Baby Doll

“Now, tell me what happened,” my middle-aged neighbor, Scott, said from across the kitchen table. I couldn't say anything at first. I couldn't even bring myself to look him in the eyes. I just stared down at the steaming mug of tea warming my hands, searching for the right words to explain the disaster at my house.

“It’s a weird story,” I murmured listlessly. Scott smiled softly at me.

“Try me. We’ve got all the time in the world.” I knew he wasn’t wrong: the police would probably be around for the next few hours. I glanced towards the living room and out the corner of the front facing window. Red police lights flashed against the backdrop of the hot July night. I caught a glimpse of a white sheet as two EMTs house crossed my front yard.

What the hell - why not...

“You know my dad died three months ago, right?” I finally said.

Scott nodded grimly. “Your mom told Mel about it the night it happened.”

“Well,” I added wearily, “I think that’s technically when it all started: around the time Dad died…”

He and I haven’t always been so close. Not since I was a little girl. But losing him like this - so suddenly and so far away - it’s been devastating. There have been times where… I don’t know, I feel like I’ve been losing my mind. Just because we didn’t see eye to eye, doesn’t mean I didn’t love him. Not even the funeral seemed to help, though I think Carla and Abby got some catharsis out of it. But then, that doesn’t surprise me… they got to be with him at the very end. Dad had slipped away just before I could make it to the hospital.

That’s what’s been bothering me the most. That I never got to say ‘goodbye.’ And that’s what I've wanted so badly: just to talk to him and say I’m sorry for everything… even if he’s still mad at me.

“Why in the world would he be mad at you?” Scott questioned.

“We had a stupid fight,” I explained. “Just before the heart attack.” I paused before adding, “I thought - I thought it was all my fault. For what I said on the phone.”

“Angie, you can’t believe that,” Scott said sympathetically. “I know how much your dad loved you…”

“I know that now," I interrupted. "He told me so.”

Scott blinked at me silently.

“Uh, what?”

“It’s complicated...”

Scott looked at me anxiously and opened his mouth to say something. But I cut him off just as quickly,

“Please, Scott, let me just get through this. You might not believe me, but I think it’ll make more sense once I’ve told you.” Scott then raised one hand, urging me to proceed.

Since Mom and Dad retired to Florida, the girls and I all decided to go and stay with her for a little while, after the funeral. Carla and Abby are still down there with her, but I just couldn’t stand it anymore. I hated being around the place Dad loved so much, but never being able to see him. So, I decided to come home early. You and Mel were still away on that cruise, and Mr. Johnson had been delayed getting back from his vacation in Greece. But everything seemed normal enough in the neighborhood when I got back. And the house was just as immaculate: no broken locks, or busted windows, and all the timers on the lights were still running smoothly. The first night I got back, I thought everything was fine.

But then, the next night, I got this really weird phone call. It was from an unknown number, so I didn’t even bother to answer it. All these telemarketers and scammers these days, I just don’t answer unless it’s someone I know. But then I got this really weird voicemail right after the call. I don’t even know how to describe it: it sounded like a busted answering machine being played in reverse. Grainy, static-y noise just played on my speaker for about 30 seconds. At first I thought it was a fax-machine that go the wrong number - don't give me that look, you know what I mean... some people actually still use those things, God knows why. So, I deleted it and didn’t give it another thought.

That is until I got another unknown call, with the exact same message, the very next night at the exact same time: 2:17 am.

This voicemail lasted a little over a minute, and it was as weird as the first. It made the exact same garbled, mechanical noises as before, only this time it sounded like a few syllables had been randomly strung together: ‘A-B-Ee… R-AH-L… A-B-Ee… R-AH-L…’

I deleted that thing as fast as I could, and immediately blocked the number, but even with all that, it still left me a little rattled. I pretty much lay awake the rest of that night. After that second call, even more weird things started happening:

I went out back to the old flower garden Mom planted for me on my 10th birthday. The girls and I had talked about using the plot to do something special for Mom, when she came to visit. But instead of overgrown weeds like I’d been expecting, I found that the whole thing had been completely pitted. Literally! All the plants and flowers, and even the weeds, had been yanked out by the roots. Like someone had just come along and gone to town destroying it.

The first thing I did was go and check the back gate, thinking maybe someone had broken the lock to come in… but everything was completely undisturbed, exactly as I had left it months earlier. That’s around the time I started getting the weirdest feeling that I was being watched: in my own house. I tried talking myself out of it - tried telling myself that I was being stupid. It was probably someone’s dog or a wild animal that dug it up. It was only me in the house, after all. It had been ever since I decided to stay in town for university.

But the rest of the afternoon, I kept finding things out of place: a chair ajar in the kitchen. Or picture frames slightly out of place, like someone had been looking at them. When I looked in the kitchen, I could’ve sworn I was short a few forks and spoons in the drawers. A knife had gone missing from the dishwasher, and I was positive I’d just put it there. There were times when the house groaned in ways that were unnatural, like someone was walking around. I nearly drove myself crazy searching every room and every closet, but in the end I couldn’t find anyone else in the house. And then night came, and I waited for the phone to ring again…

Only, it never did…

I had to stop again and take a deep breath. By then both of my hands were shaking, and I forced away another round of tears that stabbed at my eyes. Scott waited patiently while I composed myself, watching me with his curious brown eyes.

“So then, I take it that brings us to tonight?” he gently offered. I looked down at my cup, half-full with ice cold tea.

“That’s right,” I said.

Nothing strange happened all morning. I remember thinking maybe I was just letting my imagination get the better of me. That all the stress and grief from the past few months were starting to finally sink in. I tried to call Mom about it, to let her know what was going on… that conversation lasted exactly 2 minutes, and didn’t go at all like I had hoped.

She won’t say it, but I think she still blames me for what happened to Dad. I don’t even remember now what I was so angry about - that’s how ridiculous it was. If we hadn’t had that stupid fight - if I hadn’t told him I didn’t need him..

I know it wasn’t really my fault, but that’s how Mom feels about it. That’s how I felt about it… until my phone rang again.

UNKNOWN. That’s what my screen read. I stared at it for a few seconds completely petrified, because somehow I knew it was the same caller who’d been leaving me those freaky messages. Somehow I knew they were behind what was going on. This time, though, my curiosity got the better of me. So I answered it.

‘Hello?’ I asked. Silence. ‘Hello?’ I repeated. ‘Who’s there?’

‘A-B-Ee…’ the mechanical voice replied.

‘Hello?’

‘A-B-ie… Ah-LL… bA-BIe - dAH-LL…’ I hung up immediately and dropped the phone on the couch.

“Baby Doll.”

I was positive that’s what the voice was saying. It freaked me out because no one’s called me that since I was 13. No one but Dad.

I waited by the phone for the rest of the day and well into the night. I waited to see if the machine - the voice - would call again. I tried waiting up for 2:17 am, specifically. I had a feeling that if that voice was going to call me back, then that’s when it would happen.

I must’ve fallen asleep at some point because I remember coming-to when I heard my phone ringing. UNKNOWN lit up the screen. This time when I answered it, I waited to see if the voice would speak first. Silence.

‘Hello?' I said, trying to sound brave. 'Who is this calling?’ A pause on the other end.

‘BAby… DAhl…’ said the voice. I gripped the phone so tightly I felt my knuckles crack. It was distant and garbled, but I recognized the voice.

‘D-dad,’ I whimpered. Another pause.

‘Oo-ew… faT… Too… Unn… BAby…’ tears burned my eyes as I clamped a hand over my mouth.

‘Dad!?’ I repeated through my fingers, ‘Dad? Is it you?’ Breaks of static punctuated his words. His voice grew more frantic.

‘Ew… have (static) to… urn… (static) ‘round… Unn,’

‘Dad, I - I don’t understand…”

‘rUNN…BAby…’ the voice trailed off and for a split second I thought the call dropped. Until his voice exploded in my ear:

“RUN BABY! RUN!!!”

A heavy mass hit me from behind and pushed me down to the bed. Large powerful hands gripped me by the wrists and pinned me down as I screamed into the mattress. Someone twisted me around with a single, swift motion, and suddenly I was staring into the eyes of a man wearing a black mask. He sneered down at me, and held up the missing kitchen knife.

“Don’t worry girly,” he snarled. “It’ll all be over soon.” Then he pulled the sheets over my head and began pushing me further into the bed with all his might. I punched and kicked and shrieked, vaguely aware of every strike he made to the mattress. Small rips echoed in my ear as fabric tore away from the blade - it didn't dawn on me until later that he wouldn't stabbed me sooner if I hadn't been squirming around! But my strength started to fade as more and more panic gripped my mind. The sheets fell away from my face for just a second and, without thinking, I let out a single, desperate shriek: ‘DADDY!!’

BANG!

The bedroom door burst open and I felt the man turn around.

‘Hey, who are…!’ Then his weight left me completely, and grunting filled the room. Glass exploded suddenly and I knew the lamp on the night stand had been destroyed as darkness immediately followed. The man let out a bloodcurdling scream and thundered loudly down the stairs, hitting the first floor with a CRASH!

After that, everything went quiet again.

I remember just laying there shaking under a tangle of blankets, just trying to process everything that happened. Someone else had been in the room. Had they followed the thief inside? Was it his accomplice? I didn’t dare to move and find out. An eternity seemed to pass before I heard anything else again.

‘ANGELA!?’ someone called from below. Footsteps pounded up the stairs and down the hallway to my room. ‘Angela! Are you here?!’ That was when I began to sob.

‘S-Scott! Scott - in here!’

“You know the rest,” I said to him at the kitchen table. “You led me downstairs and out the front door - and over that man's body. By the time we’d come outside, Mel had the police on the phone and more neighbors were poking around. That’s all I really know.” I concluded listlessly.

“Okay…” Scott murmured, clearly unsure of what to say. “So - this guy broke into your house to kill you, but decided to taunt you first with these weird calls?”

“No," I replied shaking my head. "The calls weren’t him at all. I told you - it was Dad.” Scott eyed me curiously and I let out a sigh. “See, I knew you wouldn’t believe me.”

“No, no, it’s not that,” Scott insisted. “It’s just that… well. Well, for Christ sake, Angie, you don’t really believe a ghost was calling you this whole time?”

“I do,” I stated firmly. “And you know how I know? Because dad died at exactly 2:17 am. And that’s when almost all of those calls came in.”

“Angie, come on,” Scott protested wearily.

RING! RING!

We both jumped at the sound of Scott’s phone blaring from the edge of the table. He blinked at the screen, the word "UNKNOWN" blaring in the darkened kitchen. Then he blinked over my shoulder at the oven clock behind me: 2:17 am. I said dryly,

“I think it’s for you."

- edited 1/18/24