At first, Carol Templeton thought she was imagining it. She was grieving, after all. Her brother, Mark, had passed suddenly just three weeks earlier — an apparent heart attack, the coroner had said. Carol had come to pack up his things and care for Rocky, whom Mark had rescued nearly a decade ago after the bird was abandoned outside a gas station.
But the longer she stayed in that house, the more she felt like something was… off.
“I know it sounds ridiculous,” she said, “but there was a weight in the air. Rocky would just sit there, eyes pinned, staring into the hallway like he was watching someone.”
She tried to brush it off. A parrot repeating strange phrases wasn’t exactly new — any bird owner can tell you they mimic what they hear. But it wasn’t just what Rocky said. It was when.
Every evening at 9:13 p.m. — the exact time Mark had died — Rocky would begin his strange monologue.
“I saw him. He screamed. No — no, don’t!”
Then a pause. Then:
“It wasn’t an accident.”
Carol thought it might be her grief playing tricks. Until she found the voicemail.
Buried in Mark’s saved messages was one from a neighbor, timestamped just 12 minutes before his death. The voice was hushed, panicked.
“Hey man, I saw someone behind your house. Tall guy, hoodie, just standing there. You okay? Call me back.”