The Voice That Comes Only at Night

Every night at 12:47 a.m., Arman woke up.

Not from a nightmare.

Not from a sound.

From a voice.

It was faint at first, like a breath trapped inside the walls.

“Arman…”

The first time it happened, he convinced himself it was stress. The old apartment had strange acoustics. Pipes groaned, floors creaked. But pipes didn’t know his name.

By the fourth night, the voice grew clearer.

“Open the door.”

Arman sat upright in bed, his heart pounding. The digital clock glowed red—12:47. Always the same time. He stared at his bedroom door. It was closed. Locked. The handle didn’t move, yet the voice felt close… too close.

“Who’s there?” he whispered.

Silence.

The voice never answered questions. It only repeated itself.

Night after night.

On the seventh night, Arman stopped sleeping altogether. Dark circles sank under his eyes, and his hands trembled constantly. He searched the apartment for hidden speakers, vents, anything that could explain it. There was nothing.

The building manager laughed when Arman mentioned the voice.

“You’re not the first tenant,” the man said casually. “People hear things here. That’s why the rent is low.”

That wasn’t comforting.

That night, at 12:47, the voice changed.

“Why didn’t you help me?”

Arman’s breath caught in his throat.

Memories he had buried clawed their way back—rain, headlights, a phone vibrating on the passenger seat.

Twenty months ago, he had received a call from Lena. His sister. She sounded terrified.

“Arman, I think someone’s following me. Please—”

He had been late for an important meeting. He silenced the phone.

Lena was found dead an hour later in an alley. The case was ruled a robbery gone wrong.

Arman had never told anyone about the call.

That night, the bedroom mirror fogged up, as if someone were breathing against it from the other side. Letters slowly appeared on the glass.

WHY DID YOU IGNORE ME?

Arman screamed and smashed the mirror. The glass shattered—but the writing remained, floating in the air.

“You’re not real,” he cried. “You’re not real!”

The temperature dropped sharply. His breath turned white.

“I was real,” the voice said, now unmistakably Lena’s. “I was alive. I trusted you.”

The bedroom door creaked open on its own.

Lena stood in the doorway.

Her face was pale, eyes sunken and lifeless. Dark bruises wrapped around her neck like fingerprints. Her clothes were torn, soaked in something darker than blood.

Arman fell to his knees.

“I’m sorry,” he sobbed. “I didn’t know—”

“You knew,” she interrupted softly. “You just chose yourself.”

She stepped closer. Each step echoed unnaturally loud, as if the room were hollow.

“For months, I screamed inside these walls,” she said. “Waiting for you to listen.”

“Please,” Arman begged. “What do you want?”

Lena tilted her head, her broken neck making a sickening sound.

“I want you to stay awake,” she whispered.

The clock blinked.

12:47.

Suddenly, Arman felt hands around his throat—cold, tight, unforgiving. He clawed at the air, but there was nothing there. His vision blurred as the walls began to close in, pulsing like a living thing.

“You hear me now,” Lena’s voice echoed from everywhere. “Good.”

The next morning, neighbours complained about a terrible smell.

Police found Arman sitting upright in his bed, eyes wide open, mouth frozen in a silent scream. No signs of struggle. No intruder.

Cause of death: cardiac arrest.

But the coroner noted something strange—deep bruises on his neck, shaped like fingers.

The apartment was sealed after that.

Yet sometimes, if someone walks past the building late at night, they swear they hear a voice slipping through the cracks of the walls.

At exactly 12:47 a.m.

“Open the door.”