My Daughter's Possession

Part 1

I don't even know why I'm writing this. I guess I need someone else to read it and tell me there's a logical explanation, because I don't know what to think anymore. My name is Elena, I'm 38 years old, I live in Malaga, and I have a nine-year-old daughter named Lucía.

It all started in June. At first I thought it was the heat, or the end of the school year, or one of those things we tell ourselves as mothers so we don't worry. Lucía stopped eating well. Not completely, but enough to notice. She would just stare at her plate and then say she wasn't hungry. Her, who used to ask for seconds of pasta almost every night.

She also started sleeping badly. I could hear her moving around at night, and a couple of times I heard her talking to herself. I asked her what she dreamed about and she said she didn't remember anything. I took her to the pediatrician, Dr. Morales, who's been her doctor since she was little. She said it might be anxiety about the start of summer, that kids get it too, to give her magnesium and come back in a month if it continued.

I went back before a month.

What changed everything was a Saturday at the end of June. We were in the backyard planting tomato plants. I was digging and Lucía was helping me put the plants in the holes, like we always do. At one point, the shovel hit something hard. I thought it was a big rock, but when I pulled it out I saw it was a figure. A little figurine, made of clay or something, about four inches tall. It was human-shaped but the details were strange, like it had been made quickly or with very crude tools.

Before I could get a good look at it, Lucía grabbed it. I just remember she had it in her hand, clutched tightly, and she said to me: 'It's mine.' In a completely normal, calm voice. Not aggressive. Just... certain. Like she knew it. I asked her to let me see it and she said yes, but when I reached out my hand she had already gone inside the house.

That night I woke up at three in the morning. I don't know what woke me. I went to the bathroom and as I passed through the hallway I saw a light in Lucía's room. I opened the door very slowly and found her sitting on the floor, at the foot of her bed, staring at the wall. With her back to me. Still as a statue.

I said her name. She didn't react. I said it again, louder. Then she turned her head very slowly, and looked at me. Her eyes were wide open. She wasn't crying, there was no fear on her face. Nothing. She said to me, in a voice that sounded like hers but also wasn't, a bit deeper, a bit slower: 'He's awake now.'

I swear on everything I love. That's exactly what she said.

I put her back in bed, put my hand on her forehead, she didn't have a fever. Within minutes she was fast asleep like nothing happened. I didn't sleep a wink. The next morning I searched for that figure all over her room. All over the house. I checked drawers, her backpack, under the bed, the whole closet. It wasn't there. It never reappeared.

The following week was when she started speaking in that language.

It wasn't constant. It came in moments, almost always when she was distracted or just before falling asleep. Sounds that weren't Spanish, or English, or any language I could recognize. Syllables that repeated, with a strange rhythm, like she was reciting something from memory. I recorded it on my phone. I have four or five audio files.

I sent one to Marcos, a friend of mine from high school who studied classical philology, Latin and Greek. It took him two days to reply. His response was basically: 'Elena, I don't know what this is, but some sounds vaguely remind me of ancient Aramaic. I'm not sure. I've never heard ancient Aramaic spoken. But there's something in the cadence.' Marcos isn't one to exaggerate. Marcos is the most skeptical guy I know.

Lucía is nine years old. She's never left Spain. At school she studies English and some French since this year. She's never had any contact with any Semitic language, ancient or modern.

I still don't know what to do. I'm telling you this because I need someone to tell me there's an explanation. That kids do weird things. That there's some medical reason. Whatever it is. I'll update if anything else happens.

Update — What Happened After

A few weeks have passed since I wrote the above. Many of you asked me to update. I wish I had good news.

First: the audio. Following the advice of several of you, I uploaded it to a linguistics forum with a brief explanation. Most of the responses were from people who didn't recognize it or said it could be anything, that kids invent languages. But one user, who has an academic profile and has been on that forum for years, replied to me privately. He said he had identified two sequences that could correspond to words in a very archaic variant of Eastern Aramaic. The words, loosely translated, would be something like 'remember' or 'he remembers it', and 'the door'.

I don't know what to do with that information. I don't know what it means. I only know that since I read it, I haven't slept well a single night.

Lucía draws now. Before, she drew what all kids draw: houses, dogs, her family, the sea. Now she draws the same symbol over and over. It's a circle with something inside. I don't know how to describe it properly. It's not a face, it's not any letter I recognize. It's a shape that seems to change a bit depending on how you look at it, though I know that's probably just me. What I can say is that when I look at it for too long, I feel sick. Dizzy, an upset stomach. I've thrown away several of the drawings. She says nothing when I throw them away. The next day, there are more.

Through a friend, I contacted a priest. Not officially, let that be clear. I didn't call any parish or ask for an exorcism. My friend knows someone who knows this man, who is a priest but apparently has some experience with... strange cases. I don't know what to call them. He came to the house on Thursday afternoon. He was with Lucía for almost an hour in her room, alone, with the door ajar. I waited in the living room.

When he came out, he was pale. I'm not exaggerating. He had the face of someone who has just seen something they didn't expect to see. He sat on the sofa and took a moment to speak. What he said was exactly this: 'This isn't what we study at the seminary.' Nothing else. He told me he needed to talk to some people and that he would call me.

He hasn't answered his phone since. I've left him four messages. My friend hasn't heard from him either.

Last Tuesday was the strangest night of all this, and that's saying a lot. Lucía was completely normal the whole day. And when I say completely normal, I mean the Lucía from before, the one from before June. She laughed, ate well, helped me set the table, asked to watch an episode of her show before bed. She seemed like herself. She was herself. I was starting to convince myself that it was over, that whatever it was had ended.