sigh of relief. He was on his way to a new life. Although he was grateful to his mother for raising him, there was a stark contrast between his mother and father. Where his mother was overdramatic, and manic at times, his father was cool, logical, and matter of fact. He didn’t even seem to care about bringing up the fight at school. His father’s mind seemed elsewhere.

Twenty minutes later they drove out of the city, into a highway surrounded by thick green forests on both sides. Their car was the only car on the road. With the darkness of night coming, the car headlights lit up the road ahead, and everything started to blend into one, a monotonous line of forests, with a clearing here and there, repeated again by forests.

“Pretty peaceful out here,” his father said after a long silence in the car. “I work remote. Out of the house. So, I don’t really need to be close to the city.”

Ardwyn nodded.

“The house has plenty of room. Actually there are a few rooms you can pick from. Although it’s an old house, the architecture is quite unique, to say the least. They don’t build them like that anymore.” His father paused and seemed to be thinking about something.

“How old is the house?” Ardwyn asked.

“To be honest I don’t even know exactly. The seller mentioned the house was around one hundred years old.”

Back in the south where Ardwyn was from they didn’t have many old houses. He lived in a subdivision community, so most of the houses were twenty years old at most.

“Something that can be quite unsettling, especially at night,” his father said, “is that you can sometimes hear creaks in the walls.”

Creaks in the walls? Ardwyn shuddered, not sure if from the cold landscape or the comment.

“Don’t let that spook you,” his father said. “The house is old. So every other gust of the wind will cause creaks in the floorboards.”

Soon they pulled into a gravel parkway, surrounded by more trees. The car moved up and down with the bumps. Ardwyn realized why his father owned an SUV. Out here in the middle of nowhere there were no proper roads, just a big dark bumpy road leading into the darkness of the forests.

The car pulled around a large tool shed, and then in the background a Victorian looking house stood against the horizon. The only shape different from the surrounding trees.

“We’re here,” his father said, and turned off the car.

Ardwyn grabbed his bag from the back and followed his father up the wooden stairs to the front door. The stairs creaked with every step that Ardwyn took. He looked back to the dark woods, and felt like someone or something was watching him. Ardwyn shrugged off the feeling. He was not used to this kind of wilderness.

His father unlocked the door and then felt the wall for a light switch. He flicked on the the light switch. Towards the middle of the walkway was a set of stairs spiraling up to the second floor, with a railing that had custom art deco like Ardwyn had seen in movies. The horror kind.

They walked through the living room into the kitchen. With each step Ardwyn took the house creaked.

“You see what I mean, the house is pretty old, but kind of unique,” his father said. “Being out here in the middle of nowhere the seller couldn’t find anyone interested to buy the house for a long time. With my remote job I really didn’t mind being all the way out here.”

As Ardwyn put his bag near the kitchen table, the ceiling creaked and some dust fell off the wall. The creaks were almost like footsteps, as if someone was walking up there on the second floor.

“It’s the wind,” his father said. “You kind of get used to it.”

Ardwyn hadn’t noticed any wind outside.

His father said, “But sometimes, I think there might be rats inside the walls or something,” he said with a shrug. “Can I get you anything to eat? You must be hungry.”

His father opened the fridge. Inside, the fridge was packed with food, with hardly any room to put anything. There were deli meats of various kinds, a whole half of a shelf dedicated just for cheese, then on another shelf orange juice, pomegranate juice, the expensive kind that came in a glass bottle, pineapple juice, wine, bread from the bakery, not the kind of artificial white goo that was sold as bread, all Ardwyn’s mother could only afford back home.

“Yeah —“, Ardwyn said, “anything is fine.”

“Help yourself,” his father said. “Don’t be shy. I have to run up stairs and check in on my work.”

His father went upstairs and left Ardwyn in the empty silence of the house. Ardwyn looked outside the window toward the woods. He had the growing feeling something out there was watching him. Probably just wild animals, Ardwyn thought.