It stood alone. Empty. Abandoned.

Since the original owners had vanished, many had tried to live on the old farm. Those that survived never spoke of what they saw in the few days, sometimes the few hours, that they lived there.

The house, itself, was fine. Always clean, though no one ever visited the farm. Warm in the winters, cool in the summers. A fine house.

But the barn. No one had been in the barn in over a hundred years. “Haunted,” they said. “At night, you can hear (children/animals/people/demons/take your pick) screaming inside!” they said.

This was an exaggeration, of course. You could only hear the screaming during the winter solstice.

Year round, though, nothing within an acre of the barn would grow. Crops. Trees. Flowers. Nothing. The few trees that were there were older than the barn, but had borne no leaves since that fateful night.

Except for the screams, any who dare enter the barn, though, are never heard from again.

For the barn is lonely.

It keeps what it finds.