The wind picked up and branches brushed the side of his new home. Three weeks they lived together. Had it been so awful living with him that she couldn't make it three weeks? Sean didn't want to think about it anymore. He fumbled in his pockets searching for the key. He hadn't had a car in months, his keyring sat unused in a box somewhere The lone key felt strange and out of place in his pocket.
  It was always so cold when he opened the door, even with the muggy, humid outside air. 
 A silent reminder that he was home, and Katie wasn't.
 The room at the top of the stairs was locked. It was locked when they looked at the house. The realtor assured them that old houses often had locks that rusted over. He was going to get a locksmith to come out, but Katie was gone and he did not care to hurry as much as she had. It was his home now, and he could do things in his own time.
 Sean didn't remember there being so many frogs, when the realtor was around. Every day their numbers grew. At night, the grass seemed to be alive with them. He wondered where they went in the day. It seemed impossible for that many frogs to just disappear with the sunrise. It seemed impossible that Katie was gone now too, though. 
 *Stop thinking about it.*
 As he laid in their bed, he could not find sleep. It always came too late and often caused more trouble than it was worth. When sleep did finally come to him, he dreamed she came home. Dreamed she never left. It was a simple dream, but it was good. And there were no frogs.
 He'd been in his house for a total of three weeks, and still didn't quite feel at home. Sean suspected it'd be a while before he could love the house without Katie's warmth. A long while.
 The idea to buy a home together had been his, and Sean often wondered if that's what pushed her away. It had to be. The search for the perfect home, in the perfect place, for the perfect price was daunting and difficult and in the end all he got were those frogs.
 Sean didn't find it the least bit disconcerting that there was a room in his home that he had never entered. It was just an attic, or some kind of storage room, he had always assumed. Laying in their bed he began to wonder. His favorite place to look while trying to find sleep, was her old closet. It always reminded him of her. That silly way she would take herself so seriously when she put on make up in the closet mirror. She looked so ridiculous making faces at herself.
 He often thought about the billions of people in the world asleep at this moment, and how jealous he was of them. He took small comfort in thinking that there had to be some of them as miserable as him. Maybe he actually was the saddest person alive.
  That night he dreamed she was in the room at the top of the stairs, staring silent at one of the walls. He was usually with her in dreams, but tonight he was just a phantom spectator. That was all that happened, the entire time she spent staring lifeless at the wall until she let out a shriek that sent electricity through his veins and woke him. This did not feel like one of his usual dreams. It was so visceral and real, it felt almost as if it were memory. A dull terror ebbed through him as he woke for the day. He needed to go into the room.
 He jiggled the locked handle and cursed himself for remembering it was Sunday and the locksmith was closed. Sean found his wallet and began to try and pop the door open with a credit card. When that failed, he went to the garage to get his toolbox. The screws on the handle were rusted tight, but eventually gave. Sean wondered how many hands had opened this door before him. He placed the antique handle on the top stair and pushed the door. Even in the morning light, the door swung open to a pitch black room.

 *No windows up here*, Sean thought.

 He fished for his flashlight and found the switch. Beams of light shone from above and filled the room. The room looked just as it had in his dream. Some old furniture, a chest of drawers, everything was just as it was the night before. Everything except for the wall where Katie had been staring. Instead of an empty space, there was a large armoir. An ancient thing, it was black oak colored and looked as if it hadn't seen daylight in a long while. He paced slowly over to it, and anxiously opened. 
 Nothing. 
 What was she doing in here? There was a red­brown smudge peeking out from behind the lumbering thing. Sean slid the armoir to the side and was taken aback by what he saw.
 A single switch set in the center, and blood brown words sprawled across the wall.

LEAVE

IT

BE

 It appeared to be in the “Off” position, but there were no words saying what it did. He did not have a good feeling about this, but he trusted Katie. She may have left him, but she would never purposely hurt him. It couldn't possibly be so bad of a thing, right? It was just a switch, the house had a dozen of them, and they all were harmless. The warning was a little ominous. He was pretty sure it was blood, and hoped it wasn't human. 
 He stretched his hand out and slowly reached for the switch. At first contact he recoiled and thought it over. *What's the harm?* He rationalized. Sean flipped the switch up and at that precise moment there was a loud knocking on the attic door.

 Sean jumped and fell over on to some covered furniture. It was eight o'clock in the morning and someone was already in his house and up his stairs.

“Baby, it's me, are you up here?” a familiar voice cried. Sean was confused. It couldn't be...

He walked over to the door and it slowly creaked open. There she was, Katie, the love of his life. She was still had on everything she was wearing when he found her hanging in their closet.

With the noose still around her neck.