For October 27:
Plot:
The narrator looks back to being a twelve-year-old boy in a house full of adults who didn’t pay much attention to him.
The boy has trouble sleeping in the summer heat. His upstairs room is under a gable, and the sun hits the sloping roof with little insulation. He hears every rustle of the cottonwood trees outside. Other noises start coming from under the roof and above the ceiling.
Can’t be rats. Rats run. This just moves. Years later, he would see an amoeba under a microscope. It moves like a huge amoeba.
It soon comes every night and then during the day.
The boy knows there’s no sense in talking to the adults in the house about the noises. They won’t believe him, nor do they care. They once stood without lifting a finger to help while a fifteen-year-old neighbor boy gave him a thorough thrashing. Only when the older boy grew tired did he go home. The narrator received no sympathy but a scolding.
His one attempt to ask if anyone heard something in the night earns him a reprimand for interrupting a discussion about local politics.
One day, when he’s home alone, the boy goes into the attic to find what’s making the noises.
Thoughts:
This short tale is crafted with its aim toward the final encounter. The main character is isolated and without resources. He’s terrified and left without anywhere to turn. He finally decides to confront his demon himself.
It reads almost like a memoir. Is it all in the boy’s imagination? Is there some malign presence up under the roof trying to scare the bejesus out of him? He is without adult help or guidance. He does the only thing left to him.
The tale is nicely atmospheric and suspenseful rather than bloody. It will not appeal to everyone, but I liked it.
Bio: Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986) was born in a village named Kamundongo, near the city of Silva Porto (now Cuíto) in Portuguese West Africa (now Angola), where his father was stationed as a medical officer. The family came to the United States when Wellman was a small child. Wellman wrote mostly fantasy works and some sci-fi with a few Westerns and crime dramas. One of his most well-known works was the John the Balladeer series.
The story can be read here (p. 179 after downloading pdf):viewer doesn’t always load.
The story can be listened to here:(12:05)
Title: “Up Under the Roof”
Author: Manly Wade Wellman (1903-1986)
First Published: Weird Tales, October 1938
Length: short story
Reviews of Old and New Stories. Mostly Old 
Sad beginning of a story. Poor boy. You decribed it very nicely.
Thank you. the ending is happier. 🙂