Chapter 2: The Tin Coffin

Chapter 2: The Tin Coffin

The crumpled ghost of their old station wagon haunted the edge of their driveway for two days before a tow truck finally dragged it away. The insurance settlement, a sum that felt both insultingly small and blood-stained, arrived as a crisp check in the mail. It was a practical necessity, a link in the chain of events that Samantha was desperately trying to weld back into something resembling a normal life. Without a car, they were prisoners in their own home. Without a car, there was no school, no groceries, no illusion of routine.

The thought of setting foot in another vehicle made her stomach clench. The phantom sensation of screeching tires and shattering glass was a constant, low-grade hum beneath the surface of her thoughts. But she had to. For Sophia.

The car dealership was an assault of manufactured optimism. Gleaming metal hulks sat under fluorescent lights that bleached all the color from the world, leaving only harsh whites and sterile reflections. A salesman, whose name tag read ‘Gary’ and whose smile was too wide to be genuine, descended upon them with the predatory grace of a shark sensing blood.

“Looking for a fresh start?” Gary boomed, his voice echoing slightly in the cavernous showroom. “We’ve got just the thing. Safety is our number one priority. Top of the line in crash test ratings.”

Samantha flinched, pulling Sophia a little closer. The little girl didn't react. She simply stood, her small hand limp and cool in Samantha’s grasp, her dark eyes sweeping over the polished cars with an unnerving lack of interest. She was a marble statue in a brightly colored windbreaker.

“She’s a quiet one,” Gary remarked, winking down at Sophia, who didn’t even blink. “Well-behaved. My two are like a couple of tornadoes.”

“She’s… been through a lot,” Samantha said, the words tasting like ash. It was her shield, her explanation for everything. The accident. The trauma. It had to be the trauma.

The process was a disorienting blur. Gary led them from one car to another, reciting statistics about horsepower and fuel efficiency that went straight through Samantha’s head. She nodded and made noncommittal sounds, her real focus locked on the small, silent figure beside her. Sophia walked when she was led and stood still when she was stopped. She didn’t run her hands over the shiny paint or try to climb into the driver’s seats like the old Sophia would have. She was just… present. A placid, physical weight that seemed to anchor the world in a strange, unsettling silence.

Samantha found herself staring at their reflections in the mirror-like finish of a dark blue sedan. She saw a woman on the verge of splintering, her face a mask of exhaustion and forced composure. And beside her, a child who looked like her daughter but whose reflection was utterly blank, a perfect, porcelain doll with none of a child’s light in her eyes. It was the same look from the kitchen, that vacant stillness that had preceded the flash of pure hatred over a plate of cookies.

“This one’s a beauty,” Gary was saying, patting the roof of the sedan. “Family friendly, great mileage. You can’t go wrong.”

It was fine. It was a car. It had four wheels and an engine and, most importantly, it wasn’t the station wagon. “We’ll take it,” she said, the decision made not out of preference but a desperate need for the ordeal to be over.

The paperwork took an eternity. Samantha sat in a cheap office chair, the pen shaking in her hand as she signed document after document. Sophia sat opposite her in a chair that was too big for her, her feet dangling a foot off the floor. She didn’t fidget. She didn’t complain. She just watched her mother with those dark, unreadable eyes.

Finally, Gary handed her the keys. They felt cold and alien in her palm. He walked them out to the sedan, now parked in the ‘delivery’ bay, and held the back door open for Sophia. Samantha carefully buckled her into the new booster seat, her fingers fumbling with the unfamiliar straps. The child’s body was pliant but offered no assistance, her limbs moving only when Samantha moved them. The chill she had felt in the house seemed to emanate from Sophia now, a palpable coldness that seeped into the plush new upholstery.

Samantha slid into the driver’s seat. The “new car smell” was overpowering, a chemical cocktail of plastic and adhesives that made her feel nauseous. She closed the door, and the sound was a solid, definitive thump. The noise of the dealership vanished, replaced by a sudden, profound silence. It wasn’t a peaceful quiet; it was the hermetically sealed silence of a tomb.

This was it. A fresh start. She gripped the steering wheel, her knuckles white. The dashboard glowed to life with cold, blue light. She looked in the rearview mirror, her eyes finding Sophia’s. The child was staring straight ahead, her expression perfectly neutral.

“Well, sweetie,” Samantha said, forcing a bright, brittle tone into her voice. “Here we are. Our new car. Isn’t it… nice?”

The silence stretched, thick and suffocating. For a moment, Samantha thought she wouldn’t answer, that she would be met with that same empty wall. Then, the small figure in the backseat shifted slightly. Sophia’s gaze met hers in the mirror, and for the first time since they’d left the house, she spoke.

Her voice was not a child’s voice. It was flat, clear, and utterly devoid of emotion. It held a strange, resonant finality, as if a judgment were being passed.

“I like this car better.”

A shiver, sharp and icy, traced a path down Samantha’s spine. It wasn’t the words themselves. Any child might say that. It was the delivery. It wasn’t the excited chatter of a five-year-old. It was a cold, simple statement of fact. There was an implication in the tone, a comparison being made that terrified Samantha to her core. Better than what?

The unspoken answer hung in the air between them, a ghost in the machine. Better than the last one. Better than the one you crashed.

The seed of doubt, planted with a hateful glare over a cookie, had just been watered with ice. Samantha’s breath hitched. She tore her eyes from the rearview mirror, staring out the windshield at the darkening sky. The car, her supposed vessel of freedom and new beginnings, suddenly felt like a trap. A meticulously crafted, perfectly sealed tin coffin, and she was locked inside with a stranger.

Characters

Connor Brown

Connor Brown

Samantha Brown

Samantha Brown

The Entity / 'Sophia'

The Entity / 'Sophia'