#missysmadchallenge #116
Your challenge for this week
The letter arrived on a rainy Tuesday, and the only words inside were, “Whatever you do, don’t trust your best friend.”
Missy’s MAD Challenge # 116
The Letter That Should Never Have Arrived
#missysmadchallenge
The letter arrived on a rainy Tuesday, and the only words inside were, “Whatever you do, don’t trust your best friend.”
No signature.
No return address.
Just seven words written in black ink.
I stared at the paper while the rain hammered against the kitchen window.
My best friend, Emma, had been part of my life for twenty-five years.
We had survived terrible relationships, questionable hairstyles, disastrous holidays, and enough embarrassing memories to blackmail each other for eternity.
If there was one person I trusted, it was Emma.
I laughed nervously.
“Someone has a strange sense of humour.”
Then my phone rang.
Emma.
Of course.
“Morning, darling!” she chirped. “Fancy a coffee?”
I glanced at the letter.
“Actually, I’m rather busy.”
Silence.
Then she asked something peculiar.
“Did the postman come today?”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“Oh, nothing. Just expecting a parcel.”
I looked at the envelope again.
The handwriting seemed familiar.
Too familiar.
After hanging up, I searched through an old box of birthday cards.
There it was.
The same slanting letters.
The same peculiar way of crossing the letter T.
Emma’s handwriting.
Why would she send me a warning about herself?
At precisely three o’clock, someone knocked on my door.
Three slow knocks.
I opened it.
Nobody.
Only a small cardboard box sat on the doorstep.
Inside was a photograph.
Emma and me, standing outside an old Victorian house.
I remembered the day perfectly.
Or thought I did.
We had visited the abandoned property twenty years earlier, daring each other to enter.
But something was wrong with the photograph.
There were three people standing outside the house.
Emma.
Me.
And another woman.
Her face had been scratched away.
On the back, someone had written:
YOU PROMISED NEVER TO REMEMBER.
I dropped the photograph.
Suddenly, fragments of memory flickered through my mind.
A staircase.
A scream.
A locked cellar door.
And Emma whispering,
“We must never tell anyone.”
My phone rang again.
Emma.
This time, I answered immediately.
“Who was the third woman?”
There was a long silence.
Then Emma whispered,
“Where did you get that photograph?”
“Who was she?”
“Maggie, listen carefully. Lock your doors. Don’t let anyone inside.”
“Emma, what happened in that house?”
Her voice began trembling.
“I can’t explain over the phone. I’m coming.”
The call ended.
I stood frozen in the kitchen.
Then I heard footsteps upstairs.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Impossible.
I lived alone.
“Hello?”
No answer.
The footsteps stopped directly above me.
My bedroom.
I grabbed the nearest weapon.
A wooden rolling pin.
Not exactly ideal, but it would have to do.
I climbed the stairs.
The bedroom door stood open.
Inside, everything looked normal.
Except for the mirror.
Someone had written across the glass in red lipstick:
SHE REMEMBERS.
Behind me, the floorboard creaked.
I spun around.
Emma stood in the doorway.
Her clothes were soaked.
Her face was pale.
“Thank God,” she whispered. “You’re still here.”
I raised the rolling pin.
“Don’t come any closer.”
She looked at the weapon, then at me.
“Maggie, please. We don’t have much time.”
“Who was the woman in the photograph?”
Emma closed her eyes.
“Her name was Eleanor.”
“Who was she?”
“Our best friend.”
I shook my head.
“No. You were my best friend.”
Emma began crying.
“No, Maggie. I wasn’t.”
The room seemed to tilt.
“What are you talking about?”
She reached into her handbag and pulled out another photograph.
Three young women, laughing together in a garden.
Eleanor.
Emma.
Me.
And suddenly, I remembered.
The old house.
The argument.
Eleanor standing at the top of the staircase.
The terrible sound when she fell.
Emma screaming.
Me running towards her.
Then the darkness.
“We thought she was dead,” Emma whispered. “But when we went back, her body was gone.”
I stared at her.
“Why don’t I remember?”
“Because you couldn’t cope with what happened. You blocked it out.”
A soft laugh came from behind us.
“Not quite.”
We turned.
A woman stood beside the mirror.
Her face was pale.
Her hair hung wet around her shoulders.
She looked exactly like the woman in the photograph.
Eleanor.
Emma screamed.
But Eleanor wasn’t looking at her.
She was looking at me.
“Hello, Maggie.”
My mouth went dry.
“You’re alive?”
Eleanor smiled.
“Of course I am.”
Emma backed towards the door.
“That’s impossible. I saw you fall!”
Eleanor tilted her head.
“Yes. You did.”
Then she turned towards me.
“Did Emma ever tell you why I fell?”
I looked at Emma.
Her expression had changed.
Fear.
Not of Eleanor.
Of the truth.
Eleanor stepped closer.
“She pushed me.”
Emma shook her head violently.
“No! That’s not what happened!”
“And when you tried to help me,” Eleanor continued, “she pushed you too.”
A memory exploded behind my eyes.
Emma’s hands.
The staircase.
The sickening impact.
The hospital.
Months of recovery.
And Emma sitting beside my bed, gently telling me that Eleanor had disappeared.
That she was my best friend.
That I could trust her.
I staggered backwards.
“You lied to me.”
Emma began sobbing.
“I was afraid of losing you.”
“For twenty years?”
She said nothing.
Eleanor reached into her coat and produced a small envelope.
“The letter was mine,” she said.
“But the handwriting…”
“I copied hers. I knew you’d recognise it.”
I stared at the woman I had called my best friend for twenty-five years.
All those birthdays.
All those secrets.
All those cups of coffee.
A friendship built on a lie.
Then Emma began laughing.
Not nervously.
Not sadly.
A cold, unfamiliar laugh.
“Oh, Maggie,” she whispered. “You always were so easy to convince.”
She reached into her handbag.
Eleanor grabbed my arm.
“RUN!”
We raced down the stairs as something shattered behind us.
Outside, the rain had become a downpour.
We ran towards the road.
And only when we reached the police station did Eleanor finally stop.
I turned to thank her.
But she was gone.
No footsteps.
No movement.
Just an empty pavement.
The police listened carefully as I told them everything.
Then the officer returned with a file.
His face was grave.
“There’s something you need to know.”
He placed a photograph on the desk.
Eleanor.
Beneath it were two dates.
Born: 12 March 1972
Died: 17 October 2001
I stared at the page.
“No. That’s impossible. She was just here.”
The officer shook his head.
“Her body was discovered beneath the old house twenty-five years ago.”
My hands began trembling.
“Then who helped me escape?”
He didn’t answer.
When I finally returned home that evening, Emma had vanished.
The police were searching for her.
I walked into the kitchen and found one final envelope waiting on the table.
Inside was a photograph of three young women laughing in a garden.
On the back, written in delicate black ink, were the words:
Some friendships end.
Some promises don’t.
And beneath them:
You’re safe now.
I looked towards the window.
For a moment, I thought I saw Eleanor standing beneath the streetlight.
She smiled.
Then disappeared into the rain.
I never saw Emma again.
But every year, on the anniversary of Eleanor’s death, a single white rose appears on my doorstep.
And I always whisper the same two words.
“Thank you.”
#missysmadchallenge #PsychologicalThriller #GhostStory #HalloweenWriting #TheAfterloveVoice
DJ Maggie is in the house 🎧
My two new songs are out .
With love, coffee, poetry, and stardust,
— Maggie The Afterlove Voice 💫
My song is out on streaming platforms 💜
https://ditto.fm/silenced-but-not-broken
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