New Story Contest: _________ Detective - Josephine D. - 08/09/22

Contest: Winners

New Story Contest: _________ Detective

Submitted by: Josephine D., age 11, San Francisco, CA

The Noise in the Basement
    
Sage was sitting on the sofa, the sun shining through the living room blinds, when the thump echoed through the empty house. Nobody else was awake, for it was only seven-thirty on a Sunday morning, which was hardly a time for the Elrods to be awake. Sage had woken up early, and so she had fixed herself a bowl of cereal.
    
Thump, came the sound, before she had even picked up the TV remote. A chill fizzled down her spine as she realized it was coming from . . . the basement.
    
Thump . . . thump . . . thumpthumpthumpthump. The noise matched Sage’s racing heartbeat.

She crept toward the basement door, tucking her black hair behind her ear. Her heart was rattling in her ribcage. Mustering up all of the courage she had, she twisted the doorknob open. The stairs stretched down, down, down into darkness. Carefully, she tugged on the pull chain that lit up a dim bulb in the ceiling and slunk down the stairs in the bleak light. They creaked eerily underfoot.

When she reached the bottom, she surveyed the stacks of discarded objects. The moldy smell drifted into her nostrils, and she swallowed a gag.

Through all of the mounds of ancient items, she couldn’t see anything frightening. Is it a ghost? Sage wondered. She wove her way through the jumble of things, keeping her eyes sharp as fright knotted her stomach. No flickers of movement caught her eye. No signs that anything had been disturbed.

What was causing that noise? Suddenly, she spotted the corner of a book peeking out from behind a bin. She tiptoed toward it and saw a jumble of fallen paperbacks. With sudden realization, she guessed it had been the tower of books tumbling over. Sage rebuilt the books into a sturdier tower and hurried back up the stairs, eager to get away from the basement. She plopped down on the sofa and was about to grab the TV remote when: Thump . . . thump . . . thumpthumpthump.
 
"Seriously!?”


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