The year was 1969 and I was an excited ten year old on my way to Puerto Rico with my favorite aunt, Marlene. It was my first vacation and the thought of being in an airplane was just overwhelming! We were going to visit relatives and I just couldn't wait. The plane ride was great; I had the window seat. We landed, everyone clapped and we were met at the airport by aunts, uncles and cousins. Everyone was making such a fuss over me. They were meeting me for the first time, and I sure felt special.
We would be staying at my aunt Lucia's house in the country. I remember thinking how beautiful everything seemed from that car window. It was warm, the sun was radiant and everything was so colorful. So many palm trees, so many flowers. The air was fresh, people were smiling in the streets and I was happy. My happiness wouldn't last very long.
The Dreadful House
After about an hour's drive, we finally arrived to my aunt Lucia's house. The driver parked the car and I was a little confused because I didn’t see a house. I wondered why we stopped. We got out of the car. My aunt Marlene held my hand and we all started to walk in the same direction. When we stopped and I saw where the house was located, I was instantly filled with dread and fear. Every part of my little body started reacting, and the voice inside my head just repeated the words, Oh no! Oh no! I instantly sensed that something evil and wicked lurked about.
You see, my aunt Lucia's house was not situated on level ground. It literally sat in a hole! We had to walk down to get to it. How different than the other houses I had heard about, like beautiful houses on top of lush green hills, or houses near waterfalls and lakes. This old house lived in a ditch where the backyard consisted of bushes, and old orange and banana trees. It was the woods and it was so dark back there.
Aunt Marlene settled in, and while she talked with the family, I made friends with my cousin, Mitch. He didn't seem to mind being around a girl, so I stuck with him. Eventually, all the guests went home, yet I couldn't shake my uneasiness. The day was warm, but it was cold and damp in that ditch.
The Forbidden Area
The night started to descend upon Puerto Rico, and with it came all kinds of sounds. Crickets, frogs, owls.... Being a city girl, I wasn't used to those sounds, and they just intensified my dread and fear of that place. I felt like something was closing in as the darkness slowly crept upon us. Mitch wanted to entertain me and told me about an old outhouse that was in back of the house. He said it had been there for ages, maybe as far back as the late 1700s. It seemed the land had always belonged to our family. He also said that Aunt Lucia forbade him to go anywhere near the area of the outhouse, but he was always curious to see that outhouse and wondered what the big deal was and why he shouldn't go there.
He pulled out a flashlight from his back pocket and asked me to walk with him back there. I was terrified, but didn't want to seem like a scared little girl and so I agreed. We took each other's hand and started walking toward the woods. It was so dark and creepy. I started to sweat. I was so scared. We had walked quite a distance when Mitch said he felt the outhouse was not much further and shined his flashlight to our right. I could faintly see the outhouse – it was a huge block of gray stone with an opening in the front. It looked like a tomb.
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