Beaubois

There's a place down at the end of Beaubois Bayou Road they say is haunted.

I don't believe it.

Hauntings are gentle things, smudged memories built up over the years like the grimy patina on a doorknob. Whatever lives at.... No. Whatever infects Beaubois House is altogether wrong. It can be felt the moment you cross the shadow-laced threshold of that dilapidated old plantation.

Spanish moss hangs like tattered burial shrouds upon the gnarled skeletons of a dozen towering oaks that frame the overgrown drive. They march up from the red clay road to cluster conspiratorially around the house. The closer ones seem to lean into the home, as if sentinels awaiting orders.

By the time the sun has filtered through this riot of greenery strangling the old antebellum estate, it has taken on a gangrenous hue. Lacking appreciable warmth, it falls in feeble fragments through a dozen shutters, each missing louvers like the broken grin of some whiskey-addled bum. By the time its light settles to the floor, it has warmed nothing. The house remains as cold as winter even on the hottest day.

Even the dust motes refrain from riding those murky shafts in their usual bilious fashion. Instead, they seem drawn in perfect order on some unsensed breeze to flee from the home, as if even dirt dared not settle on this unholy ground.

No one knows exactly why the house rests so disquietly.  Maybe it laments its own ruinous form and proximity to the fetid swamps of Beaubois, home to mosquitoes, snakes, and other unpleasant lifeforms. Some talk of the murders that took place there--three, to be exact. Others whisper of the voodoo and root magic performed by angry, rebellious slaves. Perhaps the reasons aren't important. After all, who asks the alligator how he came to be while facing his open jaws?

The important thing to remember is the house is evil and it should be given a wide berth. In fact, seeing how it's the only thing down Beaubois Bayou Road these days, I might recommend you simply steer clear of the whole area.

You don't want to end up like the others, do you?