The Echo In The Attic

of the day, a phantom melody that tainted the sunlight filtering through the Briarwood's tall windows. The simple, logical explanations that had once been he

ure the distinct timbre of a child's faint giggle t

ful hum again, like a forgotten song. Other times, a distinct scraping sound, soft yet persistent, as if something heavy was being dragged across the attic floor. But the most unsettling was the repeated, fractured dialogue. "Don't touch that!" a woman's sharp, panicked voice. Followed

y. How could she design the Apex Tower, a monument to human ambition and clarity, when her own mind felt like a chaotic symphony of ghostly whispers? Her

ith new, ominous weight. On Thursday morning, forgoing her usual meticulous planning, she drove the old Peugeot into t

elderly woman named Madam Bisi, peered at Adira over spectacles perched on her nose, her eyes sharp

for a long time, that one. Before your time, of course." She pulled out dusty ledgers, old newspaper clippings, and a thick, le

rely staying for more than a few years. Each entry was a dry enumeration of names and dates, until she found it. A single, faded newspaper clipping from

ey had simply vanished, leaving behind their belongings, their half-eaten dinner, and a house full of unanswered questions. The police investigation had yielded nothing, concluding in a chilling shrug of uncertainty. The local communi

able presence in the house now, more than just sound. It was mournful, lost, and desperately trying to communicate. Not malevolent, perhaps, but certainly not at peace. A chill, unrelated to the li

", the child's truncated cry, the man's angry, guttural shout that she now distinctly recognized, followed by the terrifying, profound silence-began to replay at random times, even in broad daylight.

ng images: a bright red ball rolling across polished floors, a woman's hand reaching out, a man's shadowed face contorted in anger. They were disjoi

ctural drawings, seeing not lines and angles, but the ghostly outlines of a vanished family, their voices trapped in a chilling, endless loop. Her friends' worried calls went straight to voicemail, her excuses becoming thinner, more desperate. Was the solitude she had so eagerly sought finally b