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The girl in the photo on her wall blinked. At first, Zoe thought it was a trick of the light. She rubbed her eyes, blinked hard herself, then stared at the photo again. Still. Silent. Normal. Just her childhood picture — taken when she was seven, with pigtails, a missing front tooth, and a scraped knee she was oddly proud of. It was always on her wall, above her desk, a nostalgic charm that reminded her who she used to be. But she swore it blinked. Zoe leaned in closer, her breath fogging the glass. “You moved,” she whispered. The room didn’t answer. Only the quiet hum of her ceiling fan replied, doing lazy circles above her. It was almost midnight. Rain tapped at her windows like impatient fingers. She laughed nervously, shaking her head, and turned back to her laptop. She was just tired. Finals week. Sleep-deprived hallucinations. Case closed. But then the laughter came. Low. Childlike. And coming from behind her. Zoe froze. She didn’t want to turn around. Every hair on her arm stood straight like soldiers awaiting battle. Her hands were trembling, and her cursor hovered helplessly over a half-finished essay titled “The Ethics of Perception.” Oh, the irony. Another giggle. This time from her left. She turned — fast. Nothing. Her eyes darted around the room. The photo. The bookshelf. The closed door. All normal. But now her own picture looked... wrong. Her younger self’s smile wasn’t the same. It had widened. She reached up and took the frame off the wall. Examined it. Tapped the glass. Flipped it over. Written on the back, in childish scrawl that wasn’t hers, were the words: “Come play, Zoe.” She dropped it. The frame shattered on the floor, glass skidding across her rug like ice. The room suddenly felt colder. Much colder. Then the lights went out. She screamed. Her phone — where was her phone? She fumbled on the desk, knocking over pens, books, an old coffee mug. Finally, her fingers curled around it, and she turned on the flashlight. The beam of light wavered in her shaky hand as she swept the room. And that’s when she saw it. A second photo. On the wall. Right beside the shattered one. But this one was new. In it, her childhood self was no longer alone. Standing next to little Zoe, holding her hand tightly, was a pale, dark-eyed girl with stringy black hair and a tattered dress that looked centuries old. Zoe stepped back, heart hammering. That girl wasn’t in the original photo. No way. Her phone buzzed in her hand. Unknown Number: “Do you remember her now?” Zoe’s stomach turned to lead. She typed back, “Who is this?” Unknown Number: “You promised you’d never forget.” She tried to call. The line was dead. Then, without her touching it, the phone began scrolling through her photo gallery — and stopped at a hidden folder she didn’t recognize. The folder’s title? “Playtime.” Inside, dozens of pictures. All old. All of her, from different childhood years — in parks, in school, at birthday parties. And in every single one, standing somewhere in the background, was the same pale girl. Sometimes blurry. Sometimes clear. Always there. Zoe felt her legs weaken. She sat down hard on the edge of her bed, the flashlight shaking in her hand. “Mom?” she called out. Her voice cracked. “Mom!” No answer. She bolted out of her room, ran to her mother’s bedroom. Empty. She checked the entire house. Gone. All the lights were out. No power. No WiFi. Just her and that chilling folder of ghostly evidence on her phone. She stared at one image — her sixth birthday — and zoomed in. The pale girl was standing by the cake. Watching. Zoe’s memories felt like slippery fish, hard to grasp. But something was tugging at the edges of her mind. Something wrong. Something buried. Back in her room, she returned to the new photo on the wall. It was no longer a photo. It was a mirror. And in it, her child self still stood with the pale girl. But now the child Zoe was turning her head. Looking right at her. Zoe backed away slowly. Then the mirror cracked — and her younger self stepped out. She was transparent. Glitching. Faint. Like an old VHS tape skipping frames. “Why did you leave her?” Little Zoe asked, her voice echoing oddly in the room. “You said we’d stay forever.” Zoe shook her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” “She remembers,” the ghost girl beside her said. Her eyes were pitch black now, swallowing the light. “I never forgot. Not like you.” Then — a flash. Suddenly Zoe wasn’t in her room anymore. She was outside. A field. Fog everywhere. Trees arched like claws. And there — the girl. Pale. Standing at the center of a worn-down merry-go-round, rusted and moaning in the wind. Zoe’s breath fogged the air as she whispered, “This place…” It slammed into her — a tidal wave of memory. Summer. Age six. She and a group of children had wandered into the woods. They found a clearing. A little carnival setup — abandoned. Haunted. But it had music. Lights. It called to them. And there was a girl already there. Alone. Zoe befriended her. Played with her for hours. But as the sun dipped, the other kids wanted to leave. Zoe didn’t want to go — but fear won. She left. The pale girl had begged. Cried. Screamed. But they left her. And the woods swallowed her whole. She was never found. Until now. “You promised,” the pale girl whispered, stepping closer. Zoe stumbled backward, tripping over a tree root. “I was six! I didn’t know what was happening!” “You forgot me,” the girl said, eyes gleaming with grief and rage. “Now I’m the memory that won’t go away.” The merry-go-round creaked into motion, though no one touched it. Little Zoe appeared again, holding the pale girl’s hand. “You have to stay now,” she said gently. “It’s the only way.” “No.” “You don’t have a choice,” said the ghost girl. The trees began to close in. The ground split. Screams echoed from the fog. And then — blackness. --- Zoe woke up in her room. Daylight poured through her windows. Her phone buzzed with normal notifications. The essay was still half-written. Her mother called from the kitchen: “Breakfast!” She sat up, shaking. A dream? She turned to the wall. One photo hung there. Just one. But it wasn’t her alone. It was her, as a child — standing beside a pale, smiling girl in a tattered dress. In her hand was a birthday balloon. Written on it, in childlike scrawl: “Thanks for coming back."

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She never left

Tee

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She never left

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