“Have you ever heard of My Little Pony:Friendship is Magic?” She asked.
“Do you believe in monsters?”
It was the catalyst that has led me down a rabbit hole to strange and terrible places.
There is a strange place online I’ve been visiting for a while now; A site for storing, archiving and discussing occurrences beyond the comprehension of those who view the world in a rational way. This place centers around a never-watched cartoon show and events surrounding it that, according to all laws of the universe, should never be able to happen. Among searches for answers, I stumbled across this home away from home;. Maybe by accident or maybe, more likely, this place had been searching for me just as I had been searching for it.
It was on this site where I first learned of the Boise family tragedy, of the disappearance and the house. The event had made the local and state news, but had never gone further before fading from everyone’s memories. A forgettable mystery, a forgotten crime except for the forbidden places on the internet where dwellers like myself took an almost morbid fascination with the incident. Suggested theories range from Mafia gang style hits to the usual alien abduction story that’s always suggested when someone goes missing to being connected to some random serial killer; some had even posed suggestions of a passing satanic cult. Yet as morbid, and I suspect, dangerous as these people are, they seem to be the only ones keeping the family's memory alive.
It was the user known online as Derpy who posted this article by the late Melanie Ross. The same Derpy who sent me the other article from. I have copied and posted it here for you to read. The mystery remains ‘officially’ unsolved to this day.
Once again I cannot confirm or deny this story. Though the writer and poster are considered trustworthy, I still must insist you read this with a grain of salt.
From the journal of Melanie Ross:
The Walls are Pink
The Boise family incident.
On 4/18/2011 The Boise family went missing. They have never been found.
Transcript of Audio 911 call recorded 6:43 p.m, 4/18/11
911 Operator: 911, what is your emergency?
Caller: (unintelligible, screaming,)...coming. Help! (unintelligible, crying)...Mom! (woman screaming in background)...I’m calling...calling.
911 Operator: Ma’am, slow down, I can’t understand you. Please state the nature of the emergency.
Caller: Dad’s arm...took him...Hurry. (loud crash in the background. Screaming)...Oh god! Help!
911 Operator: Can you tell me your location?
Caller: (unintelligible)...Ple...la…(Scream)...Mom!..Grace!
911 Operator: I need to know your location. Tell me your location.
Caller: (Screaming. More loud crashing)...Boi...amily at 3431 Kin…(Scream. Call ends.)
911 Operator: Ma’am? Ma’am?
End of Transcript
This was the last known contact with the Boise family and my first documented paranormal event I observed linking back to a failed cartoon about tiny talking horses and the magic of friendship, a show designed to sell toys and make millions. But in the end it never happened. Why? When did things go wrong? Why did things go wrong? Somewhere out there is the answer to it all. An explanation for the reason why the world is not what it should be. But mostly why we should all be afraid of something that didn’t exist.
It has been raining for the last few days, which seems fitting. I’ve been staring outside the window lost in thought for at least a few hours, mindlessly watching the sun as it tried to peek through the cloudy skies. Trying every few minutes but always failing
The hotel was a dump. It was the kind of place you’d expect to see in some shoddy B movie or perhaps one of those cheap porno flicks. It was the type of room that had many stories to tell, most of them bad. However, it was inexpensive and given my current lack of cash it was good enough even if I had to fight with the staff to vacuum or change the sheets.
As I looked out into the gloomy afternoon my eyes drifted toward the old house across from the hotel, to what I think is a girl playing in the rain in their backyard. The heavy purple rain gear makes it hard to tell, but it doesn’t really matter. She seemed to be having fun running around the yard splashing the puddles. It made me smile as memories of my brother and I doing the same thing as kids come back, each of us trying to see who can get the other the muddiest.
Occasionally her carefree cries drift through the old window and wafer thin walls. Sometimes her faint voice sounds distorted, otherworldly and perhaps inhuman. When it does, a chill goes up my spine and I have to look away.
I shake off these thoughts as I shift my attention back to the matter at hand. The motel was a twenty minute drive from the neighborhood that marked the last location of the Boise residence. I had been preparing myself for meeting a few people that could tell me more about the family, unsurprisingly I didn't find a lot in my search. There wasn’t really much to tell, just a typical blue-collar family, nothing special. Father was a civil engineer named Ronald. Stepmother of ten years, Yolanda, was a high school math teacher. Both were divorcees that remarried each other in February of 2001. Two children, both daughters: Grace and Lola, along with a dog named Bosco and a cat named Ranger.
Even though both parents worked long hours they participated in their children's activities, and went on family vacations every summer. Last time I looked, the mother’s Facebook page was still up and running, her last post being an announcement on themes for the upcoming school prom. What I am trying to say in all of this rambling is that they were people, they had lives, jobs, friends, futures.
The most interesting and disturbing thing I found of the Boise family incident was how people who were involved began to… for lack of a better term, get over the event after only a few short days of investigation by the police. Few were questioned, no leads were ever discussed. No one even posted a missing person flyer, if they were printed at all:
I too felt nothing towards the disappearance when I first read about it; not out of malice, but a feeling that this wasn’t my problem, this had nothing to do with me. My own brother and his family had vanished around the same time; that alone was infinitely more important than them, and took the bulk of my thoughts by storm. As sad as you might think it, I just didn’t have time to think about another death in the news..
What changed everything was an email.
When my brother disappeared I frantically searched everywhere I could for something, some lead, some hook, anything that would point me towards anything. My research would lead me to those same strange and dark places on the internet; faint whispering about a show for kids that had somehow been connected to a lot of missing people.
At the time the only thing stuck in my mind was the dirty pony doll found in my niece's bedroom that seemed to lead nowhere. However, investigating the disappearance of my brother and his family was when I received a strange email from an unknown source that started me on my research into the Boise family tragedy, and eventually into the “My Little Pony” phenomena. It read as follows:
“Gerascophobia: An abnormal or incessant fear of growing older or growing up,” said the first line.
“Lola was a crazy fucking loon!” said the second line. It only became less coherent from there.
“Lola was damaged. I mean really mentally damaged. She was never right in the head. Why her parents never got her the help she needed before things got too bad I’ll never know. Everyone could see something was wrong but they all just kept going on believing it was just a phase and she would grow out of it. Strange how a lot of children in the neighborhood where she lived were getting hurt, sometimes really bad, but things all went back to normal when the family vanished like nothing happened. Strange coincidence you think? Too bad none of them would ever talk to you. She’s been gone for almost a year and they are still afraid of her.”
“She pretty much coasted through life, doing her own thing. The strange crazy girl was left alone to wander in her own little world- That is, until October 2010, when things changed. See, that was when our Lola finally found some friends that understood her, good friends too. These new friends really understood Lola. You know, the magic of friendship and all that shit. They believed in the same things as her. Liked the same likes as her. Played the same games as her. Even had the same streak for violence and pain when things didn’t go their way. Just a rainbow of sunshine and happiness to be around.”
At the time I did not know who Lola was, and nothing I could find online really pointed to anything suspicious-until I saw the picture that was attached:
The moment I saw her, saw the pony wrapped in her arms, I knew. It was a white one this time, obvious even through the filth that covered the thing, eyes just as black as the one I knew. On its flank, three blue diamonds were sewn onto it. Long streaks of grime ran through its mane and tail. The thing looked nasty; how she was able to hold it so close to her face without vomiting I’ll never know, but as I shifted my gaze from the doll to the girl I found myself staring in shock, and- I’ll admit-fear. The girl in the picture scared me.
She was dressed in some Disney princess dress, that was obvious. But I couldn’t tell you which one; my eyes were constantly drawn to that nasty doll in her hand she rested her cheek on, creating a surreal appearance. Though the girl looked to be in her mid to late twenties, the way she had made herself up and posed with her dolly was, well, creepy.
There was a strange intensity to her. Her short curly hair looked barely brushed and tied with a pink ribbon. The blush on her cheeks was done in a sloppy circle, blue eyeshadow was heavy and sloppily applied. In fact, everything she had put on looked caked and badly made, like when a child gets into her mothers makeup case for the first time.
But It was her eyes above her deranged, big, bright smile smeared with pink lipstick that upset me the most. Something beyond her madness floated, watched, a dangerous thing slept deep inside that child. Some unholy thing that feasted on Lola’s mind and soul. I realized after a moment what it was, and it disturbed me like nothing else thus far; It was the sensation of hope. The insanity of the thought that dreams really do come true if you believe hard enough.
I wondered what kind of person this Lola Boise was, as silly as it was. It was just a stray thought that randomly zipped through my brain before it vanished in a heartbeat. Could Lola even have been called a person?
The first break in my investigation came from finding out the family had lied about where they had come from. Not from Kentucky as they had told everyone, but Wisconsin. It wasn’t hard to trace, but such a strangely specific thing to do I had to wonder why.
I dug deeper, searching until I was able to pinpoint their original house, the school Grace had gone to, even the jobs both parents worked at. I struck paydirt shortly after a week of digging by finding a sixteen year old girl (I’ll call her “R”) who was willing to talk to me about her friendship with Lola as long as I kept her anonymous.
I could feel the tension and fear in her voice over the phone, reliving past memories in her mind. I knew this wasn’t going to be easy or pleasant, but she was still willing to talk to me about her.
“I first met her when I was around ten, she was my next door neighbor.” R started, “Well, really it was just me following her around and doing whatever she told me. Lola was well known with the other girls around my age in the neighborhood. She was strange, not like other adults. Her face was always caked with tons of makeup that would usually be pretty messed up from her spending all the time running and playing. Other than her parents, I never saw her being around any adults. She liked being around children my age, maybe a year or two younger or older.”
“She didn’t try anything, did she?” I asked.
“No,” she chuckled nervously, “Lola thought of herself as my age even though I would say she was around 20, maybe 21. I mean, she always wore Disney princess dresses or these, these tea dresses, I think they are called. It was always dresses with her, never pants or any other type of clothing, and they were almost always dirty or stained from her playing outside all the time.”
“She was very controlling to whoever she was playing with, which was why most of my other friends stayed away from her most of the time. We were all starting to grow and change, and she just… wanted to have fun in her imaginary world. Heh, me? I still wanted to play with Lola at the time, even if I was getting too big for that, even if she scared the hell out of me.”
“Why did she scare you?” I asked.
“Ever since I first met her, Lola had a cruel streak, and could get mean when she didn’t get her way. More than just shouting or throwing a temper tantrum. Like she had this scary aura about her… Lola was dangerous. She drove a lot of my friends away from me with how she acted… Looking back I should’ve realized just how bad it was.”
“She loved to play...I mean really loved to play,” continued R. I couldn’t help but notice a slight change in her voice, like she was pushing down some unpleasant memories. “Typical silly stuff children did. Make believe, parties, Lola loved doing that. Hide and seek, skipping around everywhere we went, playing on the playground even though the swings and slides were too small for her to use. Most of us stopped doing that a while ago, but not her...She was really into it. But… “
“But?” I asked, gently prodding her along.
“Well, yeah. It was still kinda fun, but Lola got to be intense. I mean, she would demand you do what you were told or she would get very angry. And when she got angry, sometimes it got really bad.” I could hear the slight pause in her voice.
“You don’t have to continue,” I told R reassuringly, but that was just bullshit. I wanted to know, I had to know. I had to know everything about this Lola girl.
“It happened after school. I was eleven at the time,” R said, “Her temper had been getting worse ever since I had first met her, but after my birthday she started becoming almost unbearable. I think puberty was starting to scare her about me growing up. I was beginning to grow apart from all that stuff. That day after school she came over and insisted we play. She was really on edge that day. For the past few days, as a matter of fact.”
“What were the two of you doing that day?” I asked.
“Well, as usual, I was left alone, so I invited her over to my house. My parents were still at work and they didn’t mind me spending time with Lola. They thought she was just slow. They thought it was nice I was spending time with the special girl. Everyone thought she was dumb, but she wasn’t. Lola was just different,” R said,clearly not wanting to talk about it. I agreed, not wanting to delve further into speculation.
“First it was some stupid board game: Candyland I think it was? Yes, Candyland...She never wanted to play anything harder than that. Afterwards we watched some cartoons,” R said, “I can’t remember what it was we watched but I do remember her getting angry at it, really angry. It came out of nowhere when something, I dunno what, just pissed her off. She jumped off the floor she had been laying on and started screeching at the TV. Just this incoherent yelling at the top of her lungs. No words, just screeching and babbling. I was terrified. I’d never seen her like this before. I think it was a peek of the real her I had seen. “
“I should’ve taken it as a warning. Maybe ask her to leave, called the cops or something. She was so scary, like a monster hiding underneath Lola’s skin, when suddenly, whatever the hell she had turned into turned off and she was regular ol’ Lola again. Laughing off what had happened like it was all a joke and wanted to go to my brother's old treehouse and do something there.”
“And what did you do?” I asked.
“Do? She scared the shit out of me,” R continued, “She looked like a maniac, This ball of insane rage and uncontrolled anger. Getting herself worked over a cartoon. A cartoon.”
Looking again at the email with the picture of Lola again I could see that. That madness hiding so well under her childlike ways, “You mentioned a treehouse?” I asked.
“See, I had this treehouse in the backyard. It was my brother’s until he went to college, so I was given it. Lola and I spend a lot of time making it our own. It was all pink and girly.” R giggled, before she suddenly stopped. I could feel the emotions welling up inside of her, even across the phone. She didn’t want to talk about it, but couldn’t stop either.”
“What happened?”
“She...uh...heh,” the girl stuttered, a small chuckle escaping her lips, “We...um...she...I’m pretty embarrassed...but um, m-my dogs Avery and King were in the treehouse with us that day. Lola didn’t like animals too much, They never did what they were told...That day...I dunno. See, some of my other girlfriends had invited me to hang out with them and see a movie and a sleepover. At that time, even I was starting to get bored of doing the same thing over and over. I was starting to grow out of it. Lola had started to change. Like, almost fighting the fact we were all growing up and changing...Before then she would just scream and yell when she didn’t get her way...She was changing, too. Just a lot worse than anyone knew.”
“Was Lola invited?” I asked.
“Would you invite someone like that to hang out with you?” she giggled. “Too bad she didn’t discover the anime scene. I think that would have helped her.”
I paused for a moment in thought, picturing the older woman desperately trying to remain a child and keep her friends as children. Everyone would’ve seen something was wrong with Lola.
“Did you two get into a fight?”
“She didn’t want me to go. Lola always just expected me to agree with everything she wanted. And to a point, I usually did, but this time I wanted to hang out with the others, talk about, I dunno, whatever other girls talked about. Something that wasn’t just about dolls or make believe,” R said, pausing for an uncomfortable amount of time until I gently prodded her to continue.
“Everything was a blur when it happened. I don’t remember much on that day, but she… attacked me. The neighbors must have heard me screaming. If they hadn’t checked to see what was going on...By that time I lost consciousness. I remember waking up in the hospital hurting all over with my mom and dad next to me.”
“She sent you to the hospital?” I asked.
“I had to get stitches across my head in two places. My wrist and two of my ribs were broken. I was covered in bruises,” she spoke slowly, choking back the tears. “She, she killed Avery. Kept hitting him across the head with a stick because he wouldn’t stop barking.”
I sat there for a moment with my thoughts, still trying to imagine who Lola was, contemplating what she was behind the violence, if anything. “Did you ever see her again?” I finally asked.
“No, my parents made sure of that. Not that I wanted to anyway. In fact, pretty much everyone shunned her after that. Even her mom kept her inside after that, with no visitors allowed. Everyone was afraid of her.”
“Was she ever punished?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. No one ever spoke to me about it. No one wanted to talk about her or the incident. Nine months later, her family moved out of state to a new house. Lola needed a lot of help. But I think her mom and dad were too scared to admit something was wrong with her. Like, they thought it meant they failed as parents or something like that. But if you want my opinion… She’s evil, was always evil. And a lot more dangerous than she looked. Heh…” she finished with a small fit of the giggles. I was already starting to question her own sanity, and that didn’t help.
“I just remembered something. Don’t know if it’s important or not.” she considered.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I didn’t hear about the family disappearing until a month after it happened. My mom told me, and she only found out from a friend who had friended the dad on his facebook account. But, and please don’t laugh when I say this, I had a dream the day they vanished.” There was a pause where I said nothing. “You think it’s weird, don’t you?”
“Do you remember this dream?” I asked, careful not to let any emotions show.
“Sometimes I catch myself staring off into space for a minute or two. When it happens, everything feels dreamy and strange.”
“What do you mean? I don’t understand.”
“Like I could reach my hand out and grab the air and… pull it all away.”
“Pull the air away?” I didn’t understand the sudden change in topic, and was starting to consider hanging up.
“I mean pull everything away. Like this place, like reality is just a covering for something else. Like a sheet over a couch, I guess is the best way to describe it. Only the sheet is covering another place. A place of bright sunshine and the bluest of skies. A place with pegasi that move clouds across the sky and unicorns that spread joy. The kind of place where everyone sings songs all day and makes cupcakes for friends. A place where friendship really does mean something.”
“Okay. But what does that have to do with Lola?” I asked, beyond lost in what she was trying to tell me.
“When that happens, I can almost hear Lola. She’s in that happy place. I know it. Sometimes I can hear her calling me, asking me to join her. I haven’t talked to her in years, but I know that voice is hers. This, whatever the hell it is, only happens for a minute, but it scares the shit out of me. Lola scares the shit out of me. She was not a good person and I can only see her getting worse as she got older. Even scarier is that a part of me wants to join her. I want to go to that magical place with her. A place where anything is possible… Equestria. That’s what it’s called. It’s called Equestria.”
A week after the interview, R vanished while attending school. According to the report, she disappeared during class; just went to use the bathroom and never returned. I found this out long after the fact.
Just like the Boise family, there was an attempt to find her. Some posters were printed, a half hearted plea by her parents for her return was called for on one of the local news channels. Just like before, the world moved on fast.. I knew she was never coming back, and I knew she was already being forgotten.
After I interviewed R, I traveled with the intention of reinterviewing the witnesses that reporters had covered earlier, along with some of the people on the mother’s old Facebook account. But getting them to talk was a lot harder than it had been the first time. Most refused to answer my calls or emails, and the few that did only offered the same two sentence replies they had offered in the article. There was nothing new or interesting to add to what I already knew- until finally one of the subjects from the paper (hereafter referred to as ‘T’), contacted me. She claimed her family used to live in the house on the other side of the Boise family, with an alley separating the two. She seemed bright and cheerful, and glowed over the younger daughter, Grace.
“Oh, Grace was a doll,” she said. There was a noticeable pause in her voice. “Grace was my younger brother's girlfriend. Wanted to be a veterinarian when she grew up. Always going on about that. She was very popular, and well liked by pretty much everyone.”
“And Lola?” I asked. I felt her tone turn cold with me.
“Lola was always...I don’t know how to put this. Lola was always… off. She didn’t interact with a lot of people, adults at least. She didn’t like talking to adults. I never talked to her myself. There was something strange about that girl. She kept to herself and played in the backyard a lot. From what the rumors I heard she was seeing a therapist for a while to no avail for… something. And she was always trying to hang out with children from what I heard. Not sure if any of that is true, of course, but it’s what I heard. For all I know it could be just a ghost story cooked up by the local kids. You know, if someone is strange or different, they must automatically be a witch or bad person.”
Her younger brother, H lived with her and gave me a lot more information after I promised him a Steam gift card. He was around Grace’s age when it happened, which was the first thing he told me. He added that he would often hitch a ride with the daughter’s mom on the way home from school, before he began painting a clearer picture of her and her sister.
“Grace would usually come over to my place to hang out, watch movies and play video games when she couldn’t be with her friends,” he told me, “She would never let me come over to her place. Me, or anyone else as a matter of fact.”
“Was it because of Lola?” I asked.
“Her family was scared of Lola, obviously She was so… weird. Sometimes I would watch her play on this playground her folks built in the backyard. She’d have her face all painted with this heavy make-up, and wore these dirty colorful dresses. She would just run around and play in her yard for hours. Grace never wanted to talk about her to anybody about anything that happened in the house. Least of all me.” He added the last part after a moment of reflection, “I don’t think Grace liked me that much. I think she came over just to get away from her sister as much as she could, when she couldn't be with her other friends.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, I mean, I did have a thing for her, ya know, but to be honest we really had nothing in common. She wasn’t into games, or anime. Once I put on the Spongebob movie to watch and she just rolled her eyes and fidgeted with her cell phone the whole time it was on. In school, other than a few classes we didn’t hang out much. She had her friends and I had mine. I mean, she wasn’t mean to me or anything. Grace was pretty cool, but it was obvious I was just an escape to get out of the house and away from her sister. Well… until Lola did that school thing. I never talked to her again after that.”
“School thing? What school thing? She was too old to go to school,” I recalled, looking over my notes. There was no mention of any incident that happened in school.
“The way I heard it, Lola, she broke into the elementary school and like smeared this really nasty pink crap all over everything. Smelled like shit from what was told to me.”
“Like sewage?” I asked.
“Naw, more like roadkill rotting on a summer day. Really nasty, heard one of the cleaners threw up from it, it was so bad. This happened three...maybe four months before the family went missing. I heard there were talks about getting her committed. She was creepy as fuck.”
“Why did she paint the school pink?” I asked, thinking over the stories I’ve been gathering. Why did her parents let this mad and dangerous child who clearly needed some help go on like this for so long?
“Her pretend friends told her to do it. Supposedly gave her that nasty pink paint too.”
“Someone else mentioned these friends of hers. I thought she was a loner.”
I could feel H pausing for a moment, probably wondering how to approach this.
“I dunno. Its hard to explain.” said H finally speaking, “It started around last October. I think that was when Lola finally lost it. I know that because that was when I started catching her playing in the backyard with these dirty pony dolls. I always thought she was crazy but there was something different about it….I dunno, like she thought they could hear what she had to say. Like, they were having these real conversations that I couldn’t hear. It was so weird watching her play with these dolls like that. Especially the purple pony.”
“Purple one?”
“I think her name was Twilight Sparkle? Yes,Twilight Sparkle. Don’t know how I know what her name was. I don’t remember anyone telling me her name. Anyway,” he said getting back on topic, “her horse dolls were just the filthiest things I had ever seen. She had six of them she took with her everywhere. They were always dirty with black eyes coated with grime. The week before they vanished I remember I was watching her play with them from my bedroom window on the second floor. Lola had arranged them in a circle on the patio table and was talking to them. Having this intense conversation the way it looked from where I was.”
“What was she talking about?” I asked
“I don’t know. She was too far away to hear, but man it got pretty heated. From where I watched it looked like her dolls had told her something she didn’t like and she was pissed. Keep jabbing her finger at the purple doll, her voice getting louder yelling “Apologize, apologize” over and over, that much I could understand. I guess she thought the other dolls were ganging up on her, she started to yell this incoherent babble at all of them, then she completely lost her shit.” H said. I could feel the excitement growing in him as he got to tell the story again to someone who has never heard it before.
“I always thought Lola was crazy but when she jumped out of her chair and attacked the Twilight doll she looked like a psycho. I never thought Lola was dangerous until then...She should have been committed.”
“You said attacked?” I asked to clarify.
“Well yeah, Lola had the doll in her hands and was trying to tear the thing apart. Like her, the doll I mean was a real thing and she wanted to hurt it. Screaming at the top of her lungs like a maniac.”
“How long did this go on?”
“Not for too long before I saw her bite the Twilight plushie on her wing and rip it off in her anger. Then it got even weirder.”
“Weirder than trying to hurt an inanimate object?”
“I saw Lola on her knees with a shit eating grin still holding the doll’s wing in her mouth. Like she accomplished something that made Twilight pay for whatever imaginary thing she had said to her. Until she started to throw up.”
“Throw up? Was there something in the doll?” I interrupted.
“Don’t know. I can only tell you what I saw and that was her making this ungodly shrieking while holding her stomach. Puking up this pink stuff all over the ground. Guess the moral is don’t piss off that Twilight doll,” H finished with a slight chuckle.
“So what happened next?” I asked after a moment.
“She sat on her ass bawling her eyes out like a preschooler. Had her arms wrapped around her stomach, still holding the doll, looking even crazier than normal. All that crying had messed up all that make-up she wore. I could see these long colored streaks running down her face and along her mouth making it into just a freakish pink smudge. I can still picture it when I close my eyes.”
“How long did she sit there?”
“Not sure but it wasn’t too long before she noticed I was watching her. You’ll think I’m crazy but it looked like the doll told her.”
“The doll?”
“Well yeah. I mean one minute she’s bawling her eyes out then just shuts up and puts that Twilight doll next to her ear and listens to it for a moment before looking in my direction. She knew I was watching her and saw everything. How could she? I was up on the second floor but she knew. It was so strange pretending as if what I had seen never happened. She got up and waved to me still with that disgusting pink crap all over her face and she gathered up her other dolls and went inside...That was the last time I saw anyone in the family.
“One last question: What about Grace?” I asked, “She was obviously disturbed by her older step-sister. How was she in all of this?”
“Before Grace stopped talking to me, she told me she thought she might be catching whatever sickness, craziness, whatever it was her sister had. Something that happened while she was in her room on her pc one day. She could hear Lola talking loudly to someone; that was something pretty known at the time. But what freaked her out was that she heard voices talking back to her. And music,” H said, “Like this real happy music.”
“She might have been on her computer, or whatever she uses.”
“Maybe, but it scared the shit out of Grace, that's all I know,” he said, before quietly adding, “They won't talk to you, ya know.”
“Who won't talk to me?”
“Adults. They’ve already gotten over the fact the family is gone. They are dead and everyone knows it. Just like everyone knows Lola had something to do with it. Something bad has happened, and the grown-ups act like it's just another day. Scary when you think about it. Like out of a Stephen King book or something.”
I didn’t know what to say after that. We talked for a little while longer about trivial things before hanging up. He agreed to talk to me again if I had any more questions.
The gentle shower became a downpour in the time I’d started thinking about the information I’d collected. I’d hoped it would be just a simple spring shower, but now it’s looking like a thunderstorm. I cursed as I realized I’d have to drive in the rain.
What incident in school? Who were these friends? None of this was ever mentioned before. I went over the police report once again a while after the H call, but my thoughts were interrupted when I feltl eyes boring into me, snatching my attention away.
It was the girl in the purple raincoat. Even from this distance I could see the girl standing next to the fence staring at the hotel. She’s too far away to make out her face, but I feel like she’d been watching me for a while now.
IWe stared at each other for a moment until I just couldn’t take it anymore, forcing myself to get up and move around just so I wouldn’t have to look at her. It was almost time for my three other interviews anyways.
I snatched my keys and headed out to the car. It was only as I got in the car that I noticed the for sale sign next to the house.
The rain. hovered between a nice shower and a full on storm; I wish it would just pick a direction and go with it, not this fence sitting between the two. It feels like the weather is messing with me intentionally.
“Lola was a crazy fucking loon,” said the message on my cellphone. My third interview in a row became another bust. The first one was a no-show at the meeting spot, and the second wouldn’t answer the door when I arrived.
The whole thing stung, only serving as a reminder of all the money wasted to come here and talk to these people. Their refusal wasn’t the part I hated; more the sensation I got that they just didn’t care. I honestly didn’t know how to take that.
I didn’t have much left to do. The only other part of my investigation was to visit the Boise residence, but even that was another dead end; I couldn't find anyone who had access to the home. At the end of the day, I was left sitting in my car in a McDonald's parking lot, debating if I should just check out and drive home or spend one more night and leave in the morning.
Still, it wasn't enough information to go on. There was no doubt that the elder daughter had mental problems and wasn’t getting the help she needed, but I still found it hard to believe that a young woman was the cause of the family vanishing. Even now, I have no question that the Boise family is dead. What happened or where the bodies are, I just don’t know, and that sends a shiver up my spine in recollection of my brother and his own family.
But I just can’t believe that one crazy woman managed to do all of that and disappear into the night, never to be seen again. Despite my investigation, I am no further into understanding what happened than I was when I started.
I took out the picture of Lola once again and looked at the dirty unicorn doll she hugged. Out of nowhere, I thought of my brother’s doll.
On a hunch I took out my laptop and opened the internet. I typed in ‘Missing persons’ and spent the next hour scrolling past hundreds of faces. Only rarely did the circumstances behind their disappearances match the Boise case.
I don’t know what it was that made me stop. Staring at some random little girl in the picture with her brown hair tied to the sidel. The little girl, probably around nine or ten, posed for some photo with her family.
In her arms she held a green colored horse doll with a minty white mane and a harp sewn on the rear leg. Like the other dolls, the thing looked filthy and bore two blacked out eyes, looking very much like something grabbed out of a garbage can. Just the sight was so filthy, I could almost smell the thing from my screen.
The nameless little girl with the short brown hair smiled the way all kids do at that age, and for a moment I was overcome with the sudden urge to rip that doll out of her hands and burn the damn toy. From the deepest pit of my soul, I knew nothing good could come from a thing like that. I hated that doll, I don’t know why, but I just hated the damn thing. No, hate isn’t the right word. I’m scared, terrified of the thing. I could almost feel the toy looking at me, feeding off my fear, delighting in my torment.
PLOP. Came the soft sound of something hitting as I scrolled, causing me to almost jump out of my skin. I looked l up to see something pink splatter on the side of my windshield. PLOP. It came again as another one spread across the hood of my car. PLOP, a third one hit before the insanity broke loose.
Plop, plop plop plop. The pink rain fell from the sky hiding the world outside my car in a flowing wave of pink and blackness. And I just couldn’t turn the ignition. I was stunned, surprised, terrified, captivated by an icy thought of something hiding, waiting in all that pink rain.
I stared, stared at the flowing colors, trying to see beyond the rain, felt something watching, mocking, drowning me almost. Seeming so dangerously inviting and friendly the more I looked. An overpowering feeling of wanting to take me to this place, whatever it was, I had never heard of it before conducting the investigation, yet at the same time it had always been with me. It was a name, a name right on the tip of my tongue, forming a word I have never heard nor spoken before. A comical and yet at the same time, a terrifying word: Equestria.
An overpowering stench of decay and rot flooded my nose as the smell filled my car, joining and distorting with everything that was happening made the world around me that much more surreal. I felt the bile welling in my throat with each inhale. That smell burned through my nostrils and throat as I inhaled from the source. I stared as some strange bright pink goo oozed out from under them, and suddenly the screen of my laptop was playing some scene from a cartoon I had never seen before.
“There you are, Twilight,” a white unicorn was saying as the screen of my monitor started to bulge outward. The pink noxious ooze leaked outward from the edges of my screen, and the video began to distort. Between flashes of blackness and the cartoon, I could glimpse what looked like some sort of face, each feature inconsistent.
“Lola?” I whispered, already knowing the answer.
“There you are, Twilight,” the white unicorn repeated. The scene replayed itself. “Moondancer is having a little get-together over in the West Castle Courtyard.” And again the face of the girl was on my screen; Her bright smile smeared with hot pink lipstick. Her eyes blanked over with thick blue eyeshadow running down her face. And in the moment, I had this insane thought she was watching me from or wherever- or whatever- the hell she was.
The screen had pulled back to show her in the middle of some school hallway, surrounded by children.
“Th-thereee Twilight, T-Twilight,” The screen flashed the ame cartoon a third time as it started to break down, horribly pixelating the image, “Moonmoonmoon D-D-Dancer Is HAVING A little get-together, get-together over in the WEST Castle Courtyard Courtyard.”
I could hear things groan and break inside my laptop as smoke poured from the top. My hand clutched the handle tightly, but I still didn’t want to leave my car even as the pink rain continued to pour downward.
“TTTTHHHEEEERRRREEEYYYOOUUUAARREEETTTWWIIILLLLIIIGGGHHHTTTTT.” The screen looked more like a bloated balloon stretched to its limits between glitches. Flashing between cartoon ponies, the dead blackness, and the hallway was another image hidden between the two, a glimpse of something hiding in the shadows. Something watching.
Then she was back. Stunned, the scream running up my throat became muffled by the rising bile.
The picture on the bloated screen looked tired and worn, like a memory only half remembered , some nameless generic school hallway you could place in any school across America. I could clearly see the doors to classrooms on either side along with infinite rows of lockers covering the eggshell painted walls- and there in the center, was the horror of Lola in all her madness.
Pink dripped from her mouth, eyes and ears, flowing down her body to leave bright happy pink footprints trailing behind her, flowing across the wall and floors. Her black curly hair tied with pink ribbons. Lola was covered in bruises and dark pink stains that ran up and down her body. It was strange, maybe even surreal to finally see this girl. The photo didn’t do justice to what I was seeing. An adult's obsession had consumed her sanity so thoroughly and for so long I don’t think anyone really noticed the true madness that went by the name Lola Boise anymore.
“Can you feel the friendship? ” She whispered.
Her voice was primal, guttural, raw. She stared outwards with a smile I hated, the one that made me so deathly afraid. “Do you know the magic of friendship? Pink is the color of friendship. Pink is the color of Love. The color of magic.” she whispered, and the mad glow in her eye began to grow, brighter and brighter on the fading screen.
I could feel my whole body shake. It was raw, and yet so unreal, as if what we called reality had been painted over with a coat of cheap pink paint to hide the pain. Heart pumping loudly in my chest, I licked my dry lips, and as much as I was afraid, I realized I wanted it just as she did. I didn’t realize just how badly I wanted to go to this magical evil place hidden behind her words, how willing I was to forget everything and follow those sweet venomous words to whatever hells had spawned it.
I couldn’t tell you what part of me finally found the survival traits inside us all. A force beyond my conscious self found the freedom to grab the door handle and twist it open, deciding that my chances outside with those things were probably better than what was going on inside.
“Have you ever heard of My Little Pony?” she asked as I tore open the door. A sweet smile spread across her face before she added, “Do you believe in monsters?” Then, just as suddenly, the screen shattered outward, shards raining past my face as it flooded my car with gallons upon gallons of that terrible stuff, pouring and cascading out from what remained of my laptop. The taste of death coated my mouth as the pressure pushed me from the door of my car, arms flailing. Panic overrode my thoughts, disgust at the vile substance meeting my last thoughts before I found myself passing out.
I don’t know how long I had been screaming before my conscious mind became aware; it was the sharp insistent pain traveling through my body as I flailed around in my state of panic that I had been hitting something over and over again that forced me back to the waking world. The agony arched its way across my body and finally brought me up into a sitting position on what I realized was a pink stained bathtub. I don’t know how long I had been laying there, unconscious, or how long I had been lost to my temporary insanity before the rational part of me wrestled control. Everything was a jumble. Everything was surreal. I softly cursed and confusedly reached around to the back of my scalp, gently brushing my fingertips against my skin. A hiss escaped from my mouth as another jolt of pain that ran over me. The back of my head was tender and swollen, and I wasn’t sure what I had hit to cause this.
The world swam with waves of nausea following my senses as I tried to remember what had happened. I blankly stared at the thousands of spots hovering in the background until the world clicked suddenly into focus.
The warm light of a spring afternoon poured from the bathroom window, making the room easy to see. Everything was covered in a layer of dirt and grime from lack of use, completely untouched.
Toothbrushes were in their holder. Towels hung on the railing with soap and shampoo bottles sat on shelves ready for use. Nothing had been taken, and I was the only thing out of place.
It took a few minutes to climb out of the bathtub. My body was stiff from being crammed into it for what seemed like a day. Already I could see bruises starting to form on my hands and arms from hitting the tub repeatedly during my freak out. It was a challenge, but after a few tries I finally got on my feet.
My breath came out in ragged chunks. My heart wouldn’t stop beating against my chest. I didn’t know where I was, or who brought me here, or even why. The memory of what had happened kept replaying over and over again; I just wanted to get the hell out and go back to where the world made sense again.
My movements were slow and plodding. Everything felt like it was underwater, surreal, dreamlike. Slowly, I made my way to the door, finally able to open it after a few tries with a loud creak. I stepped out to the hallway to try and get out of the place. I stopped just as quickly, and found a scream escaping my lips.
The dolls, those ugly, horrible pony dolls. They covered the steps leading downstairs into the living room and beyond from one end to the other. Their soulless empty eyes stared, judging, with an aura of barely contained hunger. I wasn’t going to get out that way. They wouldn’t let me leave. I was still standing there, watching, when I heard the music.
I could feel it growing, getting louder. The song has been following me ever since I woke up, but only now could I hear it unmarred. A silly tune out of some kids show scaring me out of my mind; it felt so wrong, but like a nightmare I couldn’t control I knew I had to follow it. I have to know.
“Lola?” I asked out loud. I could feel her somewhere as I turned around to follow the music. “Lola?” I asked again.
I couldn’t overcome the feeling of being watched. The ever growing, almost blinding surges of panic told me to run, and still the song continued on, careless of me.. It grew distorted as I approached, but still the words rang clear;
When I was young I was too busy to make any friends.
Such silliness did not seem worth the effort it expends.
But my little ponies, you opened up my eyes
And now the truth is crystal clear, as splendid summer skies.
And it's such a wonderful surprise.
“Lola?” I asked again, mentally kicking myself; if I had heard a reply, I would have run screaming from her house as I was sure this was the Boise residence..
I wasn’t sure if I went to the door or the door came to me. Standing in front of it, I found myself fearing the unknown presence that lived behind layered wood attached to metal hinges, even as my hand wrapped itself around the cold knob.
The handle twisted easily in my grip, as if almost opening on its own- wanting, needing to be opened. I forced myself to take a step back, mouth agape, staring at the incomprehension behind.
Though no one had lived in it for a year, the faint but thunderous sour smell of old sweat and spoiled forgotten food flooded my nose emanating everywhere from this filthy room. Even worse than the smell was the Pink. Everything in this room had been sloppily smeared with a thin coat of pink… something. From the window came faint handprints, meshing with the outlines from the rays of the sun pouring through to the walls and floor. Everything had been covered, giving the room a feeling of a deep sickness living inside, corrupting, destroying with an infinite hunger to feed on everything sane and rational it touched.
“Once upon a time. In the magical land of Equestria. There were two regal sisters that ruled Equestria and created harmony throughout the land…”
The voice came from the monitor at the far end of the room. It was a cartoon, a cartoon that until recently I had never heard of before.
“They are in Equestria. Deep inside of Equestria,” A voice behind me said, instantly stiffening my body. I could feel my blood running cold with chunks of fear pouring through each and every vein. “I can hear them singing. Always singing. It never stops.”
“Lola?” I said softly, my panic choking out the word. My imagination worked overtime, and I found myself too scared to turn around, too easily able to picture what she looked like. Face still heavily caked with makeup. Lips smeared with pink lipstick. Wearing some dress designed for someone much younger; a grown woman trying to be a child, thinking if she pretended hard enough the world would just let it happen.
“You shouldn’t be poking your nose into things that don’t concern you,” she said sweetly, the tinge of malicious glee cutting through her cheerful voice like a razor- Childlike, but filled with an ageless... aura? desire? No, an addiction to cause harm and pain to whoever it touched.
“They told me of a place where I could be the child I always wanted to be. No more grownups telling me what to do or how to do it. No more doctors telling me to act my age. No more forced bedtimes. No more friends not LISTENING” Lola shouted with anger, driving her foot to the ground with a loud thump.
“Who is they?” I asked, not just wanting an answer, but wanting to keep her talking for as long as I could.
“They, they, they. Why are you so concerned about they? Didn’t you come here to find out more about me? About my family and what happened to them?” Demanded Lola. From the corner of my eye, I could see her pink hand lightly gripping my shoulder, caressing with a gentle grip and a threatening force
“I d-did.” I stammered.
“Yes.” she whispered, Her face so close I could feel her cold rancid breath on the back of my neck, “They were right. Those...ponies gave me everything I asked and more. The only price was my family.” She giggles, “I miss my sister, but she didn’t want to play with me anymore.”
“Ponies?” I asked, “What are you talking about? Like those dolls on the bottom of the steps?”
“Oh. you have no idea. Let me take you to Equestria. Let me show you the power of friendship.” she whispered. The next moment, I felt razor sharp teeth drive into my shoulder.
I felt skin sever from my body. Her bite easily crushed bone as she held me in her grip. Pain ripped through as I felt rivers of blood pour from the wound immediately; worst still was my body's refusal to properly pass out and let me die unconsciously.
Once again panic overtook my thoughts and sanity, and I found I could only stare at her arm wrapping tightly around my chest as she feasted. The skin on her arm began to separate; revealing something soft and pink hidden inside, almost cartoonish, covered with a light fuzz.
My thoughts snapped back with the sensation of her mouth digging deeper into my flesh, pulling apart skin, muscle and bone to devour, the sickening sounds of her feeding filling the air. All I could do was helplessly struggle against her as the all consuming pain overtook me.
“What are you doing?” A voice cut through the insanity.
How long had I been standing there, I don’t know. The wounds and the pain were gone. The sensation grew fainter with every breath. Lola was gone; In fact, the room was completely empty of everything. Only a bare room with four walls painted a dull light brown remained.
“Well?” the voice asked again as I turned around.
A woman, mid-fifties I’d say, wearing some pink ensemble that screamed real estate agent. Her thick blonde hair was cut short, professionally styled. Behind her I saw a family staring at me with an edge of nervousness, as if I was going to pull out a knife and start stabbing everyone like in those slasher movies my brother made me watch with him when I was a child. By the way I looked to them, some strange woman standing in the middle of an empty room on the verge of a nervous breakdown, I couldn’t blame them.
Words were spoken at me, lots of words, but it was all just white noise in the background as I pushed my way past them all with barely a glance to make it out into the hallway.
Everything was gone. The dolls, the furniture, everything. The house was empty of the lives that once lived in it. I stood there, staring in confusion, ignoring the endless prattle going on behind me.
“The Boise family,” I finally asked after taking some time to find my voice, “What happened to all of their stuff?”
“Who?” asked the realtor.
“The Boise family. The ones that had been living here a year ago. What happened?” I asked, suspecting I already knew the answer.
“Boise family? Oh, hun, this house has been sitting empty for the last five years since the owner retired and moved to Florida. I think you better leave before I call…” She stopped as her cell phone went off suddenly.
Thank god the police weren't called. Waking up in a hospital was much preferable to waking up inside of a jail cell. The incident was easily passed off as a woman getting drunk and lost on the way back to her hotel. Many eyebrows were raised as I told them my sob story, but in the end they just gave me my discharge papers along with a warning to take it easy.
Now I’m back at my hotel, taking a break to finish this before packing up and heading back home. It’s still raining, four days straight now. I tried looking up the Boise family incident one last time, but couldn’t find anything. No mention of the disappearance on any news site. The information is still downloaded on my laptop, thank god for that, but everything else is gone.
Lola is out there somewhere. Wherever she is, or whatever she has become, is no longer human. And what of this show I keep seeing references to? What is going on?
Even now, I feel things aren’t over. I paused for a moment to stretch my sore body before finishing my report . When I looked up, for the briefest of moments I swore I could see the outlines of someone standing in the yard at the house across the street.
Lightning flashed and I caught the glimpse of what I think is a purple raincoat. Standing still and staring, just staring at me.
