The Smiling Man

Investigation

It was the first day that Matt would be coming to my school. He hadn't been able to go for whatever reason, but was finally coming on second grade. Jack and I stayed friends even after what happened, unlike me and Ryan. I was ready to see him again, but wanted to make sure that Jack and Matt would be friends when he came, so that was my goal for the first day. For the first year, I had woken myself up for school. I got ready and stopped as I grabbed socks and saw out my window.

"Oh no, not again, not now," I muttered to myself as I saw the figure of a person outside, and there was a distinct smile I had grown to resent. It had caused so much pain. I decided to not tell my dad, because it would disappear the moment my dad walked in. By this point in my life, I had gotten a laptop for my birthday and had started reading people's ghost stories on reddit, but this didn't seem supernatural, he seemed very much alive. Not like ghosts in the stories, but his smile seemed fake or not natural or something along those lines. I grabbed my new shoes and ran out into the already running car. The school was only a few miles away, but my dad had to be early for teacher duties, or something. I was normally the first kid in the classroom, other than Ryan, but he avoided me nowadays. We drove and I faintly remember seeing something on the street corners and a car following us, but it didn't register in my brain who it probably was. I guessed it had been another parent driving their kid to school.

I walked into the room about twenty minutes early, and to my pleasure, to see both Jack and Matt there talking their heads off.

"Hey, see you two are already friends, thankfully I don't have to talk you into it," I said, and Matt busted out laughing. He was the kind of person who had a very contagious laugh, and it took awhile to get him quiet again, but he also was a bit of a goody-two-shoes. He was back then at least, and so was I, but we got more mischievous as we got older. I think all kids do that though, with an exception of a few. I sat down with them both and we were already planning a night, but Jack couldn't come that weekend, so it was just going to be me and Matt. I was fine with that because we hadn't been together for a few months and I was ready. Plus I hadn't had an experience with the smiling person with Matt, so I felt safe around him. I hadn't put two and two together that the smiler came around the same time I met Matt. Matt, Jack, and I talked all week and became good friends, and finally it was time for Matt to come over. Back in second grade and even before then we used to have giant imaginations. We thought that we were investigators or something so we would pretty much unconsciously stalk people. Not trying to be creepy, just look at random people on the internet.

The weekend started like any other, we played wii and watched Cartoon Network. It went like that until the middle of saturday when we decided I would go to his house because he had a trampoline. I grabbed my laptop and my mom drove us over. It wasn't too far, so we did that a lot, switched houses. Before I left though, I found a random slip of paper on my windowsill, the one that looked out into my garden. The paper had a name on it, Ally Samoa.

"Look at this, it's a new case," I said, referring to our being investigators and all. We told my mom bye and went straight in. We were excited because we didn't know where the name had come from and wanted to do research. I pulled my laptop out of my bag and turned it on. I went to google to see if it had any results, and I found one. She was a twenty-three year old and had an instagram and facebook. We signed onto a fake account and looked at Ally's profiles. She only posted weird quotes and pictures that were out of focus, but looked familiar somehow. It looked like a place I had been to and there were people who also looked familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on it. She did have locations on her pictures though. Her facebook had a picture of herself with the caption "I'm gonna get you," and some weird pictures made out of text. In one of her pictures though, she had on a jacket on. One of the jackets with the hood that made it look like you had a different face. Her jacket though, had what looked like a smile. Not the kind of one my stalker had, but a cartoon version. The caption was "Got four and five, now the first three," It said. The picture had been taken around the time the "Beach" happened. I pulled up my sleeve and saw where the wound had been re-applied at Jack's place. Jack had also gotten a number then too, a three. I didn't think about what it meant, at least, I didn't back then. After we got bored we went outside on the trampoline with Matt's little brother, Leo. Leo could do the best tricks, mostly because he was always out there. Leo was only a Kindergartener, but could do some cool tricks. It was getting late and Matt's mom called us in for dinner, and as I was getting off, I could swear something ran away right behind Matt's fence. We ate and then went to Matt's room to watch a movie, we didn't sleep much though. We watched a few movies and then decided to go eat left-overs at around three. Behind their glass, I could see someone standing behind their wooden fence, in the midst of climbing in towards us.

"Oh my god! What the heck is he doing?" Matt asked in a concerned voice, "Is it the smiling person?" He asked. I shook my head though, it wasn't. This person had very few teeth, all of which were grown at awkward angles that didn't look right. He was also wearing a white ski mask. I did see two things that scared me though. A) He was climbing over the fence, and B) He had what looked to be a knife on his belt. I ran to the door as Matt ran to get his mom, since his dad wasn't home that night. While I was locking both locks on the door to the backyard, he spotted me. I didn't think to take a picture with my iPod so I just sat there terrified. He had probably figured out we would tell Matt's parents and he ran and jumped the fence in a single hop. I couldn't let him go though. I know I should have, but people had terrorized me too much. So I unlocked the door and ran to the fence with a rock. He had tripped and was recovering from a screwed up ankle. It gave me time. I aimed my rock as I got onto the netless trampoline. I jumped and hit him dead in the back of the head. H=The trampoline was up against the fence so I was really close to the now angered man. He pulled his knife, but my seven year old adrenaline was pumping through my veins and I wasn't scared.I had a few rocks and I noticed someone else had climbed onto the trampoline, Matt.

"C'mon, he's coming," Matt said with tears of horror pouring down his face, but something grabbed his arm from over the fence, something that wasn't the almost toothless man. It hit Matt in the head with blunt object and Then I saw the almost toothless man grab me. I saw a swing of motion and I passed out.

I woke up in bed and saw Matt in the one beside me. We were still there at his house, but Matt was still asleep. My head hurt pretty bad and I had a burning in my arm.

"No, not again," I murmured to myself as I rose my forearm to my eyes. I had a band-aid and pulled it back. I already knew exactly what was there, a number four, re-carved into the same spot it was first carved when I was six. I got up and walked to Matt's bed and grabbed his right arm. Sure enough, right where my number was, was a band-aid. I pulled his back his band-aid and saw a number "2".

"You're awake, tell me what happened. At one moment Matt was crying with illiterate words, and I walked outside and you both had knots on your head's and were bleeding from your right arm. I grabbed you and fixed you up the best I could an-" she paused, "Is that a four on your arm?" She asked very confused, but also almost accusingly.

"Wow, that's weird, Matt's is also a number. It's a two," I answered, playing dumb. I was working it out in my head how I was going to explain this to Matt. Ryan had stopped talking and Jack's parents didn't ever know, but Matt's mom knew a lot, so I had to make an excuse. I noticed it was daylight outside and grabbed my iPod. The time read 2:25. I was going home at around six, which gave me enough time to make an excuse for Matt. Matt's mom left the room and I grabbed my laptop and played a few games, passing the time until Matt awoke.

"What the hell happened?" I heard as Matt rose from his bed. It was the first time I had him or a kid our age cuss.

"Well, what do you remember?" I asked, thinking I should tell him the truth, because I could trust him not to tell his mom. She would tell my dad, and I didn't want him knowing just yet, or ever if possible.

"Well, a guy climbed my fence, you attacked him, and I passed out. Now I have a two an my arm. What's this mean?" He asked with genuine fear. I told him every story about what had happened and made him swear on everything that he wouldn't tell anyone or talk about it with anyone other than Jack or I. He swore and sat for a minute in disbelief. I went home, and instead of just a smiling person, now they took shifts. The smiling person and then every couple hours someone new came in. A person wearing a ski mask with almost no teeth.