Morning came far too quickly, and I was exhausted. My eyes were heavy, my head ached, and yet the memory of the voice still clung to me. The phone sat on my desk like a loaded weapon. I didn't want to touch it, didn't want to hear it again. But I couldn't stop thinking about the message.
THE PARK.
The more I tried to push it out of my mind, the louder it echoed.
By the time I grabbed my backpack and headed downstairs, my parents were already gone for work. A note was stuck to the fridge: "Dinner's in the freezer. Be good. Love you."
I grabbed a cereal bar and glanced at my phone. It hadn't made a sound since last night—no notifications, no messages. Maybe it was over. Maybe Billy was right, and it was just a weird glitch.
Still, as I stared at the screen, something gnawed at the back of my mind.
The park.
---
School was a blur. Billy met me at my locker, grinning like always, but the moment he looked at me, his smile faded.
"You look like crap," he said, leaning against the lockers.
"Thanks, Billy. Really needed that."
He shrugged. "Well, you do. Did the haunted phone keep you up?"
I shot him a look. "Don't start."
Billy raised his hands in surrender. "Okay, okay. Relax. But seriously, you still freaking out?"
"I don't know," I admitted, grabbing my books. "It hasn't done anything today. Maybe it's fine now."
"You're being paranoid," Billy said, but I could tell he didn't entirely believe it. "It's probably just some weird app. Or maybe—" He wiggled his fingers at me mockingly. "—it's a ghost!"
I slammed my locker shut. "I hate you."
He grinned, but as I walked away, I could feel his eyes following me.
---
The moment the final bell rang, I knew what I was going to do. It was like something had taken root in my brain—a whisper I couldn't ignore. I had to go to the park.
It wasn't far, only a few blocks from my house. Kids played there on weekends, but during the week, it was mostly empty—a playground, a creaky old swing set, and a bench or two. Normal. Completely ordinary.
But as I stood at the entrance, staring through the rusted gate, I felt anything but normal.
The air here felt… heavy. Like the world had been holding its breath. The wind whispered through the trees, cold and biting, and every step I took made the hairs on my arms stand on end.
"Hello?" I called out. My voice sounded small, swallowed by the silence.
I stepped farther in, gravel crunching under my shoes. The playground sat abandoned, the swings swaying lightly, though there was no wind strong enough to move them. My gaze swept the area. Nothing. Just empty space and shadows stretching across the ground.
I sighed. "This is stupid," I muttered.
Then, my phone buzzed in my pocket.
I jumped, startled, and pulled it out. The screen was black, like before. A single word appeared:
HERE.
I froze, my breath catching. Slowly, I looked around. "Where?" I whispered.
The phone buzzed again. The word changed.
DOLL.
I turned, scanning the area, and my eyes caught on something near one of the benches—a shape, half-hidden in the dirt. It was small, old, and unmistakable.
A doll.
It was filthy, its clothes faded and torn. Its head lolled unnaturally to the side, one glassy eye staring straight at me.
I swallowed hard. My instincts screamed at me to turn around and leave, but my feet moved forward anyway. I stopped a few feet away, staring down at it.
"Is this what you wanted me to find?" I asked aloud. My voice trembled.
Silence.
Then, the doll moved.
I stumbled back, my heart hammering in my chest. I stared, unable to look away, as its small head tilted up. Its mouth opened—jagged and cracked—and I heard the voice again.
"You… found me."
The sound didn't come from the doll. It came from everywhere at once—inside my head, in the trees, beneath the earth. It wasn't just a voice anymore; it was a presence, pressing against me, suffocating.
"Who are you?" I whispered, my throat dry.
The doll twitched. Its head turned, and the voice came again.
"Help me."
The ground seemed to spin. I reached for the bench to steady myself, my pulse racing.
"What do you want from me?" I managed to say.
Suddenly, the air changed. The wind died. The shadows stretched longer, curling unnaturally around the doll. A chill crept up my spine as a figure began to take shape beside it—faint at first, like smoke. Then clearer.
A boy.
He looked young, maybe eighteen, with hollow eyes and a faded t-shirt. He didn't move, didn't speak. He just stood there, watching me.
I opened my mouth to say something—to ask him who he was, why he was here—but no words came out.
Finally, he whispered, "You need to see."
"See what?" I asked, my voice shaking.
He pointed to the doll. "What happened to me."
And before I could say another word, the world around me shifted.
The playground vanished. The bench, the trees, the gravel—it all blurred and faded until I was standing in the same park, but it was different. The light had changed, the air thicker, and somewhere nearby, I heard the faint sound of laughter—children's voices, distant and distorted.
I turned around, my heart in my throat.
The boy was gone. The doll lay still at my feet.
"What's happening?" I whispered.
Then I saw him—a man, moving through the shadows at the edge of the park, dragging something heavy behind him. A cold dread washed over me. I wanted to run, to look away, but I couldn't. My body refused to move.
The man stopped in the center of the park and dropped what he was carrying. A boy's body.
My breath caught in my chest. The body was limp, lifeless. It was him. The ghost.
I watched, frozen in horror, as the man picked up the doll and placed it gently on the ground next to the body. Then he looked around, as if to make sure no one was watching, and disappeared into the darkness.
Silence followed.
I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe.
Then, slowly, the ghostly figure of the boy appeared again, standing next to his body. He looked at me with sad, empty eyes.
"Now you know," he said softly.
The scene around me began to blur and fade again, and I felt myself falling—falling backward through time, through air, through nothingness—until I landed hard on the gravel of the playground.
I gasped, sitting up. The park was empty again. The doll lay beside me, still and silent.
I scrambled to my feet, my heart pounding. "What was that?" I yelled.
The voice whispered one last time, faint and distant.
"Help me…"
---
End of Chapter Two