Eunji looked back down at her phone. 12:24. That would make it forty-five minutes. Fifteen-minutes longer than she had dared her two friends to stay in that decrepit house. About twenty-five minutes longer than she had thought Bomi would last and about forty-four minutes longer than she thought Chorong would.

She had expected to hear Rongie’s high-pitched scream come out and echo through the woods mere seconds after they had walked in. Maybe caused by the first sight of a spider or the sound of tree branches brushing up against the dusty windows in the Autumn breeze of the night, but nothing. “Uncharacteristic bravery.” She had initially chuckled to herself, but now she was getting worried. Something very uncharacteristic for Eunji.

She hadn’t heard a peep from the house since they had shut those creaky oak doors and she had seen no sight of the two of them since either. No light in the windows. No sound of their conversation leaking out through the walls. Nothing but a dark house and the sound of the wind drifting through the trees.

Eunji checked her phone again. 12:30 now. She could feel her stomach tightening as she looked at the time.

She had to check on them now. “Maybe they hadn’t thought to check the time while they were in there.” She thought. Bomi could be scatter-brained at times after all. Perhaps it had been her job to keep track of the clock. “Yeah, that had to be it. They just hadn’t realized that they had stayed in there for so long!” Eunji scrolled to Bomi’s phone number, but stopped just shy of placing the call.

“I can go in and tell them they won. I do NOT need to call them.” They couldn’t be more than thirty meters away even if they were sitting in the back of the house. “They would think I was being ridiculous!” But she wasn’t worried that they would think her ridiculous. After how much she had teased Chorong and Bomi about their fear of the house that sat by itself in the woods; how she had taken fifty-thousand won out of her wallet and said that neither of them could stay in there for thirty minutes, she was worried they would think she was a coward. That she may be scared of this house too and just too proud to admit it.

Eunji pushed herself off of the tree she had been leaning on and started moving towards the house. There was a small stone path made of uneven rocks leading up to the front porch surrounded on both sides by tall and unkempt grass. The house had been abandoned since she could remember, and it was a small miracle that it still had four walls and a roof. The elements and time had been cruel, tearing away the siding on the walls, leaving exposed wood and brick. It could have been a nice colonial estate at some point in time, but something about the place just made that seem impossible. Like the building had always been ugly and decaying, skulking away in the woods just out of the corner of everyone’s eye.

When she placed her foot down on the first step of the porch it made an awful creak that made Eunji stop and swallow hard. She had teased Chorong when she had done the same thing on that first step, but she now understood. It felt like the sound shot right through you.

But Eunji wasn’t going to let a creak stop her. She went up the next three steps without a moment’s hesitation. She carefully ducked under the wooden beam that was partially hanging from the ceiling and approached the doors. She grabbed a hold of the iron handle and pushed forward, making sure not to touch too much of the rust that sat on it. They were shockingly heavy and resistant to movement, but she got the doors open enough and slid through into the house.

Outside there had been the faintest light with the stars and crescent moon in the sky, but in the house there was nothing. The whole place was pitch-black.

“Bomi! Rongie!” She called out. “You did it. You won. You’ve been in here for thirty minutes, you can come out now.” she waited for a reply, but all that could be heard was the wind coming in through the gap in the door.

She took another step in. “This isn’t a trick or anything! I’m not trying to make you come out before your thirty minutes are up. You’ve seriously won. I lost. You proved me wrong.”

Still no response.

Eunji mumbled to herself, pulling out her phone and switched on the flashlight. It only created a cone of light the size of her hand, but it was much better than nothing. “They’re fine. I’m sure. They’re probably… in one of the back rooms upstairs playing with some old junk they found.” She thought to herself.

The interior showed its age, much like the exterior, but if you looked past the dust and the spiderwebs you could see that everything that sat in the foyer had been expensive at one point in time. The chairs that sat by the walls had been upholstered with crimson leather, there was a tasteful rug probably about 3 meters long leading along the ground to the stairs, and sitting high above it all was a portrait of a horse and a stern man with an ugly scowl across his face.

Eunji couldn’t figure out if it was the shadows of the room or the painting itself, but staring at that portrait was unpleasant. His dark eyes, painted a single shade of black, and his long face that seemed to built for looking displeased. It gave her the creeps.

Written across the bottom of the frame were the words, “Noe Yong-Ho and his stallion, Bibalam, November 1959 ‘What is mine is mine forever, what is yours is mine for the taking.’ Noe Yong-Ho”

The pompous words that sat at the bottom of the expensive portrait of a dislikable man left Eunji even more disgusted by the whole house. “Geez, what a creep.” She said, moving away the painting and towards the stairs.

She called up the stairs again for Bomi and Chorong. There was still nothing. “Maybe they snuck out the back. Tried to trick me.”, but even Eunji didn’t believe that. Bomi would never give up the prospect of free money, even if it meant staying in this awful house.

The stairs spiraled up to the second floor, and as she walked up them they creaked like the one outside. At the top there sat five rooms, all close enough to hear her now. “Bomi! Chorong! If you’re trying to prank me I’m not taking the bait. Come out now otherwise I drive off home without you guys!” Still no response.

Eunji flicked at her bangs. “This is pointless. They must of left already.”

At that moment a weak moan crawled through the hallway. Eunji stood completely still, suddenly frozen by the haunting noise. The pitch warbled horribly, like a voice being sped up and slowed down over and over again. To even say if it was a person’s voice was tough to say.

Her body was frozen along with her thoughts. She wanted nothing more than to get out of this awful house. But the kind part of her, the part she hated in situations like this, told her she had to make sure it wasn’t Chorong or Bomi that was making that awful noise. She had to make sure a wooden beam hadn’t fallen on top of them or one of them had fallen and hit their head. It still could all of been a prank to get back at her, she was aware of that, but she had to make sure they were okay, she wouldn’t forgive herself otherwise.

Forcing her feet into motion she followed the sound to the door on the far left, moving so slow it made her legs shake. The door was sitting cracked open, the moan clearly coming from the room behind. She pushed it open and shined her phone in there.

The source of the awful sound wasn’t clear, but the room fit the sound perfectly. All sorts of distorted and disturbed trinkets and baubles filled every surface of the room. Hunting trophies, shrunken heads, medieval torture devices. Every tasteless thing a rich person could collect was on display to some variety in that trophy room. It was a sickening room, but Eunji stepped in and followed the sound.

Only two steps in she could see what was making the noise. Behind the couch, just out of initial view was Chorong, face down on the floor. “Chorong!” she cried, running over to her side. She lifted Chorong’s head up so that she could see her. She couldn’t see any marks on her, but she seemed dazed. Eunji snapped her fingers in front of her eyes and Chorong blinked sluggishly in return.

“Oh Rongie, what happened?!” Chorong rubbed her forehead and winced in pain.

“Eunji? What are you doing in here? Didn’t you say you would wait outside?”

Eunji helped her up to her feet. “Yeah, I said I would count down your thirty minutes an HOUR ago. What happened? Where’s Bomi?”

Chorong looked around the dark room, Eunji using her light to help her look. “I don’t know. All I can remember is walking up the stairs with Bomi. She said she wanted to find a room with some comfy chairs to wait our thirty minutes out in.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Bomi. Okay, we need to find her and then take you to a doctor to make sure you’re okay.” Eunji looked around the room, hoping to see Bomi asleep in some nearby chair. “Why would she not be with you?”

“You know n-now that you say that I do remember her saying some weird as we were going up the stairs.”

“Weird for Bomi?”

“Yes. She was talking about the house and hunting and horseback riding. I didn’t understand her at all. She was talking like a completely different person. I just don’t get it.”

Eunji could feel the hair on the back of her neck standup. But standing next to Chorong she knew she had to put on a brave face. “Okay. Okay. Well maybe we can call someone to help us look around. Bring some flashlights. Maybe Hayoung or Naeun.”

“But what if she got hurt too? We should look for her shouldn’t we?”

Eunji closed her eyes tight, not wanting to admit that Chorong had the reasonable and rational answer. “Okay! Okay. You’re right. We need to find her and then we can get the hell out of here. But we stick together. I don’t want you falling asleep on the floor again.” Eunji laughed at her own joke, but it was a forced laugh brought on by an uncomfortable situation.

Eunji was trying to think up a rational answer for Bomi. “Maybe no one lives here because there’s a gas leak. Yeah, that could get her to say those weird things. Or maybe it’s a joke. Bomi can tell some weird jokes.” She couldn’t find any answer she would believe.

At the first door they entered and were greeted with a room twice the size of the previous room. It was a garish combination of office, lounge room, and an extension of that awful trophy room. The two of them circled around the room each going their own direction looking behind furniture and calling out Bomi’s name.

As Eunji checked behind the desk at the far end of the room, she heard the door slam shut! By the time she looked up Chorong was pulling on the door trying to get it open. “It’s locked!”

Eunji rushed over to the door and tried the knob herself. When it refused to move she tried to pull on the door. Still nothing.

“Bomi if that’s you on the other side this isn’t funny!” Eunji yelled, beating on the door in anger. “I think Chorong is hurt. We need to get her out of here!” No one responded. “Oh come on!” Eunji hit the door a few more times with her hands before kicking it with all her might.

The door stayed still. Eunji pounded her hand against the door again. She wished she hadn’t teased the two of them about this stupid house. She wished none of them had taken a single step onto that creaky porch.

“What do you suppose we do now?” Chorong said.

“I don’t know!” Eunji shouted back.

“Perhaps you and everyone like you can finally learn you can’t take what’s mine. I can only take what’s yours.”

Eunji’s eyes held wide as she turned around and shined the light on Chorong. She stood there with a disgusted scowl, eyes coal black and hands coming for her face.