additional notes: haunted house, attempts at horror, set in 1960s i think
summary: the introductory snippet to a story based around the idea of a 1960s couple moving into a haunted house and Valerie's struggle with a thinly veiled abuse metaphor.
writing on hiatus, one off, word count: 229
The house by the sea is made of creamy white wood with a charming shingle roof painted a deep azure. Large, windowed, dark brown doors stare out at you when you stand at the bottom of the worn steps leading up to the porch. It was once an alluring Victorian era home. Now it simply stands with its guts hanging out, slowly rotting, like a forgotten fox carcass on the side of a road.
The ageing is obvious. Cracked windows. Unstable walls lined with overgrown grass. Sand blown in through a myriad of cracks and crevices. A stomach-churning stench flowing with the breeze. Rubbish strewn about on the lawn. Newspapers, old cans, sweet wrappers, the like.
Staring at the house, shadowed by the large oak tree in its back garden and surrounded by pinpricks of growing-wild white chrysanthemums, the kind that were used at her father’s funeral, all Mrs. Valerie Irvine can think of is that it feels like coming home. See, the then Ms. Valerie Jackson was born and raised in a house by the sea not unlike this one and the years she has spent in the city with her Neil have made her homesick for the sound of waves and rows of old homes that dot the seaside. It’s part of the reason she begged him to buy this house rather than one in the suburbs.
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