Some people swore that the house was haunted. Some swore that the previous owners had gone insane. The creek of the windows and the moan of the century old house atop of hill was enough to make people think twice about passing the lonely driveway. For as long as anybody could remember, there were rumors and odd events surrounding the house. Despite the eerie rumors, the Johnson family decided to move into the house in a quaint suburb of Boston, Massachusetts.

The Johnson family was an ordinary family. Their family consisted of two parents, Michael and Susan, their fifteen-year-old daughter, Marie, and their terrier dog, Shadow. As seasons passed, they partook in seemingly ordinary activities and Marie made many friends at her new school. There were parties, hour-long phone conversations, sleepovers, and Susan became the class parent at Marie’s new school. Quickly, they became the most popular family in the neighborhood. The neighbors were amiable and the spine-chilling building on the hill became known as the Johnson’s house.

Summer and fall had passed with less and less being seen of the Johnsons. Marie no longer attended school and the dog was never seen. Slowly but surely, the eerie presence that was associated with the house came back as the flowers began to die and the soil began to rot. There were calls made to the Johnson’s answering machine and the house looked deserted. The neighbors had become worried because they could not fathom where the family had gone.

Inside the house, the Johnson’s had a secret. Marie was a clone. She was the clone of a sister whom she had never met because she had died before Marie was born. Michael and Susan had felt it necessary to steal information on cloning from MIT because they had grief from the untimely death of their first daughter, Maria. Michael had formerly worked as a professor at MIT and had full access to the material. It had been a risky move; yet, Michael and Susan thought it was worth it to have the daughter they had always wanted back.

They were beginning to have problems with the logistics of taking care of Marie’s needs as she was growing. They needed to maintain her health and give her special medicine for her manipulated cells. The problems were that Michael and Susan were in hiding because they stole information from MIT and Marie did not know that she was a clone. Michael and Susan needed to lie low while trying to attain the medical supplies and answer Marie’s questions about her past and her parent’s odd behavior. They needed to explain to Marie what had happened.


Early in the morning in the basement of the creaky house, Michael and Susan decided to tell Marie about her sister. Maria had been killed in a driving accident that had been Susan’s fault. Michael and Susan had been grief-stricken and felt that stealing the information was the only answer. Marie was shocked to learn about her past. Nonetheless, she was willing to help her parents get the necessary medicine.

During their time in hiding, Susan and Michael had become wanted criminals. They decided to skip town and create a science lab in Canada to figure out what medicine they needed. After they left, the town learned about what had happened in the family’s past. They were shocked that criminals and a secret like that could live next to them. From then on they closed and locked all of their windows and doors because the atmosphere of the town had become one of anxiety and fear. Nothing was ever the same after that.