nosleep

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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/EmmaWatsonButDumber on 2024-10-18 14:27:06+00:00.

It started when I was a kid. My parents had warned me to stay out of the attic. "Too much junk up there," they'd say, waving me off whenever I asked. But of course, the more they told me to stay away, the more curious I became. So one afternoon when they were out, I climbed the narrow, creaking stairs to the attic and turned the rusty knob of the old door.

The attic was just as dusty and cluttered as I'd imagined—boxes piled high, old furniture draped with moth-eaten sheets, the smell of stale wood and forgotten years filling the air. But it wasn’t the mess that caught my attention. It was the silence.

It was too quiet. The kind of silence that presses in on you, that makes you feel like you're not alone. I stood in the middle of the room, feeling a cold draft brush against the back of my neck, even though none of the windows were open.

I don’t know why I did it, but I whistled. Just a simple, soft tune, something my grandfather used to hum when I was younger. I was about to turn back toward the stairs when I heard it—a whistle. Faint, soft, but unmistakable.

Only it was wrong.

The sound didn’t echo my tune exactly. It was off. Like someone trying to mimic what I did but failing, their tone slightly warped, distorted, like an old record played at the wrong speed. I froze, my heart hammering in my chest. I waited, listening, but the attic remained quiet again, just as it had before.

I should have left. But I didn’t.

Every time I went up there after that, I’d try it again. Turn off the light, stand in the dark, and whistle. Every time, something whistled back, always off-key. Sometimes it was slow and drawn out, like whoever—or whatever—it was, was struggling to remember the melody. Other times it came back quickly, like a mocking echo. But it was always wrong.

As I got older, I started visiting the attic less. The whistles became a story I’d tell at sleepovers, something to laugh about with friends. But I always left out the part where it truly terrified me. How every time I heard that off-key sound, a chill would crawl up my spine. How it felt like something was just beyond the edge of the dark, watching, waiting.

Years passed. I grew up, moved out, went to college, started a life. I didn’t think about the attic much anymore. But after my parents passed and I inherited the house, I found myself standing in front of that same door again, the old knob cool under my palm.

I hadn’t set foot in the attic in years. But as soon as I pushed the door open, the air hit me like a wall—stale, cold, the same sense of something lurking just beyond sight. The boxes were still there, the furniture still draped, but there was something else now. A weight to the space, like the room itself had been waiting for me.

I don't know what possessed me, but I turned off the light and whistled.

It came back instantly, faster than it ever had before. And this time, it wasn’t just off-key. It was garbled, like too many voices trying to whistle at once, their tones clashing and scraping against each other. The sound filled the attic, growing louder and more twisted with every second.

Panicked, I scrambled for the light switch, but in the dark, my fingers fumbled. The noise grew louder, closer, like it was coming from the very walls, wrapping around me. And then I felt it—something cold brushing against my arm, like a hand, but not quite.

I slammed the switch on, flooding the room with light.

The whistling stopped. The air went still, but I knew it was there, just beyond the light, waiting.

I stood frozen in the attic, my breath coming in ragged gasps as the light flickered overhead. The sudden silence was worse than the sound of the broken whistle, worse than the garbled tones that had filled the air moments before. Because now, I could feel it.

Whatever had been whistling back all those years, whatever was lurking just beyond the dark, was closer than ever.

I took a hesitant step toward the door, my legs stiff with fear, when I heard it again. Not a whistle this time, but a soft, shuffling sound, like feet dragging across the floor behind me. I turned slowly, my heart in my throat, expecting to see nothing but the same old boxes, the same forgotten furniture.

But something was different.

The sheets that had covered the furniture were moving—barely noticeable at first, just a subtle shift, like something was breathing beneath them. One by one, they seemed to twitch, the fabric rippling as though disturbed by a breeze I couldn’t feel. My pulse pounded in my ears, drowning out all reason. I backed up, my hand grasping blindly for the door behind me, eyes fixed on the stirring sheets.

Then one of the sheets slipped off, falling to the floor in a slow, deliberate motion.

I wasn’t prepared for what I saw underneath.

There was no chair, no box, no old forgotten relic. Instead, something crouched there—a shape, hunched and twisted, its back to me. Its body was wrong, unnaturally elongated and contorted, like a shadow stretched across a wall. The thing was pale, too pale, its skin thin and translucent, like the surface of a moth’s wing. Its head hung low, obscured, but I could hear the softest sound coming from it—a wheezing breath, labored and wet, like the thing was struggling to stay alive.

I should have run. Every instinct screamed at me to turn, to get out of that attic and never come back. But my feet stayed rooted in place, paralyzed by the grotesque sight.

Then it moved.

The thing’s head lifted slowly, unnaturally, its neck twisting with a sickening crackle of bones. It turned toward me, but it didn’t have a face. Not really. Just smooth, empty skin where its features should have been. And yet, somehow, it saw me. I knew it could see me.

It let out a long, drawn-out whistle—off-key, just like before.

That was all it took. The spell broke, and I lunged for the door, slamming it open and nearly tripping down the stairs in my rush. I stumbled through the hallway, my heart racing, the sound of that whistle still echoing in my head.

But as I reached the bottom of the stairs, I heard it again—faint, but unmistakable. It wasn’t coming from the attic this time. It was coming from behind me. From the darkened hallway that led to the rest of the house.

Something was following me.

I turned, my breath hitching in my chest, and saw nothing. Just the empty hallway, bathed in the dim light from the ceiling. But the sound was getting closer. The off-key whistle, garbled and wrong, growing louder with every step I took.

I bolted for the front door, fumbling with the lock, my hands shaking. The whistle was right behind me now, almost in my ear, so close I could feel the air shift. I yanked the door open and stumbled outside into the night, slamming it shut behind me.

The whistling stopped.

I stood there on the porch, panting, staring at the house in the darkness. Nothing moved. No sound followed me out. The attic window was still, the house eerily silent, as if nothing had happened.

I told myself it was over, that I had imagined the whole thing, that the house was just playing tricks on me.

But as I backed away, I saw something—just for a moment—in the attic window. A figure, standing there, watching me. Its head tilted, its body twisted and wrong, a pale hand pressed against the glass. And even though I couldn’t hear it, I knew it was whistling.

Off-key.

And now, every night, no matter where I go in the house, I hear it. That soft, broken whistle, coming from the walls, from the attic, from right behind me.

It’s waiting for me to turn off the lights again. And next time, I don’t think I’ll be able to escape.