@spottybob wrote this haunting and creepy short story which will give you shivers!

The sense of euphoria that Ivory Tellman rarely had was usually well-earned.

Of course, the way she found those moments were hardly the way that 'normal' people would find them, as she would find her amusement out of much stranger things. When younger, she was often found humming to herself as she sat in her room, staring at a wall that had a small ring of toys around it. Her parents later found that she was 'listening' to her imaginary friend speak and that the imaginary friend had often requested toys and odd little things for itself.

The parents had brushed it off as a phase that the seven-year-old was going through when things became much more sinister.

The girl had begun to speak to people who weren't there, watching the wall for hours upon hours of time, and wandering the halls in the late hours of the night, her feet falling softly on the creaking floorboards that were coated with a fine layer of dust.

At this point, the girl's parents had brought the girl to a psychic, not believing that whatever had been going on was truly coincidental. The so-called seer, however, had told them that her Third Eye hadn't shown her anything. Her parents, especially her mother, Maria, had been disappointed, but exceedingly unsettled. They hadn't done anything about the strange behaviour, letting the girl walk through the home, leaving everything behind her cold as they believed her not to be in control of herself.

Ivory, however, was in full control of what she was doing and had oddly found everything amusing, her brown eyes sparkling at the suggestions her friend had made, who was with her every step of the long path she had taken. The friend hadn't given a name, but it spoke in her thoughts, caressed her mind with whispered suggestions, poisoning her thoughts with the evil it spread in her body.

The whispering shadow had been the only one that had stayed loyal to Ivory, all her former friends abandoning her when finding out about her 'quirks' which Ivory saw as normal.

Of course, the now fourteen-year-old girl had completely given herself to the shadow that had tailed her wherever she roamed. The sunken look that had been seen on her face had long since been established since she met the shadow.

The shadow, however had only giggled madly at the look she had adopted, whispering into her ears with new things to make others suffer for imaginary crimes.

The murder rate, since that night, had long since gotten higher and higher, the murders more violent and grotesque than the less and police officers going missing, being picked off like flies.

At least, until the shadow that had so long protected Ivory had come to her with a suggestion. A way to get proper justice for the wrongdoings of all, and ivory accepted readily. The shadow had grinned wickedly and led her to the forest.

The murder rate in the small town dropped quickly once Ivory was found slumped against a tree, a gleeful smile on her face with no pulse, and no eyes. The shadow was no where to be found.

At least, until it appeared once more, whispering into the ears of a child who had stumbled too far from home. Ivory was ready to corrupt the child as the shadow had done to her.