The thing at the bottom of the stairs.

When I was four or five, we stayed with some of our family in an old house.

Because it was so many people I usually slept with either

my mom or my sister. Mostly my mom. I always felt uneasy when I visited this house, especially at night.

This one time I was sleeping with my mom and I heard someone calling my name.

At first I thought it was my sister of one of my cousins.

I got out of bed, left the room, and went into the hallway. It was always

dimly lit at night in case anyone needed to go to the bathroom. I looked down the hall to the

rooms my sister and cousins were in, but their doors were closed

and I didn't see any lights peeking under the doors, so I knew they hadn't called me.

I heard the voice call my name again.

I immediately turned in the direction of the stairs

at the other end of the hall.

The voice kept calling my name and telling me they needed my help.

I slowly walked down the hall and stopped at the top of the stairs. The hallway light illuminated

most of the stairs except for the bottom two, so I couldn't see anything beyond that point,

just darkness. The voice called my name again but the tone shifted slightly.

It was a little more friendly and inviting. It said again that it needed my help. I asked it why it needed my help, but it said a way to have to show me for me to understand.

It begged me to come down the stairs so that it could show me. I took a step down the stairs, but a voice in my head said it was a trick. So I yelled down to the voice that it was trying to trick me and I was going to get my mom. The voice

started begging me more to help it and began to make crying sounds as if it were in

pain. I immediately felt bad for it. I started taking more steps down the stairs as the voice

continued to plead for my help. I got halfway down the stairs when a voice screamed loudly in my ear.

...