I Can Hear You Breathing

I never went to my Aunt Helen's attic after that day.

It was the first week of December. My parents and I had come to visit my Aunt Helen for Christmas. She lived in Salvation,Iowa. Aunt Helen was divorced, and lived with her three children (one son and two daughters), Mike, Judy and Linda. I was the oldest among them. Every time I visited their house, we had a game of 'Hide and Whistle' instead of 'Hide and Clap'. It was our tradition.

As usual we were playing our little game. Aunt Helen was about to leave with my parents for Christmas shopping and she insisted that I was the one blindfolded as the others were small and could get their feet caught in the carpet and trip. We began. Judy gave me 5 rounds and all the kids ran off giggling. I came out of the room and called out, "First whistle!" And I heard three faint giggles and whistles. The loudest one came from the attic, so I fumbled inside and called out again, "Second whistle!" I heard a clear giggle and whistle which came from the far wall where an old closet was. I fumbled around towards the sound of the giggles and opened the closet. I stood in front of it in a way so that whoever was in it couldn't make a run for it. I heard a giggle. It sounded boyish so I thought it was Mike.

I said slowly, "Third whistle Mike!" No sound. "I can hear you breathing. Caught you Mike!" I said again. I heard a giggle. I could hear him breathing heavily. I grabbed hold of him. Mike felt a little different. He felt skinny. I wondered why chubby Mike felt so skinny all of a sudden. I let go of the boy and took the blindfold off. I made sure that I was standing in a position that would not let the boy escape while I took the blindfold off. When I opened my eyes I couldn't believe it! There was no one in the closet. I was standing like a wall in front of the closet and no one could come in or out of it. So where did he go? Then Judy, Linda and MIKE came in the room. Judy said, "You took your blindfold off! Which means we win!" I asked Mike, "Were you in this closet?" Linda answered, "We were all downstairs. We don't hide in this dusty closet. Mom doesn't let us." I was so shocked. I left the attic. Who was I holding? Who was that skinny boy? If all of the kids were downstairs, then who giggled from the attic?

I didn't go to the attic again. We spent a good Christmas and came home. But I kept thinking about that skinny boy, his giggle, his whistle. I had such an eerie feeling when I heard the boy's heavy breathing.

So that's it for this incident. Thank you all for reading. Please comment down below if you have any questions or an explanation for what I experienced.