The Man on the Bench

You have to understand—I’m not crazy. People like to throw that word around, but it’s not true. I see things clearly, more clearly than others. And if they would just listen to me, if they would just pay attention, they’d understand that everything I’ve been saying is real.

Take the man across the street, for instance. No one else seems to notice him, but he’s always there. Sitting on that park bench. Every day, same time. From the moment I wake up and glance out my window, he’s there, reading his paper, sipping his coffee. Perfectly ordinary, right?

Wrong.

It’s the small things that give him away. The way he never turns the page in his newspaper. The way the coffee cup is always in his hand, but he never seems to drink from it. People pass by him like he’s part of the scenery, and that’s the most suspicious part of all. It’s like they don’t even see him. Or worse—they’re pretending not to.

I asked my neighbor about him once. Emily, from the building next door. She’s always walking her dog at the same time, right past the bench where he sits. I figured she must have noticed something off about him too.

“Do you ever see that guy in the park?” I asked her, trying to keep my tone casual.

She gave me a blank look. “What guy?”

“The one on the bench. Across the street. He’s always there.”

She frowned, glancing in the direction I pointed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. There’s no one there.”

I laughed, thinking she must be messing with me. “Come on, he’s sitting right there. He’s always sitting there.”

But Emily just shook her head, tugging on her dog’s leash. “Maybe you’re imagining things,” she said, in that way people do when they think you’ve lost it. She walked off, leaving me standing there, feeling like I was the crazy one.

But I’m not crazy. I know what I saw. And the more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that there was something sinister going on.

The next day, I watched him again. I woke up early, just to catch him in the act. And there he was, sitting on the bench like clockwork, that same unmoving newspaper in his hands, that same untouched coffee cup. I stared at him for hours, watching for any sign that he might be real—that he might be anything but a projection, or a figment, or…something else.

It wasn’t until dusk that I saw him move. He stood up, finally, and placed the newspaper on the bench. For a moment, I felt a rush of vindication. This was it. This was proof that I wasn’t imagining him, that I hadn’t invented some figment of my paranoia.

But then I saw it—the way his shadow didn’t quite match the angle of the setting sun. How it stretched in the wrong direction, long and jagged, like something was wrong with the light. Or maybe with him.

I grabbed my phone, deciding I’d record him. That way, when Emily—or anyone else—denied seeing him, I’d have proof. Cold, hard proof. I pressed record, aimed the camera at the man, and waited.

Except… nothing happened. The bench was empty. I zoomed in, thinking I must have missed something, but no—there was no one there. No man. No newspaper. Not even the coffee cup.

I stared at the screen, my heart pounding in my chest. I could see him right in front of me, clear as day, but through the lens of my phone, there was nothing. How was that possible? What kind of trick was this?

I pulled the phone down and looked with my own eyes. He was still there. I looked back at the phone. Nothing.

That’s when it hit me: whatever he was, he didn’t want to be seen. Not by anyone else. Not by a camera. Only by me.

I didn’t sleep that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw him. That twisted shadow. The empty coffee cup. The blank page of his newspaper. I knew I needed to confront him, to figure out what he wanted, why he was there, why I was the only one who could see him.

So the next morning, I went down to the park. I don’t know why I thought it would help, but I needed answers. The man was sitting there again, as usual, his back turned to me. I approached cautiously, trying to keep my breath steady.

“Hey,” I called out, trying to sound more confident than I felt. “Who are you?”

He didn’t respond. He didn’t move. I took a few steps closer.

“I know you’re not supposed to be here. I know you’re—”

I stopped. Something cold crept up my spine. He still hadn’t moved. Not an inch. Not a twitch.

I reached out, and just as I was about to touch his shoulder, I froze. His coffee cup—it wasn’t a cup at all. It was part of his hand. Molded to him, like it had grown out of his skin. And the newspaper—it wasn’t paper. It was part of him too, like he’d become the bench itself. Like he was merging with the park, becoming part of the landscape.

I backed away, my heart racing, but his head turned toward me, just slightly. His eyes—blank, empty—met mine, and I realized I had made a terrible mistake.

I don’t know what I saw that day. But I know it wasn’t human.

And you…you believe me, right?