Lin the Pool

CHAPTER 1 – Pool

Eshan Verma had recently moved into a quiet town. His new house was old, lonely, and strangely silent. But the backyard held something worse—an abandoned swimming pool.

At night, Eshan heard soft water sounds “plup… plup…” as if someone touched the surface with a fingertip. One cold night, he grabbed a torch and walked outside. A damp, rotten smell filled the air.

The water was too still.

Too perfect.

Too quiet.

When he stepped closer, Eshan froze.

A tall, thin man stood in the middle of the pool, soaked and pale, eyes open too wide. Beside him was a little girl in a pink dress, her hair stuck to her cheeks as if she had just risen from underwater.

Both stared at him without blinking.

The girl whispered, in a broken, drowning voice:

“Lin…”

Eshan blinked.

And in that single blink

they were gone.

The pool was empty.

Only a small ripple remained…

and on the edge, a half-erased chalk word:

“Lin.”

The next morning, everything looked normal. The pool was dry on the surface, the water calm, the air quiet. Eshan wondered if he had imagined the whole thing. Maybe stress, maybe exhaustion.

But that night, the sound returned.

This time softer.

More careful.

Almost… playful.

Eshan forced himself to ignore it, but the feeling of being watched grew stronger. He finally looked out the window—and froze.

The **little girl** in the pink dress was standing at the pool’s edge. Not inside the water. Not drowning.

Just standing… staring at him.

Her head tilted slightly, like she was trying to understand him.

Eshan stepped outside slowly.

“Hey… are you okay?” he asked.

The girl didn’t move.

Didn’t blink.

When he reached the pool, she pointed toward the water. Her arm was trembling, fingers thin like twigs.

Eshan looked down.

**There was no reflection of the girl.

Only his own.**

He turned back to her—

and suddenly the air around him felt heavy.

The girl whispered just one line, barely audible:

**“You forgot me…”**

Eshan’s heart dropped.

He took a step back.

But the moment he blinked…

the girl vanished again.

Only wet footprints remained on the pool tiles.

Eshan decided he needed answers. He went to the town library, a dusty old building where the air felt older than the books. After hours of searching, something finally caught his eye.

A faded newspaper clipping.

Man Drowns in Lin Pool. Daughter Missing.”

The photo was blurry, but the man looked frighteningly similar to the figure Eshan saw in the pool. The girl in the old photo wore the same pink dress.

Eshan’s hands trembled as he read further. The article mentioned the accident happened years ago. The daughter’s body was never found.

The librarian, an old woman with shaking hands, noticed him reading.

“You shouldn’t look into that,” she whispered.

“People who see the girl… don’t sleep well after.”

Eshan’s throat went dry.

“You mean… she’s been seen before?”

The woman nodded slowly.

“And every person said the same thing. She looks the same age. She never grows. She never changes."

Eshan felt cold.

“But why me?” he asked.

The librarian looked at him seriously.

“Because if you can see her… it means your past is tangled with hers.”