Chapter 13 - The Shared Wall
Elena sprinted back across the street, leaving the police officers behind as she burst through her front door. "Clara!" she screamed, racing up the stairs two at a time.
She threw open the master bedroom door. Clara was standing alone in the center of the room, looking shaken and pale, clutching the leather-bound diary to her chest.
"Mom, she touched me," Clara whispered, tears streaming freely down her freckled cheeks. Her grey polo shirt was damp, and her breathing was rapid and shallow.
"Where is she?" Elena demanded, grabbing Clara by the shoulders and pulling her close. "Did she hurt you?"
"No," Clara shook her head, looking toward the walk-in closet. "She didn't hurt me. She showed me something. In the diary. The builder, James Sterling... he didn't just kill his wife and hide her body across the street. He built this house right over her shadow. The foundation of this house was poured over her original grave site before they paved the cul-de-sac."
Elena felt the ground practically shift beneath her feet. "That's why the house is reacting... why Lily knew..."
"Lily!" Clara suddenly gasped, her eyes widening in horror. "Where is Lily?"
Elena spun around. The toddler was nowhere in the room. The walk-in closet door was wide open, and the hole Lily had been digging in the corner was now twice as large, opening up into a dark, vertical shaft that descended directly into the foundation of the house.
Without a second thought, Elena dropped to her knees and crawled into the closet, shining her phone light down the dark shaft. "Lily!" she screamed into the void.
From deep below came the sound of a toddler’s happy giggles, followed by a soft, motherly hum that echoed up through the concrete foundation.
"Mom, look!" Clara shouted from the bedroom.
Elena crawled back out of the closet and rushed to the bedroom window. Down on the front lawn, Detective Miller and several crime scene technicians were examining the exterior wall of Elena’s house where it aligned with the foundation. One of the technicians was pulling away a section of the vinyl siding, revealing the original 1994 wooden exterior wall underneath.
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Carved deeply into the weathered wood of Elena’s house, right beneath the siding, was a message written in fresh red paint that matched the color of Lily's sweatshirt: SHE IS COMING HOME.
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