Chapter Text
CHAPTER 1
The apartment was suffocatingly still, as if the walls themselves were holding their breath. It was clean, ordinary even—books on the shelf, a pot of cold coffee on the table—but none of it felt safe.
Charlotte “Charlie” Warren sat quietly in the corner of the room, her back straight, hands clasped tightly in her lap. She didn’t speak. She didn’t fidget. She simply stared across the room at the doll.
Annabelle.
The name hung in the air like smoke.
Charlie’s eyes never left it. The doll sat neatly in a floral armchair, legs hanging loosely, red hair in neat braids, that painted face perfectly still—and yet watching , somehow. Charlie had felt its energy the moment they stepped inside. Not sadness. Not grief. Something else. Something dark. Hungry.
She listened as the girls, Debbie and Camilla, tried to put words to their fear.
“It scares us just thinking about it,” Debbie said shakily. “When you hear it, you're gonna think we're insane.”
Ed, sitting beside Lorraine, leaned forward with practiced calm. “Try us. Please. From the start.”
Charlie glanced at her father. His tone was steady, like always, but she could feel the tightness in him—the way his hand brushed against his thigh as if resisting the urge to reach for a crucifix.
Debbie swallowed and spoke. “It started out small. The hand or leg would be in a different position. Then the head was tilted up when it was looking down. Then one day… it was in a completely different room.”
Her voice cracked slightly. “It’s moving around by itself.”
Charlie’s stomach tightened.
Ed furrowed his brow. “Ever think that maybe somebody had a key to your apartment? Maybe someone was playing a trick on you?”
“That’s exactly what we thought. But there was never any sign of intrusion.”
Lorraine’s voice came, soft and knowing. “And all of that led you to believe the doll was possessed?”
“Yes,” Debbie said. “Camilla got in touch with a medium. We learned from her that a 7-year-old girl named Annabelle Higgins had died in this apartment.. She was lonely and took a liking to my doll. All she wanted was to be friends.”
Charlie’s eyes narrowed.
Friends didn’t move around at night.
“When we heard this, we felt really sorry for her,” Camilla added. “We’re nurses. We help people. So... we gave her permission to move in to the doll.”
Ed sat up straighter. “Wait. You did what?”
“She wanted to live with us by inhabiting the doll,” Camilla said. “We said yes.”
Charlie’s heart beat faster. Her mother had always warned her—never invite. Never give something a name. Never say yes .
“But then things got worse,” Debbie said. “We’d find her in rooms we didn’t leave her in. Then the notes started.”
Flashback.
Charlie saw it in her mind even before they described it—a slip of paper on the floor, the jagged letters scrawled in red crayon.
"Miss me?"
The girls had found the doll in the hallway, sitting upright like she’d been waiting.
“Debbie!” Camilla screamed. “Debbie, wait!”
Charlie could almost hear their panic echoing through the walls. She shivered.
Back in the apartment, Debbie’s voice broke. “We were beyond terrified. We don't know what's going on or what to do.”
“Can you help us?” she asked, eyes pleading.
Ed nodded slowly. “Yes. But first… you need to understand something. There is no such thing as Annabelle. And there never was.”
Charlie looked to her mom. Lorraine’s face was calm, but her energy was sharp. Focused.
“Ghosts don’t possess such power,” Lorraine said. “ I think what we have here is something extremely manipulative. It's something inhuman.”
Ed’s voice was firm. “It was a big mistake acknowledging this doll. And through that the inhuman spirit tricked you. You gave it permission to infest your life.”
“What is an inhuman spirit?” Camilla asked, barely whispering.
“It’s something that’s never walked the earth in human form,” Ed said. “ It's something demonic.”
Charlie stared at the doll. The air around it seemed to pulse.
“So the doll was never possessed?” Debbie asked.
“No,” Lorraine said. “It was used as a conduit. It moves around to give the impression of possession. Demonic spirits don't possess things. They possess people. It wanted to get inside of you..”
Charlie's grip on her bracelet tightened, her thumb brushing over the small “W” charm.
She looked at the doll again.
And she knew— it was looking back .
“Alright that's good, Drew. You can shut it down now. Hit the lights.”
The projector gave one last whirring sigh before Drew switched it off, casting the fading photo of the haunted apartment into darkness. He hit the lights, flooding the university lecture hall in pale fluorescence. Dozens of students blinked and straightened in their seats, the eerie stillness of the Warrens’ case finally giving way to the buzz of post-lecture energy.
Charlie sat two rows back near the end of the aisle, one leg crossed over the other, arms folded tightly. At fourteen, she looked a little out of place among the college students—but no one seemed to question her presence. She was quiet, attentive, her copper-red hair falling in soft waves down her back, a pencil gripped in her hand, and a notebook sat open in her lap, doodles curling around the margins of sparse notes. Beside her sat Drew, Ed’s longtime assistant, resetting the projector.
Charlie leaned toward Drew and muttered just loud enough for him to hear, “I give the whole thing a solid seven on the creepy scale.”
Drew smirked, not looking up. “Only a seven?”
“I’m pacing myself.”
Ed addressed the room again. “So we got the church to send a priest over to bless the house and the occupants. Whatever was oppressing that apartment…”—he gave a small shrug—“…was no longer with them.”
There was a beat of silence before Ed scanned the crowd. “Any questions?”
Hands went up. Charlie noticed one of the girls near the front looked like she wanted to ask about five different things but was trying to narrow it down to one.
“Yes,” Ed said, pointing.
“Where’s the doll now?” the woman asked.
Charlie didn’t need to look to know which doll they meant. The answer never changed—but the way people asked always did. She could feel the flicker of tension around the question, like someone had cracked open a cold window.
“Someplace safe,” Lorraine said evenly.
“Yep,” Ed echoed with a nod.
Next, a guy raised his hand, half-curious, half-skeptical. “So, what are you guys? I mean… what do people call you?”
Charlie rolled her eyes faintly, leaning toward Drew again. “Cue the identity montage.”
Ed launched into the well-worn list. “We’ve been called demonologists—that’s one name.”
“Ghost hunters…, paranormal researchers…,” He offered next.
“Kooks,” Lorraine added lightly, to scattered laughter.
“Wackos,” Ed chimed in.
Charlie whispered, “Don’t forget ‘the weird family with the haunted basement.’”
Drew snorted quietly, but kept it under control.
Lorraine stepped forward a little, her expression softening. “But we prefer to be known simply as…Ed and Lorraine Warren”
There was a quiet that fell after that—not awkward, not tense, just thoughtful. Even the students who hadn’t quite believed everything looked like they wanted to. Some of them had leaned forward. Others scribbled notes, unsure what to make of what they’d just heard.
Charlie looked toward her parents, the pride unmistakable in her eyes—even if her dry wit stayed intact.
When the lecture hall began to stir again, students collecting bags and buzzing with commentary, Charlie murmured just loud enough for Drew to hear:
“They’re gonna have nightmares for a week.”
Drew glanced at her, half amused. “Including you?”
Charlie raised an eyebrow. “Please. My room is right over the real thing.”