The Man in Apartment 3B

I’ve always had a habit of noticing things I’m not supposed to.

Little things. A light that flickers at the same time every night. A song playing from a window that hasn’t been opened in years. A shadow moving just a second too slow.

So when I moved into that old apartment building on Ridgewood Avenue, I knew right away that something was… off.

Apartment 3B was supposed to be empty.

That’s what the landlord told me. Said the last tenant bailed in the middle of the night—no goodbye, no boxes, nothing but a half-drunk bottle of whiskey and a fading smell of cologne.

It should’ve been quiet. But it wasn’t.

Most nights, I’d pass by and hear music. Not from the hallway speakers or someone’s phone—real music. Vinyl crackling. Sinatra. Always Sinatra. “Come Fly with Me” was a favourite.

Then came the voices. Low, murmuring like a conversation behind a wall. Footsteps pacing. And once… laughter. Just one short burst, like someone had remembered something funny, and then silence again.

One night, maybe out of boredom, maybe just to prove I wasn’t losing it—I knocked.

Just once.

The door opened a few inches.

No creak. No sound. Just… open.

Inside was something out of a time capsule.

A living room with shag carpet, an old amber-glass ashtray on the table, floral wallpaper peeling at the corners. The light from a tube TV flickering in black and white. And a man sitting in an armchair like he’d been waiting for hours.

He looked like he’d stepped out of a photo album from the '60s—hair slicked back, shirt tucked in, tie slightly loose. Calm. Unbothered.

He looked at me like I was expected.

“You made it,” he said. Just that. Like we were supposed to meet.

I didn’t say a word. I closed the door and walked back to my apartment without turning around.

The next day, I asked the landlord—half-laughing, trying not to sound insane—if someone had moved into 3B.

He frowned. “Still empty,” he said.

I asked if he’d mind opening it up so I could look. Just to prove something to myself.

When he did, the place was completely bare. Floor to ceiling dust. Empty walls. No furniture. No record player. No armchair. Just the smell of old air and that same lingering cologne.

I tried to shake it off, but it got worse.

Some nights, I’d see a figure on the stairs just ahead of me, turning the corner before I could catch up. Other times, he was across the street, under the streetlamp, just watching. Not menacing—just there. Still. Waiting.

Eventually, I started digging. I had to know.

Turns out, a man named Charles Evers lived in 3B in the 1960s. His wife died in a hit-and-run while crossing the street just outside the building. He vanished weeks later. No one ever found him.

The rumor? He never left. Not really.

I haven’t seen him in a while. Maybe because I stopped looking.

But sometimes, on a quiet night when the city sleeps, I still hear the music.

Faint. Warm. Distant.

“Fly Me to the Moon.”

Some ghosts don’t rattle chains or scream in the dark.

Some of them just… miss someone.

And some places hold onto them, like a memory that never quite fades.