Ellie didn't remember walking home.
She didn't remember unlocking the front door.
She only remembered the girl's face. That smile.
It wasn't a child's smile.
Now, sitting in her childhood bedroom, Ellie clutched the old shoe wrapped in a dish towel. Her laptop sat open, the screen filled with police records she shouldn't have access to—thanks to an old contact who still owed her a favor.
Lila Harper.
Eight years old. Vanished October 16, 1996.
Last seen at a school Halloween party—dressed as a ghost. No leads. Case cold.
But the report was wrong. Lila had not disappeared at the school.
Ellie remembered something. A scent.
Smoke.
It came back in a wave—ash in the air, someone screaming, lights flickering across the grove.
She was six. There had been a fire.
But her parents had said it was a dream.
She opened Miss Whitaker's diary again, flipping past the cryptic entries—until she saw one circled in red pen.
> October 10th
I've decided to go back to the well. I don't care what the town says. They buried what happened to Lila. She didn't run. She was taken. The woods never let go of what they want to keep.
Below it was a hand-drawn symbol—a crude shape, like a spiral made of roots.
Ellie stared at it. Her fingers tingled.
She'd drawn that before. On her notebook. On napkins. Over and over as a kid.
She reached for her phone and called Detective Granger. Straight to voicemail.
She left a message: "I found something. The well's real. So was Lila. I think Miss Whitaker knew who—what—took her."
A creak echoed through the hallway outside her room.
Ellie froze.
"Mom?" she called.
No answer.
She stepped into the hallway, heart pounding.
And saw the girl again.
At the far end. Yellow coat. Bare feet.
She stood perfectly still, staring.
Ellie took a step forward. "Lila—"
The girl opened her mouth. But no sound came out.
Instead, ash poured from it. Soft gray flakes drifting to the floor.
Then she was gone.