Knock Knock Knock

Knock Knock Knock

There were two things that were unexpected concerning the knock at the window.

The first was that it was the middle of the night, the dim light from her alarm clock confirming that it was 2:17am. In fact, the knock had woken her up - loud and demanding with three sharp raps against the glass. The beginnings of dread began to pool in her stomach as she pulled her bedsheets up a little closer to her face.

Three more knocks. She jumped before going as still as she could.

The other unexpected part of this knock was that it was coming from the window directly in front of her. That was her bedroom window.

Her bedroom was on the third floor.

She hadn’t gone outside in a long while - a couple weeks at least. A sudden case of the flu leaving her bedridden for a considerable time. Her roommate had gone out to get her some medicine, but in the state she was in she couldn’t remember if that had been hours or days ago. Attempting to rationalise, she wondered if he’d locked himself out of the house, and had climbed up to get her attention. But they were living in a high rise apartment building without any kinds of pipes, footholds, or trees that would allow anyone to climb up to the window.

The next rational explanation was that this was a nightmare. Lord knew she suffered enough of them in the past few days for it to be believable. It didn’t feel quite the same as the others - the details too sharp, her mind too clear - but she chalked it up to being in the recovery stretch of her illness.

She began to settle back down, forcing her tensed muscles to relax as she placed her head back onto her pillow, blankets drawn a little tighter than before. If she could just drift off to sleep, she may wake up again in reality. Heart pounding, she focused on taking deep breaths to stave off the adrenaline.

In

Out

In

Out

In-

Knock Knock Knock

Her eyes flew back open with a jolt to her system. She barely dared to move, her eyes searching her curtains for any sign of a figure or entity on the other side. From the corner of her eye, she saw her phone charging atop her bedside table, the screen dark. Not wanting to make any sudden movements or noise, she slithered a hand under the sheets before reaching out and unplugging it, drawing it back under the covers to disguise the light from the screen. With a deep breath as if she were about to dive underwater, she slipped her head beneath the covers to check the device.

Her first move was to call the police, shaking fingers managing to mistype the simple three-digit number. They trembled still when she brought the phone to her ear after hitting the ‘dial’ button.

‘The person you are trying to reach is currently not able to accept calls. Please try again at another time.’ 

She almost dropped the phone in shock. This was a 24 hour line. Even if she had to stay on hold for a moment, the call wouldn’t hang up before she could connect. Scanning the screen for answers, her gaze fell on the top of the screen. The words ‘NO SIGNAL’ stared back at her in what felt like a taunt. This was the city centre, there were cell towers everywhere, she couldn’t think of a reasonable explanation for it.

She checked her call history. Her phone had been on silent so she could rest in peace - her usually light and melodic ringtone becoming migraine fuel after only a couple hours. The last received call was from four days ago.

Dad had called her fifty-seven times.

The texts weren’t much better, but she gleaned a bit more information from them. He’d only left a few, presumably between attempts at calling her.

Honey it’s your dad

Please call me back

I’ve been trying to reach you for hours

You’re scaring me

Oh god please let me know if you’re safe

I’m so sorry

I love you baby girl

Knock Knock Knock

A wave of nausea slammed into her as the sound pierced the quiet again. She was beginning to notice how weak she felt, realising she probably hadn’t eaten in days. The hunger pangs - unnoticed under the adrenaline - were beginning to rear their ugly head. She needed to get out of this room, and the kitchen was just across the hall from her. If she was fast and quiet, she gambled she’d be able to get there without alerting anything that could be on the other side of the glass. There was still no sign as to what was lurking outside the window. It was so quiet. Oh god why was it so quiet. Where were the sounds of traffic, the distant, pounding bass of nightclub music, the neighbour kid leaving his music player on too loud.

She scanned the room with a frantic eye for something, anything, that could be used to defend herself. Her lamp could work in a pinch, as well as an empty glass bottle sitting on her desk under the window. Knees sliding up towards her chest, she clutched the covers in her fists, steeling herself to move them away. 

Knock Knock-

The intensity of the knocks froze her in place once more, sounding like someone smashing their fist into the glass. But another thing caused her to pause.

That was only two knocks.

Each time she had heard that knocking on her window, there had been three knocks. No more and no less. They had been deliberate, with the same amount of pause between each. So she waited. Despite the hunger pains clawing through her abdomen, and the nausea threatening to overtake her, she held her ground.

One minute passed.

Two.

Five.

Ten.

She kept her gaze firmly on the alarm clock, watching each second tick by like an eternity. No more knocking followed the last two, and the fear began to wane ever so slightly. It was still there, bubbling under the surface, but it gave way to another feeling. Curiosity. Was it over? Did it give up and leave? Or was it simply waiting for her to emerge by herself?

Her legs moved of their own accord, slipping out from under the covers to shakily set down on the carpeted floor. She took one step at a time, her heart pounding in her ears as she approached the curtains. A little voice in the back of her head screamed how terrible of an idea it was, but she moved closer. She just had to know what was going on, see it with her own eyes. Raising a hand to pull back the curtain enough to see, she peeked through the crack. 

It was dark. All of the streetlights were off - the only light coming from the half-visible moon in the sky above. She could barely make out details in the street below her - just outlines and shapes. But then she saw movement. Scanning the horizon, she began to pick out more and more movement across countless streets around her. All she could make out was silhouettes, but it was enough to send her stumbling back, her death grip on the curtain causing it to come crashing down off the wall with her.

Dozens upon dozens of slender, humanoid figures that easily reached up to twenty feet tall, wandering aimlessly across the streets. Some were paused by buildings, arms raised as they rapped their long, claw-like hands on the windows there. Her mind screamed at her to run, to lock herself in the bathroom until morning. Another part of her prayed she was still dreaming, or suffering from a hallucination of some kind. But before she could begin to scramble away, a shadow fell over her window as a pair of black, empty eyes met hers.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK