There is a small village on the Island of Hawaii called Ola’a. Nobody would ever guess the terrible secret this village holds, following the accidental drowning of a young boy many years ago. Today, the tragedy still haunts the villagers and their children. Back in 1947, a group of kids were playing on the banks of a deep pond, outside the village. One boy accidentally tripped over a log and fell into the water with a splash. before any of the other children could react, the boy sank beneath the water’s shimmering surface. For a few moments, they waited for him to resurface, but there was no sign of him. Horrified, they ran back to the village to get help. Some local men came as fast as they could and dived into the pond, searching for the young boy. They were terrified by what they found. The boy was sitting on a rock at the very bottom of the pond. His arms were hanging down by his sides and his body was swaying back and forth with the currents. His eyes were wide and his mouth was hanging open, but he was dead in the water. The eerie sight sent shivers down the spines of the men who had dived in to save him. They were deeply disturbed and said it was such an unusual way to drown. It was as if the boy had calmly sat down on the rock and waited there to die. They retrieved the corpse, and dragged it onto the bank of the pond. Everyone who lived in the village was saddened by the tragedy, but after the funeral, they tried to put the strange death behind them. Afterwards, bizarre rumors began to spread around the area. In the middle of the night, villagers would hear unexplained screams and cries coming from the direction of the pond. At first, they tried to tell themselves that the haunting cries were just caused by the wind blowing through the tall trees. However, as time went on, some people started to report disturbing experiences. Whenever people walked past the pond at night, they would feel something reaching out and trying to grab their feet. Many villagers believed that the ghost of the drowned boy lurked beneath the dark waters of the pond. They said that, at night, he would come to the surface, cold, wet and shivering, his icy hands clutching at unsuspecting victims and trying to pull them into his watery grave. According to the rumors, he was trapped in this world by accident, and the only way he could escape was to find someone else to take his place at the bottom of the pond. One day, a boy was out walking with his father. When they passed by the haunted pond, the boy picked up some stones and skimmed them across the surface of the water. Suddenly, the boy screamed out in terror. Something was holding his leg and dragging him into the pond. The boy clawed at the earth, trying to hold on, but it was no use. Before his father had a chance to grab hold of him, the boy was pulled down into the watery depths. The desperate father jumped into the pond and tried to find his son, but there was no trace of him. Minutes later, he dived deeper and finally located the young boy. He was sitting on a rock on the bottom of the pond, arms placidly at his side, eyes and mouth wide open, swaying gently to and fro in the current. The father grasped his son and pulled him up to the surface. He made his way to the edge of the pond, dragging his son behind him like a dead weight. Luckily, the father had taken some courses in first-aid and there, on the bank, he was able to perform mouth-to-mouth resusitation on his son. The man did everything he could and finally, just when he was about to give up, he saw his son’s chest rise and fall and the boy coughed up all the water in his lungs. The boy was alive. After that, all of the parents in the village warned their children to stay away from the pond. A priest was brought in to bless the waters and the local people felt that would put an end to the haunting. However, on particularly dark nights, when the evening skies were as black as ink, those who lived closest to the pond claimed that,
