Episode Two: The Girl Upstair
848 Words
Maya didn’t move.
She stood at the bottom of the staircase, staring at the empty space where the little girl had been.
The hallway was silent again.
Too silent.
“Hello?”
Her voice sounded small.
No answer.
Maya looked toward the front door.
It was still locked.
She tried the handle again.
Nothing.
“Okay,” she whispered. “Don’t panic.”
Her phone suddenly vibrated.
Maya nearly dropped it.
For one second, she thought the signal had returned.
But there was no notification.
The screen simply displayed the time.
2:17 AM.
Maya frowned.
“That can’t be right.”
She had arrived shortly after seven.
She couldn’t possibly have been inside the house for seven hours.
She checked again.
2:17 AM.
The time didn’t change.
Then her phone rang.
Unknown number.
Maya stared at the screen.
She shouldn’t answer.
She knew that.
But something inside her told her that she had to.
She pressed accept.
For several seconds, there was only static.
Then she heard breathing.
Slow.
Uneven.
Familiar.
“Mom?”
The breathing stopped.
A whisper came through the phone.
“Don’t go upstairs.”
Maya’s blood turned cold.
“Mom, where are you?”
Silence.
Then:
“I’m underneath you.”
The call ended.
Maya dropped the phone.
She looked at the floor.
Underneath you.
Her eyes slowly moved toward the basement door.
It was at the end of the hallway.
Maya had never noticed it before.
The door was painted black.
And someone had carved a single word into it.
REMEMBER.
She stepped closer.
A terrible smell drifted through the cracks.
Something damp.
Something old.
Maya reached for the handle.
Then—
Knock. Knock. Knock.
She jumped.
The sound came from upstairs.
Three slow knocks.
Maya looked toward the staircase.
“Who’s there?”
Nothing.
Then another three knocks.
This time, they came from the bedroom directly above her.
Maya swallowed.
She remembered what the taxi driver had said.
Whatever you hear tonight… don’t answer it.
But she had already answered.
She slowly climbed the stairs.
Each step groaned beneath her weight.
Halfway up, she noticed something written on the wall.
It looked like a child’s handwriting.
MAYA
She stopped.
Below her name was another sentence.
YOU LEFT ME HERE.
“No…”
Maya backed away.
“I didn’t.”
The house answered.
A whisper came from behind her.
“Yes, you did.”
Maya spun around.
Nobody was there.
She ran the rest of the way upstairs.
There were five doors.
Four were closed.
One was slightly open.
The open door belonged to a child’s bedroom.
Maya pushed it wider.
A small bed stood against the wall.
Old toys covered the floor.
A wooden rocking horse sat beside the window.
It was moving.
Backwards.
Forwards.
Backwards.
Forwards.
Maya stared at it.
“I don’t remember this room.”
A photograph sat on the bedside table.
She picked it up.
It showed two little girls.
One was Maya.
The other was the girl from the stairs.
They were holding hands.
On the back of the photograph, someone had written:
MAYA AND ELLIE — SISTERS FOREVER.
Maya’s hands began shaking.
“Sister?”
A memory suddenly flashed through her mind.
A little girl screaming.
Her mother crying.
A locked door.
Fire.
Then darkness.
Maya dropped the photograph.
“No…”
She pressed her hands against her head.
“I don’t have a sister.”
The rocking horse stopped.
A child’s voice whispered from behind her.
“You did.”
Maya slowly turned.
The little girl stood in the doorway.
Blue dress.
Pale face.
Wet hair covering half her eyes.
Maya couldn’t move.
“What do you want?”
The girl smiled.
“I want you to remember.”
“Remember what?”
The girl’s smile disappeared.
“What you did to me.”
Maya’s breathing became shallow.
“I never hurt you.”
The girl pointed toward the basement.
“Then why did you lock the door?”
Suddenly, the bedroom door slammed shut.
Maya screamed.
The room went dark.
Something grabbed her ankle.
She fell.
Her fingers desperately searched the floor.
Then she heard her mother’s voice.
Not from the phone.
Not from the hallway.
Right beside her ear.
“Maya… run.”
The bedroom door suddenly opened.
Maya scrambled to her feet and ran.
She reached the staircase.
Behind her came the sound of tiny footsteps.
Fast.
Getting closer.
Maya ran downstairs.
She reached the front door and pulled it open.
This time, it opened.
She stumbled onto the porch.
Rain poured around her.
She turned back.
The house was completely dark.
No lights.
No movement.
No little girl.
Maya breathed heavily.
Then she noticed something on the porch.
A child’s shoe.
Blue.
Wet.
Exactly like the one the little girl had been wearing.
Maya stared at it.
Then the house whispered from behind her:
“You forgot the other one.”
Maya slowly looked down.
There were two tiny footprints beside her.
One set led from the house.
The other set led toward the woods.
And neither set belonged to her.
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