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Everyone around here remembers that day. The day when that little girl came knocking at our doors.
She was a plain little thing, no more than ten, with black hair in pigtails and a frilly purple dress. In a town as small as this one, everybody knew each other, so a stranger like her showing up out of nowhere stuck out like a sore thumb. The other kids watched her from across the street, whispering and speculating amongst themselves. I didn’t give her too much thought. After all, I pointed out, she was only a child. Probably just got on the wrong bus on the way home from school.
Suddenly the murmurings stopped; the girl was walking up the steps to someone’s front door. I recognised it as number seventeen, the Robinsons’ place. I wanted to walk away, but my feet stayed rooted to the spot. Some insatiable part of my subconscious simply had to know what was going to happen next. The same morbid curiosity which takes hold when you see someone riding their bike with no hands and wait for them to fall off. So I stood there, watching her climb the steps to the front door and ring the doorbell.
I tried to rationalise with myself. She probably just wanted to ask for directions, or to call her parents. Yes, that was it.
She waited. We waited. The door opened and Mr Robinson appeared, cheerful and friendly as ever. From that distance we couldn’t make out what was being said, but I assumed it was the usual exchange of pleasantries. But then the girl was beckoning him closer, and he bent down so she could whisper in his ear. I found myself leaning closer, as if it would make any difference.
The colour drained from Mr Robinson’s face. Babbling some excuses, he stumbled back inside and slammed the door.
Even from across the road, I’m certain she could hear us all gasp in unison. She paid us no mind as she walked off to who-knows-where – we certainly weren’t going to follow her after a display like that.
I couldn’t sleep that night. My brain was fixated on that thirty-second memory, playing it on a loop, trying to make sense of it.
When I arrived at school the next morning, I’m certain we all noticed the only empty seat, and the only name on the register met with silence: Ben Robinson. There were all sorts of rumours and theories circulating around the playground that day, and not one of them was Ben taking a sick day. They all tied back to that mystery girl, and whatever she had told Mr Robinson.
Out of curiosity, a few of us checked the Robinson residence on the way home from school. We knocked on the door like that girl had… and it swung open. Further investigation showed that the place was deserted. They must have skipped town during the night. From the looks of it, they had been in a hurry. We pondered telling the police, but what would we tell them? Mr Robinson fled his home with his wife and son because a little girl told him something he didn’t like?
That was only the beginning. A few days later Derek Scott vanished too, with his house in the same state. My classmates started disappearing left and right, sometimes as many as three a week. Within a month about a dozen of them were gone. Soon we all started to dread every knock at the door, lest it be that same girl with her deadly words.
Myself and the remaining neighbourhood kids kept our usual vigil, watching her take her walks through the neighbourhood, feeling our stomachs tie into knots as she passed in front of our respective houses, until she reached her target. This wasn’t that same childish superstition which makes you believe in stuff like Santa or the Tooth Fairy; this was true fear.
It was only a matter of time before my luck ran out. And run out it did; two months after she arrived, by which point I could count the number of my friends who were still standing on one hand, she finally made her stop at my front door. I was inside when it happened. As a matter of fact, I was the one who answered.
You’re probably wondering why someone who had been dreading this girl’s arrival for so long was suddenly so eager to greet her. Well, when you’ve been watching something like this for as long as I had, a fatal curiosity starts to burn in the back of your mind, the type which can eventually override all rational thought.
So when I heard that all-too-familiar knock and unlocked the door, the last thing I expected was that look of puzzlement on the little girl’s face. She almost seemed taken aback at the sight of me. This lasted for all of about ten seconds before her attention turned to my mother behind me, and I finally got to hear her mysterious words.
‘I know what you did.’