Through Their Eyes

The Loop Restarts

Emby gasped and bolted upright in bed. The morning sunlight streamed through her window. Her tea sat untouched on the table beside her.

For a fleeting moment, she thought it was over. A dream, maybe. But then her phone buzzed. A message showed on her dimly lit screen.

From: Jason M.

“I don’t think I want to be seen at prom with your weird ass friend Sky. I only said yes because of the bet.”

Emby’s fingers trembled as she read the words. The same words from the day Skylar was taken. And outside her window, the same crow perched on the fence, its white eyes gleaming.

It cawed once.

Then twice.

The sound echoed like a warning.

And it was deep beneath Fright Wood, something nefarious is beginning to emerge once more.

The memories came crashing back so vividly that Emby nearly dropped her phone.

The bet.

She remembered every cruel detail of it.

Jason Mathews wasn’t just another student at FrightWood High. He was the captain of the football team, the golden boy every teacher praised and every freshman wanted to be. Charming when adults were watching and ruthless when they weren’t. Jason surrounded himself with friends who treated people’s feelings like entertainment.

It had started a month before prom.

During lunch, one of Jason’s teammates had pointed across the cafeteria toward Skylar, who sat alone reading one of her thick books on folklore while scribbling strange symbols in the margins of her notebook. She never paid attention to the whispers around her anymore. Years of being called the orphan girl, witch, and or freak had taught her to tune them out.

“I bet you couldn’t get her to fall for you,” one of the boys laughed.

“Nah,” another replied. “Forget falling for him. Bet you can’t even get her to sleep with you on prom night.”

The table erupted with laughter.

Jason leaned back in his chair with a smug grin.

“That would be too easy.”

“Oh yeah?” another teammate challenged. “Then prove it.”

The wager grew uglier with every passing minute.

If Jason could convince Skylar to be his prom date and get her to believe he genuinely liked her, he’d win five hundred dollars, free tickets to the senior beach trip, and, more importantly, bragging rights that would echo through the school long after graduation. To them, it wasn’t about Skylar at all. She was simply the target of a joke, someone they assumed no one would defend.

They mocked the way she dressed in black even during spring, the crystals hanging from her backpack, and the dried herbs she sometimes carried home for the elderly woman who owned the little apothecary shop on the edge of town. Rumors spread that she talked to ghosts, cast spells, and wandered the cemetery at night. None of it was true. At least not the way they imagined, but teenagers had never needed facts to fuel gossip.

Jason laughed louder than anyone.

“I don’t even have to try,” he had the nerves to say. “She’s so desperate for someone to notice her she’ll probably think it’s fate.”

His friends howled with laughter.

For weeks, Jason played his role perfectly.

He smiled at Skylar in the hallways.

Held doors open.

Walked her to class.

Even asked questions about the books she loved, pretending to be fascinated by every answer she gave. For the first time in years, Skylar began to believe maybe everyone had judged him unfairly.

She never dreamed she was simply another punchline.

Emby had warned her more than once.

“I don’t trust him,” she’d whispered after school one afternoon.

Skylar only smiled softly.

“I know what everyone says about him,” she replied. “But maybe people can change.”

Looking back now, Emby wished she had screamed instead.

The night before prom, Jason’s friends demanded proof that he was going through with the bet.

Instead of defending Skylar, Jason scoffed.

“Please,” he said with a roll of his eyes. “You think I’d actually go to prom with the weird witch girl? She’s creepy. Always hanging around cemeteries and talking about dreams and spirits. I can’t stand her.”

Someone asked why he had accepted her invitation then.

Jason shrugged.

“Because I wanted to win.”

The message Emby had just read was never supposed to reach her.

It had been meant for one of Jason’s friends after he’d finally decided he wasn’t willing to be seen with Skylar in front of the entire school. Rather than ending the charade face to face, he sent the cruel text and left Skylar waiting, dressed for what she believed would be the happiest night of her life.

But she never got her happily ending love story.

Instead, she walked through the quiet streets alone, her heart breaking with every step toward the cemetery, never realizing that someone or something far worse than Jason had been waiting for her in the darkness.