The Ghost in Room 13

I never believed the rumors about our high school. Every old building has its ghost stories, right? But those stories are just to scare freshmen, I thought—until I found myself in Room 13, staring into the eyes of something that wasn’t supposed to exist.

My name is Ayushi, and it all started in my second year of high school. There was always something off about Room 13. It was in the farthest corner of the old building, tucked away from the other classrooms. The lights there flickered more than in any other part of the school, and the air felt colder, even during the summer. Teachers avoided it, and it was rarely used—except for when they couldn’t fit students anywhere else. Unfortunately, that year, we were the unlucky ones.

Our chemistry teacher, Mr. Sharma, announced one day that we would have to move to Room 13 due to renovations in our regular classroom. A collective groan rippled through the class, but no one said anything aloud. Everyone knew the stories. The ghost teacher. The unknown presence that lingered.

"It’s just an empty room," I told myself as I packed my bag and followed my friends to the dark corridor. But the moment we stepped inside, I felt it—a cold chill, like the air was denser, heavier. My skin prickled, and I glanced around. The windows were covered in grime, the desks dusty, and the chalkboard was cracked. But what unnerved me the most was the silence. A silence so thick it felt like something was watching us.

We settled in, trying to ignore the creepiness. Mr. Sharma began the lesson, but my mind kept wandering. I couldn’t shake the feeling that we weren’t alone. I glanced up at the clock. It had stopped. The second hand was stuck at exactly 3:03 PM.

Then, it happened.

Midway through the lesson, the door creaked open. Slowly. Everyone turned to look. At first, no one was there. Just the dim, empty hallway beyond. But then we saw it—a shadow. Faint, almost unnoticeable at first, but as it slid into the room, it became darker, more defined. My heart skipped a beat. It wasn’t someone from the hallway. It was something else.

Mr. Sharma froze, his face pale, his chalk hovering mid-air. His eyes darted around the room, but he didn’t say a word. The shadow drifted across the floor, moving toward the front of the class, stopping just in front of the blackboard.

And then, it wrote something.

A single word appeared, scratched onto the chalkboard by an invisible hand:

"LEAVE."

The class erupted into whispers and nervous laughter, but the air in the room had changed. My chest felt tight, like it was hard to breathe. I looked at my friends, hoping to see some reassurance on their faces, but all I saw was fear reflected back at me.

“Did someone set this up?” I whispered to Priya, who sat next to me.

She shook her head, her face pale. “No. No one could have done that.”

Suddenly, the lights flickered. The windows rattled, and the door slammed shut with a deafening bang. We were trapped.

And then we heard it—a soft voice, faint at first but growing louder. It was singing. A slow, eerie melody, like an old lullaby sung out of tune. The voice wasn’t human. It was cold, raspy, and seemed to come from every corner of the room.

We looked around, but no one was singing. The voice continued, drifting through the air like a long-forgotten memory. It grew louder and louder until I had to cover my ears to block it out.

That’s when I saw her.

In the corner of the room, standing just behind the last row of desks, was a figure. A woman. Her face was pale, her skin almost translucent, with sunken eyes that seemed to glow in the dim light. She was dressed in an old-fashioned teacher’s uniform, her hair pulled back in a tight bun, but something about her was all wrong. Her mouth twisted into a strange, unnatural smile, and her eyes... her eyes were empty. Hollow.

She was watching us.

Watching me.

The class was frozen in terror. No one moved, no one spoke. We were trapped under her gaze. Slowly, she began to move, her body floating just inches off the ground as she drifted toward the front of the class. My heart pounded so hard I thought it might burst. I wanted to scream, to run, but my legs wouldn’t move.

She stopped at the blackboard, her hand raising slowly. She pointed at me.

"You," she whispered, her voice cutting through the air like ice. "You know why I’m here."

I shook my head, unable to speak.

Her smile widened, stretching her face in a way that no human face should. "You can’t run from the past."

The temperature in the room plummeted. My breath came out in visible puffs of air. The lights flickered again, and this time, they went out completely. We were plunged into darkness.

I don’t know how long we sat there, paralyzed by fear, but when the lights finally came back on, she was gone. The door creaked open again, and Mr. Sharma stood there, looking dazed, as if he had no memory of what just happened.

We ran out of the room, not stopping until we were outside, gasping for breath in the safety of the daylight. But even out in the open, I couldn’t shake the feeling that she was still watching me.

Later, I learned the truth. Years ago, a teacher had gone missing under mysterious circumstances. Room 13 was her classroom. The students whispered that she had gone mad, obsessed with one of her students—obsessed with something they knew but refused to admit.

The school had tried to cover it up, but her presence lingered, searching for answers. Searching for me.

Now, every time I walk past Room 13, I feel her. She’s waiting. And I know, deep down, that it’s only a matter of time before she comes for me again.

You can’t run from the past.

Now, every time I walk past Room 13, I feel her—the ghost teacher. Her cold presence lingers in the air like a warning. I thought escaping her was as simple as avoiding the room, but I was wrong.

A few nights after the encounter, I woke up to the sound of that same eerie singing, the off-tune lullaby that haunted me in the classroom. It drifted through my window, chilling me to the bone. At first, I tried to ignore it, pulling the covers over my head, convincing myself it was just my imagination. But when I opened my eyes, she was there, standing at the foot of my bed.

Her hollow eyes locked onto mine, that twisted smile stretching across her pale face.

"You can’t run from the past, Ayushi." Her voice was a rasp, like dry leaves scraping across concrete. "You know why I’m here."

I tried to scream, but no sound came out. My body was frozen in terror. She reached out a skeletal hand, her cold fingers grazing my arm. My heart raced as an unbearable weight pressed down on me, making it hard to breathe.

Suddenly, she vanished, leaving only the icy chill in the air. But her message was clear: she wasn’t done with me.

Now, the singing follows me everywhere. In the halls, at home, even in my dreams. I don’t know what she wants or why she singled me out, but I can feel her getting closer, watching, waiting.

And I know one thing for certain: there’s no escaping her.

The ghost of Room 13 isn’t just a story. It’s real. And she’s never going to let me go.