The Correct Name

Marla had always been skeptical of the paranormal apps that flooded her phone’s app store. When her friend Chloe dared her to try the ‘Spectral Communicator’ for a YouTube challenge, she scoffed but agreed, more for the amusement than any real belief. The challenge was to contact the spirit of the murdered banker, Edward Rinehart, from anywhere using a spirit box. Marla didn’t have a physical device, but the app claimed to use white noise and EVP analysis.

She set up in her cramped studio apartment, the city lights of Denver flickering through the blinds. She placed her phone on the coffee table, opened the app, and pressed ‘Begin’. A cascade of static filled the room, punctuated by random blips that sounded like faint whispers. For ten minutes, she asked the recommended questions: ‘Are you here?’, ‘What do you want?’, ‘Why do you stay?’ The responses were garbled nonsense, as she expected.

A detail nagged at her. She remembered reading that Rinehart, after his controversial acquittal, had legally changed his name from Eddie to Edward, distancing himself from the childhood nickname. Most people who tried to contact him used ‘Eddie’, but Marla thought, why not respect his preference? With a shrug, she asked: ‘Do you prefer Eddie or Edward?’

The static emitted a clear, flat, almost robotic voice: ‘EDWARD.’ It was so distinct, so devoid of emotion, that Marla’s blood ran cold. She yelped, ‘Thank you, goodbye!’ and slammed the app closed. She sat in silence, heart hammering. The voice had been unmistakable. She knew those apps were dubious at best, but that was ridiculously clear.

Days passed. Marla tried to dismiss it as a coincidence, maybe some rogue algorithm or a glitch. But she couldn’t shake it. She mentioned it to Chloe over coffee, and Chloe, ever the skeptic, laughed it off. ‘Probably just a random audio snippet,’ she said, but Marla noticed a flicker of unease in her eyes.

That night, Marla’s phone pinged at 3:33 AM. She groggily checked it: a notification from the Spectral Communicator app. She hadn’t opened it since the incident. The notification read: ‘Alice, you have 1 new message.’ Her name was Alice, not Marla. She never used the app for messaging. Her finger hovered, curiosity battling dread. She opened it.

The screen was static, but then a text appeared, typewritten in a cold, neutral font: ‘YOU USED MY NAME. NOW I USE YOURS.’ Marla felt a chill. She typed a trembling response: ‘Who is this?’ The reply was instantaneous: ‘YOU WILL NOT FORGET ME.’

She tossed the phone aside, but the app continued to vibrate. She tried to delete it, but it wouldn’t uninstall. The icon seemed to pulsate. In the following days, her world tilted. Doorbells rang with no one there. The radio in her car turned on by itself, emitting static that formed her name in hushed tones. She started seeing the name ‘EDWARD’ scratched into dust on her windows, appearing in the condensation on her bathroom mirror.

Her friends noticed she was fraying. She had stopped smiling. She confessed to Chloe about the app’s persistence, and Chloe, now pale, said she had deleted the app too but got a message saying ‘I WILL FIND YOU.’ They compared notes: the app had installed itself in their phones’ systems, undetectable, uncanny.

One evening, Marla’s phone glowed spontaneously. The screen displayed a single word: ‘ALICE.’ Then, ‘YOU KNEW WHAT I PREFERRED. SO I WILL KNOW YOURS.’ Her full name was Alice Marie Hargrove. She had never told the app that, nor had anyone. The phone rang, and when she answered, static blared until a voice, the same asexual monotone, whispered: ‘You’re ready to join me.’

Panic consumed her. She threw the phone across the room, shattering it against the wall. Silence. She breathed a sigh of relief, but then she saw her reflection in the broken screen – but it wasn’t her. It was the gaunt, hollow-eyed face of a man she’d only seen in old photographs: Edward Rinehart, as he’d looked in his mugshot. He opened his mouth, and a stream of static poured out, forming the words: ‘NO ESCAPE.’

She tried to scream, but her throat cinched. The apartment lights flickered and died. In the darkness, she heard footsteps on the ceiling, though she lived on the top floor. They drew closer, descending the walls, until a cold hand clamped over her mouth. A voice whispered in her ear, ‘You called me by my true name. Now we are bound forever.’

The next morning, her apartment was empty. Her friends reported her missing. Chloe, weeping, told police about the app. When they examined her phone, the app was still there, the screen blinking: ‘THANK YOU FOR SETTING ME FREE. ALICE WAS MY DOOR. NOW SHE IS LOST.’

Chloe tried to uninstall it, but her own phone started vibrating. A message appeared: ‘YOU KNEW HIM AS EDDIE. BUT I SEE YOUR NAME IS CHLOE. PERHAPS YOU’LL KEEP ME COMPANY.’ The screens went dark, and in the reflection, Chloe saw a figure standing behind her, a shadowy man with no face, only a static void where his features should be. She didn’t scream. She couldn’t. She just stared as the figure reached out a hand, and the world dissolved into white noise.