The town where memories last forever：Chapter 3

Part Three: The Truth Beneath the Ashes

The darkness pressed upon her like a living thing.

Alison fumbled desperately for her flashlight, her heart pounding against her ribs. It was no use. It was dead. The only sounds she could hear were her own rapid breathing—and a faint scraping sound from somewhere in the ruined cabin.

“Who’s there?” she called out, forcing her voice to remain steady.

Silence.

She backed toward the door, hands outstretched. Her foot caught on something—a broken beam—and she stumbled, slamming against the wall.

The figure that had been watching her was gone.

A whisper came from the darkness, so close it hurt her ears:

“It never left…”

Panic surged through her. Alison darted out of the cabin and raced through the tangled forest, branches scratching at her arms and face.

She ran until the trees thinned and the muddy Hollow Creek came into view.

She bent over, gasping for air, and saw something tangled in the reeds at the water's edge. Something pale.

She approached cautiously—and froze.

A hand.

A body—or what was left of it—half-submerged in the mud. The clothes were tattered and unrecognizable, but on the wrist was a familiar braided bracelet: the same red and black one that had appeared in Daniel Reid's missing persons photo.

Alison stumbled back, a grudge rising in her throat.

Before she could process what she was seeing, there was more movement in the woods. Slow and deliberate. Someone—or something—was watching her.

She turned and ran, stopping only when she crashed through the door of the Hollow Creek Inn, startling the old innkeeper as well.

"You found it, didn't you?" he asked hoarsely, his eyes wide with a mixture of fear and cruel satisfaction.

Alison nodded, shaking. "Daniel is dead."

The innkeeper slumped over the counter, as if a great burden had been lifted—or, rather, added.

"He shouldn't have gone there," he whispered. "None of us should have gone there, not since the fire."

She leaned over, her voice hoarse. "What happened? What was there?"

The innkeeper hesitated, looking around as if the walls were listening.

"A long time ago," he whispered, "this town made a choice. A bad choice. In a cold winter, the townspeople—they did something to survive. Something they could never forgive themselves for."

He looked up at her, his eyes empty and filled with guilt.

"The forest remembers."

Alison swallowed. “The forest?”

“It’s more than just trees. It’s memory. Sadness. Regret. And it will hold on to anyone foolish enough to touch it.”

Outside, the wind whistled against the thin windows of the motel with a sound that wasn’t quite wind—a low, sad whisper.

That night Alison didn’t sleep.

She packed her bags before dawn, shoving her notebook deep into her bag. She didn’t look back as she drove away from Hollow Creek—even when she caught a glimpse of a figure standing by the trees in the rearview mirror, watching her car disappear into the mist.

Her editor would read the story. The world would hear about Hollow Creek.

But deep down, Alison knew a terrible truth:

Some places don’t want to be remembered.

Some memories will never let you go.