Tell All But Tell No One

• Tayla Batterbury, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2021

As I walk past the old, abandoned home on the corner of Sunshine Valley, just south of the Hamptons, there is something weary and off about this house. I’ve personally never been in it, I don’t plan on going in there, especially since the recent rumours have been going around. I believe them, I don’t normally believe the rumours that most spread but I definitely believe this one. I get sick every time I walk past knowing what people and my family members have said about this place. I find it funny how this house is built in the Sunshine Valley Estate, because this house never seems to have the sun shine on it and when it rains it always seem to rain on this house the hardest. I don’t think anyone has been in this house ever since the incident. Now it wasn’t just any regular incident that you would expect, like the balcony deteriorating off the second floor and damaging someone’s car. No, this is way worse. This seems like something you would watch in a horror film made for adults, not children.
The incident happened about 7 months ago. There was an unexpecting, innocent family living in there. Quite a nice couple with 2 children, twins, they were about 12 years of age, maybe a bit younger. Well one day the family went missing. The police looked in their home first, didn’t find them. They either did a really bad job looking or, the family was killed and then placed back in their home once the killer found out that the cops had already searched their home so they aren’t going to look there again.
The cops ran about a 2 and a half month search for the family of 4 before checking the house again, that’s where the family was then found. The cops were dumbfounded but proceeded to do their job and continued investigating. The family was killed by impalement. The killer used a hot rod and jammed the rod through the lower abdomen of all the family members, including the children.
A few months go by, the autopsy has come back, the friends and extended family of the victims are still grieving, and the funeral has just started. Everyone who was invited to attend has arrived, but one person has arrived that was not invited. It is Aunt Carol. The extended family didn’t invite her for a reason. This was because Aunt Carol has had history with the victims and had an AVO placed on her.
Aunt Carol walks into the reception crying like she’s some actor on Home and Away. People try to shove her out of the reception to avoid havoc being caused. It’s a delicate time and Aunt Carol doesn’t understand ‘delicate’ but it’s too late. Aunt Carol starts, and when she starts, she doesn’t stop. This has happened before, but not like this, not this bad. Aunt Carol has made a mistake. A huge one, and she going to regret it.