The Knock
I was mid-spoon in a bowl of cereal when the knock came.
It was sharp. Precise. Three raps. Not rushed, not hesitant. Intentional.
I glanced at the clock—6:42 AM.
No one knocks at that hour unless it’s bad news.
I waited, half-hoping I’d imagined it. But after a beat, it came again. The same three knocks.
I live alone. My house is at the end of a long gravel road, five miles from the nearest town. The only regular visitor I get is the UPS guy, and even he doesn’t show up before noon.
I stood slowly, wiping milk from my chin with the back of my hand, and went to the door.
I didn’t open it.
“Who is it?” I asked.
A voice, calm and clear, answered, “I’m sorry to disturb you. My car broke down a few miles up. I was hoping I could use your phone.”
It was a man’s voice. Mid-30s maybe. Educated-sounding. No trace of panic. But something about it didn’t sit right. Who *asks* to use a phone anymore?
“I can call someone for you,” I offered.
A pause. “I’d really rather speak to them myself. My phone’s dead.”
I looked through the peephole. He wasn’t what I expected. He wore a button-up shirt, sleeves rolled. Dark jeans. He had a satchel slung over one shoulder. Clean-shaven. Not a drop of sweat despite the humid morning.
He smiled at the door like he could see through it.
“I won’t come in if that’s a worry,” he added. “You can keep the chain on, whatever makes you feel safe.”
I hesitated.
And that’s when I saw it.
A speck of red.
His left shoe had a smear—small, but unmistakable.
Blood.
I stepped back from the door and locked the deadbolt.
“Sorry,” I said loudly. “I can’t help you. I’m calling the sheriff now.”
I didn’t wait for his reply. I grabbed my phone and dialed.
The line didn’t ring.
No dial tone. Just dead air.
I stared at the screen. Full signal. Wi-Fi connected. But nothing was working.
My heart thudded. I hung up and tried again.
Still nothing.
I opened my browser. Every site failed to load. A system error flashed briefly. Something about DNS resolution.
I didn’t even know what that meant.
I tried the sheriff’s direct number. Then 911. Still dead.
There was another knock. Louder this time.
“You okay in there?” he called.
I didn’t answer.
Instead, I crept to the kitchen, grabbing the cast iron pan from the stove. My fingers trembled around the handle.
I waited. No more knocks.
I peeked through the curtains.
He was gone.
No sign of him on the porch. No car in the driveway, of course. Just birds and trees and morning haze.
I should’ve felt relieved.
Instead, I felt watched.
---
I spent the rest of the morning in high alert. I locked every door, every window. Drew the curtains. Set the pan by my side like a loaded weapon. My dog, Penny, paced near me, ears twitching, nose in the air.
Something had spooked her too.
By noon, the internet was still down. My phone still bricked.
That’s when I saw the second sign.
It was on my mailbox. Just a smear. Red. Diagonal. Like someone had dragged a finger across it. Blood again?
I didn’t go out to check.
I sat back down and waited.
---
At 3:17 PM, the phone rang.
The sound nearly gave me a heart attack.
I snatched it up without checking the ID.
“Hello?”
A pause.
Then: “That wasn’t very neighborly of you.”
My spine turned to ice.
It was the same voice. Calm. Polite. Soft-edged.
“You’re trespassing,” I said, struggling to keep my voice steady. “I’ve called the authorities.”
“No, you haven’t,” he replied. “But that’s okay. You’ve got time to fix this. I’ll come back around sunset. We can try again.”
The line went dead.
I tried to redial. Nothing.
---
Sunset comes slow when you're waiting to die.
I considered leaving. But my car wouldn’t start. Not even a sputter. I hadn’t driven it in three days and it had been fine. Now the engine didn’t even turn over.
Battery? Sabotage?
I tried the landline in the den. Dead too.
Every form of contact—gone.
I still had the pan, plus a crowbar in the shed, and my grandfather’s old hunting rifle under the bed. It hadn’t been fired in twenty years.
I spent the next hour cleaning it, my hands trembling with every click of metal.
I’d never shot anything larger than a squirrel.
But I would if I had to.
---
Sunset spilled orange over the fields as I waited by the front window, rifle propped against the wall. Penny sat beside me, growling low.
Then I saw him.
He stepped out of the tree line like he’d been there the whole time.
Same clothes. Same satchel. Same calm stride.
But he didn’t come to the door.
He walked around the house. Slow. Measured. Like he was inspecting it.
I watched him from inside, heart hammering.
Then he looked right at me. Through the glass. And smiled.
I jerked back, gun up.
When I looked again, he was gone.
---
The night dragged.
No more knocks. No more phone calls.
Just the sound of the wind and creaks in the wood and the whisper of thoughts unraveling in my brain.
I barely slept. Every hour I walked the perimeter of the house, gun in hand.
Nothing.
By dawn, I convinced myself I’d imagined the whole thing.
Sleep deprivation. Stress. Maybe some hallucinatory fever.
Then I saw it.
Carved into my front door.
A symbol.
A circle with three vertical lines through it. Each line ended in an arrow. Crude but deep. Like someone had used a knife.
Not vandalism. Not random.
A *mark*.
---
By the third day, I’d stopped hoping for help. The phone still didn’t work. No one came down the road. Not even the mail.
On day four, a note appeared on my kitchen table.
I hadn’t heard anyone enter. No broken windows. No forced locks.
Just a folded piece of paper that hadn’t been there the night before.
It read:
**"This is how it starts."**
Nothing else.
No signature.
The power went out that afternoon.
---
By day six, the world had narrowed to candlelight and whispers. I stopped trusting my eyes. I thought I saw him in the mirrors. In reflections. Always standing still. Watching.
I broke every mirror in the house.
Then I boarded the windows. All of them. Hammered planks until my hands blistered.
I started rationing food. Drank rainwater from a bucket.
I was preparing for a siege. But I didn’t know from *what*.
That night, he came again.
Not to the door.
Inside.
I woke up to the sound of breathing.
Right next to my bed.
I didn’t move. Didn’t open my eyes.
Just waited.
The breathing continued for what felt like hours. Then it stopped.
When I finally sat up, the room was empty.
But the sheets beside me were still warm.
---
Day seven.
I cracked.
I ran. On foot. Through the woods. Didn’t bring the gun. Didn’t bring food. Just ran.
I don’t remember falling.
But I must have.
When I woke up, I was in my bed again. Clothes muddy. Feet cut and bleeding.
And a new note on the nightstand.
**"You can’t leave until it’s done."**
---
I stopped keeping track of the days.
I lived like an animal. Ate cold beans from cans. Slept with the rifle under my arm. Kept candles lit in every room like they could ward him off.
I never saw him again—not fully. Just glimpses. The corner of a coat in the hall. A shadow on the stairs. A breath behind me.
He never spoke again.
Until yesterday.
---
I found the final note in the fireplace.
Burned edges. Just five words.
**"You know what to do."**
I didn’t.
But then I looked in the mirror.
One of the few I hadn’t shattered.
And I didn’t see myself.
I saw him.
Not a reflection.
*Him.*
Staring at me.
Smiling.
And then I understood.
He wasn’t just a stranger.
He was me.
Or what I would become.
---
I don’t know how this ends.
But I know what he wants.
He’s teaching me something.
About fear. About isolation. About surrender.
And every day I stay, I feel him closer.
Taking over.
Becoming.
---
If you find this—
If you read this—
Don’t answer the door.
Don’t talk to the stranger.
Because once you do, you invite him in.
And once he’s in—
React
