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Escape pod. Episode 883. Just us and the mannequins. By Lyndon Nihov.

Hello and welcome to Escape pod. I'm your host and co-editor, Merlaferty. Today's story

is Just Us and the mannequins, my Lyndon Nihov. Lyndon is a writer and photographer living

in a small Kansas town. She loves Scooby Doo, is an accidental collector of vintage cameras

and will read anything that's labeled gothic or atmospheric. Her short fiction has appeared

in the magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Daily Science Fiction, Weird Horror and Elsewhere.

It's narrated for us by Heather Thomas. Heather Sleem's jewelry by day, but is an aspiring

voice actor by night. In her high school year, she was classically trained in opera but

now mostly just things carry okay. She is wildly enthusiastic about all things horror and

has notably curated an impressive collection of earnest yet awful dog portraits. This is

an escape pod original. So gather all your friends about you even if there's only one of them.

It's story time.

Just Us and the mannequins. By Lyndon Nihov. Narrated by Heather Thomas.

It was creepy at first. All those mannequins. It must have been someone who'd worked at

them all because there were so many of them posed around town after everything had shut

down and the streets were bare. Standing on the sidewalks, peering back into the same

windows they used to look out of, posing on a bench in a moment of what would have been

an animated conversation. Except, except the eyes are dull, painted blue, green, brown

...