His mother's brows furrowed—deeply this time—as if trying to decipher whether she should be more concerned about his words or his state. She took a hesitant step forward, her eyes scanning the room with the slow, deliberate movement of someone unsure of what they were searching for but needing to search anyway.
Her gaze lingered in each corner for longer than necessary, as if hoping to catch something—a movement, a trace, even a feeling. Her eyes flicked toward the shadows beneath the bookshelf, then to the empty space near the window, then back to the center of the room where Mansh still sat slumped on the floor. But nothing stirred. The room remained still. Just still.
Her shoulders lowered—barely, but enough to notice. The crease between her brows softened into a look of reluctant calm, though her lips remained tight. The air had not warmed, but it had lost that oppressive weight that moments ago had filled it like smoke.
Then, her expression shifted—subtly at first. A faint pull at the corners of her mouth. A narrowing of her eyes, not toward the unknown anymore, but toward something familiar. The skepticism was creeping in now. Replacing her initial alarm was something colder. Grounded. Parental.
"A ghost?" she repeated slowly, as though the very shape of the word in her mouth felt ridiculous. Her voice was quieter now, but not gentler—more like she was talking to herself. "Mansh, ghosts aren't real."
She took another step forward, carefully, but not because of fear anymore—because she was preparing herself to confront something less supernatural. Her arms folded loosely across her chest, and her tone sharpened with that well-worn edge of disbelief.
"It must be your imagination," she added, like a verdict.
There was a pause. A long one. The kind that stretched unnaturally, like time hesitating before falling forward. Mansh didn't speak. He couldn't—not yet. His lips parted slightly, but no words formed. His mind was still swimming in that moment, replaying it—frame by frame—trying to reconcile her normalcy with what he had just seen.
His breath still hadn't returned to normal. Each inhale came uneven, like something fragile fighting to stay whole in a world that suddenly felt too sharp. His heart pounded in his chest—not with the chaotic thrum of panic, but a deeper, slower dread. A dread that settled in the marrow of his bones.
And then, her tone changed again.
"Wait a minute…" she muttered, this time with sudden, suspicious energy as she stepped closer, her feet barely making a sound on the floorboards.
There was a shift in the air. The focus in her eyes turned inward, toward a new culprit—one far less mysterious than a ghost.
Her eyes fell to the bedside table. More specifically—to the phone sitting atop it.
Her brow arched.
Without another word, her hand shot out with the speed and precision of muscle memory, grabbing the phone in one motion. She turned her back slightly, shielding the screen with her hand like it was some fragile secret as her thumb began tapping rapidly.
The screen lit up. Her fingers navigated with ease. Tap. Swipe. Tap. Her expression grew darker, not with fear—but with the low-burning frustration that only mothers truly mastered.
Then her thumb stilled.
"Two hours," she said under her breath, barely more than a whisper. But it was loud enough for Mansh to hear. She said it with a mixture of tired resignation and restrained disappointment, the kind that didn't need to be shouted to hurt.
The numbers glowed back at her, damning in their quiet truth.
She stood there for a moment, eyes still on the screen. Not angry. Not scolding. Just tired.
Then, with an exhale that was far more loaded than it needed to be, she handed the phone back to him. Her hand lingered a moment as he took it, fingers cold from gripping the device. She didn't say anything further—at least, not yet. But the silence she left hanging between them said enough.
"It's probably just your tired mind playing tricks on you," she said at last, her voice softer now, though it still clung to that firm, maternal certainty—like she was trying to speak reality back into the room. Yet even as she said it, her eyes betrayed something else. Not quite fear, not yet—but a subtle unease. A flicker of something behind her calm, like a ripple across the surface of still water.
She stood there a moment longer, unmoving, her silhouette framed against the dim hallway light. One hand rested on the doorframe, the other empty, nothing–just a closed fist. Her gaze swept the room slowly—one corner at a time—lingering, just briefly, on the far side where the darkness still clung like smoke.
But she said nothing more.
Just a breath—long, low, resigned.
Then she turned, wordlessly, and walked out.
The door gave a soft creak as it began to close behind her. It wasn't slammed, nor hurried, just pulled shut with quiet finality. And when it clicked into place, it was as if the entire house had exhaled with her—leaving Mansh alone again, wrapped in silence.
From downstairs, faint noises stirred to life. The soft clang of a pan against the stove. The creaking of floorboards. A cupboard opening, then shutting. Normal sounds. Domestic sounds. Things he'd heard every morning without thought.
But now, they felt distant. Faint. Like they belonged to a world that no longer fit around him.
Mansh hadn't moved.
His body remained where it had collapsed. Knees bent awkwardly beneath him, legs tingling with the dull throb of lost circulation. His hands, once shaking, were now stiff against the floor, pressed into the carpet like anchors. His back was slightly hunched, his head bowed—not out of submission, but the weight of too many thoughts dragging it down.
The air in the room had changed.
He could feel it—not colder, but heavier. As if the space itself had thickened. As if the walls had drawn in by a fraction. Every shadow seemed to have deepened by a shade. Every corner pulled a little farther from the light.
Even the silence was wrong.
It wasn't the peaceful kind—the kind that came with quiet mornings or late nights. No. This silence carried weight. It had shape, presence. It pressed in on his ears, filled the spaces between his breaths, settled in his chest like stone.
He slowly lifted his head, his gaze sweeping across the room. Familiar objects stared back—his desk, his shelves, his curtains, his notebooks.
But something about them had shifted.
Nothing had moved.
Yet everything felt… touched.
Like the air itself had remembered something terrifying and refused to let it go.
He swallowed, the motion slow, the sound too loud in the quiet. His throat felt dry. Scratchy. Like he'd swallowed dust or ash.
A strange, foreign tightness had taken root in his chest, curling like smoke through his lungs. His fingertips tingled, not with cold, but with the eerie aftertaste of adrenaline. He tried to blink the lingering sensation away—but it clung to him.
And then the thought came.
Not loud. Not sudden.
It slid into his mind with quiet certainty, curling around the base of his spine like icewater.
The novel…
His lips parted slightly, breath trembling through them.
'It's happening… just like in the novel.'
And with the realisation came a chill—not the kind that touched the skin, but the kind that seeped inward. A sinking, suffocating dread. Because if what he'd just seen wasn't a dream… if that presence wasn't just a trick of exhaustion or imagination…
Then what came next?
What else would follow the script?
His pulse thudded in his ears again, louder this time, as if his heart was trying to warn him of something his mind hadn't caught up to yet.
He closed his eyes—briefly. Just a blink. But behind his lids, the memory returned in sharp, cold flashes. The figure. The movement. The stare. A presence that didn't belong. One that didn't need to speak to be understood. One that didn't need to stay to leave its mark.
His fingers clenched involuntarily. Nails dug lightly into the carpet. He didn't realize he was holding his breath until the pressure behind his eyes made him gasp softly. The sound echoed in the room, strangely loud.
He wanted to move. To stand. To shake it off.
But something kept him there it was–fear.
He just sat there, spine bowed beneath the quiet weight of something unseen.
And though he was alone, the feeling had not left.
The shadow might have vanished… but something had been left behind.
Something that didn't need to be seen to be real.
A cold draft brushed past his cheek.
But the window was shut.
And deep down, in a place too quiet for words, Mansh knew—
It wasn't over.
Not even close.
it was just the beginning.
***
A/N: normaly i duble checks my work but today i did not.
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