Ethan was a 10 year old boy who lived in Kentucky, with his two siblings and parents. Being the youngest, he was often the one who would get whatever he wanted, so when he was not given the new ‘scaredy snake’ toy, which every popular kid in school had, he was visibly upset. In protest, he had threatened his parents by saying that he will not eat food till the time he gets the toy, but the parents, who knew how the protest would eventually end with the 10 year old giving in, happily joked about how much money they would save if he did not eat.
The toy Ethan wanted was not like some ordinary lego set which would have cost about 20-30 dollars. It was an expensive 200 dollar 30-inch toy snake that would move ahead when it would sense motion. It was marketed as a ‘scared little pet snake’ that would play an ‘endless game of tag with you’ while avoiding obstacles and walls coming in its way using ‘advanced technology.’ Ethan had been wanting it badly for a long time. Since his hunger strike had not been working, he decided to break it just 3 hours in and decided to convince two of his friends Sam and Ravi to ask their parents for 40 dollars each, so that they can buy a second-hand one and share it. Each one of them would get to keep the toy for 1 week, before giving it to the other person. Ethan’s parents liked the idea and gave him the 40 dollars he needed. The toy was ordered soon.
As it was supposed to ship to Ravi’s house, the friends decided to have a sleepover there on the day of its arrival. The toy was shipped and the three boys completely ripped the package open. It was working almost perfectly and the three friends were having the time of their lives. They were chasing the snake, gathering around it to try to trap it. The snake was not very good at dodging obstacles, as it would just run into walls randomly sometimes, but yet the friends were happy. So as to not drain the whole battery in a single day, after an hour of playing, they kept it away and started watching a movie. Ethan was a little disappointed, as he was expecting the snake to be a little more realistic. The other boys were slightly disappointed too, but they did not show any of it on their faces, as all of them had spent money on it. While all of them were munching on popcorn watching the new Kung Fu Panda movie, Ethan could hear some noises coming from the hall. Initially, he did not think much of it though. Suddenly the light went off. Jacob, who was scared of the dark, instantly got a little nervous. In a few minutes, Ravi's parents rushed out of their rooms to see if everything was okay. Although everything was fine and soon the generator also started working, there had never been a power cut in their area and their house was the only one to go dark.
Suspecting something odd, Ravi’s father went out to check what had happened while his mother stayed with the boys inside the house. Ravi’s mother was having the gut feeling that something was not right but tried to keep the kids involved in their movie. Ravi’s father returned with no explanation for the incident, and the light came back. The boys were back to eating popcorn and enjoying the movie. But for some reason, Ethan could still hear the noise. He asked his friends if they could hear anything, but they said no. Ethan was clearly disturbed by this but he tried his best to ignore it. Soon all of the kids decided to go to bed, Now the noise had got worse. While Ravi and Jacob were sleeping, Ethan left his bed to check what was happening. There he found the scaredy snake, which was moving in circles. Ethan picked the snake up in his hand and heard someone shout from the corner “Hi Ethan! Do you like snakes?”. The person was sitting there in the corner with his head up. Only his eyes could be seen lightly and the shape of his head could have been made out easily by Ethan. Ethan shouted, and ran inside to wake his friends up, but when they went out, they saw nothing.
Ethan started crying and wanted to go back home, so his parents were called. Ethan knew that what he had seen was not some kind of twisted game his imagination was playing, as everyone else was saying.
For a few days, Ethan was traumatized. He also refused to take the scaredy snake home when it was his turn, but with a little help from his friends and parents, soon everything got okay and life went back to normal for the three boys.
A few days later, a new trend of 10 year old children making Instagram accounts came in. Since this did not require money, all three friends together made accounts without telling their parents, as they would not have allowed it. Ethan was happily using that app, until he saw a follow request from an account with a name in a dialect he did not know, with a profile picture depicting the exact same scene that he had seen earlier. A boy in the corner of Ravi's house’s hall, with only his eyes being seen. He opened that account and saw that it had over 600 posts of the very same picture, over and over again.
Ethan was shocked and decided to ask his friends about the picture, but while scrolling up, he saw that the profile picture had changed, and now the person in that picture was staring right at him with red, glowing eyes. Ethan threw his phone and ran into his room. Trying to convince himself that this must have been a prank by the mean kids in school, he was looking for possible explanations when he heard a noise coming from outside. It kept on getting louder and louder when he took the courage to go out of the room. Out there, next to his phone, was the snake and there was a notification on the phone that read, “Do you like snakes, Ethan?”
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