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Signal Lake Has No Echo

mystery◐ Teen
5 contributors · 3 paragraphs deep

Priya wandered toward the main lodge with her camera. The front door hung open. Inside, the walls were covered in old camp photos, except every single face had been scratched out with a key or a knife. "Guys," she called, her voice shaking. "You need to see this."

Priya kept filming the scratched-out photos, then froze on one in the corner. Unlike the others, this face was untouched: a smiling girl with a lifeguard whistle. Taped under it was a name tag that read COUNSELOR, 2007. That was the same year the camp closed.

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Priya zoomed in on the counselor's whistle. Behind her in the photo, six kids stood in a line at the water's edge. Priya counted them twice, then went cold. In the reflection on the lake, there were seven. "She's the one who kept the count," Priya whispered. "And the count was always wrong."

BD
Bram de Vries
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