Every muscle in my ghostly form tensed as Lila's small, trembling voice echoed through the quiet house. Upstairs, a door clicked shut, and soft, slow footsteps began moving toward the stairs. Lila was coming, and she was walking straight into a lie that could break her forever.
Clara's head snapped toward the staircase, her face white with terror. "Ethan," she whispered sharply and urgently. "Go. Stop her. Keep her up there. Don't let her see this."
Ethan's eyes widened. He nodded quickly and turned toward the stairs, but he did not get more than two steps before Lila's small shadow appeared at the top of the steps. Her light footsteps paused, and I watched helplessly as she leaned forward slightly, her small face peeking over the railing. Her blonde hair fell in front of her eyes, and she rubbed at one of them with her fist, still half-asleep. She had no idea what waited for her at the bottom of the stairs, that her father was dead, that her mother and brother were hiding a terrifying secret, or that the bottle hidden in my bedroom could destroy everything.
"Mom?" Lila said again, her voice softer and confused. "Why are you whispering? Is something wrong?"
Clara's hands shook so badly I thought she might fall over. She forced a smile, but it looked pained and wrong, like a mask slipping off her face. "Everything's fine, baby," she said too quickly. "Go back to your room. Your dad's… he's resting. We'll be up in a minute."
Lila hesitated. I could see the doubt on her face. She was fourteen, smart and perceptive—she knew when her family was lying. She had heard the fear in Clara's voice and seen how Ethan stood stiff as a statue, refusing to look up. She knew something was very, very wrong.
"Why can't I come down?" she asked, her voice wavering. "Did something happen to Dad?"
Ethan stepped forward, blocking the bottom of the stairs. His back was to me, but I could see the way his shoulders tensed. "Don't come down, Lila," he said, his voice gentle but firm. "Just stay in your room. We'll explain everything later."
That was the worst thing he could have said. Later. A word that always meant trouble, hiding fear, guilt, and secrets.
Lila's lower lip trembled. She took one small, tentative step down the stairs, then another. Clara let out a quiet, panicked sound. "Lila Marie, don't you take another step." But Lila kept going.
She was halfway down now, her eyes fixed on the space behind Ethan where my body lay. She couldn't see me yet, but she could sense something terrible was there, something that had turned her family into strangers. I drifted forward as close as I could get, screaming silently. Don't look. Don't come down. Don't see this. She was too young, too kind, too full of love to have her heart broken like this.
But she kept moving. One more step, and her eyes cleared the space past Ethan's legs.
And she saw me.
For a long, horrible second, nothing happened. Lila froze completely, her foot hanging in the air. Her eyes went wide, her mouth fell open, and sleepiness vanished from her face in an instant, replaced by pure, unthinking shock. Then her face crumpled. A small, broken sound escaped her, and tears burst from her eyes, rolling down her cheeks in hot, fast streams. She did not scream or yell. She just stared at my body on the floor, and I could see every piece of her heart breaking apart.
"Daddy," she whispered so quietly I barely heard it. "Daddy, no…"
She started forward, rushing down the stairs, but Ethan grabbed her before she could reach me. He pulled her into his arms and held her tight against his chest, and she fought him weakly and desperately, pounding her small fists against him.
"Let me go!" she sobbed. "Let me see him! Let me go to him! What happened? What's wrong with him? Why isn't he moving?"
Clara covered her mouth with her hand, her shoulders shaking as she cried silently. She couldn't look at Lila. She couldn't look at me. She just stood there, drowning in guilt while her daughter's world fell apart.
I floated there, invisible and useless, my ghostly chest aching in a way no physical pain ever had. This was the worst part of all—not the betrayal, not the fear, not the confusion of being dead. It was watching my little girl cry for her father and not being able to hold her, not being able to tell her I loved her, not being able to tell her I was right there.
Ethan held Lila until she stopped fighting, until her sobs softened into quiet, shaking breaths. He rested his chin on top of her head, his own eyes shiny with tears. "I'm sorry," he whispered to her. "I'm so sorry, Lila." But he didn't explain. He didn't say I'd fallen. He didn't say it was an accident. He didn't say anything that might ease her pain. Because he couldn't. The truth was too terrible to say out loud.
Clara finally moved, stepping forward and placing a hand on Lila's back. Her touch was gentle, but Lila flinched away as if her mother's hands burned. It was a small movement, but it cut through the air like a knife. Lila didn't trust them anymore—not yet, not now, not after what she'd seen.
After a long, terrible minute, Lila lifted her head from Ethan's chest. Her eyes were red, her face wet, but her voice was steady—scary steady for a fourteen-year-old girl who'd just found her father dead.
"Who did this?" she asked. Her eyes moved from Ethan to Clara and back again. "Who killed my dad?"
The words hung in the air, cold and heavy. Clara's face went pale. Ethan froze. No one answered. No one could. Because the answer was standing right in front of her.
And then, before anyone could speak, a sound cut through the silence—a sharp, loud noise from the front of the house.
A knock. One. Two. Three loud, firm knocks on the front door.
Everyone went completely still. Clara's eyes widened. Ethan's jaw tightened. Lila stopped crying, her small body going rigid. Who could that be? It was three in the morning. No one came to the house at three in the morning unless they knew. Unless they'd seen something. Unless they'd come for the truth.
I drifted toward the door, my spirit cold with dread. Someone was outside. Someone knew. And whatever they wanted, it would tear this family apart forever.