The Last Fare of the Night

The rain-slicked streets of London stretched ahead of Daniel, shimmering under the dim glow of flickering streetlights. The wet asphalt mirrored the city’s glow in broken, shifting patterns, while puddles gathered along the curbs, rippling with every fat raindrop that hit them. His windshield wipers swiped back and forth, struggling to keep up with the drizzle, briefly clearing the glass before fresh droplets blurred his view again.

By day, London was a city that never stood still—horns blaring, footsteps echoing, voices overlapping in an endless, chaotic rhythm. But at this hour, everything felt different. The noise had faded, replaced by a heavy stillness that settled over the streets like a thick fog. It wasn’t just quiet—it was the kind of silence that made the city feel older, like the past was just beneath the surface, waiting for the right moment to break through.

A lone figure hurried along the pavement, their shoulders hunched against the cold, an umbrella tilted precariously against the wind. They barely spared a glance at the passing cab, their silhouette swallowed almost instantly by the shifting shadows between the streetlamps. Somewhere in the distance, the wail of a siren cut through the silence, echoing off the towering buildings before fading into the night. Daniel exhaled, his breath misting faintly in the cool air inside the cab. He’d done the night shift for years, but there were moments—strange, quiet moments like this—when the city felt almost otherworldly, as though something unseen was watching from the empty alleyways and darkened doorways.

He barely noticed the man stepping from the shadows until he raised a hand, signaling for a ride. Something about him—his old-fashioned suit, the way his breath didn’t mist in the cold air—sent a faint chill down Daniel’s spine. Still, a fare was a fare. The tires sent up a fine spray of rainwater as Daniel eased the cab to a stop along the curb. As he slid into the back seat, the scent of damp wool and something faintly metallic filled the cabin.

“Take me to Hawthorne Lane,” the passenger murmured, his voice smooth yet distant, as if he were speaking from a place far removed from the present. His tone carried no urgency, no hesitation—just quiet certainty. “The house at the end.”

Daniel’s hands tightened around the steering wheel. Hawthorne Lane. The name stirred something uneasy in the back of his mind, a long-abandoned stretch of the city where buildings sat in silent decay, their windows gaping like empty eyes. No one had lived there in years—not legally, at least. Squatters, thrill-seekers, and those with nowhere else to go had passed through, but even they never stayed long. The place had a reputation, though no one could quite agree on why.

He hesitated, his instinct whispering that something wasn’t right. But when his gaze flicked to the rear view mirror, he found the man staring back at him, his dark eyes steady, unwavering. There was something about the way he looked—not demanding, not pleading, just waiting. Expecting.

Without a word, Daniel gave a slow nod, his fingers loosening their grip as he eased the cab forward. The city’s golden glow faded behind them, swallowed by the inky blackness of the roads ahead. The hum of the engine filled the silence, the steady thrum a heartbeat against the stillness of the night.

The rhythmic sweep of the windshield wipers did little to clear the sense of unease pressing down on Daniel’s chest as he drove deeper into the city’s forgotten outskirts. Streetlights grew fewer and farther between, their dull orange glow barely managing to cut through the mist that had begun creeping in from the Thames. The cab’s headlights sliced through the darkness, illuminating wet pavement, empty sidewalks, and the occasional boarded-up storefront. Even the familiar hum of London’s ever-present traffic seemed to vanish, leaving only the sound of the tires hissing over the slick roads and the steady breath of the man in the backseat.

Daniel stole another glance at his passenger through the rear view mirror. The man sat unnervingly still, his gaze fixed on something beyond the rain-streaked window, watching the city slip past as if seeing something Daniel could not. His face, though shadowed, carried an unnatural stillness—no nervous shifting, no idle glances at a phone, not even the occasional clearing of a throat. It was as if he weren’t truly there, as if he were merely a shadow cast by something long forgotten.

Daniel had been a cabbie long enough to know that some passengers preferred silence, but something about this one unsettled him. His clothes—an old-fashioned suit, slightly damp from the rain—looked decades out of place, the dark fabric slightly frayed at the cuffs. His hands, pale and thin, rested motionless on his lap.

Trying to shake off the tension, Daniel forced a casual tone. “Cold night, isn’t it?”

The man didn’t react. For a moment, Daniel wondered if he had even heard him, but then, in a voice barely above a whisper, he replied, “It always is.”

Daniel frowned at the odd response. “You live around Hawthorne Lane, then?”

A pause. Then, slowly, the man turned his head toward the mirror, meeting Daniel’s gaze with an unreadable expression. “You could say that.”

Something about the way he spoke made the hair on the back of Daniel’s neck prickle. He swallowed and forced a chuckle. “Don’t get many fares going that way. Place has been empty for years.”

The man’s lips curled slightly, though it wasn’t quite a smile. “Not as empty as you think.”

Daniel’s grip on the wheel tightened. The streets were darker now, the streetlights fewer and farther between. The rain had slowed, but the mist creeping along the pavement gave everything a hazy, dreamlike quality.

Hawthorne Lane wasn’t far now. Daniel could already feel the weight of the old place pressing against the night. And yet, as he risked another glance at his passenger, a shiver ran through him.

Because the man was smiling. And there was something deeply, terribly wrong with it.

They turned onto Hawthorne Lane, and a shiver crawled up Daniel’s spine. The street was narrower here, the buildings taller, pressing in like silent spectators. Windows were dark, doors sealed shut, and an air of abandonment clung to the row of forgotten houses like a lingering fog. At the very end of the lane stood the house. Even in the dim glow of the cab’s headlights, it exuded an oppressive presence. The paint had long since peeled away, revealing warped wood beneath. The windows gaped open, shattered glass still clinging to their edges, and the front door stood slightly ajar, as though waiting for someone to step inside.

“We’re here,” Daniel said, his voice barely above a whisper. He turned in his seat to meet his passenger’s gaze.

But the back seat was empty.

Daniel’s breath caught in his throat. His fingers tightened around the steering wheel as cold dread seeped into his bones. He hadn’t heard the door open. He hadn’t felt the shift of weight as the man left. And yet, there was no one there. Only the faint imprint of where someone had been sitting, dark against the cracked leather of the seat.

A gust of wind howled through the empty street, rattling the loose shutters of the house at the end of the lane. Daniel swallowed hard, his pulse thudding in his ears. Instinct screamed at him to leave—to turn the car around and drive back into the safety of the city’s glow. But something held him there, an invisible force keeping him anchored in place.

His gaze drifted to the curb, where a tattered newspaper lay half-submerged in a puddle. The print was blurred, the edges frayed with age, but one headline remained legible beneath the flickering light of the cab’s interior.

The print was faded, the ink smudged with age, and the edges of the newspaper curled and brittle, as if time itself had tried to erase the story. But beneath the flickering glow of the cab’s interior light, one headline remained chillingly legible:

MYSTERIOUS DEATH AT HAWTHORNE HOUSE – MAN FOUND MURDERED IN ABANDONED HOME

Daniel’s breath hitched. His fingers hovered over the paper, his pulse hammering in his ears. The article was old—decades, maybe—but something about it gnawed at him, something familiar. Squinting, he scanned the smaller, faded print beneath the headline.

"Local businessman Charles Whitmore, missing for two weeks, was discovered in the decaying ruins of Hawthorne House late last night. Authorities confirm his throat had been slit, and he had bled out where he fell. The police suspect the killer to be Henry Garrison, a former associate of Whitmore’s, who was last seen boarding a train to the coast on the night of the murder. A manhunt is currently underway."

Daniel’s stomach lurched. His passenger’s clothes—old-fashioned, slightly tattered at the cuffs—flashed in his mind. The dark, unreadable eyes that had met his in the mirror. The eerily distant way he had spoken.

His hand twitched toward the paper, desperate to read more, to confirm the impossible thought clawing at his brain—but before he could touch it, a sudden gust of wind lifted the fragile sheet from the pavement. It danced through the air like a ghostly whisper, tumbling end over end before vanishing into the dark.

Daniel didn’t wait to see where it landed. With a strangled breath, he threw the cab into gear, the tires skidding on the slick pavement as he sped away—away from the house, from the empty seat, from the thing that had ridden with him through the rain-soaked streets of London.

He didn’t look back. He couldn’t.

Because if he did, he was terrified he’d see him standing there. Watching. Waiting.