“GIVE ME BACK!!!” – the boy’s heart-rending scream echoed through the San Isidro Elementary School, Quezon City, making students and teachers stop in shock after school.

The child was about nine years old, skinny, with red eyes, crying and pointing at the caballero tree in the corner of the yard. At first, everyone thought he was being teased and panicked. But when he kept crying and trembling, pointing to the ground under the tree:

“There… my brother is there… give him back…”

The atmosphere suddenly became tense. Many parents who were leading their children to the gate slowed down. The head teacher Alvarez rushed to hug the child and asked, but the more she tried to comfort him, the more he cried. Principal Reyes also stepped out to calm him down, but to no avail.

The rumor spread quickly. Adults whispered: “He must have watched a horror movie and imagined it,” “Or is there something haunting the house?” But looking at the child’s genuine fear, everyone saw something unusual.

A parent who was a QCPD police officer, Mr. Dela Cruz, squinted at the caballero and said softly:
— “Let’s dig. If there’s nothing, let the boy rest assured.”

No one expected that this suggestion would reveal a buried secret. Two security guards brought shovels and started digging right where the child pointed. The students were all excited; the adults were half-believing.

After just a few shovel strokes, the damp soil gave off an indescribable pungent smell. A piece of pink cloth emerged. The whole yard fell silent. Mr. Dela Cruz told everyone to back off and continued digging.

The piece of cloth turned out to be an old children’s dress. And underneath… what stunned everyone: a tiny, almost intact skeleton of a newborn baby.

The silence was suffocating. Some parents hugged their children and sobbed. The boy collapsed, screaming:

“There! That’s my brother… I told you…!”

Mr. Dela Cruz clenched his jaw and immediately called the Quezon City Police Department. The principal turned pale; the teachers panicked. The bustling schoolyard suddenly became dark…

The biggest question that arose: How did the boy know there was a baby under the tree? And who was the “little brother” he was screaming for?

The scene was sealed off. The boy, named Nico, was invited to the headquarters to give a statement with his mother. Nico’s mother, Rosa, was in her thirties, with a gentle face but exhausted from worry.

At first, everyone thought Nico was imagining things. But the boy’s words gave everyone goosebumps.

Nico said: for many months now, he has been dreaming about a little girl in a pink dress, sitting and crying under the caballero tree in the school yard, calling him “brother”, reaching out and begging:
— “Brother, take me out… it’s cold… it’s dark…”

At first, Nico thought it was just a dream. But the dream kept repeating itself. This morning, as soon as he entered the school gate, looking at the caballero tree, his head felt dizzy, the cry echoed in his mind, he rushed out, pointed and cried uncontrollably.

The statement was hard to believe but could not be ignored. The investigator checked the history of the land and asked if there had ever been a family that had mysteriously lost a child around here.

Meanwhile, Sister Rosa turned pale. She confessed the truth: more than ten years ago, when she was very young, she had an unwanted pregnancy with an irresponsible man. Fearing scandal, her family forced her to leave her hometown. In her seventh month, she gave birth prematurely to a baby girl, who died a few hours later.

In desperation, a relative took her to a school that was under construction and not yet operational, and secretly buried the baby under an old caballero tree to hide the story. She then left Manila for another place, returning to Quezon City many years later.

She had never told anyone about this, not even her current husband. And Nico—the son she gave birth to later—could not have known.

The interrogation room was silent. Every detail matched strangely.

If that was true, the “sister” that Nico was screaming for back was the little sister who had never been welcomed into this world.

The news spread throughout the barangay. People came to discuss, both scared and sympathetic. The school was shocked, coordinating with QCPD and DSWD to provide psychological support for the students.

Nico became the center of attention. Some people whispered that the boy had “special powers” or special senses. But psychologists said: maybe Nico’s subconscious absorbed part of his mother’s memories and emotions; or he accidentally heard a story from the past and became haunted. No matter how it was explained, Nico pointing out the right burial place is still difficult to explain.

As for Ms. Rosa, after confessing, she broke down in tears, knelt before the family altar to apologize. The obsession of more than ten years was finally exposed. Her current husband, initially shocked, then gradually accepted, because she had suffered too much.

A small funeral was held for the girl’s remains. The school and many parents came to light candles and offer white flowers. The tiny coffin was placed in the middle of the wreath, Nico sat next to it, holding his mother’s hand tightly.

At that moment, people no longer argued about spirituality or science. They only saw a family daring to face the truth, and a child finding his younger sibling in the strangest way.

After the funeral, the schoolyard gradually returned to normal. The old caballero still stood there, but from now on it became a symbol: a reminder that mistakes, no matter how deeply buried, will be exposed by time.

And Nico, the boy who once cried in the schoolyard, has calmed down. He still dreams of his sister sometimes—but this time, she just smiles, then turns away, no longer begging.

People believe that the baby has been “returned”—not just to Nico, but to a family that once hid the pain. And in Quezon City, under the red caballero trees every summer, that memory will continue to remind people to face, to heal.