My parents passed away last year, and my family and I are getting things cleaned up to sell their home.

There have been lots of creepy surprises along the way. The jack-o-lantern door mat and classic horror movie DVD’s were warm reminders of my dad and his love of spooky stuff. The bags of bones were probably from an art project of his. The old plastic doll, missing an eye, her head turned around, and mysteriously standing in the middle of the workshop was weird, but not in a bad way.

But my family didn’t like the haunted shed.

The shed probably wasn’t really haunted.  Sure, it was filled with some odd things.

Medical equipment is not inherently scary, and old wheelchairs and walkers shouldn’t be surprising in a home where elderly people passed their last days. But my parents never used this equipment.

The dust and cobwebs were simply what collects in an outbuilding under the trees. They were lovely, in their way, draped on the walls and hanging from the ceiling. There was rusted scaffolding in there, and tools. A hammer with the hand-built handle. A pitchfork. Multiple machetes. It had a dirt floor, so of course something had burrowed up into the old squirrel cage and built a nest. The aesthetic was right up my alley. Dim and claustrophobic. Creaking. Dilapidated.

My family said it felt bad in there.

The haunted shed was recently cleared out by professional trash haulers.  Everything was pulled out and stacked on trailers, mundane in the light of the day.

But I like to wonder, will hauling all that away expel everything that was moving in there?