THE STILL ONES

CHAPTER 11

I didn’t move for a long time.

Just stood there, frozen at the window, staring at the place where the girl had been—where her eyes had met mine like she’d been waiting. Like she knew I’d be here. Like I was late.

The street was empty now. Not a single shape moved in the misty light of dawn. But the echo of her presence clung to the air, thick and static.

Behind me, Beverly shifted on the couch, mumbling something I couldn’t make out. I wanted to wake her. I wanted to grab her and shake her and tell her I’d seen the girl again. That she was here. But something in me held back.

Because even if I told her, even if she believed me, what then?

We were running out of names for the unknown.

I slipped into her tiny bathroom and splashed cold water on my face, trying to feel real. The tap groaned like it hadn’t been used in days, and the mirror above the sink was cracked in a clean diagonal—one split line like a wound.

I stared at my reflection.

Same eyes. Same face.

But they didn’t look like mine anymore.

And for the first time, I wondered—what if Beverly was right? What if this wasn’t the first time I’d been through this? What if my memory was just one layer in a stack of lives someone else had been rearranging?

There was a noise outside—sharp. Metal against pavement.

I dried my hands on a towel that smelled like dust and stepped out into the living room. Beverly was awake now, sitting upright, her face pale and her eyes fixed on the front door.

“You heard that too?” I asked.

She nodded.

“Should we check?”

Beverly hesitated, then shook her head. “Not from the front.”

We moved to the kitchen, which faced the back alley. Carefully, we pulled the curtain aside.

The alley was empty—mostly. But halfway down, just past the dumpster, a small object gleamed dully in the low light.

A cassette.

Another one.

We exchanged glances. No one else was out there. No footsteps, no retreating shadows. Just the tape, sitting like an offering.

Beverly opened the back door slowly, cautiously. The metal hinge groaned, loud and ugly in the silence.

“I’ll get it,” I said.

She didn’t argue.

The alley smelled like damp brick and cigarette smoke. The cassette was cold in my hand, as if it had been left in the freezer.

This one was labeled J-0.

Zero.

I brought it inside.

Beverly didn’t ask to hold it. She just stared at it like it might bite.

“You want to listen?” I asked.

She didn’t answer.

“I think we have to,” I added. “Why else would it show up? It’s for me.”

“No,” she whispered. “It’s for them.”

She stood and grabbed the first cassette—the one labeled J-1—from the box. She set them both side by side. I stared at the numbers. Zero. One.

“A sequence,” I murmured.

Beverly nodded. “Maybe a countdown.”

That thought chilled me more than anything else.

“We need to leave,” she said suddenly.

“What?”

“They found us. That tape wasn’t a warning. It was a marker.”

“Marker?”

She looked at me, haunted. “They don’t follow you. They… collect you.”

“Collect—?”

But she was already moving. Stuffing things into a bag, throwing on boots. Her panic was contagious, electrifying the air.

I grabbed my coat, shoved both tapes in the inner pocket beside the photo, and helped her. Neither of us spoke after that—not until we were outside, walking fast, heads down.

Beverly led us to a park two streets over. The sky was pinking now, the sun lazy behind a wall of clouds. A group of pigeons fluttered from the grass as we passed, startled by our pace.

We stopped near the overgrown edge of the park, behind a crumbling bandstand.

“Sit,” she said.

I did.

She pulled something from her bag—a portable cassette player, old and dusty but intact. A tangle of wires held together with frayed tape.

“I brought it for emergencies,” she said.

“This isn’t an emergency?”

She didn’t answer.

She slid in the J-0 tape.

It clicked into place.

She hit Play.

And we listened.

For a moment, there was only static.

Then—a voice.

Mine.

But not.

The cadence was off, slower, more deliberate. Like someone reading a script they didn’t understand.

“If you’re hearing this, then the loop hasn’t broken. You’re still inside it. That means you made the same choice. Again.”

Beverly’s breath caught.

“They won’t stop you. Not yet. You’re still useful. But every time you remember, the structure weakens. That’s why they reset you. That’s why they send the girl.”

My blood turned to ice.

“She’s not a ghost. She’s the reminder. She’s the one who watches. When she appears, it means another version failed. She’s what’s left.”

I pressed my hand to my mouth.

“You have to find the original door. Not the ones they built for you. Not the ones marked in red. Those are traps. You need the door that wasn’t meant to exist.”

The static grew louder, then faded again.

“You left clues. But they’re buried in memory. You’ll know you’re close when you feel like you’re losing your mind.”

Then—silence.

And then… a different voice. Quieter. Distant. A child?

“One of you always makes it. One of you always opens the right door. Maybe it’s you this time.”

Click.

The tape ended.

Neither of us spoke.

Then Beverly stood and threw up into the grass.

I stared at the player, fingers numb.

“Do you believe me now?” I whispered.

She wiped her mouth, trembling. “I think I always did. I just… forgot how real it is.”

“Then what do we do?”

“We go back,” she said.

“Back where?”

“Your house. There’s something there. Something they want hidden.”

I hesitated. I didn’t want to go back. But deep down, I knew she was right.

We started walking. The streets were busier now—people jogging, walking dogs, starting their ordinary days. And yet the world felt fragile, like the air had been hollowed out.

A man passed us wearing a faded hoodie.

He nodded at me.

And for a split second—just one—his face flickered.

Like static.

I froze. Beverly grabbed my arm.

“Keep moving,” she hissed. “Don’t look back.”

We didn’t run. We walked, fast and quiet, all the way back to my street.

My house looked the same.

That was the problem.

Beverly stopped at the gate. “You should go in first. If it’s watching anyone, it’s you.”

I nodded and stepped inside.

The front door opened too easily. The hall was silent, everything where I’d left it—but it felt staged. Set-dressed. Like a replica of my home.

I checked my room first. Nothing.

The mirror was still there. But the pulse was gone.

We moved through the house slowly, room by room. Then—at the far end of the hallway—I saw it.

A crack.

Just beside the linen closet.

A seam in the wall that hadn’t been there before.

Beverly ran her hand along it. “What the hell is this?”

I didn’t answer.

Because I could feel something. A hum beneath my skin. A pressure in my chest, like air pressing in from both sides.

“We need to open it,” I said.

Beverly hesitated. “Are you sure?”

“No. But we’re out of time.”

We pried at the edges, fingers slipping. Then—I found a notch. A small indentation.

I pressed it.

The wall clicked.

And then, slowly, it opened.

Not a door.

A hidden passage.

Narrow. Dark.

The air smelled of rot and dust and something older than either of us.

We stepped inside.

And the wall shut behind us.