Chapter One

The Day Before

September 13, began with a knock at my door. It was 6:42 in the morning, far too early for anyone I knew to be awake, let alone standing outside my bedroom. I lay beneath the blankets, listening as three slow knocks came again, each one separated by the same amount of time. I held my breath and waited for whoever was outside to knock again, but the hallway remained completely silent.

I reached for my phone on the nightstand and checked the time. 6:43. There were no missed calls, texts, and nothing that would explain why someone would be standing outside of my bedroom before sunrise. I considered calling out, but something about the silence made me hesitate. Instead, I slowly sat up and stared at my door, trying to convince myself that whoever was on the other side would eventually say something.

The handle moved.

Only slightly, but enough to make every muscle in my body tense. I stared at it, waiting for the door to open, but it didn't. The handle slowly returned back to its original position, and the hallway fell silent again. After several seconds , I forced myself out of bed and crossed the room, keeping my eyes fixed on the door the entire time.

When I opened it, nobody was there. The hallway was empty , every other door was closed, and the house was so quiet that I could hear the faint hum of the air conditioner. I stepped into the hallway and looked towards the stairs, expecting to see someone waiting for me or hear footsteps disappearing downstairs , but there was nothing.

The I noticed something lying on the floor. I crouched down to pick it up. It was a picture of me, standing in a room I didn't recognize. I studied it carefully, searching for some sort of clue that might tell me when or where it had been taken, but nothing looked familiar. I turned it over, expecting to find a date or a name written on the back, but it was completely blank. I almost threw it away until I noticed a small timestamp printed in the bottom corner of the picture. 6:42 a.m. I looked at my phone again. The screen read 6:45 a.m.

My stomach tightened as I stared between the timestamp and the time on my phone. There was no reason for a picture taken at 6:42 to be sitting outside of my bedroom door when I had been inside the entire time. I told myself there had to be an explanation, even though I couldn't think of a single one that made sense. I slipped the picture into my pocket and walked downstairs.

By eight o'clock, I had almost convinced myself that I had imagined how strange the morning had felt. I made coffee, turned on the TV, and tried to settle into my regular routine. The news was playing in the background while I scrolled through my phone, barely listening to what the reporter was saying.

Then the TV flickered.

The screen went black.

I looked up and waited for the picture to return, but instead a single sentence appeared across the screen. I stared at it, confused, as the words remained there for several seconds.

DO NOT GO TO SLEEP TONIGHT

The screen flickered again, and the news returned as if nothing had happened. The reporter continued speaking without acknowledging anything unusual. I grabbed the remote and turned off the TV, staring at my reflection in the black screen. I told myself it was a technical error. A glitch. Something that had somehow appeared on the news by mistake. There were plenty of believable explanations, and I so desperately wanted to believe one of them. Then my phone started ringing. I looked down at the screen and felt the blood drain from my face. The incoming call was my own number. I didn't answer,I simply just started at the screen as it rang.

The call stopped briefly, then rang again. Same number. Mine. I let it ring until the call ended, and almost immediately after a voicemail appeared. I stared at it for several seconds before finally pressing play, already wishing I hadn't. At first, there was nothing but static. Then I heard breathing, slow and uneven, as though whoever had recorded the message was trying desperately to keep themselves quiet. I turned the volume up and leaned closer to the phone. Then I heard my own voice.

"Whatever happens tomorrow, don't believe anyone who tells you that you disappeared." The message ended and I didn't move. I replayed it again thinking I somehow heard it wrong, I hadn't. The voice belonged to me, the words were mine. But I never recorded the message, and I had no idea what it was supposed to mean. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the picture, something about it looked different. I stared at the image again, focusing on the background. At first I couldn't find what had changed, but then I saw it. There was someone behind me. The figure was hidden in the darkness of the unfamiliar room, but their face was visible enough for me to see that they were smiling directly at the camera. I didn't recognize them.

I turned the picture over, and there was now writing on the back. I knew it hadn't been there before, I checked it twice upstairs. Three words written across the paper in dark ink: YOU ALREADY DID. I stood completely still, staring at the message while my mind struggled to understand what it meant. Then I heard something upstairs, a slow creek. I looked towards the ceiling, as another creek followed but this time it was accompanied by the faint sound of footsteps moving across the floor above me. I hadn't heard anyone come into the house. I hadn't heard anyone come down the stairs. I was alone. At least I thought I was.

The footsteps stopped directly above me, and for several seconds there was complete silence. I stared at the ceiling, barely breathing, until I heard the unmistakable sound of my bedroom door opening upstairs. I looked down at the picture one last time. The figure in the picture was no longer smiling, they were looking over their shoulder towards the bedroom door. And then I heard something. I heard my name. I heard someone whisper my name from upstairs.