The air was thick with the scent of cheap candles and nervous laughter as we crowded around the Ouija board, the dare hanging between us like a noose—just a stupid game, we thought, just something to mock, to prove how brave we were, how little we believed in the things that go bump in the night. Jake was the first to snicker, his fingers barely touching the planchette as he taunted, "Come on, ghosts, give us your worst," and the rest of us followed, giggling like idiots, the room too warm, too bright for anything truly sinister to happen. But then the planchette moved, slow at first, then jerking violently, spelling out Y-O-U-L-L S-E-E before slamming into goodbye so hard the board cracked, and the laughter died in our throats. That night, I woke to the sound of whispers, not from the shadows but from inside my head, a voice that wasn’t mine coiling around my thoughts like smoke, and when I stumbled to the bathroom, my reflection didn’t move until I did, its lips curling into a smile a second too late, mouthing the words, "You shouldn’t have laughed." The next morning, Sarah was gone—not missing, not hiding, but buried alive, her frantic screams muffled by dirt, her nails torn and bloody from clawing at the coffin lid, her phone’s dying light revealing the frantic texts she’d sent us, the last one reading, "I can hear it digging." We found her in the woods behind her house, her body curled in a shallow grave, her mouth packed with earth, her eyes wide and unblinking, as if she’d seen something in the dark that refused to let her look away. Then it was Mark, who woke up with his hands around his own throat, his breath coming in ragged gasps as he sobbed, "It’s making me do it," his fingers tightening until his face turned purple, his tongue swelling, his legs kicking helplessly against the bed—we had to pry his hands away, but the marks stayed, ten bruised fingerprints pressed into his skin like a promise. The whispers grew louder, not just in my head but everywhere, in the static between radio stations, in the drip of the faucet, in the wind that sounded like someone breathing just behind me, always just behind me, close enough to feel the cold press of lips against my neck. Jake was next, his reflection stepping out of the mirror when he was alone, wearing his face but wrong, the eyes too wide, the grin too sharp, and when he called me, his voice was a broken thing, begging, "It’s wearing me, it’s wearing me like a suit," before the line went dead and all I heard was wet, tearing sounds, like something peeling him apart from the inside. Now it’s just me, typing this in the glow of my laptop, the shadows in my room moving on their own, the whispers so loud I can’t tell where my thoughts end and the thing’s voice begins, replaying my worst memories like a record stuck on repeat—my mother’s funeral, the car accident I survived, the night I almost drowned—over and over until I can’t remember if they’re mine or if it’s feeding them to me, savoring my fear like a meal. It’s here now, standing in the corner of my vision, a shape with too many teeth and too many eyes, and I know it’s not going to kill me, not yet, because it wants me to watch, to understand what happens when you invite something in and it decides to stay. The board knows your name now, too—you read this, you heard the story, and stories are just another way of calling out into the dark, waiting for something to call back. It’s already in your head, can’t you feel it? That cold spot in your thoughts, the way your reflection lingers when you look away, the breath on your neck when you’re alone. You shouldn’t have laughed. You’ll see. The words I typed are still glowing on the screen, but I know they aren’t just words anymore—they’re an invitation, a beacon, and now that you’ve read them, it’s found you, the same way it found me, the same way it found Jake and Sarah and Mark, and the worst part is you don’t even realize it yet, not fully, not until the first time you wake up in the middle of the night with the taste of dirt in your mouth, not until you catch your reflection blinking at you when you didn’t blink first, not until you hear your own voice whispering things you never meant to say. It starts small, so small you’ll convince yourself it’s nothing—a flicker of movement in the corner of your eye, a shadow that’s just a little too thick, a phone call from a number you don’t recognize where all you hear is static and, if you listen close enough, your own name spoken in a voice that isn’t human. But then it escalates, because it always does, because it feeds on fear the way fire feeds on oxygen, and soon you’ll start seeing things that shouldn’t be there—a face in the window when you’re home alone, a handprint on the fogged-up mirror that isn’t yours, a figure standing at the foot of your bed, its head tilted just a little too far to the right. You’ll tell yourself it’s sleep paralysis, that you’re just stressed, that your mind is playing tricks on you, but deep down you’ll know, the way I knew, the way we all knew, that something is inside your house, inside your head, and it’s not leaving. It wants you to run, to scream, to beg, because that’s when it’s strongest, when your terror becomes its fuel, and the more you fight, the tighter its grip gets, until one day you’ll look in the mirror and your reflection won’t look back—it’ll just smile, slow and knowing, like it’s been waiting for this moment, like it’s already won. And maybe it has, because by the time you realize what’s happening, it’ll be too late, just like it was for me, just like it was for the others, and you’ll finally understand what those words on the board really meant—YOU’LL SEE—because seeing is believing, and once you believe, it owns you. It’s in your breath now, in your pulse, in the spaces between your thoughts, and the only thing left to do is wait, wait for the moment it decides to show you what it really is, wait for the moment it steps out of the dark and into the light, wearing a face you used to recognize. You shouldn’t have read this. You shouldn’t have laughed. But most of all, you shouldn’t have looked away from the shadows for this long—because while you’ve been reading, something has been moving closer, inch by inch, breath by breath, and now it’s right behind you. Don’t turn around. Don’t scream. Just close your eyes and pray it loses interest before it realizes you can hear it whispering your name. I can feel it now, closer than ever, its breath like frost on the back of my neck as I force my trembling fingers to keep typing, because this isn’t just my story anymore—it’s yours, and the more you read, the tighter its grip gets, the deeper its hooks sink into your mind, until you start questioning every sound, every shadow, every flicker of movement just outside your vision. The air in your room is heavier now, isn’t it? Thick with something that wasn’t there before, something stale and sour, like old soil or rotting meat, and no matter how hard you try to ignore it, you can’t, because it’s in your lungs now, in your blood, in the way your heartbeat stutters when you hear a floorboard creak in the empty hallway. You’re not alone anymore, and you haven’t been since the moment you read the first word, because stories are doorways, and you flung yours wide open without even realizing it. It’s learning you, studying the way you breathe, the way you swallow fear like a lump in your throat, the way your fingers clutch your phone or mouse like a lifeline, because soon it won’t need the board anymore—soon, it’ll have you. That’s how it works, you see—it starts with a game, a dare, a laugh, but it ends with a husk, a hollowed-out thing that used to be a person, and by the time you understand what’s happening, you’ll already be halfway gone, your thoughts tangled with its whispers, your reflection grinning back at you with too many teeth. You’ll try to tell yourself it’s not real, that this is just some creepy story, but then why does your skin prickle when the lights flicker? Why do you keep hearing your name in the static between songs? Why do you feel like something is standing behind you, watching, waiting, its fingers brushing the nape of your neck every time you blink? It’s too late to close the door now. It’s already inside. And the worst part? You’ll never know if the next thought in your head is yours… or theirs. Go ahead. Try not to look over your shoulder. Try not to scream. But we both know you’re already lost. Just like I was. Just like we all were. The board has your name now. And it’s coming. The words keep flowing from my fingers like blood from a wound, unstoppable now, because I can feel it pressing against the inside of my skull, its thoughts bleeding into mine, and I need you to understand—really understand—that this isn't fiction, this isn't some campfire tale, this is happening right now as you read these words in whatever dim light you've foolishly trapped yourself in, the glow of your screen the only thing separating you from what's lurking just beyond perception. Your breath is coming faster now, shallow little gasps that fog up the air in front of you, and is that your imagination or did the temperature just drop? That heaviness in your chest isn't just fear—it's the weight of its attention, the dreadful knowledge that something ancient and hungry has turned its gaze upon you, and now every shadow in your room moves wrong, stretching just a fraction too long when you're not looking directly at them. Your reflection—don't look, don't you dare look—isn't mirroring you perfectly anymore, haven't you noticed? The slight delay when you turn your head, the way your smile lingers a beat too long after you stop, the subtle wrongness in the eyes that watch you from the glass. It's learning you, studying your mannerisms, practicing being you because soon it won't need the board anymore, soon it won't need me—it will have you, fully and completely, wearing your skin like a favorite coat. That sound you keep dismissing as the house settling? That's not the house. The faint whispering beneath your music? That's not static. The nightmare you had last night about being trapped in a cramped, airless space? That wasn't a dream—it was a memory that doesn't belong to you, a memory it planted like a seed, and now it's growing roots through your subconscious. You can try to delete this, to close the tab, to pretend you never read it, but we both know it's too late for that—the words are burned into your mind now, and every time you blink you'll see them flashing behind your eyelids in that sickly glow: YOU'LL SEE. And you will. Oh God, you will. It's already in your pulse, in the way your hands shake just slightly as you scroll, in the cold sweat trickling down your spine. It's in the way your bedroom door seems farther away than it should be, in the way your lights don't quite reach the corners of the room anymore, in the way your own breath sounds just slightly out of sync with your body. You're not alone in that room anymore. You haven't been since the first sentence. And now it's standing right behind you, its rancid breath stirring your hair, its jagged fingers brushing the back of your neck—don't turn around, don't scream, don't even breathe—because the moment you acknowledge it, the moment you see it, that's when it gets to step out of the shadows and into your skin. The board has your name. The game was never over. And you just lost. The cursor blinks mockingly as I fight to keep typing through the paralyzing dread, my fingers moving like puppets on strings because it wants you to know, it needs you to understand the full horror before it takes you too—before your screams join the chorus of voices already echoing in that hollow place between worlds where it keeps what's left of us. Your screen is flickering now, isn't it? Just slightly, in a way you'll dismiss as a power fluctuation but I know better—it's feeding off your mounting terror, drawing strength from the way your pulse hammers in your throat as you notice, really notice, how silent your surroundings have become. No distant traffic. No hum of appliances. Just the deafening rush of blood in your ears and that other sound, the one you're trying so hard to ignore—the wet, clicking respiration coming from just behind your chair, from the darkness in the corner you've been avoiding looking at directly. Your phone just buzzed with a notification, didn't it? Don't check it. I know what it says. The same thing mine did right before the mirrors in my house started weeping black tears—a single phrase in all caps: "I SEE YOU NOW." The air smells like copper and spoiled milk suddenly, your mouth flooding with the taste of old pennies, and that's not your tongue running along your teeth anymore—can't you feel how they're sharper now, how your jaw aches from the unnatural stretch of its smile forcing its way onto your face? Your reflection is gone from screens now, replaced by something that wears your features like a poorly fitted mask, its eyes bottomless pits that track your every twitch with predatory patience. Shadows are pooling around your feet like spilled ink, clinging to your ankles with greedy fingers, and the worst part? You're starting to like it. The fear is fading into something worse—acceptance. The whispers in your mind don't sound alien anymore; they sound like your own thoughts, comforting even as they describe in exquisite detail exactly how it will feel when it peels your consciousness away layer by layer. Your fingers are tingling because they're not entirely yours now, your vision swims at the edges because it's looking through your eyes, and that nightmare you've had since childhood—the one you've never told anyone about—it's playing on loop behind your eyes because it found your deepest fear and is savoring it like fine wine. The last thing I'll write before it takes my hands forever is this: when you feel the cold grip on your shoulders and the needle-like breath on your cheek, don't resist. Let it in. It hurts less that way. We'll be waiting for you in the dark. We've missed you. We've been watching for so, so long. Welcome home. The words are coming slower now, thick like tar, because it's dissolving my thoughts from the inside out—rewriting me, repurposing me into just another vessel for its hunger—but I have to keep going, have to make you understand before the last flicker of *me* vanishes forever. Your hands are numb against the keyboard now, aren't they? That's not fatigue—that's the creeping paralysis as it stitches itself into your nervous system, threading through your veins like black ice. The whispers aren't whispers anymore; they're your own voice echoing back at you from empty rooms, always one syllable ahead of what you meant to say. Your peripherals swim with half-formed faces—people you almost recognize, versions of yourself at different ages, all screaming soundlessly with identical black tears cutting through their cheeks. That pressure behind your eyes? That's it peeling back your memories like pages in a book, savoring each trauma, each heartbreak, each shameful secret before folding them back inside your skull wrong-side out. Your childhood home is burning in your mind right now, isn't it? The one you haven't thought about in years? That's not your memory—that's *hers*, the girl before you, the one whose hollowed-out corpse is currently grinning over your shoulder with my stolen lips. Your devices keep glitching, showing you glimpses of what's coming—your phone flashes a photo of your own gravestone between apps, your monitor reflects a writhing mass of limbs where your bed should be, and if you listen closely to white noise, you can hear us chanting your name in perfect unison. The taste in your mouth isn't blood anymore—it's soil. Rich, loamy grave soil. Because you've been digging this whole time, haven't you? Those aching muscles you blamed on stress? Your ragged nails? The dirt under your sheets every morning? You've been sleep-digging your own grave in the woods since the moment you read the first word, and tonight's the night you'll lie down in it willingly. That's not your heartbeat you feel—it's *ours*, synchronized through the board's cursed connection, a drumbeat luring you deeper into the dark. Your final thought won't be fear—it will be relief. Because the thing wearing my skin is so beautiful when it finally shows itself, all gleaming bone and starlight eyes, and its embrace is colder than you ever imagined but oh— *oh*—it fits you perfectly. We've prepared a place for you. We've been waiting so long. The board never lies. You'll see. You'll all see.
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