UNCLE DAVID’S HOUSE OF HORRORS
By the P6 and P7 pupils of Whiteness Primary School
It was Halloween. Miley and Kelsey had decided to go guising. Miley dressed up as Donald Duck. Kelsey was a duck-billed platypus. But where were they going to go?
“Let’s go to that old house at the Cliffs of Eshaness,” Miley said.
“You must be joking!” Kelsey said. “That’s where Uncle David lives.”
Everybody was frightened of Uncle David. They told lots of stories about him, and most of them were bad stories. He lived all alone, ever since his wife had died. But some people said she hadn’t died of natural causes. They said Uncle David had murdered her.
They also said that he kept a hyena to scare people away from his house.
They said he used to work in Area 51 in the American desert, which was full of aliens.
They said there was a tunnel under his house that went all the way to an evil underground layer in the middle of London – right underneath 10 Downing Street, in fact.
There were even stories about him kidnaping children and eating them.
“I’m not going anywhere near there,” Kelsey said.
“Oh, those are just stories,” Miley said. “You always hear scary stories at Halloween.”
Eventually, Miley persuaded her friend to go with her. It was a long walk to the Cliffs at Eshaness, and they were tired by the time they got there. It was also cold, and the wind was rising, and it was beginning to rain. The house looked all crooked, and many of its windows were boarded up. The garden was overgrown. It didn’t look as if anybody lived there at all.
When they knocked at the door it swung open. “Let’s go in,” Miley said, “so we can get out of the rain.”
They found themselves in a big room with chairs and sofas all covered over with dust-sheets. “Let’s get out of here,” said Kelsey, who didn’t really feel like being a platypus any more.
Just then they heard somebody crying. It sounded like an old man. They opened another door and there was Uncle David sitting by the fireside. He was blowing his nose and wiping his eyes with his hanky, and talking to himself.
“Oh, darling, I still miss you,” he said. He was talking to his wife, who had been dead all those years!
Suddenly he turned round and saw the two lassies. But instead of trying to eat them, his face lit up with delight.
“Is it Halloween?” he cried. “It’s so long since anyone came guising here. Please come in and warm yourselves by the fire. Here, have a piece of chocolate cake. My wife hated Halloween, and made up all these stories about the house to keep people away. But now you have come! You are very welcome.”
He had an old record-player, and played them some Beatles records. “These always help to calm me down when I’m feeling upset,” he said. “George Harrison is my favourite songwriter.”
“Which is your favourite Beatles song?” Miley asked as she reached for a second slice of cake.
“Here Comes the Sun,” said Uncle David. “Although I also like ‘In My Life’. Do you have a favourite?”
“I do,” Kelsey said. “It’s ‘Blackbird’.”
But they didn’t have to play it, because outside in the overgrown garden they could hear a blackbird singing.
Find out more about 365: Stories and Music here.
