Chapter 1 – The Echo in the Camera

The old pawn shop smelled like dust, cigarette smoke, and lost dreams.

“Why am I even here?” I muttered, poking through piles of junk.

“Because you owe me lunch money,” Ayaka Mizuno said, arms folded, that annoyingly perfect smile plastered on her face. “And because you’re hopeless.”

I picked up a cracked film camera. The moment my hand touched it, a whisper slithered into my ear.

—click, laugh, click… don’t forget me.

I froze. “What the hell was that?”

Ayaka tilted her head. “What was what?”

“The… uh…” My voice cracked. Great. First sign of insanity at seventeen.

But the whisper grew louder, the echo of someone’s laughter flooding my head until I almost dropped the camera. And then—just for a second—I saw a boy’s shadow in the dusty mirror across the room. A boy with a mask.

And he was staring at me.