Who Are You, Gael

I immediately retorted, "That’s impossible! I was traveling abroad during the Spring Festival, and I didn’t come home at all."

Dad was stunned, clearly recalling this fact.

Uncle John spoke up, "He came to my house last weekend to fix my computer. We even had some drinks together."

I looked at Aunt Micah. "Is that true?"

Aunt Micah shook her head, confused. "Last weekend, we went to Mom's house. We weren’t even home."

Uncle John's expression shifted to panic. "No, I clearly remember..."

I interrupted him. "Let’s try this—let's all draw Gael. Everyone draws what you think he looks like."

Soon, eleven sheets of paper were filled with various depictions of people.

Some were tall and muscular, others short and lean; some wore glasses, others were bald; some had beards, others had delicate features. These portraits had no common features, as though they were drawings of eleven completely different people.

"This can’t be," Uncle Dominic muttered, staring at the wildly different images. "How could we all have such different memories of the same person?"

Suddenly, Uncle Meldrid’s eyes lit up, and he shouted, "I remember! Gael could do magic tricks. Every year during the New Year gathering, he would perform magic tricks for everyone!"

"Yes! He could do magic!" Several people echoed in unison.

This seemed to be the only characteristic that everyone agreed on.

As the eleven adults fell back into stunned silence, a sound came from the staircase.

Sheena's daughter shakily walked down, holding a bag of chips.

Sheena immediately stood up, "Sweetie, weren't you asleep?"

The little girl waved the chips in her hand, "Uncle Gael woke me up just now and gave me these chips. Mommy, do you want some?"

Gael came... and was upstairs?

Everyone was shocked.

I glanced around. "We need to check on the kids."

Aunt and Sheena nodded, quietly following me upstairs. As we rounded the corner, we heard laughter coming from the children's room.

We pushed open the door to find two little children sitting on the floor, playing with toys that neither belonged to them nor should have been in that room.

"Where's Gael?" Aunt Micah asked, picking up her grandson.

"He went to the bathroom," the child answered, still holding onto a toy.

Sheena and I exchanged a look and quickly made our way to the bathroom at the end of the hallway.

The door was slightly ajar, and the bathroom was empty.

We checked every room upstairs, but there was no sign of Gael.

The three of us had no choice but to take the three children back downstairs. The other relatives were still deep in discussion about Gael in the living room.

"Did you find Gael?" Dad asked, looking up.

Sheena shook her head. "He’s not upstairs. There were just some new toys in the room that we didn’t recognize."

That was when I noticed the cups on the coffee table.

I counted them once, then again.

My voice trembled. "Twelve! We only have eleven people. Why are there twelve cups on the coffee table?"

What was even more unsettling was that each cup showed signs of having been used, including the "extra" cup.

I looked toward the sofa and saw twelve distinct indentations where people had been sitting, arranged in a circle, just like when we were discussing things earlier.

"Gael... was he here the whole time?" Aunt Micah’s voice quivered.

No one answered, because no one remembered.

Panic began to spread.

We scattered around the ancestral house, desperately searching for any sign of Gael.

In the study, we found an open book with fresh notes written in unfamiliar handwriting.

In the kitchen, there was a freshly washed coffee cup in the sink, but no one in our house drinks coffee.

In the backyard, there was a clear set of footprints on the grass, leading toward the wall, then abruptly stopping.

The most chilling part was when we returned to the living room—the "extra" cup was gone, and only eleven indentations remained on the sofa.

"What the hell is going on?" Uncle Dominic yelled, his voice nearly breaking.

In the midst of the terrifying atmosphere, the front door was gently knocked on.

"Who is it?" Aunt Nerissa asked sharply.

"It's me, Gael..." came the response from outside.