The school festival was already a nightmare and it hadn't even officially started yet.
The Paranormal Investigations Club—twenty-five of us, loosely organized under a banner of "mystery and exploration"—was setting a booth display between the club rooms of the chess nerds and the overachievers, already running a blood-pressure booth. Our own contribution to the chaos? A DIY ghost photography display, a borrowed monitor looping grainy EVP footage, and a stack of "haunted trivia" flyers that Jordan printed last night while cramming for our exams.
"What a mess." I sighed.
We had plenty of people, but somehow, we still ended up with this bland mess. But I had to agree somewhat. This was definitely way better than sitting around doing nothing all day and being a passerby. At the thought of this I tightly gripped the tape that I was holding on one hand and stretched it to let my classmate cut the other end of the tape.
This was my role in the Paranormal Investigations Club at the school festival: quiet, competent, vaguely useful. And invisible. Mostly invisible.
While the booths beside ours looked as appealing.. I could not argue for ours. While the booths beside ours looked lively—maybe even a little overambitious—I couldn't exactly defend our own.
To our left, the Chess Club had set up a small arena, complete with velvet ropes, fake trophies, and a live bracket displayed on a screen twice the size of our entire table. To our right, the club which seemed to completely comprise of just haughty overachievers were doing well doing what they do best- showing off. Sure we'd have people come by and pass through our booth but it wasn't that interesting as they mostly stayed for only a minute when they would just decide to look at the other booths.
I was about to retreat to the corner of the room when I heard a very specific, very dangerous voice call out.
"There you are, Remy!"
I didn't even get a chance to turn before Hailey Collins slid into view.
She had her signature messy blonde hair, long and layered like she'd tried to braid it and gave up halfway. Her uniform shirt was slightly wrinkled beneath a soft, oversized beige-gray sweater that she clearly wasn't supposed to be wearing under regulation. The collar of her uniform peeked out sharply against it, giving her this weird mix of rulebreaker and teacher's pet.
"How's the booth going?" Hailey asked tilting her head before turning towards the club room. Her sneakers squeaked against the pavement as she slid up beside me, the smell of her fruity shampoo wafting by. Her cheeks were flushed from the late summer heat.
"I want to go home." I frowned.
She chuckled and gave me a very hard slap on my shoulder. I think she might have gone overboard with that slap because I can feel something just broke. "I see. Then that means it's all going well, just as I expected from my assistant!" She flashed a smile and hurried over to my classmates who were busy making last minute decorations to the booth.
I don't remember agreeing to be her assistant, but she clearly decided I was. No point fighting it now.
They were busy cutting out the decorations for a cardboard sign reading "Do You Believe?"
"Where were you Hailey? Our president was just looking for you moments ago" I asked Hailey who was also helping them cut out the carboard into pieces.
Hailey waved off the question back at me as if I'm some fly or something. "Scouting. Getting more ideas for our shtick," she said, pointing vaguely at the booth as if it deserved more credit than it did.
I was about to reply when Jordan—eternally sleep-deprived and smelling faintly of printer ink—hurried over with a weird look on his face. "Hey, uh… Remy? Can you look at this?" Jordan's hands trembled slightly as he held out the flyer, the paper crinkling.The ink had smudged a bit near the bottom, but that wasn't what caught my attention.
It was the last trivia entry on the sheet. One I hadn't seen during layout review.
"Black Mansion on Whitewell Street, sealed off after 1995 and said to be the home of a family of 4- now long brutally murdered. Rumors say the killer lives in this very mansion to this day."
As I read the flyer I cringed and frowned. "We weren't supposed to use real life murder stories."
Jordan blinked. "Dude, this wasn't in the original doc. I swear."
"That's odd," Hailey said, snatching the flyer from my hands and narrowly squinted at the flyer. "The Black Mansion on Whitewell Street… That sounds familiar."
I watched as her eyes lit up in recognition. "I watched her dig through her bag for her phone. The more excited she got, the more certain I became that this would go badly. Not supernaturally — logistically."
"This is the very same mansion?!" Hailey proudly exclaimed as she lifted a finger pointing it to the article.
"Y-yeah..It seems like it, although I wonder why that article sneaked its way in to the flyers. I must have dozed off a little too much last night." Jordan rubbed his eyes and tried to concentrate carefully as he tried to stifle a yawn. "Well whatever this is, we got to get rid of this flyer before someone does find out." I openly said.
"It's not like its even real in the first place." There's no practical reason a killer would stay in the scene of the crime. It draws attention. The story's probably exaggerated. I scoffed at the ridiculous idea. Who would do such a thing?
Hailey didn't speak right away. Just kept staring at the letter. Not like she was excited. More like… entranced.
"We should check it out," she finally whispered. "I think… I think we're supposed to."
"What? Are you crazy? There is no way in hell that's even real." I pointed out.
"But what if it's not?" Hailey whispered, a little too excited. "What if we used this for our next club event? Like… real haunted house. Real photos. We could even film it. Boom. Instant credibility."
I stared at her. "Hailey, taking a group of students to a condemned site over an unverified flyer? That's how people end up in court. Or the morgue."
She grinned. "Oh my god, you get it. That's why we're friends, Remy. That and your amazing talent for saying no and doing it anyway."
God help me, she looked genuinely inspired.
Before I could reply, a shadow fell across our booth. An older man—thirty‑something, maybe—stood just beyond the velvet rope. Black coat despite the heat, brimmed hat tilted forward so I couldn't see his eyes. He held a single flyer between gloved fingers.
"Afternoon," he said, voice low and unhurried.