It was 9 PM.
The silence in my apartment was a heavy, living thing. To fight it, I scrolled mindlessly through my camera roll, the glow of the screen a poor substitute for company. A half-eaten container of cold lo mein sat forgotten on my lap. My thumb stopped its mechanical swiping on a picture from just last weekend—a vibrant, sun-drenched group selfie from my cousin Liza's graduation.
We were all there, crammed into the frame, a chaotic mess of grinning faces and proud eyes. And right in the middle was Aunt Carol, her arm wrapped tightly around Liza, her smile the widest of all. It beamed with a pure, uncomplicated joy that made my heart ache.
It was the last picture we had of her.
Aunt Carol passed away three days ago in her sleep. A sudden, silent heart attack, the doctor said. The funeral was tomorrow, a thought that felt like a stone in my stomach.
A heavy, syrupy sadness settled in my chest. I zoomed in on her face, tracing the familiar laugh lines around her eyes. Her smile was so full of life, a perfect, frozen memory.
But then, a cold prickle started at the base of my neck. It feels like I'm being watched.
The thought was irrational, but the sensation was unmistakable—a pressure, like someone standing just behind my shoulder, their gaze fixed on the back of my head. I shook it off, forcing my attention back to the screen.
I zoomed out. Took in the whole photo. Then zoomed in again, my focus narrowing. My breath hitched.
In the photo, everyone was looking at the camera lens, at Liza who was holding the phone. Everyone except for Aunt Carol.
Her head was tilted down just a fraction, and while she seemed to be facing the camera, her eyes… they weren't focused on the moment. They were looking directly forward, as if staring right through the screen, right at me. And that proud, beaming smile I remembered now looked strained at the edges. The more I stared, the less it looked like joy and the more it looked like a tight, knowing smirk.
A violent shiver racked my body. "It's the grief," I whispered to the empty room. The feeling of being watched intensified, the air growing thick and cold around me. I had the sudden, insane urge to turn around, but I was too afraid of what I might see in the dark, empty space behind my couch.
I locked my phone with a decisive click and tossed it onto the couch cushion beside me as if it had burned me.
My phone buzzed instantly, lighting up the dark room.
The screen glowed with a notification. A direct message.
It was from Aunt Carol.
My heart seized, a cold fist clenching in my chest. This wasn't happening. It couldn't be.
With a hand trembling so badly I could barely control it, I picked up the phone. I tapped the message.
It was the same group photo from the graduation.
But in this version, the vibrant colors were washed out, tinged with a sickly grey-green hue. Everyone in the background—Liza, my uncle, my other cousins—were all blurred into unrecognizable, shadowy smudges. Only Aunt Carol was in sharp, horrifying focus.
And she was no longer smirking.
Her face was a mask of pure, wide-eyed terror. Her skin was pale and waxy. Her mouth was stretched open in a silent, desperate scream.
A small, pathetic sound escaped my lips. The feeling of a presence in the room was now overwhelming, a cold spot forming in the air to my left. I couldn't bring myself to look.
Below the grotesque photo, a new message bubble appeared. The three dots pulsed.
"I wasn't smiling then, anak."
A pause. The dots pulsed again.
"I was trying to warn you."
Before I could process the words, my phone erupted in sound and vibration, jerking in my hand. The screen changed to an incoming video call.
The caller ID, illuminated in stark white letters against a dark background, made the blood drain from my face.
It simply read: Aunt Carol.
And against every screaming instinct in my body, my thumb, moving as if possessed, hovered over the green "Accept" button.