The Laughing Room

My daughter, Lily, had always been a bright light in a dim world. But after her father left, that light flickered. She found solace in a forgotten corner of our new house, a room the realtor had called ‘the parlor’ but we never used. One evening, she came down with a deck of cards she’d found in the attic, a game called ‘The Unspoken Truths’. It was old, the box worn, the cards stained with something that looked like rust. We decided to play, hoping for a distraction.

Lily dealt the cards. The first one read: ‘What do you fear most?’ She wrote her answer on a slip of paper: ‘Being alone.’ The next card: ‘What did you lose that you can never get back?’ She wrote: ‘My father’s laugh.’ I felt a pang of guilt. But then she dealt a card that made her laugh, a darkly humorous confession about the time she’d hidden her brother’s toy. It was the first genuine laugh I’d heard from her in months. She laughed, a sound that filled the empty house, and for a moment, the shadows seemed to recede.

That night, I woke to a strange sound. It was coming from Lily’s room. It was a giggle, high and sweet, but there was something wrong with it. It was too precise, too deliberate, as if it were being manufactured. I when to her door and cracked it open. She was asleep, but the sound continued from the corner of her room. I saw a shape in the darkness, a black lacquered box I’d never seen before, its lid open. The giggle emanated from it, a low, mocking melody. I slammed the door and ran back to my room, my heart pounding.

The next morning, Lily seemed fine, but the box was gone. I searched for it, but it had vanished. Over the next weeks, things changed. Lily grew distant, her laughter hollow. She started talking to herself, her voice echoing in empty hallways. One night, I heard her coming down the stairs, past my door, into the parlor. I followed, my feet silent on the carpet. She stood in the middle of the room, her back to me, and I saw the box again, on a small table I’d never noticed. She was speaking to it in a language I didn’t recognize, and then she laughed—a perfect replica of that sound from the night before.

I confronted her. She turned, and her eyes were vacant. ‘It knows my fear,’ she said, her voice flat. ‘It feeds on it. But it gives me company. I’m never alone now.’ I grabbed her, forcing her to look at me. ‘What is it?’ I demanded. She smiled, a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. ‘It’s my laugh,’ she said. ‘The one I lost. It saved it for me.’

That’s when I saw the box’s lid open wider. Inside, there was a single, impossibly clear glass jar, and in it, a wisp of something that shimmered like heat. My daughter’s face, in the reflection of the glass, was still, but her mouth moved, and the giggle filled the room again, louder this time. It wasn’t coming from her. It was coming from the jar. The thing in the jar was her laughter, and it was laughing at me.

I tried to grab the jar, but my hand passed through it as if it were air. The giggle grew to a cackle, a thousand voices layered over each other. The room grew cold, and the walls seemed to close in. Lily slumped to the floor, unconscious. I scooped her up, carried her out, and drove to the hospital. She was diagnosed with a severe psychological break, and we moved out of that house the next week.

But I didn’t get rid of the box. It followed us. It’s in the corner of our new apartment now. Every night, I hear the giggle, and I see Lily, standing at its door, reaching for it, whispering, ‘It’s mine. It’s the only part of me that’s happy.’ I can’t throw it away. It’s fused to her, a parasite that wears her joy. And every time she laughs, I can’t tell if it’s her or the thing that wears her laugh. I’m writing this from the kitchen, where the light is strongest. But I can hear the box creaking open. And Lily is laughing. And I know, tonight, it will be just me and that sound.