Suddenly, the footsteps stopped at what seemed to be the top of the stairs. My eyes were shut tight and for some reason, I covered my ears because I was frightened. I didn’t want to see who it was, or even worst, what it was. The house became silent again and even though we were in the dark, my sister and I starred at one another and we laid there in fear. We will never know what it was, but we will never forget the footsteps on that dark night. 

My grandmas house in Mexico, is the last house on the right. It is an old two story house painted in a beautiful light blue shade that has paint chipping off it revealing the rough cement under it. A garden is out front filled with colors ranging from yellow like the sun on a golden summer day to blue like the summer’s sky that holds the sun. 

Being Hispanic, my family has always taunted me and my siblings with scary superstitions to old folk legends. It didn’t help that my family based all these superstitions and folk legends in Mexico. They have always warned us to not stay up late, not to comb your hair at night, don’t play with dolls at night, don’t look in the mirror at night.

Night, night, night, night. “Nothing good comes from the night time. Everything bad and scary comes out at night” is what my mother repeated over and over. I must admit, my family has accomplished the fact that I don’t like sleeping in Mexico. 

Upstairs in my grandmas house, the walls are a light brown and deep red tone that makes the red brick ceiling stand out. Her floors are a creme vanilla shade with brown lines and specs making patterns across them. There are three rooms, one bath, one balcony and an upstairs living area that we created into a room as we visited. My sister Lupe and I stayed there and we felt free to do anything since we weren’t in a room. We said our good nights as the rest of my family closed their room doors behind them.

I being eight and my sister fourteen, of course, we stayed up laughing at the memories of the day, feeling excited for our adventures the following day, and commenting on how we’ve missed being in Mexico. We were constantly waking up my mother and hearing her yell at us to go to bed. The time came. The light switch was on the opposite side of the room and stairs and we were fighting and telling one another to go turn it off. We were both scared of the fact that we would have to run in complete darkness to get back onto the bed. 

I being the younger one, she made me do it. I Switched the light off and in complete darkness my feet stomped on the tile floor as I dashed across and I jumped into bed making the springs squeak loud in the quite night. My sister and I continued to talk and giggle with one another, but then we were interrupted by foot steps, and not just any foot steps, but footsteps at the bottom of the long staircase. We knew it couldn’t have been someone that left the room because we would have seen them. 

We froze in fear. Not a single breathe escaped from either one of us. We continued to hear the footsteps and wanted so badly for it to stop. The light switch seemed like it was miles away and neither of us dared to even move our eyes to look at it even worst to run for the light.

Thump, thump, thump, thump. Slowly and at a steady beat almost like a drum the footsteps got closer and closer. My grandma has a metal rail that leads up the stairs and as clear as water, we heard as if they held on to the rain to help walk up. Thump, thump, thump.