The Haunting of Ong's Hat

Katelyn lay in her bed trying to go to sleep. She had drawn the bed curtains around, and pulled the covers up to her face. Occasionally the room would light up from the distant storm and she would hear the low rumble seconds later. The sound of rain struck softly against the windows. She drifted in and out of sleep as she heard the clock strike the quarter hour, directing her hearing downstairs. Then she heard something more disturbing. It made her mad. The door knob on her closet began to move with a click, click, click, followed by the long slow creek of old rusty hinges. …..She felt something tug on her foot and then giggle in a high pitched demented little voice. Katelyn jammed the covers into her mouth, trying desperately not to scream. So begins the adventure of three unusual kids: Katelyn, her brother Joey and their neighbor, Taylor. The downturn in the economy had caused their father, Horace Wolfe, to lose his job. In desperation, the Wolfe family had little choice but to sell their home and move in with their Great Aunt Gertrude, into a house Katelyn referred to as disturbing. She had confided to her brother that it was “disquieting,” but that wasn’t the worst of it. The small community of Ong’s Hat had a terrible secret buried in its history, one which began with the arrival of its first inhabitants. Sacrifices and deals were made to appease restless spirits. But whatever dwelt in the Pine Barrens was more than alive, and it would make itself known among the living and the dead.