I was 12 years old when I first heard the noise. It was in the summer of 1995. The noise sounded like someone was walking around downstairs in the basement. The weird thing was, though, was that it stopped as soon as I opened the basement door. I didn't hear that sound again until the next year.

I was 13 years old in 1996. I began to hear that strange noise again. It only seemed to happen when I was alone. A few days before this started to happen again I saw my neighbor outside for the first time. I was walking to Ms. Halley’s house to pick up my bracelet that she had made, but I accidentally left it there. Mr. Stanley, my elderly neighbor, who has lived here for quite a long time, walked out his front door and was looking around. He saw me passing by his closed up, old house and turned to stare. Right away he turned back around and went inside of his house again. But before he had fully turned his back on me I caught a glimpse of him. He skin was weathered, and wrinkled, but there was something that stuck out to me. His eyes were coal black. They were squinted in a disapproving matter, and it felt like they could pierce right through you. I had never seen anything like them. After Mr. Stanley had gone back inside I sprinted the short distance to Ms. Halley’s house. I never again saw Mr. Stanley in the day light.
The next couple weeks were quite boring and long. I went to visit Ms. Halley a couple of times during those few weeks. Ms. Halley was in her mid-60’s and was always giving advice on anything I needed. She was a good person to talk to. It was just her and a 14 year-old black cat that always would always come lay in my lap. It never did purr even when it started to fall asleep. Ms. Halley said that he wasn’t one to purr.
It had been over a month since I had heard those strange noises coming from downstairs. I was so relieved. Then, suddenly, when my parents were gone, I started to hear creaking sounds and I once saw something race across the front window. I thought that it was my imagination running away with me, and that the creaking was the furnace and the shadow was an animal.
I went over to Ms. Halley’s house one Saturday afternoon, around 3:00 P.M. We talked about anything and everything. She asked me just before I was getting ready to leave what I was doing that night. I told her that I was alone, because my parents were going to a business dinner and they would be out from 6 till after midnight. Ms. Halley told me that she would bring over some of her cookies that she was baking, so I wouldn’t get too lonely.
I was sitting watching television, when I began to hear a rustling outside. I figured it was just the leaves moving in the wind and I went to fix some supper. That was when I heard the footsteps so loud and clear, that I couldn’t mistake them for anything different than feet. I quickly ran to the basement door and opened it in hopes of making the noise stop like all of the other times. And luckily it did. I climbed down the stairs, letting my shuffling feet guide the way until I found the light switch. The only problem was that it wouldn’t turn on. Then, just as I thought I could never be more terrified in my life, I heard a voice that grew louder and louder. ‘Get out!’ ‘Get out!!’ ‘GET OUT!!!’ And then I heard a gasping of breath before it was quiet. I knew that I wasn’t alone. The last thing I heard was, ‘I’m sorry that I forgot you cookies, dear.’
I couldn’t hear anything after that, but what I saw in that second were the piercing black eyes. They no longer scared me, they comforted me. I wanted to run, but my legs wouldn’t move. I knew those black eyes were pleading me to run too, but somehow I just couldn’t. That was the last thing I saw. The last thing I felt was the hard, cold floor below me.
My parents got back and found a note saying that I had gone over to my friend’s house, because she had gotten back last night. My mom called my friend’s house and found that no one answered, so she went over there herself. Everything was closed up and nobody answered the door. My parents knew something was up.
In the months to come, no one ever found out what happened to me and Mr. Stanley. Some people thought we ran away together, but many people knew that neither of us would do that. There was no evidence left behind that led to my mysterious disappearance, except an empty space. Mr. Stanley was, I found out, a very nice person, that was quiet and kept to himself. He couldn’t hurt a fly. It turns out that a lot of people really did like Mr. Stanley after all.
Exactly 1 month after our disappearance, the police really started looking hard for us; Ms. Halley decided she was going to move. She told my parents that she had lost so many people in her lifetime, she couldn’t stand living near where I, Ally Green, used to live. My parents said that they understood and that she would be missed. Ms. Halley replied with a quiet, ‘I’m sorry’ and just as she was about to walk out she turned around and pulled something out of her pocket. It was my bracelet that she had given to me. I was wearing it the day I was murdered. My parents couldn’t believe it, but Ms. Halley said that she found it in her house; that it must have fallen off of Ally’s wrist, and if she wouldn’t have found it, it would’ve been lost forever. Just like me.