She was the best nanny in the southeast. Everyone in the small town of Peachville knew it,and loved her dearly. Her specialty was children; she was patient and gentle, yet she knew how to be stern when the need called for it. Miss Emma was the nanny of the most prestigious and wealthy family in Peachville, John and Mae Sommer and their three children. It was a well known fact in the small town of gossip that the Sommer’s took in Miss Emma when she was little, after the mysterious death of her family.
What no one knew about Miss Emma was that she had a brain tumor in her head that started to develop. Undiscovered due to lack of knowledge and technology, the tumor settled on her hypothalamus, the small part of her brain that triggered her emotions, namely her aggression. Our story starts on one bright summer day when John was called away on business. Mae elected to go with him at the last minute, needing a break from home. That, of course, left Miss Emma at home to watch their three children, Junior, Rose, and Charles.
One night after supper, the children were supposed to be upstairs washing up for bed. However, as we all know, this rarely gets accomplished without some horseplay and general ruckus. Unfortunately, this particular night Emma had been suffering from a severe headache at the hands of her tumor. Suddenly, what would usually just be a call for some discipline became much more. The loud laughing and shouting of Rose as her brothers chased her around the upstairs hallways, and the playful threats of her siblings became too much for poor Emma’s searing head. Her rage slowly gaining momentum as it built up, Emma rose from her chair in the sitting room and shouted up at the children. “I told you all to wash up for be now! I’m not in the mood for this tonight!” Her warning went seemingly unheard however as the children continued to goof around.
Unable to control the increasing pain in her head due to her tumor, the only thought going through her mind in her fit of rage was to someway, somehow, make that horrendous noise stop. Jumping to her feet, she stormed into John Sommer’s trophy room and snatched his prized hunting rifle form its spot above the mantle. No longer able to think clearly, the once gentle and beloved nanny made her way upstairs to silence the children that she once loved as her own. As soon as she hit the upstairs landing, however, Rose ran up to her and hid behind her leg, laughing all the while, with her two brothers not far behind her, a mischievous gleam in their young eyes.
“I’ve told you once already to stop this insane ruckus and wash up for bed. I will not repeat myself a second time.” The angry, clipped voice of Miss Emma startle the playful children, but not for long. Known for playfulness herself, in her normal state that is, the children did not take Emma seriously and continued on their way. This, however, proved to be a fatal mistake.
“I said,” came the biting voice once again, “that I wasn’t going to repeat myself.” Before the unknowing children had a chance to react, Miss Emma raised her boss’s prized hunting rifle and began firing. In one terrible moment, all three children dropped to the ground, a bullet in each of their innocent chests.
However too late, Miss Emma came to her senses, the splitting pain from the tumor having finally retreated. A wail of despair left her lips as she looked down and realized what she had done. Knowing she wouldn’t be able to live with herself after that terrible deed, Miss Emma, the town’s most beloved and respected nanny, raised the rifle to her temple and pulled the trigger. The four bodies were not found until John and Mae returned home two days later.
However, Miss Emma and her three victims did not wish to leave the wealthy Sommer home where they had lived all their lives. They can still be seen roaming the halls of the now abandoned house. If you happen to be in Peachville on a warm summer’s night, when the moon in full, stop by their mansion. They say you can still hear the laughter of the children in the upstairs hall, and a lantern shine, forever moving from the sitting room to the trophy room, and then upstairs. And listen for the gunshot, as Miss Emma forever relives her horrible deed, even in death.
