Whispers from the Wall

When Mira moved into apartment 3B, she was just relieved to find a place within her budget. A small, third-floor unit in an aging brick building on the edge of the city. The landlord was an old man with trembling hands and glassy eyes who didn’t ask too many questions. “Don’t worry about the neighbors,” he said with a weak smile. “You probably won’t hear a thing.”

That night, she unpacked in silence. No footsteps above or below. No TV sounds through the thin walls. It was unnervingly quiet—too quiet. But Mira welcomed the peace. After three years of toxic roommates, this solitude was bliss.

She fell asleep early, curled in a blanket on her mattress on the floor.

At 3:12 a.m., she woke to a whisper.

It was so soft, she thought it might be the wind—or a half-remembered dream.

“…help me…”

Her eyes flicked open. She sat up. Silence.

She checked her phone. No texts. No alerts. She turned on her bedside lamp. The room looked exactly as it had hours ago—bare walls, closed windows, the same low hum from the refrigerator in the kitchen.

She shook her head and laughed. “Too many horror podcasts,” she muttered and went back to sleep.

---

The next night, it returned.

“…it’s cold… please…”

Mira sat bolt upright. The voice was inside the room. No—from the wall.

She pressed her ear to the paint-chipped plaster. Her breath caught.

“…so long… can’t feel… fingers…”

She stumbled backward.

Heart pounding, she turned on all the lights. The room brightened, but the fear didn’t leave. She checked her hallway. No one. The apartment next door was still vacant.

Mira didn’t sleep again that night.

---

By the fourth night, the whispers had names. A woman’s voice—delicate and trembling. A child’s sobs. A man moaning in pain.

“…I’m still here…”

“…mommy, where are you…”

“…they buried me in the wall…”

Mira stood frozen in her living room, mouth open, tears sliding silently down her face. She recorded the wall on her phone. Played it back. Nothing. Static silence.

She called the landlord the next morning.

“There are voices,” she said. “In the walls. Every night.”

He paused.

“You should move out,” he said quietly.

“What? That’s it?”

“I told you not to worry about the neighbors,” he said. “I wasn’t talking about the living ones.”

He hung up.

---

Mira spent the rest of the day researching.

The building had been constructed in 1912. Used as a boarding house in the 1940s. In 1956, a family of three disappeared from apartment 3B—no signs of struggle, no forced entry, just…gone.

In the '70s, the unit was sealed for “repairs.” Reopened in the '90s. Since then, five tenants had left within a month. Two were reported missing.

She slammed her laptop shut.

That night, she wore noise-canceling headphones to bed.

Still, she heard them.

The voices were louder now—desperate, angry, pleading.

“…let us out…”

“…we’re part of the wall now…”

“…he sealed us in…”

She tore the headphones off, screaming. Her hands shook as she picked up a hammer from the toolbox she barely used. Without thinking, she slammed it into the wall.

Plaster cracked. Dust filled the air.

She hit it again. And again.

Until the hole was big enough to see inside.

A cavity.

Darkness.

And then—eyes.

Looking back at her.

Not human. Not anymore.

---

Mira woke on the floor hours later. The hole in the wall was gone. No crack, no dust, no sign she had touched it.

She left that morning with only a backpack.

She never returned to collect the rest.

---

A month later, the apartment was listed again.

“Cozy 1-bedroom, historic charm, low rent. Quiet building. Long-term tenants preferred.”

The ad ended with the landlord’s usual line:

“Don’t worry about the neighbors.”