It's Rose's second week back at school. The halls feel colder. Students whisper about the missing teacher, Ms. Moore, but no one knows the truth… except Rose.
One afternoon, while walking past the old storage room at the end of the school's north wing – usually locked – Rose hears a faint creaking sound… and then, a whisper.
"You shouldn't have seen it."
She freezes.
The door isn't fully closed. Something – or someone – is inside.
She slowly reaches for her sketchbook (she never goes anywhere without it now) and holds it close to her chest.
A chill crawls down her spine.
Suddenly, the janitor appears from behind, "You've shouldn't be here." he mutters. His tone is flat. Eyes unreadable.
He walks past her... and shuts the door without even looking inside.
Rose take one last glance at the door. There's a dark red smear just beneath the handle – almost invisible unless you look closely.
She hurried away, heart racing, but later that night... she sketches what she saw again.
And this time, the face that appears beside the door in her drawing ... wasn't there before.
Rose shut her bedroom door quietly that night. Her brother Jake was already asleep, and Aunt Marian's room had gone dark hours ago. But she couldn't sleep.
Not after what she heard.
She pulled out her sketchbook from under her pillow. The soft scratching of the pencil was the only sound in the room. Her hand moved without thinking – capturing every detail her memory refused to forget.
The half-open storage room door.
The dark red smear under the handle.
The shadowed hallway behind her.
And then –
A face.
Pale. Watching.
But she hadn't seen a face there earlier.
Her heart skipped a beat. She leaned closer to the drawing.
The eyes in the sketch were narrow, hollow. The mouth slightly parted. It wasn't Ms. Moore.
It wasn't anyone from school.
it was.. familiar.
No not familiar – haunting.
Like someone she'd seen before, in the window.... that night..... dragging something heavy or it was Ms. Moore, into the woods.
Suddenly, her pencil snapped.
Rose jumped, hand flying to her mouth to stop a gasp.
She looked around.
Silence.
But something had shifted in the air. Like something or something was in the room with her.