CANDLELIT CHRONICLES: HISTORIC HAUNTS

Entry for 1/09: Only the Beginning...

Only the beginning, so far..this is turning out to be a short story--or more..So this is what I've written so far..











         





Alice closed the back cover of the brittle old ledger and turned it over and over in her hands, her puzzled expression alternating with frowns. When she discovered the item as she delivered last month's holiday decorations to the attic, she knew she had not seen it before. Why hadn't she uncovered it when she first unpacked the ornaments, tinsel, and yard décor on Thanksgiving weekend? It was plainly obvious, on the floor against a two-shelf empty bookcase.





                   Well, perhaps it had been in the bookcase, and her footsteps crossing the attic floor had set up a vibration which pushed the ledger off the shelf. No, that made no sense either; the bookcase held nothing else. Well, no matter: she had found it now, had read it, and now the puzzles were only beginning to unfold.





                   The ledger, which she expected to be an accounting record from some long-forgotten ancestor (or former owner of the house, from generations past), or even a diary, had instead opened to reveal itself as: a baby record.