Footprints in the Fog

By Ikhtisham Hayat

It began on a Wednesday.

Michael had just moved into the old apartment on the corner of Willow Street—a second-floor unit in a building that hadn't seen fresh paint in years. The rent was cheap, and he didn’t mind the creaky floors or the fog that clung stubbornly to the windows each morning. He was alone, newly single, and the silence suited him.

But the footprints didn't.

That morning, groggy and half-blind without coffee, Michael walked into the hallway and stopped mid-step. The carpet, dull green and flattened from years of wear, was wet—not just damp, but soaked. More troubling were the footprints: barefoot, small, and muddy, trailing from his bedroom door to the front door.

He stared.

They weren’t his.

He lived alone.

At first, he convinced himself it was a prank. Maybe the maintenance guy had come in and tracked dirt. But when he checked the lock, it was still bolted from the inside. No signs of tampering. No broken window. Nothing.

He cleaned up the mess and went to work, brushing it off as strange but explainable.

Thursday morning, they were back.

Same size. Same path.

This time, Michael didn’t just stare—he followed them. They ended at the door, but didn’t start from the bedroom like before. Now, they began halfway down the hall, as if someone had appeared in the middle of the night.

He checked every corner of the apartment. Closets. Cabinets. Even under the bed.

Nothing.

And yet the muddy prints sat there, fading slowly into the carpet as the fog outside thickened against the windows.

By Friday, he wasn’t sleeping.

He kept the lights on. Set up his phone to record the hallway overnight.

In the morning, the prints were there again—but the phone had stopped recording at 2:17 AM. It simply shut off, battery drained, even though it had been fully charged. When he turned it back on, the camera app was frozen, like it had been forced closed.

Michael’s hands trembled as he wiped the latest set of footprints, darker than before, like the mud had seeped into the floor itself.

He called the landlord, asked if someone had ever died there. The landlord laughed it off.

“People ask that all the time,” he said. “Old building. It creaks. Things settle. Your mind plays tricks.”

Michael didn’t laugh.

Saturday, the footprints didn’t just walk to the front door.

They stopped outside his bedroom door. Just there. Waiting.

He stood across the hallway, staring at them. Something about their position—like someone had stood there for hours, watching the door, waiting to come in—made his stomach twist.

He didn’t open his bedroom door.

He left the apartment and checked into a hotel.

But the prints followed him.

Not physically, no. But the dream—he had the dream.

In it, he woke up in the hotel room, fog pressed thick against the windows. He stepped onto the carpet and felt it cold, wet, soft with fresh mud. When he looked down, footprints surrounded his bed.

And then he heard it—a soft, dragging sound. Like bare feet moving across carpet.

He turned.

Someone was there.

Small. Thin. Dripping wet.

Their face hidden behind the fog in the room.

He woke up screaming.

Sunday, against his better judgment, he returned to the apartment. He needed to prove to himself that it wasn’t real. That it was just his imagination and stress.

Everything was quiet.

He entered slowly. No footprints. The hallway was dry. He checked every room. Nothing.

He sighed in relief. Maybe it really was over.

Until he went to the bathroom.

The mirror was fogged.

He hadn’t taken a shower.

He wiped it clean.

A word was written on the glass—in a child’s handwriting, drawn with a fingertip.

“LET ME IN.”

He stumbled back, heart pounding, and the lights flickered.

And then he heard it—the soft, wet slap of feet against the hallway carpet.

Slow. Approaching.

He turned.

There she was.

A girl. Maybe ten years old. Soaked, hair hanging like weeds over her pale face. Eyes black, hollow, endless. Her arms dangled at her sides. Her feet left dripping prints on the floor.

She didn’t speak.

She didn’t need to.

Her eyes said everything.

He had invited her without knowing. Each time he noticed the prints. Each time he wondered. Each time he feared.

And now she was inside.

They found Michael’s apartment unlocked two days later. He hadn’t gone to work. His phone was dead on the floor. No signs of struggle, no forced entry.

Only the footprints remained.

Small. Muddy. Fresh.

Trailing into the fog.

And no one ever saw him again.

The apartment’s still available. Cheap rent. Just don’t ask about the carpet. Or the fog.
Because every so often, even now—
Someone new hears soft, wet footsteps...

Just outside their door.