At dawn, a storm swept through the town, its thun­der rever­ber­at­ing against the heav­ens as rain pat­tered down on rooftops. Jim and Will found them­selves in a fit­ful sleep, haunt­ed by dreams that seemed craft­ed from dark fab­ric. Amidst this, the car­ni­val grounds stirred; the carousel awak­ened with a dis­cor­dant melody, hint­ing at its return to life, like­ly heard by only one per­son in town—Miss Foley, who hur­ried away upon hear­ing it.

As rain poured hard­er, Jim and Will sought solace in their homes, con­vers­ing qui­et­ly about past events. Dressed in rain gear, Jim stepped out­side into the gloomy Sun­day before slow­ly mak­ing his way towards Will’s house. When Will joined him, they walked with heavy thoughts, reflect­ing on unset­tling mys­ter­ies from the pre­vi­ous night. Jim broke the silence, recount­ing a dream about an omi­nous parade fea­tur­ing a cof­fin, which he imag­ined to be as long as forty feet. This led them to humor­ous dis­cus­sions about bal­loons and funer­als, but an unset­tling air hung above.

Their con­ver­sa­tion turned seri­ous as they approached an emp­ty lot dom­i­nat­ed by a tow­er­ing oak tree, where they heard a girl weep­ing. Despite Jim’s reser­va­tions about a girl cry­ing in the rain, Will, com­pelled by the sound, ven­tured towards the tree and dis­cov­ered a dis­tressed lit­tle girl, unable to stop cry­ing. She sought help, cling­ing to them in des­per­a­tion. Jim recoiled, insist­ing they didn’t know her, while Will felt increas­ing­ly drawn to the girl’s plight.

Will com­posed him­self and promised the girl they would return with help, acknowl­edg­ing her famil­iar eyes despite Jim’s protests. Jim felt a mix­ture of dis­be­lief and frus­tra­tion, while Will point­ed out the dif­fer­ences he noticed rem­i­nis­cent of their pre­vi­ous encoun­ters with the sin­is­ter car­ni­val. They real­ized Miss Foley was in dan­ger, pos­si­bly caught in the clutch­es of the car­ni­val.

As they strate­gized about the urgent need to assist the girl, they were dis­tract­ed by the boom­ing sounds of the carnival—clowns, music, and the stir­ring aura of an approach­ing parade. The boys felt the grav­i­ty of their sit­u­a­tion as they rushed to hide, hop­ing to pro­tect the girl beneath the oak. Upon return­ing, their search turned to dread as they found the spot under the tree emp­ty, prompt­ing them to hide even deep­er with­in the town as wor­ry seeped in about the girl’s fate .

Wait­ing ai

Wait­ing ai