I woke up the next morning feeling like I needed to get to know this place better. I wandered outside to find Peyton eating cereal on his front porch. "Hey!"
He looked up to see me waving at him. He set his bowl down and jogged over to greet me. "How's it hangin', Mercer?"
"It's hangin'," I said. Maybe this place isn't as bad as I thought, I thought to myself.
He looked around and sighed, "So what're you up to?"
I started walking and Peyton joined me. "I just felt like I needed to get to know this place better." He nodded and started talking, a conversation started and we were walking through the garden in my backyard. I stopped walking to admire the astilbes, balsams, begonias, ranunculi, and other flowers. As I was talking about the flowers I noticed a little shed. "Ranunculi are cool-season flowers that grow best in spring-like temperatures of about-" I stopped talking when I noticed it.
"Why'd you stop?" Peyton asked.
Instead of responding, I walked over toward the shed. Peyton followed. I pushed the door open and was greeted by a musty smell. The whole shed was covered in dust. "I don't think it's a good idea to go in-"
"It'll be fine," I interrupted. I was a little worried because that was exactly how people die in horror movies, but this wasn't a horror movie, this was real life. I moved in further, taking in all the vintage with Peyton hesitantly following behind me. "This stuff is so cool!"
"I'm not gonna lie, it's pretty cool," he said, not wanting to admit it.
We were hanging out in that shed for hours, it became our new favorite spot. We would meet there every day. Sometimes he would find me reading in there, and sometimes I'd find him writing.
One day I woke up pretty early and I couldn't fall back asleep so I decided to go to the shed. I found a bunch of cleaning equipment in our closet so I brought it with me and cleaned up the place. Peyton met me there that day and we hung out in there the rest of the day.
That pretty much became our everyday.
Until one day. Peyton and I were talking in the shed when we heard a thud. The thud came from inside. I jumped, "What was that?"
"Quiet, someone else might be in here," he whispered as he reached for the broom that I had left in there. "Stay calm, walk slowly towards the door."
That's exactly what we did. We got to the door, I reached for the handle, and then my hand stopped.
"What are you doing? Open the door!"
"I can't," I couldn't. "My hand just stopped, for no reason. I can't move it! Peyton, I'm scared." We both looked over to see the most terrifying thing we'd ever see.