Speaker 1: Liam and I have been planning the trip for months,
just the two of us, no girlfriends, no responsibilities, just
a long overdue weekend to disconnect. We picked the cheapest
cabin we could find, tucked in the tree thick edge
of some forgotten lake up north. Fishing drinks, maybe a
little weed, the kind of lazy, directionless break we both
pretended we didn't desperately need. I'd just quit my job,
burnt out. Liam's engagement had fallen apart two weeks before
the wedding. We didn't talk about either. The next morning,
I woke up early, couldn't sleep. Liam followed me down
to the dark, leary eyed, both of us clutching mugs
of awful instant coffee. That's when we saw it, the water,
barely visible through the fog. A house, A full on house,
two stories, pale siding, sharp roof, perfectly symmetrical, and definitely
not there the day before. Maybe we were too hungover
to notice. Liam said, maybe someone built it overnight. I joked,
but the chill of my spine didn't match my tone.
We watched it for a while. It didn't move, flicker,
or fade. It just sat there, still and waiting. We
couldn't see a dark or a path leading to it.
It was just there. Eventually, curiosity got the better of us.
We climbed into the old metal rowboat. The cabin provided
or squeaking with every pull. The lake was calm, the
surface didn't rip. Even the fog seemed thick and deliberate,
as if it wanted to hide something. As we rowed,
I remember thinking, maybe we're about to ruin someone's very
private weekend. The fog parted like a curtain the closer
we got. It sat dead center on the water, no docks,
no stilt, no visible support, just the two story colonial
style house, perfectly above the glass of reflection, as if
it had been cut and pasted into the world without explanation.
Liam was the first to say it there's no foundation.
I nodded, there's no reason it should be standing. We
circled it in the boat, but there was no clear
entry point, just still water and the low whisper of wind.
And then, miraculously we spotted a flat wooden platform hidden
by the shadows beneath the water. In front of the
porch steps a place just wide enough to climb onto.
We tied off and stepped onto the platform. It didn't
creak or sway. It felt impossibly solid. The front door
opened with the first twist of the knob. Inside was warmth.
I don't mean just temperature. It felt like a loved home,
like someone had been expecting us. Lamps glowed in every room,
soft orange glow, washing over clean furniture and polished hardwood.
A fire crackled in a stone hearth despite no visible
chimney outside. The smell of fresh bread hung in the air.
The dining table was set for two full place already prepared,
roast chicken, vegetables, mashed potatoes, still steaming like they'd just
been prepared. Our stomachs growled in unison, but neither of
us dared touch it. Maybe this is one of those
theme rentals. Liam said, like a weird Airbnb experience. I
was too stunned to respond. The place was stunning, leagues
above the glorified shed we'd rented. We moved from room
to room quiet Now every bed was made, clawsets full
of clothes, neutral, unlabeled but folded with care. Framed photos
hung along the hallways, but the faces were impossible to
make out, like they'd been smudged or captured. Mid motion,
familiar an alien at the same time. Everything had that
once loved feeling, old but clean, used but treasured. The
kitchen was fully stocked, the fridge cold and humming, cabinets
filled with dry goods, even a fruit ball on the
counter apples waxy and perfect. We stood in the living room,
surrounded by silence and comfort. This place is nicer than
our cabin Liam said, by a mile. No mold, no
wood rot, no smell, like a raccoon died under the floorboards.
I added. We laughed, but the feeling crept over us
that we didn't belong. This was someone's place, and we
were walking it like a public space. We didn't stay long.
The air inside that house had away of numbing time,
like everything outside. The walls didn't exist. But when I
checked my watch, nearly two hours had passed. The food
on the table hadn't cooled. Liam whistled low, All right,
enough ghost, real estate, and s head back before dark, yeah,
I said, though my voice didn't sound convincing even to me.
I didn't want to admit how the place made me
feel safe, almost hypnotically, so, like leaving would be wrong somehow.
He was already at the door you coming, Yeah, right
behind you. He stepped out first, boots thumping lightly on
the wooden platform. The sound was grounding real. Then I
tried to follow and hit something that wasn't there. The
air had hardened, not like wind or resistance. It was
like walking face first into glass. My whole body jolted backward,
My breath caught in my throat. What the hell? I
pressed my hands forward. They flattened against nothing. The door
frame was right in front of me, open, but I
couldn't cross it. It was like the house itself was
pushing back. Matt William's voice floated through the fog, muffled.
It hit the barrier again, harder this time. I can't
get out. What are you talking about? I can't get out.
Then everything changed. Every light in the house went out
all at once. The warmth bled away, The fire hissed
out mid crackle. In the sudden silence, the sound of
my own breathing filled the room, quick, sharp, and too loud.
The moonlight filtered through the windows in weak silver ribbons, illuminates,
eating motes of dust that hadn't been there a moment ago. Liam.
My voice sounded small, No answer, just the distant rhythmic
lap of water against the foundation, a sound that somehow
felt closer than it should. Liam. I shouted, panic rising.
My heart beat thudded in my ears. Footsteps thudded across
the porch. Then the door swung wide like poured back
in around him, like someone had hit a switch. The
fire roared again, the air warmed. Everything was normal. Liam
stood in the doorway, eyebrows raised. What the hell's your problem?
I stumbled forward, gripping the frame. I couldn't leave the
air it, I stopped. How insane I sounded. He looked
past me, scanning the bright, cozy room. You sure you
didn't just freak yourself out? Man, You've been johmpy ever
since we got here. I'm serious, I said, shaking my head.
It was like hitting a wall. He juggled uneasily, clapping
my shoulder. Yeah, a spooky, invisible wall in the middle
of a magic lake. Maybe he's up on the edibles, huh.
But even as he laughed, I caught it the way
his eyes darted toward the open door behind him, then
back to me. He didn't say it out loud, but
I could tell he felt it to the air outside
was heavy, the kind of stillness that waits. We kept
testing it, thinking maybe it was just the fluke, some
bizarre sensory thing, or maybe we were overtired. But now
every time we tried to leave together, shouldered to shoulder,
we both hit it an invisible wall, like the air
had been vacuum sealed. No resistance, no sound, just solid nothing.
The first time it happened to both of us at once,
we looked at each other and said nothing, just backed
up back into the house. So we tried splitting it
up again. I left first, made it to the porch.
He followed, blocked, and the moment I crossed the threshold,
the lights flicked back on, warm, cozy, like nothing had happened.
Then we reversed it. He went out fine, I followed,
blocked again. It became clear you could leave, but only
if some one else stayed behind. One must remain. I
don't know how the house enforced that rule, but it
did every single time, no matter how we tried to
game it. Eventually we stopped trying and sat in the
living room surrounded by ticking clocks and two perfect furniture.
The crackling fireplace didn't burn down, and the food and
the table never got cold. It was all still waiting.
Liam was the one who spoke first. I'll go, he said,
I'll get help, I'll be fast. I didn't like it,
but he was already walking to the door, and as
he crossed the threshold, the light didn't just fade. It curdled.
Warm gold drained into thin gray moonlight that coated everything
like dust. The fire died without smoke. The smell of
bread soured to something metallic and old. The temperature dropped
five degrees and kept falling. I tried turning on the lamps.
Nothing switches clicked, bulbs stayed dead. I even tried the
lighter from the kitchen drawer, but when I flicked it,
nothing sparked. So I started walking. At first, everything looked
the same, but age seemed to infect the place. The
once pristine wooden ornaments peeled and flaked into husks that
only resembled what they once were. Then I opened a
door that should have led to the hallway and found
a staircase narrow, pitch black. I didn't go down. I
closed the door, took a breath, opened it again. The
hallway was back. I stood there for a while, just breathing, listening.
The sounds came slowly, like the house had been holding
its breath and finally let it out. Soft creaks, then
the hum of something shifting, almost organic, like bones realigning
in the walls. There was movement too, at first, just
flickers at the edges of my vision, a shadow passing
behind a doorway I hadn't opened, Something crawling along the
ceiling fast enough to make me question if I saw
anything at all. I turned corners that should have led
to the kitchen and ended up back in the foyer.
Doors led to wrong places, windows showed only fog. Eventually
I gave up trying to map it. I picked a room,
a small guest bedroom I hadn't seen before, and shut
the door behind me. It was bitterly cold. I climbed
into bed, fully dressed, clutching the thick covers to my chin.
I heard breathing, not mine, slow, deep grasping. Somewhere in
the walls. I heard scratching, two nails or claws, dragging, pacing.
Once something brushed my legs under the covers, slow and deliberate.
I didn't move, didn't breathe, I just waited. No noise
after that, just silence. So complete. It buzzed in my ears.
I don't remember falling asleep. I must have passed out
from exhaustion. I woke up hours later, cramped, teeth chattering,
heart pounding, like I hadn't rested at all. The room
was darker than before, and the door I came in
through was gone now on the other side of the room.
I stretched off, ready to look around, and felt my
stomach curl. I was starving, not just hungry. It was
like something had reached inside during the night and scooped
up more than food. The lights were still dead, the
fireplace remained cold, ash the food from before gone missing,
like it had never existed. I tried the taps. Nothing
came out, no hiss, no drip, just silence. The windows
still showed the lake fog blanketed and still, but the
sky hung in perpetual dusk. The moon hovered low, never rising,
never falling. The shadows stayed long stretched. At first I
thought a day had passed, then two. Now I wasn't
sure if time was moving at all. I started keeping track.
I used the state knife to carve a tally into
the kitchen table every time I slept. There were five lines.
Now maybe six. One of them was deeper, fresher, but
I didn't remember making it. It didn't let me rest anymore.
Every time I closed my eyes, I felt it watching,
not from the darkness, but everywhere, like the walls were
its skin and the beams were its spine. I could
hear it breathing through the grain of the floorboards, smell
it sweet wet rot, even when I pressed a pillow
over my face. At first, I stayed in one room.
Then I tried moving, hoping to outrun it, but the
layout wouldn't stay still. Doors opened, the dead ends, staircases twist,
Mirrors didn't reflect the right version of the room, and
for similar of what the room was meant to be like.
It was half guessing the worst o the rooms I
didn't remember entering. I'd blink and be standing in a
narrow crawl space, breathing hard, hand scraped raw, like I'd
been clawing at the walls. I once woke up inside
a closet, curled around a pile of clothing that didn't
belong to me. The thing moved differently when I was exhausted.
It didn't bang or scream, It stalked. Sometimes I'd hear
it just outside the door, slow steps that paused too long.
Once I saw a shape under the crack, like something crawling,
flat bellied across the hallway, dragging limbs. I locked the
door that night. It tapped slow and patient, and on
the other side hours of soft tapping just beyond the wood.
One night I found muddy footprints in the kitchen, small, barefoot,
like a child. They circled the room, then stopped at
the base of the bed. I didn't hear it, didn't
see it, but it was there inches from me while
I slept. At some point I lost count of the days.
The first few talies on the table were neat straight.
I even tried marking time by the dim shift of
light outside, but that stopped making sense fast. The sky
didn't move here, it stayed caught in that same silver
half light. I thought I carved thirty marks, maybe forty.
But somewhere in the blur of time I stopped sleeping,
or I started sleeping without knowing. I started scratching marks
on the wall instead, just to feel something different, something rough.
But even the walls began to reject it. The scratches
would vanish when I looked away. One time they came back,
but moved higher, too high to reach. The house was
keeping its own count. I hadn't eaten it what must
have been weeks. My stomach ate constantly gnawed at itself,
no food, no water. But I didn't die. My mouth
stayed dry, my lips split, my head spun when I
stood too fast, And yet I'd wake up the next morning,
still alive, still here, still hungry. It wasn't kindness. It
was cruelty, measured out one tick at a time. It
was getting bolder. The first time it touched me, I thought,
I imagined it a cold pressure on the back of
my neck. But then it brushed my ankle. When I
hid under the bed. It gripped my arm once while
I slept, hard enough to leave finger shaped bruises. I
looked in the mirror and saw no one behind me.
Now I heard it breathing at night, not just through
the walls or doorway from my pillow. One day or
whatever day meant, I saw a figure standing just beyond
the kitchen doorway, not moving, just watching. It had no face,
just the suggestion of one, a dint where her mouth
should have been, a shimmer of breath where eyes might blink.
I couldn't tell if I'd gone insane, or if insanity
would have been a massy Then finally it cornered me.
I was running again, trying to get to the staircase
that used to lead to the bedroom. It ended in
a wall. When I turned, it was there. It didn't
charge at me. It raised a hand, pointed at me.
The ceiling bent around it like gravity itself was drawn
to it. I backed into a corner, shaking, whispering anything
I could remember, prayers, apologies, my own name, over and over,
like a shield. It stepped forward, closer. The temperature dropped,
My breath hitched and crystallized in the air. It reached
out fingertips about to brush my chest. The lights snapped on, warm,
full blinding, the fireplace raw to life, the smell of
cinnamon baking bread. I dropped to my knees, sobbing. The
thing was gone. I wasn't alone, Hey, A voice called,
I locked up. My friend stood in the doorway, back
lit by the sudden warmth of the house. He was
breathing hard, grinning in disbelief, like he'd found me after
a long game of hide and seek. Dude, he said,
you're right, I couldn't speak. My throat felt torn raw.
Every inch of my body saw like I'd been wrung
out and left a dry I pushed myself upright, still
on my knees, eyes adjusting to the impossible light. He
crossed the room, steadying me by the shoulders. What the
hell happened? I was gone, like maybe two hours. I
called the guy who rented us the cabin, but he
had no clue what I was talking about. Said there
was no house on the lake. Thought I was with
him two hours? I crooked, yeah, left just past noon.
It's not even three. Yet that hit harder than the
cold ever did. I looked in the mirror and hid
my reaction to what I saw. I hadn't aged a day,
but I'd lived a lifetime. I stared at the fireplace,
the plate of food reset perfectly, the soft tom of
peace back in the air. I'd carved more than thirty
marks on the table. I'd felt my sanity stretched thin,
and yet he said two hours. I didn't even argue,
just closed my eyes for a moment. Then I turned
to him, voice low, Look, I just I need to
get out of here, just for a little bit. I
haven't eaten or let I messed up. Man. He frowned suddenly, uneasy.
I thought you said we couldn't both leave. No, I
said quickly, that's not it. We can leave, but not together.
One of us has to stay behind. That's the rule.
He hesitated. So if I stay, you'd be fine. I'll
row back, grab supplies, maybe talk to someone else, be
gone maybe twenty minutes. Tops. His eyes flickered toward the door. Seriously,
I said, you don't have to do anything, just hang out,
enjoy the food here. He gave a weak laugh at that.
That's insane, You know that, Yeah, I said, already halfway
to the door. But we're dealing with it, right. A pause,
then a reluctant nod. All right, go. I didn't look back,
didn't check the sea. If the house dimmed behind me,
I just stepped out into the fog, let the door
swing shut, and walked down to the boat. The water
lapped gently against the boat as I neared the half
way point across the lake, and already I felt the
weight in my chest shift, like something was being peeled
off me layer by layer. I stopped rowing, turned my head.
The house sat still on the water, perfectly scentered but
the lights they were gone. The soft golden glow that
once made it look like a dream had vanished. Its
silhouette stood darker than the mist around it, every window
and lifeless square. He was in there now, alone, and
I'd known it would happen. I'd let it happen. I
dropped the oars, let the boat drift, and tried to
convince myself there was still time. Maybe he'd figure a
way out. Maybe I was wrong about the rules. Maybe,
just maybe, if I waited, he'd be on the porch waving, laughing, saying,
this place is messed up, man, But I handled it.
I waited. I watched the house remained still cold, untouched
by time or warmth. I rowed the rest of the
way in silence. Back in the cabin, everything felt too loud.
The creak of the wood, the hum of the refrigerator,
the crunch of my footsteps all too loud after what
I'd just left. I tried to eat. The food turned
to ash in my mouth, gilt ripped away any semblance
of appetite. I stood by the window, watched the lake,
watched the dark shape where the house waited. I told
myself I could back at sunrise, rest up a bit
for my turn back in there. Then I told myself
i'd go if the lights came back on every hour.
I checked nothing. I went to the dock with the
boat ready, hand on the rope, but I didn't untie it.
I just stood there, feeling the mist curl around my ankles.
And then I started bargaining. Maybe it didn't have to
be both of us getting out. Maybe he was okay,
Maybe this was just temporary, and when I left the
house would vanish and let him go. Maybe the house
only wanted me and was fine for him. I whispered
his name once it caught in my throat like a splinter.
The guilt came in waves, shame, anger, denial. I punched
the counter, cursed him for not refusing, cursed myself for asking,
Curse the lake, the fog, everything. Then I looked out
the window one last time. Still nothing. That's when I
started lying to myself. He'd seen the dark, now, he understood,
he'd know what I went through, the walls, shifting, the breathing,
the endless not quite night. And because of that, if
I went back, if we treaded places again, he'd leave
me there. He'd have to, he'd know it's the only
way one of us walk away. So maybe leaving now
wasn't betrayal. Maybe it was the only way to make
sure I survive. That's what I told myself anyway, over
and over, until it stopped sounding like cowardice and started
sounding like salvation, a second chance. I waited until dusk
before packing my bag, fifteen minutes maybe less. Just clothed
to my phone at the door, I hesitated, looked back
at the half empty cabin, the lake beyond still, no lights,
just silence. I whispered, I'm sorry, though I wasn't sure
who I meant it for. Then I left Ey