Nina shot straight up in her bed from a deep slumber, heart pounding in her chest and sweat making her shirt stick to her back. She looked around her room disoriented and confused. She  could have sworn she heard a voice right next to her ear, waking her from her deep slumber. A wispy, chill-inducing voice, that caused a shiver to run down her spine. Looking around her room, Nina searched for the person she imagined must be lurking in the shadows waiting to murder her. To her left, was a window that looked out onto her front yard and a desk littered with papers and school books, but no creepy stalker to be seen. To her right, were two closed doors. One led to her ensuite bathroom, the other to the upstairs hallway. As she looked around through squinted eyes, trying to adjust to the light, she noticed nothing amiss. Not a thing out of place. Yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching her. With one last look around, Nina decided it must have been her imagination and tried to go back to sleep. Even though the words she swore were whispered in her ear kept repeating in her restless mind. “Help me, please.”

The next night, the creepy voice returned. Nina, once again shot up in bed after hearing the wispy voice sound next to her head, as if the person was lying beside her with their head resting on the same pillow. She refused to go back to sleep and write off what she heard for a second time. She was sure she had heard a voice. This time when she looked around she noticed that her window was wide open. Her dusty, pink curtains fluttered in the nighttime breeze. Nina’s heart froze in her chest at what she saw. That couldn’t be right, she never opened her bedroom window, especially not on a frigid, autumn night. She got up from her bed, body shaking with fear, and ran to close her window. There is no way she would have forgotten opening her window, someone else must have opened it. When she reaches her window, she slams it shut and lifts her hands to close the curtains. That’s when she sees it. A shadow of a person looming on the wall next to her. Fear encompasses her body, her fight or flight instincts flaring up. Her muscles tense and she prepares to run for her bedroom door and yell for her parents when a large hand clamps over her mouth. “Shhhh don’t be afraid, I didn’t mean to scare you, '' says the eerily familiar voice.” The intruder, who had a definitively male voice turns Nina around, hand still covering her mouth. 

The figure before her is not at all what she imagined. Instead of a crazed killer, with a gun in hand and a ski mask with manic eyes peering through, she is faced with a teenage boy around her age. He has friendly eyes and a weirdly cheerful expression on his face. Yet despite his cheerfulness, there’s something distinctly off about him. He seemed familiar, but Nina couldn’t put her finger on why that was. Instead of pondering further on where she could have possibly seen this boy before, she snaps to her senses and remembers that he had broken into her house. “Who are you?” She whisper-shouts. Why she doesn’t yell for help or make a move to escape she has no idea. Despite the eeriness she feels around the guy in front of her, curiosity gets the best of her. She never did have the best track record for thinking things through. His happy demeanor and young age made it easy to overlook the red flags he was giving off. Instead of the rational answer Nina had hoped for when she asked who he was, all she got was a grim and short, “I need help.”

With that response, it was like a switch went off in the odd boy’s head. One moment he was right in front of her with his weirdly happy smile, the next he is at her window signaling her to follow. Never in a million years did Nina think she would ever follow a random stranger in the dead of night. A stranger that snuck into her house no less, but something inside her said to follow him, so she did. What she didn’t realize was that it was the worst mistake that she would ever make.

When she got to her window, the stranger had already reached the ground below. How in the world had he gotten down so quickly. Not thinking further about it, Nina scrambles out the window and drops to the ground below. Luckily, the drop isn’t too far down. The street in front of them is completely deserted, everyone already having gone to bed hours earlier. The streetlights illuminate the calm cul de sac that she lives on, showcasing the wholesome little houses lining the street. The stranger turns and starts walking to the left, where the end of the cul de sac turns into dark, endless woods. He gestures for her to follow behind him as he enters the pitch-black, never-ending darkness of the woods. Nina hesitates, these woods are known to be haunted. The only interesting stories you hear about her small town are the ones you hear about these woods. She never forgave her parents for buying a house so close to the place that haunts every child’s dreams. Every other time she got close to these woods she quickly turned around and headed in the opposite direction. This time she decided to take a leap of faith and followed her guide to hell right on in.    

The two of them make their way through the tall trees with their leaves starting to turn color. Their shoes are squelching in the mud left over from a recent storm. Nina was beyond scared. Why was she even following this guy? Hadn’t she learned anything from watching horror movies? Stupid teenage girls who follow strangers into the woods are always the first to die. “Where are you taking me,” she asks the guy she has been following for what must have been at least an hour. “I already told you, I need your help,” he responds in a voice barely above a whisper. “Sorry, I didn’t realize vague responses were the new norm these days. Usually, I like to be taken on a date before I follow strange dudes into the woods late at night.” Silence is the only response she is granted after her smart reply. They continue to walk for a short while longer until they come upon an old, dilapidated well. Nina had never seen a well in person before, but she had read enough fairytales with children fetching water to know what one looked like. With one glance at that well absolute terror paralyzed her body. Never had she been more horrified in her entire existence. Not even the events from earlier in the night could top the fear she now felt coursing through her body. This wasn’t just any water well, this was the well.

Every person in Nina's town had heard the stories about the mysterious well that was built in their neck of the woods. It was said long ago when the town was first built, a family lived in these woods. They resided in a cozy little cottage, with a stone well in the back to provide them water.  The family consisted of a lovely married couple and their six-year-old son. One day, the son was playing outside when he saw a chipmunk run past him. The boy was delighted by the chipmunk and chased it around the cottage. Eventually, the chipmunk raced up the well to get away from the overly excited child. The boy pounced at the chipmunk sitting on the well, wanting to become its friend and keep it as a pet. The chipmunk got frightened by the boy's sudden movement and fell into the well. The boy was devastated and wanted to save his new chipmunk friend. He peered over the side, to see if he could see the chipmunk in the water below. When he couldn’t see the chipmunk he leaned further and further over the side of the well, until his legs were clear off the ground. The boy only holding onto the well with his hands, loses his grip and falls into the well. His parents inside were oblivious to his fall and didn’t realize until their son never came inside for dinner that anything had happened. The boy tried to climb out of the well, but his efforts were fruitless. He ended up drowning when he became tired and could no longer tread the too deep water. It was said that the boy’s ghost haunted those woods until he was able to find another kid to trick into falling into the well. Ever since a series of people have fallen into the well to take the last victim’s place as the haunter of the well. Their souls were unable to pass over until someone else could take their place. 

    Seeing the well made everything click into place in Nina’s mind as she stands frozen in front of the well. In her mind, she starts going over all the things she had cataloged about the boy that she had chosen to overlook. His clothes were dirty and looked to be a few sizes too small. He was missing one of his sneakers, and his hair was long like it hadn’t been cut in years. Weirdest of all, was that he appeared to be soaking wet from head to toe as if he had jumped in a pool with all his clothes on. That’s when a lightbulb went off in her mind. His face, she had seen his face a hundred times before. On every single milk carton in school for three years straight when Nina was in elementary school, his face was printed in black and white with the word missing in bold letters over it. Jaxon Flemming. The seven-year-old little boy who had gone missing from his bed in the middle of the night, and was never to be seen again. Her mystery intruder was Jaxon Flemming! Jaxon Flemming who has been pronounced dead for eight years now!

    She turns to run away from the well and the dead man walking, but Jaxon is standing right behind her with a bright smile on his face when she turns around. “Finally, I will be free, he says in the creepiest voice Nina Had ever heard.” “What are you talking about, Nina whimpers. She has a bad feeling she knows exactly what he’s talking about. “I thought you were supposed to be dead.” Jaxon’s quiet “I am,” was the last thing Nina heard as she fell backward to her death into the well, with a solid shove.