Little steps. Little but sure, firm steps to provide me with the maximum security as I walked on the wet and slippery ground. The walk to the apartment building resembled the advice given to me almost every day. With the melody of the rain as my only companion, I chose to take the stairs instead of the elevator. Just see it as my late evening, weird therapy after a long and stressful working day.
Little steps again. All the way to the 6th floor, until I reached the entrance door of Unit 610 at the end of the corridor. I stood in front of the door for a few seconds, not knowing what I was waiting for, keys in hands, raindrops falling off my black raincoat and making little puddles around my boots.
“Hey Ben!” I heard behind me. The sound of the familiar voice pulled me out of the train of empty thoughts.
“Hey Harry!” I quietly replied, without even looking back at my neighbor as I inserted the key and unlocked the door.
“You good?” He asked, a little concern easily detectable in his voice.
“I’m alright, thanks.” I replied while entering my apartment and closing the door behind me to avoid another awkward conversation.
Without locking the door, keys still in my hand, I rushed to the open window through which the rain has been inviting itself into my apartment, wetting the part of the floor close to the opening. I firmly gripped the handle of the window to close it and mistakenly let my keys fall.
I just closed my eyes in annoyance and disbelief. I had to walk back down there just to find those keys under the rain and at almost 11 pm. I looked down through the window, trying to spot them somewhere on the ground from such a height of course to no avail.
No need to complain. I made my way back to the ground floor, taking the elevator this time. I went to the area under my window, looking for my keys, when I suddenly heard a noise, like the one a set of keys would make if it fell on the ground. I looked up, my face partially covered by the hood of my raincoat and saw another person, with a black raincoat and hood on just like me, briefly looking down then disappearing through my very own window.
“What?” I whispered.
Scanning the area from which I heard the noise, I quickly found my keys and ran back into the building. I stood in front of the elevator, already engaged by another person coming down. My mind drowned in an ocean of questions as I tried to make sense of what just happened:
‘Who was that? Is there a robber in my house? A killer maybe? That person looked like me. Could it be me? Was I trapped in some sort of paranormal loop? Why? How? If this is a loop, and since I took the elevator to go back outside, could it be the other me coming down in that elevator? I asked myself, wandering in my own mind and lost in my own thoughts.
The elevator reached the ground floor and its doors opened, revealing the terrifying answer I only came to consider at the last second. Standing in front of me in the elevator was a man, head down, dressed exactly like me, with a black raincoat and with the hood covering his head.
A few people said that an encounter with anything paranormal, visible, or invisible, often comes with various sensations and that is what I felt at that moment. I could not see his face, but I knew he could not be normal. All the hair on my whole body stood as he just walked past me like everything was fine. A heat invaded my eyes and some tears escaped from one of them.
Trembling, and in absolute shock, I just walked in the elevator while he exited the building. My hand seemed to press the button 6 all by itself maybe by reflex since I felt that mind just left me. My heart raced and pounded in my chest when the doors started to close as I imagined that other me suddenly running back inside to finish me off.
After the doors closed, my legs failed and I just collapsed, finding myself sitting on the floor and breathing heavily. The elevator moved up but I could not feel the motion, still completely in shock and I remained on the floor until the doors re-opened, and I could see my entrance door straight ahead.
I got up and ran inside the apartment. Disoriented and absent-minded, I started to walk in circle, trying to convince myself that I did not just become crazy, not even noticing that I left the door wide open. My keys still in end, I noticed the open window again and went straight to close it. You will not believe what happened again.
Yes. You probably guessed it by now, my keys slipped again from my hand and fell once more. In complete disbelief, I did not wait a second that time and watched it fall, already noticing somebody down, dressed in a black raincoat just like me. As soon as the keys reached the ground, he looked up, and I backed away from the window almost immediately, shaking my head in shock and terror.
He is coming back to the house. I had to act fast. If it is a loop, then it could only end if things happen with a very considerable difference. To hell with those keys, I opted for the use of a single spare key with which I could lock the door, kept somewhere in the bedroom. I ran to the bedroom and in complete panic. I trashed my own place in search of that key and could not find it anywhere.
I leave in a building where it is possible to hear the loud elevator go up and down, and especially when its doors open or close on other floors or mine. Therefore, I could hear it open on the ground floor then close, then make its way up while I was desperately looking for that key. I finally found it in the pocket of a shirt and ran to the entrance door.
The doors of the elevator straight ahead opened, and I could see something black inside. But before I could clearly see who it was, I slammed the door shut and locked it, leaving my key inserted. I could hear that man, that thing, approaching slowly, making little steps, walking just like I was walking before when I first arrived home.
He reached the door and tried to insert the other key as I backed away. What will happen if he gains entrance? I thought. My hands shaking, my eyes widening, my breathing getting heavier by the second, I just watched him trying to unlock the door, pulling, and reinserting the key and twisting the doorknob again and again until he was interrupted.
“Ben? Anything wrong?” Harry asked, thinking he was talking to the real me.
“Nothing—wrong.” That man replied perfectly imitating my voice.
“Need some help with your door?” Harry insisted.
“No.” He said before I could hear him walk away.
Looking through the peephole, I could see him going to the elevator and completely ignoring Harry who was still talking to him, saying I do not know what. I rushed to that window and closed it at last. I sat on the floor in the middle of the living room and spent the night there.
That freak did not come back, fortunately. Even if he was gone with some important keys like the one to my apartment, the one to my office, I never saw him appear anywhere. I will not lie, I was expecting him but, this terrifying experience never happened again. I still do not know why it even happened to me in the first place.
What was even more frightening is that after I asked to see the camera recordings of that night’s events, he could not be seen anywhere. There were only doors, seemingly opening and closing by themselves, including the ones of the elevator, that was visibly operated by an unknown force, and Harry, talking all alone in the corridor.
Certain people like those ghost hunters seek for encounters like that. I am not crazy enough to do the same. As the saying goes: be careful what you wish for.