When she woke up, there were 17 voicemails from a stranger. She left her phone on her nightstand, deciding she at least needed some coffee before dealing with it. After that, she dragged herself in the living room where she proceeded to doomscroll on her social media when finally she felt her curiosity piqued enough to listen to the voicemails.&nbsp; The first one was at 03.03 am, she pressed play and a low childish voice filled the space"Hello? Is anyone there? Claire? I'm scared of the dark, please help" the message ended abruptly, in just 11 seconds.She realized she had straightened up and gripped the arms of the rocking chair tightly. Did she know the voice? How did the caller know her name? She struggled to get her fingers to cooperate and listen to the following message. The same voice, of a little girl crying into the phone"Come get me Claire, I'm scared, please, please don't leave me here"She stood up, almost knocking over her seat. That voice... That voice belonged to her missing sister. She went missing when Claire was 14 and she was just 7 years old.&nbsp; Her parents never lost hope that they would find her, she would return or, at least, after 9 years of searching, following every clue every fake call, letter and rumor they heard they would learn the truth about what happened to her. 24 years had passed. They were long dead, having never really recovered from their loss. She lost her mom to a simple cold which turned out to be meningitis, leading to her abrupt death just a few months before her 21st birthday. Her dad followed just 3 years later, he passed away from a stroke even though he was mostly a shell of himself by then. Claire felt cold sweat damping the t shirt she wore to sleep last night. She picked up her phone and forced herself to press play to the next message&nbsp;"Who is there? Claire? Can you let me out? I promise I'll be good, I'll never bother you again and make you play with me" the girl sobbed, sounding terrified. Claire gasped, feeling her vision tunnel and her heart rate elevate. Where do these messages come from? How is that possible?&nbsp;"Help me! Can anyone hear me? Help!""Please Claire! Please let me out! I'm sorry, please!""*Unintelligible mumbles and sobs*" She forced herself to calm down and googled the phone number but nothing came up, ot was probably a burner phone, untraceable. "Fuck" she screamed, clutching her phone. She started pacing the room, grunting and cursing every few seconds. "Okay, you need to calm down. Listen to the messages, see what we are up against" she placed her phone on the coffee table, snatched a bottle of whiskey from her cabinet, sat down and once again, pressed play. She heard doors banging, bottles rolling around and jostling, the frightened gasps of her sister on the background. "Who are you? Where is Claire? Please help me""Help! Help! No! Claire! Help!"The screams penetrated her head like bullets. She went back to the day her sister went missing.&nbsp; She was so angry as a teen. She constantly fought with her parents, they always told her that she should be more mild, more like her sister, more normal.&nbsp; More normal. What wasn't normal was that when her sister was born, she was put in the backseat, never to be cherised again. The age difference made her parents treat her like a guest in their house. Her sister had health problems, she couldn't play loudly in her room, she couldn't go to playdates with her friends or play with the neighborhood kids because noone could be there to take care of her, they had to care for their baby. Growing up, she had to babysit, "no rough playing, your sister has asthma", no having friends over "your sister should be the priority, she can't get sick", nothing was for Claire. She watched her friends go out, organise gatherings and later parties and late night sneaking out, but none of that was for her. She had to care for her sister and be the third parent to a child she didn't want in the first place.&nbsp; She didn't ask to be tossed aside and be forgotten. The screaming matches she got on with her parents were daily when she hit puberty. She wanted to be seen and understtod but her parents only ever cared for "the baby". The baby who had grown up and was always in her business. She followed her around, copied her and stole her things, only for her to break them or ruin them.&nbsp; The next 7 messages were filled with screams, heavy grunts and all kinds of metallic noises. They were all at least 20 seconds long or more. She heard her sister plead for her life, cry, throw up and scream until her little voice was hoarse and broken. She had her head in her hands, curling into a ball and stayed there for hours. That day, she wanted to go to a party that her parents of course didn't let her. She had decided that she would sneak out when everyone was asleep. Her sister was late again that morning, but of course she had to wait for her to go to school together. She yelled at her that she was leaving without her and the little girl started crying when her mother interjected to tell her off. As her mother was helping her sister get ready and wipe her tears, she blurted out that she had heard Claire making plans the night before, with her friends to go to the party. Her mother was furious, she slapped her and grounded her immediately. Claire shrieked at her and stormed out, her sister following her timidly. She felt her anger rise like never before. Her life would be so much better without her sister taking up space, love and money that was supposed to be hers.&nbsp;As they were heading to school, she snapped.&nbsp; She felt like someone else made the decisions for her and she just watched. She took a different path, storming through the dense forest that surrounded their little town. She practically dragged her sister halfway through the path, suddenly deciding what to do. Leaving the trail, she headed towards the old abandoned cabin that sat almost in the middle of the forest. There were some cabins sparsely positioned here and there. The locals never went near them, all the folklore of the town framing them as haunted, even though once upon a time they must have had a use, probably for the miners who used to work in the town decades ago, since the cabins were located close to the mines. She trampled through the densely forested area, holding her sister by the hair, not caring about the scratches and her cries for her to stop. She hauled her up the dilapitated stairs of the cabin, pushed the rusty door open and shoved her in there, not leaving her a second to react before closing the door and blocking it with a munted bench she found on the patio. She could hear her sister's pleadings and cries and didn't even feel a hint of remorse. She just left and went to school. The day passed in a blur and already she had a plan in her head. She would return home, claiming that she had a lot of homework to do and she couldn't wait longer for her sister. She knew how to get home. Once she didn't show up, she would fake ignorance and that would be it. Her life would be that much better from then on. Claire realized that she had gone through half of the bottle she had in front of her. She had 2 more messages to go through. Reluctantly, she pressed play.She heard rustling and muffled sounds, then some digging, a loud thud and more digging. Or maybe placing back the dirt that was dug up. Then silence. The message went on for four minutes. She finally had a clear understanding of what happenned to her sister in the matter of the days, weeks that she was kept alive. The mystery was solved. When the little girl was declared missing, search parties started to form, stretching through the streets, the forest, even the mines from a police unit. Nothing was ever found. Claire was always astonished by that. She figured that at least her body would be discovered some days later but when the people started going through the cabins, noone seemed to have been there. It was like her sister vanished. That made Claire a bit paranoid. For months following the dissapearance, she thought her sister would march through the door and tell everyone what she did. She barely slept and ate. When she finally calmed down though, things where not how she had imagined. She knew that her parents would be devastated but she thought that, with time, they would surround her with love since she was at last their only child, not fall into their demise and become walkind dead bodies who just exist. Her life was never the same. She was left on her own, even though noone knew what she had done. She had learned to live with that and still remained in her family home, long after the death of her parents. She never followed the dreams she had when she was younger, she lived an isolated life, working in the towns supermarket and coming back home, where she stayed alone. No friends, no family, nothing. She pressed play to the last message and a deep male voice made her fill with dread "I know what you did Claire, and there is no coming back from this. You left your little kid sister for dead, leading to her violent torture and untimely death. That's not something you should get away with. Everyone should know. You should live your life rotting in a cell, being tortured for what you made your sister go through. The clock's ticking. Your time is running out" She felt the hair on her arms go up. Why would someone do that to her? Why now? Why should her life continue to be destroyed, all for a brat she didn't even want in her life from the start?And then she remembered. Next week was the 25th anniversary of her sisters death. Whoever planned this, had timed it to bring her down a bit before the crime could be considered statute of limitations and she would be freed of the burden forever. Someone knew and planned to lure her into their sick game, just so she could strive again to get away with murder. Only she had played this game before and now she was older and more capable. She had let down her guard but she knew she had to strike back harder than ever.&nbsp; As she gulped down the last bits of the bottle, she felt the familiar warmth engulfing her and she felt ready. She smiled as she let the adrenaline course through her. The game was on.

The golden child

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The golden child

Valia_K

Valia K

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The golden child

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