The morning brought no clarity. Just cold wind, long shadows, and a town that seemed to press inward like the thick fog Mara had encountered on her first night.
Durn Hill's streets were still—silent. The air hung heavy with an unspoken tension, and for a moment, Mara thought she might be the only living soul moving through it. Main Street stretched out in front of her, the pavement worn and cracked underfoot, as if it too had been waiting for something to stir, something to snap. She could almost hear the town holding its breath, but nothing ever happened. Not yet.
Her boots crunched over grit and fallen pine needles, the echo of each step sharp in the stillness. The windows of every storefront she passed were dark, the curtains drawn tight. The bakery sat silent. No warm smell of fresh bread. The post office door creaked open, but when she stepped inside, the bell barely rang, and no one greeted her. It was as though the town existed as a ghost, and Mara was intruding, disturbing its fragile balance.
She went door to door, trying to speak with anyone who had known Samantha Leigh. The town had a reputation for being tight-lipped, but she thought, at least, she could break through if she tried.
The first stop was the bakery. Inside, a young woman with dark, tired eyes stood behind the counter. Her name tag said "Fay," but when Mara asked her about Samantha, she barely reacted.
"She was a quiet one," Fay said, her voice flat. "Never had much to say."
"Did she ever talk about being scared? About anything strange happening before she went missing?"
"No. She was quiet. Like I said. Just kept to herself."
Mara's pen moved across her notebook, writing down the same words, the same sentiment she had heard in every conversation since arriving: quiet, kept to herself.
She forced a smile, though it didn't quite reach her eyes. "Anyone else I could speak to?"
Fay looked at the clock above the counter, which ticked ever so slowly toward the next hour, but her gaze never lingered on Mara. "Try the general store. Or the post office. If they'll talk to you." She pointed vaguely toward the front door, not meeting Mara's gaze as she turned back to her work.
No help here.
Mara stepped back into the cold air, the door closing behind her with an unnatural slowness. It felt as though the town were watching her, every creak of wood and whisper of wind carrying its own private message. She glanced at the sky. Gray.
Next stop: the general store.
It was a dimly lit, cramped building with wooden floors so old they creaked underfoot. The shelves were stocked with faded cans, dusty bags of flour, and half-empty jars of pickles. The woman behind the counter was frail, her skin paper-thin and pulled tight over sharp cheekbones. She barely looked up as Mara approached.
The woman's name tag read "Irene."
"I'm told Samantha used to come in here," Mara started, leaning against the counter.
Irene nodded slowly, her hands clasped around a teacup that Mara could almost swear hadn't been touched in hours. "She liked the licorice," she said in a voice so low it almost seemed reluctant to speak.
"Did she ever seem… frightened? Did she say anything strange before she disappeared?"
Irene's eyes flickered to the side, and then, like a switch had been flipped, she was back to staring into her teacup.
"Teenagers are always scared of something," Irene muttered. "You want to write something down, write that. She liked the licorice. Nothing more to say."
Mara leaned in slightly, her voice quieter. "But didn't she ever seem—just a little bit different in the days before she vanished? Did she act like she knew something?"
Irene's mouth tightened, her fingers twitching over the teacup as though they wanted to crush it. "No," she said, her voice stiff. "No. She didn't say nothing like that. Just licorice. You know how it is. Nothing to write about."
Mara pressed further. "What about your security footage?" She looked around, and the dim light revealed a few old monitors in the back of the store. "Can I see it? From the week she vanished?"
Irene's face froze. The veins in her neck bulged ever so slightly. "We don't have cameras," she said, voice hardening.
Mara raised a brow. "No cameras?" She looked around at the store, which felt too empty to justify no surveillance. "Seems a little unusual for a town this size, don't you think?"
Irene's hand twitched near her chest, where a simple crucifix necklace hung. "We don't like things watching us." Her voice was colder now, the words carefully chosen.
Mara tilted her head. "But something is, isn't it?"
Irene's eyes flickered toward the window, then back to Mara. Her hand tightened around the pendant, knuckles white. "You think you'll find her. But that girl… she's beneath it now. The roots drink deep."
Mara didn't know what that meant, but she felt a shiver run down her spine. She took a step back, but before she could ask another question, a bell rang behind her.
A man stepped into the store. He wore a heavy green coat, the hood pulled low over his face. His features were blurry, like the world was refusing to let her focus on him. His face wasn't deformed—just... wrong. It felt out of place. Mara's eyes couldn't seem to hold his features.
Irene's whole demeanor changed in an instant, her body stiffening like a board. "That's enough questions for one day," she said, her voice hard and sharp.
Mara turned, but the man didn't move. He stood by the door, unmoving, as if the air had frozen around him.
She left. And the man never followed.
The next visit was to Samantha's neighbor, an elderly man with a sagging face and eyes that looked like they belonged to someone much older than his sixty years. His house was small, the lawn cluttered with old furniture and overgrown vines. The moment Mara knocked, he opened the door without hesitation.
"I'm not here to accuse anyone," Mara said, trying to keep her voice gentle. "I just want to understand what happened to Samantha."
He didn't respond, just stared at her with eyes too hollow to be fully alive.
Finally, after a long silence, he spoke, his voice low and raspy, like something from a dream. "It's the same every time," he said. "You'll think you're getting close. Then the ground opens."
Mara's pulse quickened. She stepped forward, but he didn't move. "What do you mean? What happens when the ground opens?"
He stared at her for a long moment, then mumbled something under his breath. "It's not for you to know."
"Has someone else come looking?" Mara pressed, refusing to let him slip away from her questions.
He didn't answer. Just turned and shut the door in her face.
By mid-afternoon, Mara sat in her rental car, the engine off as she reviewed her notes. Her fingers trembled slightly as she flipped through the pages, the weight of the town's silence pressing in on her. It was when she reached the bakery interview that her stomach twisted in a way that was more than just frustration.
The order of her notes had changed.
She had started at the bakery. But now, her notes listed it third.
The worst part? The handwriting was hers. Her pen. Yet she didn't remember writing the last entry, not the way it appeared.
And in the margin, scrawled in rushed, jagged ink, was a single line that made her stomach drop.
"Don't trust the mirrors."
She hadn't written it.
But it was her handwriting.
That night, she went to the diner. It was the only place in Durn Hill where the lights stayed on after sunset, a low, flickering beacon in the overwhelming darkness that seemed to swallow the rest of the town.
Tessa, the waitress, avoided her gaze at first, but eventually, after a few questions and the weight of silence, she leaned in closer, her voice low.
"My brother, Caleb, went missing in '06," she whispered. "Sixteen. Same age as Samantha."
Mara leaned forward, her pulse quickening. "What happened?"
"No one knows," Tessa said. "One night, he was just gone. His shoes were still under the bed, like he never left. But I saw something before it happened." Her eyes flickered toward the door, as if expecting someone to be standing just outside.
"What did you see?" Mara asked.
"A man," Tessa said, voice shaking. "Or... something. Standing by the tree line. It wasn't a man. Too still. Too quiet. And the way it looked at me—it knew I'd see it, but no one else would."
Mara felt a cold pang of fear in her chest, but she forced herself to stay calm. "And you think this… this thing is involved in Samantha's disappearance?"
Tessa's hand trembled as she reached for her coffee, but she didn't drink. "It doesn't want to be found. You dig too deep, and it finds you."
"'It'?"
"The Hollow," Tessa said, her voice barely a whisper. "That's what the old folks call it. The thing under the pines."
Mara's hand froze over her phone, the recorder still on, waiting for her next question.
Tessa leaned in closer. "You're not the first fed to come asking. But none of the others remembered being here. Not after."
Mara's heart skipped a beat. "Others?"
"One woman," Tessa whispered. "Said she'd solved bigger cases. Big name. She left town screaming her sister's name in the rain. Told me her dreams were rewinding."
"Her name?"
Tessa's voice faltered. "Doesn't matter. None of them stayed."
Just then, the diner lights flickered—once, twice.
When they came back on, Mara glanced at the mirror behind the counter.
Her reflection was missing.
But the shadows were moving.