Skeleton in the Closet: First Draft

So hey first really super big project for my creative writing class. :) It is a work in progress but this is the first draft to it. I might actually expand it and turn it into a full fledged story with beginning middle and end. 

Enjoy!

Skeleton in the Closet

By: Alice C. Kirk

It was a warm July afternoon in Flagstaff Arizona. Apartment complexes were beginning to fill up because of the returning students and new tenants that would be living in the cooler weather, and Roy Tucker could not be more than happy to be cleaning out and touching up empty apartments at the complex he worked at. Bear Ridge apartments. The complex itself resided behind a neighborhood near Lake Mary Road and could easily be passed by. The nights and days were usually quiet due to some of the rules the complex had. He paused with a smile, thanking God that he was alive on that day, and proceeded up the brown wooden stairs to a one bedroom apartment, his tool box in one hand and a case of cleaning supplies in the other. Apartment 211 eagerly awaited the young man and sat quietly in its corner. Roy pulled out the key to the apartment, slid it into the lock, unlocked the door and stepped inside the white walled, brown carpeted room. His nostrils were struck with the scent of fresh carpet upon entering and he set down his supplies to the side. He figured he would start cleaning in the bedroom first just to get it out of the way. It was only a few steps away from the living room, or one large step away from the kitchen that rested parallel to the room. Grinning he searched the room for any sort of blemishes, pen marks, dents, and the like. Finding nothing out of the ordinary he opened the door to the walk in closet. Whatever color was in Roy’s face at that moment, drained quickly as his pupils dilated to mere pinpricks and his heartbeat raced so fast he could have sworn he was running a marathon.

Lying inside the closet was a clean but mangled skeleton.

His breath quickened and the sweat began to pour forth from his brow as he stared upon the horror in the closet. He had to loosen his collar in order to breathe better and he couldn’t help but wonder what travesty happened in this room to hide a skeleton. Was a young girl murdered and raped here? Did a young teenager commit suicide? Or was there an occultist that lived her prior and used the skeleton for some crazy voodoo ritual? Roy had a million questions careening through his brain.

“Oh sorry that’s mine.”

He almost leapt three feet in the air when he heard a soft feminine voice speak. Whirling around to look behind him, he saw the translucent image of a young woman behind him, wearing a baggy jersey, her legs clad in black leggings. Her hair was brown, curled and gave her pale face the perfect frame. From ghastly lips and pale eyes she smiled at Roy. The woman couldn’t have been any older than nineteen. He began to feel a panic attack begin to arise as the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end and his heartbeat raced faster. With a slender hand she waved slightly at him.

“Hi,” She said.

Never in his life had Roy screamed so loud or so high before. Without another word, or thought he bolted out of the room and the apartment itself, not daring to look back at the skeleton or the ghost that spoke to him.