The Light Switch

The door slammed shut behind me, and the darkness swallowed everything whole.

I hadn't meant to come inside. The old Caldwell house had been abandoned for thirty years, its windows like hollow eyes watching the neighborhood. But my phone had died mid-walk, and when the October rain started sheeting down, the partially open front door seemed like an invitation rather than a warning.

Now I stood in what I assumed was the foyer, rain drumming on the roof above, my sneakers squelching on what felt like ancient carpet. The darkness was absolute—the kind that makes you question whether your eyes are even open.

A light switch. There had to be a light switch.

I stretched my hand toward where the wall should be, fingers splayed wide, shuffling my feet forward in tiny increments. My fingertips met plaster, rough and cold, peppered with what might have been peeling wallpaper. I slid my palm along the surface, searching.

Something in the house creaked. Old wood settling, I told myself. Just old wood.

My hand continued its journey across the wall, moving left, then right. Where was it? Every house had a switch by the front door. That was basic. That was normal. Unless—

My fingers found a small protrusion. Relief flooded through me.

But it wasn't a switch. It was soft. Yielding.

And it was warm.

I snatched my hand back, my heart hammering against my ribs. Warm things didn't belong on walls. Warm things were alive. I stumbled backward, and my foot caught on something—an umbrella stand, maybe—and I crashed sideways into what felt like a side table. Something clattered to the floor with a sound like breaking glass.

"Sorry, sorry," I whispered automatically, though I couldn't say to whom.

The darkness seemed to press closer, as if the house were leaning in to listen. I forced myself to breathe slowly, to think rationally. It was probably just a pipe. Warm water running through the walls. That made sense. That was logical.

I tried the wall on the opposite side of the door, moving faster now, more desperate. My fingers traced over bumps and divots, over door frames and corners, but no switches. It was as if the house had never heard of electricity.

A sound drifted down from upstairs. Footsteps. Slow, deliberate footsteps crossing a floor directly above my head.

"Hello?" My voice came out smaller than I'd intended.

The footsteps stopped.

The silence that followed was somehow worse. I could hear my own breathing, ragged and quick, and underneath it, something else. A low sound, almost like humming, coming from deeper in the house.

My hands found another wall, and I worked frantically now, no longer caring about being systematic. I just needed light. Light meant safety. Light meant knowing what was and wasn't there.

My palm slapped against something plastic. A light switch—finally!

I flipped it up. Nothing.

Down. Nothing.

Up and down, up and down, clicking uselessly in the dark. Dead. Of course it was dead. The power had probably been shut off decades ago.

The humming grew louder, resolving into something that might have been words in a language I didn't recognize. Or maybe it was just the wind through broken windows. Maybe it was just the house itself, breathing.

I turned back toward where the front door should be, hands outstretched, moving as quickly as I dared. My shin cracked against something hard, and I bit down on a cry. Nearly there. Nearly—

My hands found the door frame, then the door itself. I scrabbled for the handle, found it, turned it.

It didn't budge.

I yanked harder, throwing my weight backward. The door remained closed, as if it had never been open at all. As if I'd never come through it.

Behind me, the footsteps started again. Closer now. Coming down stairs I couldn't see.

And then, with a soft *click*, a light turned on.

Not the overhead light. A small lamp on a table I had knocked earlier, its bulb flickering weakly, casting the foyer in sickly yellow light. In that dim glow, I could finally see the front door, its deadbolt turned firmly to locked.

I could see the hallway stretching behind me, empty.

I could see my reflection in a cracked mirror on the wall—pale, wild-eyed, terrified.

And I could see, just behind my reflection, the suggestion of another face. Blurred. Watching.

The light flickered once more and went out.

In the darkness, I heard a voice, dry as ancient paper:

"Why did you turn off the light?"

My hand was still on the light switch. The one I'd been flipping. The one that hadn't worked.

Except now, I realized, I'd been flipping it down to turn it on.

Down to turn it on.

I flipped it up with a trembling hand, and the overhead light blazed to life, so bright it burned my eyes. The hallway was empty. The door unlocked. The house silent.

I didn't wait to understand. I wrenched open the door and ran into the rain, not stopping until I was three blocks away, soaking wet and gasping.

I never learned who—or what—had turned on that lamp.

And I never went back to find out.