I’ve always been the type of guy to go to bed late. I’m not sure why, probably because the night is too beautiful to be spent unconscious. I have the chance to live in a very well-located apartment in the outskirts of New York, but my favorite part about my home is the balcony. I love to spend hours sitting there looking at the sky, thinking about what’s out there or peeking at the cars passing by, wondering where are all these people going. That night I had made myself a delicious mojito that I sipped slowly through the first hours of darkness, in between munching on some ritz crackers I bought earlier.
It was getting really late, probably around 1 am, so I built up the courage to escape the beauty of the stars and headed back inside. After a quick stop in the kitchen to leave the rest of my drink in the fridge, I went to the bathroom. The silence surrounding me was only broken by the buzzing sound of my old neon lamp. As I was brushing my teeth, my smartphone, that I always leave in the living room before sleeping, rang. I quickly spit out the toothpaste and rinced my mouth before rushing to my phone. I didn’t recognize the number but picked up anyway, worst case scenario it’s a scam and I can just hang up.
-“Hey Michael, why didn’t you show up to the meeting today? We’re waiting for you.” a dark, low voice asked calmly. My name was indeed Michael.
-“What are you talking about? Also I don’t recognize your voice, who is this?”
-“Stop acting ignorant Mike, you know little games aren’t appreciated by the organisation.”
-“What organisation? What meeting were you talking about? I don’t think I know you dude…” this felt weirder and weirder as the conversation went on.
-“Alright see you next time, just know he’ll be informed you’re acting stupid and he won’t be happy.”
-“Who the..” beep. He hung up before I could even talk. Now I was standing there, in the middle of my living room in the dark, phone in hand. “Alright this was just a coincidence Michael no need to worry, just go to sleep and it’ll be okay,” I said out loud.
I had some trouble falling asleep that night, but I eventually had a couple hours of sleep. I took my usual breakfast, a couple pieces of toast with jelly and a glass of orange juice, before heading to work. I had gotten this job recently, it pays decently but is kind of annoying since I need to stay in an office all day.
My day at the office went fairly well, nothing much happened. At around 4pm, I began getting really bored but my office phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, so it was a client. I was relieved to finally have something to do and I immediately picked up. The voice I heard sent chills dashing down my spine. It was the same voice from the weird call I had received yesterday, but this time he wasn’t calm. The guy had the end of the line felt extremely angry and he was practically screaming. “What on earth are you doing Michael? You knew it was an important event today, we had to start the ceremony without you since you didn’t come! He told us we would need to kick you out if you continued not caring and it would be good riddance, you’re a damn disgrace Mike we’re beginning to hate you ! You hear me, we don’t want you with us anymore !” I panicked, I hung up before looking up at my surroundings, all my colleagues were staring at me. I think the girl on the desk next to me could even hear the guy talk. “Damn.”, She said, before going back to her computer screen. Everybody started working again like nothing happened.
I still had two hours of work to do, but they weren’t very productive. My mind was filled with questions. What’s this organisation that dude was talking about? How does he know my name? Why does he think I’m part of his weird community? Who is this “he” he mentioned? I spent way more time staring at nothing trying to give answer to unsolvable questions than working. At 6pm, nervous, I got up from my desk and rushed out of the building, got in my car and drove home. When I got to my apartment, I could already hear the phone ringing. I opened the door, headed to the phone and recognized the number that called me yesterday. I stared at it for a couple seconds, reading out all the numbers to make sure it was him. And it was. I decided not to do anything, and waited for it to stop ringing. When it finally did, I began walking to the kitchen to get me something to eat but I was quickly interrupted. Someone knocked on the door, three times, slowly. Someone was coming. Someone was coming for me.