Chapter 5: THE LOCKET
500 Words
Elena’s lungs burned as she struggled to catch her breath.
The gravel beneath her hands was damp with dew, and every muscle in her body trembled.
“Child!”
Mama Grace rushed from the cottage, wrapping a blanket around her shoulders.
“What happened?”
Elena tried to speak, but the words caught in her throat.
“He… he said I was supposed to stay dead.”
Mama Grace’s face turned pale.
She glanced toward the dark forest, but whoever had attacked Elena was gone.
Only the sound of rustling leaves remained.
“We’re leaving,” Mama Grace said firmly.
“Leaving?”
“Whoever found you once will come back. We can’t stay here.”
⸻
The next morning, Detective Daniel Hayes returned to the forest where the body had been discovered.
Something had been bothering him since the beginning of the case.
The grave.
It was too neat.
Too carefully prepared.
Almost as if the killer wanted the body to be found.
He crouched beside the empty burial site.
“Search every inch of this area again,” he ordered.
An officer approached a few minutes later, holding a small evidence bag.
“Sir… we found this buried under the roots.”
Inside the bag was a silver locket, coated in mud.
Hayes carefully opened it.
On one side was a tiny photograph of a smiling little girl.
On the other…
A single word was engraved.
Hope.
Hayes frowned.
According to Elena’s records, she had no children.
So why had the woman in the grave been wearing a locket with a little girl’s picture?
⸻
Several hours later…
Mama Grace and Elena boarded an old bus heading toward the city.
The farther they traveled, the stronger Elena’s headaches became.
As the bus passed through the outskirts of Blackwood, she looked out the window.
A grand stone church came into view.
The instant she saw it, another memory struck.
She was standing inside the church wearing a wedding dress.
The music was playing.
Guests were smiling.
Then…
A man in a black suit leaned close and whispered only three words.
“Don’t marry him.”
Elena gasped.
Her heart pounded.
Who was the man?
Why had he warned her?
Before she could remember his face, the vision vanished.
⸻
That evening…
Sophia entered Elena’s old bedroom for the first time since the funeral.
Everything was exactly as Elena had left it.
The perfume still sat on the vanity.
A wedding invitation lay on the dresser.
As Sophia opened a drawer, she noticed something unusual.
The wooden base wasn’t level.
She pressed against it.
A hidden compartment sprang open.
Inside was a small envelope.
Across the front, written in Elena’s handwriting, were the words:
If you’re reading this… I never made it to my wedding.
Sophia’s hands shook as she slowly broke the seal.
Outside the bedroom door…
Someone was watching.
A shadow slipped silently down the hallway.
The floorboards creaked.
Sophia looked up.
The bedroom door began to open.
- Writer
