Author: M D Smith IV

Uncle Robert had never been wrong.
At least, that was how he told it. At holidays, his certainty arrived before he did, settling into rooms like a sour draft no one could quite locate. He corrected memories that weren’t his, adjusted stories mid-sentence, replaced laughter with lectures. When contradicted, he smiled patiently, the way adults smile at children who insist the sky is green.
“I remember things accurately,” he liked to say. “Other people get confused.”
After Grandma died, Robert said the house was his. The will said otherwise. He waved the papers away without reading them. “That’s not what she meant,” he said, tapping his temple. “I knew her better than anyone. I’m a medium and occult.”
We moved in anyway. My wife, our daughter, and me. Robert lived three states away. Or so we believed.
The first correction came quietly.
We hung a framed family photo in the hallway. The next morning it was lower, centered with mathematical precision. A kitchen chair we favored by the window was pushed back against the wall. A door we always kept closed stood open, breathing cold air into the room.
“That’s not where it goes,” Robert’s voice murmured from somewhere inside the walls. Calm. Certain.
At night, I dreamed he stood at the foot of our bed, straightening the blankets. You’re remembering it wrong. You didn’t lock that door. You never do.
We changed the locks. They unlocked themselves.
My wife began sleeping lightly, jerking awake at the smallest sound. She swore she saw Robert once at the end of the hall, shaking his head sadly at the way we slept, at the way we lived. Our daughter stopped playing in her room and started arranging her toys in neat rows, explaining softly that Uncle Robert preferred order.
The final argument came during a storm. Thunder shook the house. The lights died. Our daughter screamed that Uncle Robert was in her room, telling her how to breathe properly.
I ran down the hall and found her standing upright, eyes fixed on nothing, inhaling and exhaling in a slow, rigid rhythm that wasn’t hers.
“He says this is the right way,” she whispered.
I shouted into the dark, told Robert he was wrong. Told him the house was mine.
The walls creaked, correcting me.
Morning came quietly. The storm was gone. So was my family.
Uncle Robert is right. The house belongs to him.