Footsteps In The Dark

Our house was built by my parents on land owned by a rather rich family. The neighbours surrounding us have the same history as we do; they purchased the land from the family and built a house on it. No deaths are far as I know, I'm about 90% sure that no one has died on this land my house is situated on. Now that all of that has been cleared up, let's get on with the story.

My room was officially the 'creepy room'. I didn't want anything to do with it and for a 10-year-old to go sleep in her parents' room was ridiculous. So I came up with a solution, it was called 'Mom, can I sleep on the couch?' Now here's the catch, I dragged my mom downstairs with me. Our house has two levels with three bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs, downstairs is the family room, living room, fourth bedroom, kitchen, laundry room, and third bathroom. The family room was where the couches were, a long leather couch, leather loveseat, and leather recliner. My mom reluctantly slept on the larger couch while I slept on the loveseat.

The nights weren't as dark and with windows all around it allowed moonlight to shine. My old dog at the time, an all-black German Shepherd, slept at the foot of the loveseat and I would constantly stick my arm out from under the blanket shield I had made and per her for comfort. I had to make sure that no part of my body was exposed and that even my hair was trapped under the blanket. Needless to say, it got unbearably hot. Sure the leather would be cool when I first lay down, but soon after I would be sweating.

I wouldn't get to sleep for a long time and would often sleep in awkward positions due to the fact that the blanket only had limited options. I heard the clock hanging up in the kitchen chime twice before I heard the footsteps. If memory serves me correct it would have been around 11:15 or 12:15 when this happened. My parents were painting the basement walls and had paint cans, brushes, and a large black tarp lay out across the basement floor.

I heard slow footsteps, as if the person were trying to be careful not to get their feet tangled up in the plastic. Whoever they were, they were very loud and it made me sweat worse. My fingers knotted themselves in my dog's fur as pure fear shot through me. My mom was the one, who did the actual painting while my dad supervised, but both of them were asleep and the basement door was locked. The footsteps echoed worse due to the fact the basement floor was pure concrete with nothing over it. I could hear the smack of each foot on the floor. This went on for easily an hour.

They would pause perhaps as the spirit admired the work (there were windows down there too, it was light up by moonlight so you could easily see your way) that my parents did. Perhaps it was looking for something; we have storage rooms down there filled with many things, work equipment, collectables, etc. But it scared me and I kept looking toward the steps that led down to the basement in fear it would come upstairs. I did not have my glasses on and couldn't see all-too-well. Having my vision impaired meant it was useless to try and see what was going on so I closed my eyes and listened.

Finally I told myself that this was enough and that if one more thing happened I was fleeing upstairs since my dog was no longer providing me with comfort. BANG, I shot up and clutched my blanket in terror. I went upstairs to my room after that and slept through the night without any other happenings.

In the morning I went down to the basement and saw indents in the tarp (since footsteps don't really show on such a surface) and on top of the tarp was a paint can that had tipped over. On the side of the paint can--which was thankfully closed tight--was an indent, as if someone hit it hard enough with a tool that it just caved in. Falling couldn't have done this as the dent was at such an angle.

This event greatly shook me up and I have never slept on the couch since. It was a bit long of a story; sorry I didn't shorten it down a bit, kudos to whoever read through it all. Any ideas on what it was? I have some thoughts, but I'm waiting to hear from all of you before I voice them. Thanks for reading!

-Hope