Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-26105632-20150213141622

Hello all, this is my first creepy pasta so I would love some feedback. All advice will me much appreciated! Also, could I get some feedback on the ending as it was going to be continued but after reading the whole thing together I decided to cut it out.

I have been living in this 5 bedroom student house for well over 2 months. I don't know why people give the idea of living away from parents all its glory as, frankly, it isn't that great. My name is Kevin and for my second year of university me and my friends decided it would be fun for us all to live together as opposed to living another year in student halls (apart from me who lived his first year with his parents). I can't say that this was my greatest decision, my room here is considerable smaller than my room back at my parents and I am just about scraping by having to pay for both food and rent (I suppose I took a lot of things for granted before) but its much better than the alternative of living with my parents. Of course, it would be nicer if the rent was cheaper but, unfortunately, one of our friends, James, had backed out and had left a couple of days just after we first moved in which has resulted in 4 students living in a 5 bedroom house. Me and my friend, Emma, live on the top floor, my other two mates have bedrooms on the 1st floor leaving a lone bedroom on the ground floor, it being small and the university year having already started, it is still unoccupied. James is a good friend but it was quite random when he suddenly left, he didn't even say why but I just assumed he was still pissed that he got the worst room. To give you some background, when we all reserved the house many months ago, there was some fighting about who should get which room. Some rooms are considerable bigger than others but, basically, no one wanted to live in the bedroom on the ground floor. After all it was: the smallest, its windows overlooked directly onto the streets, it was the closest to the door meaning it was the most likely to be burgled and it was next door to the basement entrance. Personally, I don't count that last point as a real downside but according to James, as he expressed countless of times, the basement is - his words - 'not right'. God knows what he meant by that but thinking back to before when we, for the first time, viewed the house I remember he hated the idea of having a basement. I don't know why but as you can imagine, it didn't take long for us to make up spooky ghost stories that played on James' paranoia and we even agreed that on Halloween we are going to enter this 'ghost filled' basement and spend a night there, basking in the horrors (most likely we would spend an hour in there, it would be boring, we would then leave and sleep in our actual rooms). What the funny thing was was that after drawing straws it was James, much to his disappointment, who was given that room and, thinking about it now, it wasn't that surprising after all that he left.

The time is 1:47 in the morning, yes in the morning, and I have yet to fall asleep. Of course who could fall asleep with the constant banging escaping from the room opposite. My housemate that lives directly opposite me, Emma, has acquired, lets just say, a male friend which has been keeping her, him and, unfortunately, me awake all night for the past couple of days. I like Emma and in this house she is no doubt my closest friend which is why I have tolerated this, shall we say, new regime for the past couple of days. But enough is enough. I have a long day tomorrow, which has now become today, so I really need some much needed sleep but lets be realistic - what am I to do? I can't exactly knock on the door and tell Emma to keep it down a notch and I'm sure that a text would equally kill the mood (not like they would hear it anyway) so I opted for the more sensible method. I grabbed my blanket, pillow and phone as I prepared to venture down stairs and sleep in the spare room. As I said it isn't the greatest room in the house but it is a much better alternative to where I was sleeping now so as I tiptoed down the stairs (I don't know why I tiptoed as I'm sure any creaking floorboards would be engulfed by the noise up above) I couldn't help think of the basement that James hated so much. The thought cropped up then that something had to have happened for him to leave as, thinking back, he was as excited of the thought of living together as we all were and I made a mental note to call him in the morning to see how he was getting on. I got to the bottom of the stairs, made my way to the spare room and I collapsed onto the bed, a bed much bouncier than mine and after two minutes of wrapping my self in my blanket I was looking forward to my soundless night ahead. I yawned and rolled over to my side and I was just about to drift into sleep, until - I heard it. Sobbing, sobbing that sounds pained, young and definitely belongs to a girl. A wave of shock and panic coursed through my body. What the hell is that! Could it be Emma's sobs I wondered but that thought soon diminished when I remembered that she is two floors above me. The painful sob is still loud in my ear and I wonder if the sob belongs to my other two house mates. However, like the first, the thought trailed of as I realized that not only does the sob sound younger, a lot younger than any of my housemates but it also sounds like it is coming from below. My heart sank into my chest because I knew exactly what was directly underneath the spare room. The basement.

I spent a couple of minutes in the bed turning over thoughts in my mind, pointless as I was just delusioning myself as those sobs are definitely coming from the basement. That first panic was just drifting off now and I was getting a hold of myself until, of course, the thought of 'what the hell I was going to do' crept into my mind. If my housemate's moans had kept me awake I was certain that a pained sobbing, no doubt coming from the basement, is hardly going to soothe me into sleep. I listen on, those sobs seem even louder now then when I first heard them, I know I have to do something about it but exactly what? Should I call the police but what am I going to say - "I heard sobbing in the basement so I called 999"- yeah, that thought trailed off so I wondered if I should tell my housemates. Let me level with you, I haven't been the most ideal housemate and I don't think that waking up my house mates at what - 1:53 in the morning - is the most ideal course of action. No, there is a simpler solution - I'm going to go into the basement and check for myself. After all, it's just my mind playing tricks on me and I blame Emma for this lack of sleep which has obviously resulted in me hearing these non existent sobs. I stood up from the bed, determined to prove that these sobs are just my imagination so I can finally go back to sleep. I located my phone to use as a make shift light and I strode to the bedroom door, my hand now grasping the door knob as I thought back to the times that, despite living with my parents, I could at least get a good nights sleep. I pulled open the door and a wave of doubt hit me almost knocking me of my feet. Lost in thought I forgot how terrifying the sobs sound, my heart is beating very fast now - oh God I hope this is just a figment of my imagination. I hear no shuffling or in fact anything from upstairs which gives me some comfort because if these sobs are genuine I'm sure my house mates would be awake by now probably running down the stairs to find out what was going on. I walked to the stone stair case which leads down to the basement door, the stairs turns at a corner near the bottom so I can't see if the basement door is open, not like it would be. Looking down now at this dark stairway, as inviting as a back alley at night, thoughts of running home crept into my mind. I have never craved my bedroom at my parents so much, since I can remember I have always wanted to move away, God I took so much for granted before. And then it hit me. Could it be that James had this exact experience, it explains why he left just after a couple of days but, nevertheless, I am confident; no, I can even bet money that nothing is in that dark, dingy basement. I stepped onto the first stone step and the coldness shot up me like like rocket, my head started to ache and my legs began to feel weak. I want to turn back but I need to prove this to myself. I carried on and with each step the coldness of the stone felt like broken glass to my feet. My confidence deteriorated with every single step and now standing on the final step of the stairs my chest aches and my rig cage feels like its about to give way; for the first time in my life, I am terrified. My legs feel cripplingly weak, my hands are shaking furiously and as I clutch my phone with all my might the thought of it dying and being without light scares me like nothing else. Those sobs are gone now but have been replaced by an eerie silence. I never thought how agonizingly scary the sound of silence could be, I'm finding it hard to breathe, sounds of people having sex; no, even pained sobbing would be better than this completely, dead silence. I looked up now to the stair way entrance and thought whether it is all worth it. It's not too late, I can run home now and then first thing in the morning I could come back and pack up my things and leave forever. Should I phone James? He must know something I'm certain but, of course, theres a quicker way out. Even if I runaway now I will be thinking about this day for the rest of my life - I know what I have to do. I swallow hard then I reach for the handle but I stop in my tracks. Just below the door handle is a key lodged in the key hole. Since when did the basement have a lock on it? But more importantly, why is there a key in the door? If the landlord or whatever wanted to keep us out of the basement then he didn't do a very good job of it by leaving the key in the door. I started to shake. My hands lost grip of my phone and it fell onto my foot but I didn't shriek, more importantly though, I didn't make a sound. Maybe the purpose of this lock was not to keep someone out but maybe it was to keep something in. I have a habit of biting my tongue whenever I feel I am about to faint, I've only done it once, I was biting my tongue now. I grasped the handle and turned clockwise, then anti-clockwise. Locked. This is all crap. My minds is making shit excuses for completely logical explanations and I know it, all I have to do is prove it to myself. I turn the key. Unlocked. The moment of truth, I grab my phone and aiming the light at the door I push it open. Like a detective surveying a murder scene, I aim the light frantically from corner to corner, floor to ceiling, cobweb to cobweb. Nothing. But I'm not satisfied; I walk in, clutching the phone as if if something is in fact here, my phone will save me. I can see the back wall much clearly now and as I scan it with my light, I exhale. Using my other hand I wipe the sweat from my forehead - I feel it, the presence of someone else. I do a snap, 180 turn and I see it. My life is over. Standing in front of me in the door frame is a girl of about 8 or 9, she is staring at me or so I can assume. Because where her eyes should be are black as death gaping holes representing, what I can only imagine, are her eye sockets. The eyeless thing's scruffy, dead hair runs down her face, down her body and cuts of at knee height. I see it now. Long, sharp cuts across her chest and neck no doubtedly from some sort of knife. I look down to her hands but I can only see stumps; and blood running down from them as if it's fingers have only been cut off just minutes ago. Nothing moved in the room. I want to cry but theres no time to think about crying because thick, deep red blood starts to drip down from her eye sockets and scars. I can only make out a smirk of what seems to be a mouth, tears are running down my face now as she walks towards me. I'm biting my tongue hard, the taste of my own blood ripples my taste buds. I need to act but the terror is racing around my body rendering me unmovable. My hands shake furiously and I make some sort of shriveled up whining noise, but I don't even hear my own shriek as it is being drowned out by the thumping of my heart. My legs go weak and I tumble onto the ground, my phone hits the floor but, unluckily, the light is shining upwards. I look up, staring at the thing which is now standing over me. My mouth is filled with the taste of my own blood but I don't want to faint, I can't. Blood from it drips onto my face. It's warm. 