It started a week ago, at a restaurant downtown. It wasn’t a big one, but it wasn’t small, either, and it had this aura of peace.
I was eating there across from my friend, Lexie, when I first saw him. There was this figure, this silhouette of a person right up against a window, eating without a care in the world.
Of course, there’s nothing wrong with eating, no. But the way the man ate, it was… strange, to say the least.
He was eating spaghetti, but with his bare hands- but weirder, I saw the man reach for the pepper, unscrew the cap of the container, and dump the entire thing into the meal. Then, he proceeded to do that with the salt.
“What the heck?” I murmured.
“Hm? Do you not like my idea?” Lexie replied, a bit confused. I realized I’d forgotten what she was talking about.
“No, look,” I pointed. “That guy’s eating weird.”
Lexie turned and then tilted her head, confused. “What guy?”
“That…” I looked back. There was nobody, not even a plate of peppered spaghetti. “What?”
“Hey, you’re the one who pointed.”
“Nevermind,” I decided. At the time, I chalked it up to my imagination, and a sleep deprived brain. I’d been staying up at night for hours studying, and I’d only gotten a mere five hours of sleep before.
So I turned my attention away from the strange man and back to Lexie. And as the hours passed, I’d forgotten all about the man and his mysterious desire for salt and pepper.
But that wasn’t the end of it, no, there was so much more to come.
Lexie was my neighbor; she lived in the apartment next door with her roommates. I lived with my two roommates, Quint, and Kaia. I actually met Lexie through my roommates, who apparently all knew everyone living next door. They introduced me to her once I moved in, and we became fast friends after that.
I was looking out the window, down upon the streets of the city, wondering what tomorrow, or the days beyond would take me. I looked at the streets, watching people waltz here and there.
And then I noticed the man from before.
He was looking up at my building with this… this twisted smile on his face, like he was mocking someone.
For a second, I was afraid he was looking right at me, deep into my eyes- when I realized that no, he wasn’t.
He was looking at the balcony next door- no, past the balcony, past the window, into Lexie’s apartment.
What the heck?
I rubbed my eyes, confused. Was it the same man I’d seen at the restaurant- but no, he wasn’t real- no plate had been left behind, and Lexie hadn’t seen the guy, just me. Was I hallucinating the whole thing?
I went back inside to find my phone, to take a photo of this guy- if he was real, and for some reason, looking into Lexie’s apartment, I could get the police involved, in case it went further.
But by the time I’d gotten my phone, the guy was gone. There was just nothing where he’d been earlier, no trace of him- no, the guy was gone, as if he’d never been there to begin with.
Instead, this couple was there, taking a photo of themselves against the light of the moon.
Confused, I sank back to my bed, and closed my eyes. I fell asleep moments later, I needed it, and by the time I neared the edge of sleep, I decided I was probably hallucinating as a result of, again, sleep deprivation.
When I saw the man again, the next day, I was convinced it wasn’t a hallucination.
I was at class, with Lexie, sitting next to each other, as usual, and watching the weirdly young professor teach something about physics, that related to humanity, somehow.
There was something in the corner of the class theater, right near the door. It was crouching, and covered in dark, moist fur. When I’d passed as I entered class, I assumed it was the professors dog- but then, I swore I’d heard the professor talk about an allergy to dogs.
I focused on the thing in the corner and nearly screamed when I realized it wasn’t a dog- but the same man, crouched and covered in hair, looking not at me, but at an unassuming, focused, Lexie.
What the hell was going on?
Nobody else seemed to acknowledge the thing, the man in the corner- hell, nobody except me seemed to see the thing in the corner. It was there, so plain and obviously there yet-
Yet only I saw it.
Only I saw it’s twisted grin, it’s broken, sharp teeth in that twisted smile. And the teeth- they were all canine, carnivorous, and has this distinct tinge of a dark red, stain.
I could only hope it wasn’t blood.
I tried to take a photo of the thing, but when I did, I ended up with nothing. There was just a dusty old corner, no man, no thing with sharp bloodstained teeth- nothing.
“Alecia,” Lexie began, later, after class, “are you okay?”
“Huh?” I replied, still thinking about the thing I’d seen in class. “What?”
“Are you okay?” she repeated. “You look kind of nervous.”
I was about to make some excuse about being nervous for exams when I noticed the man from earlier across the street, looking right at Lexie. “Have you- well, have you noticed someone following you?”
“No, why?” she simply stated. “Have you seen someone following me?”
“Yeah,” I confessed. “Remember that guy at the restaurant, the guy I said was eating weird- but when you looked, there wasn’t anyone there?”
“Right, what about it? Is he-”
“He’s been following you,” I blurted. “But it’s like you don’t even see him- and nobody else can to- just me. I don’t know how it works and all, but I saw it- him in class in the corner- and I swear the thing had sharp teeth stained with blood- and I tried to take a picture but- well, nothing came out.”
“Right,” Lexie murmured. “Yeah, Alecia, you definitely need more sleep.”
I looked back at the thing across the street. The thing’s smile was wider now, like a clown mocking the audience.
Mocking… me.
“Yeah, maybe,” I replied, defeated. “I definitely need more sleep.”
And so, defeated, that’s what I did. I walked straight home and slept. I slept for hours and hours, and when I did wake up, I felt much better, better then I’d been the entire week.
But still, I was sure Lexie was being followed, and no matter how much sleep I was getting I’d still be able to see it. But still, deep down, I hoped my mind was wrong, and that this was all one big side effect of not getting enough sleep.
Unfortunately, I was wrong.
A few days later, I was at the local theater watching a movie. It was just me, Lexie, and a few of our roommates. There weren’t many people there, it was a sequel to a cult classic, and it hadn’t really been marketed well.
But before the movie started I made an excuse to run to the restroom. In reality, I was scanning the audience as I walked away, looking to see if the man was there.
When I didn’t find a single trace of the thing- the man, I relaxed, returned to my seat and began to enjoy the movie.
The movie seemed ironic, to me, at least. A tale about a stalker hunting and killing people. But still, I hadn’t seen the strange smiling man, so I kicked back, and enjoyed the movie.
Until around halfway, when I noticed something strange on screen. It was this fuzz, a glitch, but nobody seemed bothered by it.
There was just a small mass of fuzzy light in the corner, and I watched as it slowly corrected itself, eventually revealing a man, crouched on the ground, staring from inside the movie- outside, right at my friend.
I took out my phone to see if I could document it somehow- but it wouldn’t turn on, instead, reflecting my surroundings back at me, a black mirror.
I yelped when I saw the smiling thing right behind me. I turned- and saw nothing.
Luckily, nobody noticed, the movie had coincidentally been playing a jumpscare exactly as I screamed, so nobody seemed to notice.
But still, the crouched thing was still in the movie, in the corner smiling a twisted smile, mocking my ability to see it.
And I couldn’t do anything about it.
Only I’d been seeing the thing. Just me, alone. And now that it’d appeared in the movie, and the reflection of my phone, I was growing concerned I was going insane.
And again, unfortunately, I was not insane.
Lexie went missing the next day. Just… gone. Vanished, like she was removed from the universe. Her roommates woke up and couldn’t find her anywhere. It wasn’t rare thing, Lexie often woke up early to go for a run before the city awoke.
But when hours passed and she didn’t come back, we all began to grow concerned.
I confessed to my roommates, the ones who’d introduced me to Lexie that I’d been seeing something strange follow her- making sure to ignore the whole movie theater event, however. That part just wouldn’t make sense.
To my dismay, neither of my roommates had seen it either.
Still, it seemed like evidence enough to report her missing. Though despite my words, we weren’t taken that seriously.
How incompetent.
Anyway, we took to searching the city, looking for her. Looking in all the places she usually hung out- the library, a bakery, the university- but no, she wasn’t anywhere. She was just… gone.
When we finally returned back to the apartment, we were all exhausted. By now, we’d convinced the authorities to help us search.
But still, nothing was found.
Well, not exactly.
I’m not sure why, but my roommate, Quint, they keep looking back and shrugging- almost like something was watching us, following. It reminded me of, well, me looking at the thing that was following Lexie.
They found Lexie the next day.
It was past way past midnight, around four when the police knocked on our door. They found something- bits and pieces of clothing- Lexie’s.
That wasn’t all. The clothes were torn, as if bitten by a mouth full of teeth. And further, they’d also found this matted, coarse fur all over it.
A wild animal attack, they claimed. And yet, they weren’t sure where the hair had come from. No animal seemed to have hair like that, and the fact that there was no body gave them hope that she may still be alive, somewhere.
But while they don’t know what took her- I do. That thing, that rotten smiling thing took her. I don’t know how, or why- but I know it was that thing.
And that was that. Since then, I haven’t seen the thing. No trace of it’s smiling, twisted face. No trace of it’s bizarre ways of eating. It was gone, gone from my life, just like Lexie.
I’d hoped so, at least.
Yesterday, though, Quint pulled me aside, a note of concern in their voice. Apparently, ever since Lexie had vanished they’d been seeing something strange out of the corner of their eye.
Something watching me that only they could see.
Something that looked like a man with a twisted smile, staring directly at me.