Story #1 ~The Man in the Window
~The Estelle Series~
Story 1
Little Estelle was born in the house she lived in until she was eight years old. She shared a room with her older sister and when her younger sister came along, she too was moved into the same room.
Estelle actually liked the idea of sharing the room with two sisters. The room was plenty big enough, but there was another reason. Estelle was utterly scared to be in this room alone. For as long as she could remember there was an uneasiness about that room. Estelle didn't quite understand the heightened sense of doom that was immediately present upon entering it. She could see his figure on the other side of her window and she knew he was always watching her.
Now Estelle could only see his silhouette, she never saw him because of the curtains that hung to the floor. They were white and layered and it let the light filter in the room, but they were thick enough that she couldn't make out the objects on the other side. And she couldn't make out the man either. But she knew one thing...that man wasn't a good man...he meant harm and that scared her. And that had Estelle wondering why on earth was this man was always on the other side of her window.
By the time Estelle was in grade school, she had expressed to her folks that she had an uneasiness about the room. Her parents didn't want to hear such nonsense and reassured her there was no one on the other side of the window. From her room, her father would say, "See there is no man standing there." This confused Estelle because as her father said those words and pointed to the window, Estelle saw the man scoff at her from the other side. The man was always in the window. Why could she see him and no one else?
At night she shared a bed with her older sister and during the day she played outside or anywhere else but in her room. She kept out of trouble and never back talked because she didn't want to be sent to her room alone as a punishment. One time she was really sick with the flu and her mother told her she had to stay in bed. That man watched her all day long and her fever got worse. Fear grew within her and she begged to lay out on the couch. Finally, her mother agreed, but she ended up getting the rest of the family sick. From that day forward, she was told she had to stay in her room when she was sick. This had her praying every night that she would be well the next day. She was too scared to stay in that room alone.
Another time, she was late for school and she didn't get to eat breakfast. Being in a rush she forgot her lunch and had remembered it half way down the block. She ran back to the house and had to pass her bedroom to get the kitchen. That day the man was in the room. How did he get inside she wondered in a split second. She couldn't make out his details, but she utterly panicked at the site of him. She grabbed her lunch and ran out of the house. That was the last time she ever forgot her lunch or her books or anything else on the way to school.
Estelle turned eight in 1929, and her parents had lost most of their wealth in the stock market crash. Her parents quickly sold the house and they moved onto a farm about 35 miles north. Estelle was never so happy to leave that house and move out of that room. The night before she was to move the man in the window was screaming at her. The noises coming from him were frightening and deafening, as if he were being tortured. She never understood what he wanted or why he was there, but she prayed all night that God would hear her prayers through this man's screams. She prayed that the man wouldn't follow her to the new house.
And it seems that God had heard her prayers.
When they arrived at the new house, Estelle checked it out. To her relief, Estelle saw no man in the window in her new room. This room was bigger then her old room and she would be sharing this one with a third sister. She loved her new home, her new room and for the first time in her life, Estelle wasn't scared anymore. She never understood exactly what she saw back at that other house or what she heard. It was like some hellish nightmare that never ended for her. Maybe it was all childhood silliness? After all, no one else saw him.
Two weeks after Estelle and her family had moved into the farm house, her father received a letter in the mail. The family that had bought their old house in the city tragically died in the middle of the night. The house had exploded killing everyone inside. A neighbor had thought he has spotted someone outside the bedroom window earlier that evening. He alerted the family and a police report was taken.
The neighbor wasn't exactly able to describe the man he saw, just that he was lurking outside when he shouldn't have been. The letter had asked Estelle's father if they'd ever encountered any problems with menaces or peeping toms before as they needed as much help as they could get with the investigation.
That night Estelle knew that the man in the window was real...maybe everyone couldn't see him...but she had.
**Images used in this piece were found on Google Images Search. They can be viewed in their original format by original author's by clicking on the photos.**
