Where the Town Sleeps

There was a reason no one talked about Black Hollow. It wasn’t on any modern map, though if you followed the old tracks west from Kilburn and ignored the rusted “No Trespassing” signs, you’d find the dirt road. A bone-colored path that wound through rotted trees and dead brush until it dropped you at the edge of what used to be a town.

Black Hollow.

Twenty-six buildings. All still standing. All empty. Windows like open mouths. Doors half-ajar, creaking even when there was no wind. The church at the center tilted slightly, its steeple like a finger pointing at something only it could see.

They said the town vanished overnight. Some blamed a fire. Others whispered about sickness. No records. No bodies. Just...gone.

Naturally, I had to see it for myself. I was halfway through a photojournalism fellowship, urban exploration was my niche. I’d shot asylum basements, flooded train stations, even a sunken amusement park in the Everglades. I wasn’t scared of some half-dead village. But this place wasn’t dead. It was waiting.

The first thing I noticed was the silence. But not a usual forest quiet, but something unnatural. No wind. No birds. Not even my footsteps. Just an absence, like the air had been hollowed out.

I started snapping pictures: the general store with rusted tills, a nursery with rocking horses, still rocking. I should have left when I noticed the table was still set. Dust-covered plates. Forks mid-meal. A coffee cup half full and cold as ice.

No mold. No rot. Like someone pressed pause on the world.

I moved on, heart pounding. The church was last. Inside, pews were untouched, facing a pulpit where a single Bible lay open, its pages flipped violently the second I stepped in.

A breeze. Finally. Except none of the windows were open. And the door slammed shut behind me.

There was a sound, soft at first. Whispers crawling up the walls. Then louder. Layered. Chants, sobbing, screaming, laughter. Hundreds of voices trapped in the same breathless moment.

The lights came on. There was no electricity. Then...they appeared.

Flickers of people. Faded outlines. Men in suspenders. Women in bonnets. Children, all staring at me with hollow, coal-black eyes. They didn’t move. Just watched. Until I spoke. “I’m not here to hurt anyone.”

They blinked as one. The woman standing close to me stepped forward and opened her mouth—not to speak, but to let out smoke. Thick, black tendrils that slithered toward me, curling around my arms, my face, my camera.

I tried to run. I couldn’t move. The smoke whispered, "Now you stay, too.” And a shiver ran through my spine.

I woke up just outside the town line. No gear. No camera. Just dirt on my boots and blood on my tongue. I ran. Made it back to civilization three days later, sunburned and raving. No one believed me. But last week, someone found a photo online. A picture of the Black Hollow church. Front row. A new face in the pews. Me. In the background, there is the faint outline of a man, camera in hand, mouth open mid-scream.