Narrator (Female)

NARRATOR WILL PERFORM ALL VOICES

Adult female voice. This is the primary voice of the story.

Jean-Marie is recounting something that happened to her when she was nine, many years later. Her adult narration should feel direct, intelligent, conversational, and somewhat hardened by having lived with the memory for so long. She believes what happened to her, even while acknowledging that others may have interpreted it as trauma or psychosis. Pasted markdown

During the 1985 scenes, the performance should recover some of the immediacy of her nine-year-old perspective—jealousy over Lilian’s bike, excitement over lemonade money, childish temptations, and absolute dependence on her brother—without switching into an exaggerated “little girl” voice. The adult and child perspectives should coexist. Pasted markdown Pasted markdown

As the van draws her closer, her delivery should gradually become more entranced and sensory, as though her judgment is being overridden. Once her brother pulls her away, that fascination breaks into genuine terror. Pasted markdown

Nine-year-old girl.

Importantly, what Jean-Marie encounters in the van is not actually Lilian. It is something using Lilian’s appearance and voice as bait.

At first, the voice should be recognizable as a friendly little girl—familiar enough that Jean-Marie desperately wants to believe her friend is alive. But something should feel subtly wrong. The story describes her speech as resembling a scratched record or an answering machine, with the sound seeming to originate deeper inside the van rather than naturally from her body.

The actor should resist a conventional demonic voice. Slightly unnatural rhythm, emotional flatness, or mechanical repetition will probably be much creepier; any heavier supernatural distortion can be handled in production.

Young male voice; his exact age is not specified.

He is Jean-Marie’s brother and ultimately the person who saves her. His defining moment is pure panic: he sees Jean-Marie being pulled toward the van, screams her full name, and physically yanks her away. Pasted markdown

Only light vocal differentiation is needed. What matters is the sudden force and urgency of his intervention—it should break through the strange, seductive atmosphere of the van like a shock.