My House of Horrors

“Have you seen my child?” a voice said in Xiao Gu’s ear. Within his view, the woman from afar turned her head like she was looking into his eyes. Shivering, Xiao Gu involuntarily staggered backward.

“Are you okay?” The doctor stood up and very kindly went to hold Xiao Gu. There was a weird smell on the man.

“I’m fine, thank you.” Xiao Gu turned back to look. Because he was so close, he realized that the doctor wore nothing under his white coat. Xiao Gu’s expression changed, and he quickly introduced some distance between him and the doctor.

“Good, good.” The doctor maintained the smile on his face. He stood next to Xiao Gu for a while before returning to his seat. Forcing a smile, Xiao Gu hugged his arms, which were covered with goosebumps. “The man is a pervert. Just what kind of person I’ve met tonight?”

Xiao Gu wanted to leave, but once he remembered the woman with the red raincoat waiting for him, he started to have second thoughts. Between the pervert and a ghost, he thought about it and felt like it was safer to stay in the bus. Even though the passengers were weird, at least they were human.

Along the way, Huang Ling’s phone rang several more times. The man on the phone kept asking where she was even though Huang Ling had told him many times already. Whenever her phone rang, it was the man asking for her location. This repeated several times until Huang Ling thought that the man was toying with her, so she switched off her phone directly.

“You’ve failed so many of the promises that you’ve given, now do you finally regret it?” Huang Ling seemed to have many things in her heart. Through the conversation, Xiao Gu had a brief idea of Huang Ling’s situation. Her husband was not working. On the surface, he told others he was a freelancer, but in reality, it was Huang Ling who held up the whole family on her own.

After the phone got switched off, the bus became quiet again expect for the occasional cough from the child. The rain flooded the city. The bus raced down Route 104—no one had any idea where its final destination would be.

The bus is supposed to drive around the city, but how come it feels like we’re leaving the city? There are no people around, and the surroundings look so deserted.

The lights in the buildings outside were off, and the place felt strange.

Several minutes later, the bus arrived at Li Wan Mall, and the doors opened. Xiao Gu leaned against the glass to look. The woman in the red raincoat was standing right at the edge of the station, looking at the bus silently.

At the next stop, she’ll be showing up at the door. Should I wait until she gets on first before I get off?

Xiao Gu was coming up with an escape when an argument came from the other side of the bus stop. They were being very loud. The woman’s voice was shrill, and the man was not holding back; it felt like they were going to get physical.

Turning to look, Xiao Gu saw a man and a woman hugging each other tightly but caught in the middle of a big argument. The man wanted to get on the bus, but the woman tried her best to make him stay. She scratched, pawed, and screamed, basically going anything she could to make him stay.

What is up with them? Xiao Gu pulled his head back. Already in such a big argument, why are they still stuck together? They can’t tear themselves apart from each other?

The bus stopped for a full minute. With the woman’s madness, the man failed to get on the bus. The bus moved away from the bus stop slowly.

“The rain has been falling for an hour already, but the two’s clothes were dry. Looks like they have been arguing here for a long time already.” Xiao Gu turned to look back at the stop. The arguing couple had already disappeared—only the red shadow was left.

“Where did they go?” He stood up to take a better look. He wanted to open the window, but he was unable to get it to open. The lock seemed to be broken.

This is too weird. Xiao Gu was getting more and more uneasy. Could that couple be ghosts, too? But they acted so normally…

Holding the phone, Xiao Gu looked down, and he was reminded of the articles that he had read earlier.

Li Wan Mall? Something happened here too! Xiao Gu looked through his phone and found the news about the couple committing self-immolation at Li Wan Mall. The picture attached had blurred out their faces, but the couple hugged each other tightly in the fire like they did not want to be separated even after death.

Isn’t this too much of a coincidence? The doctor and couple are the same as the news—are they all ghosts? Do ghosts also need to take the bus?

Xiao Gu glanced at the doctor across from him. The man in the white coat kept his eyes glued on Huang Ling like he was having some dirty thoughts in his mind.

Nah, this man is probably just a pervert, not a ghost.

The bus continued to move forward. No one got on the bus, but Xiao Gu noticed something weird. The bus would stop for a full minute at every stop. Xiao Gu intended to leave several times, but his courage would disappear whenever he saw the woman at the station. The situation was different from what he thought. The woman got closer and closer to the bus, but she did not look like she was getting on. She only stood at the backdoor like she was waiting for someone.

Why is she so hung up on this bus?

The more Xiao Gu thought about it, the more afraid he became. In the end, he took out his phone and searched for Chen Ge’s number.

Directly calling Brother Chen might not be a good idea. If I’m really haunted, then I’ll only drag Brother Chen down with me.

Xiao Gu hesitated. In the end, he decided to message Chen Ge. He wrote down everything that happened that night, and after confirming he did not leave anything out, he sent it to Chen Ge.

While he was writing the message, the bus stopped at its next station—Eastern Jiujiang’s Dam.

The bus stopped, and there were footsteps coming from the platform. Three soaking wet men got on the bus. They had their heads lowered, and their clothes were dripping wet. They were silent and shuffled onto the bus without paying the fare. The driver pretended to not see the three, but from the sweat that trailed down to his chin, it was clear that he was very nervous.

After the three got on, they sat around Xiao Gu. One of them even sat next to him. A smell of decay drifted into his nostril, and Xiao Gu leaned closer to the window. Since they were so close, Xiao Gu could see that the three looked like they had just been hauled out of the water. Their skin was pale and wrinkled.

Xiao Gu did not dare to look any closer. He took out his phone to send the message to Chen Ge. The bus started again. Probably because they had entered the countryside, the bus wiggled. Slowly, they left the dam and officially entered Eastern Jiujiang.

Water dripped from the men’s bodies. The eyes of the three men slowly pushed out from their sockets. Their bodies swayed along with the bus. and they slowly leaned toward Xiao Gu.

After the bus left the station, Xiao Gu’s phone vibrated. It was Chen Ge’s reply. “Can you call me now? It’s very important!”