The reflection still didn't match.
Ethan leaned in closer, breath fogging the window. The cold glass blurred his view for a moment, and then slowly cleared. The face on the other side leaned in too—same angle, same eyes, same tired lines drawn across the forehead. But something was wrong.
Not the features.
Not the expression.
The timing.
A second too slow.
Like watching himself on a livestream with a weak connection, half a beat behind the present.
He stepped back, heart nudging against his ribs like a trapped animal.
"Get a grip," he muttered, dragging a hand through his hair. It felt more like a ritual than comfort.
Maybe the obituary was fake. Some twisted algorithm scraping his data for an AI-generated prank. He'd seen those hoaxes before. Fake deaths. Celebrity obituaries. Deepfakes. Clickbait eulogies.
He just never thought he'd be one.
Still, something in the air felt off. Wrong in the bones of the day. Like the sky had tilted slightly, and no one had noticed but him.
His apartment—once familiar in every creaking floorboard—now felt staged. Recreated. Like someone had tried to rebuild it from memory and missed a few small, crucial details.
There was a coffee mug on the kitchen counter. Pale blue. He didn't remember buying it.
A light switch that had always been on the left wall was now on the right.
He stood in the living room, trying to shake the crawling sensation that none of it belonged to him anymore.
His phone buzzed on the coffee table.
No Caller ID.
Again.
He stared at the screen until it stopped vibrating. The silence that followed felt heavier than it should have. Then—three solid knocks at the front door.
Knock.
Knock.
Knock.
Deliberate.
Slow.
As though whoever—or whatever—stood on the other side wasn't in a hurry.
He hesitated.
Another knock echoed, then nothing.
Ethan walked to the door, pausing a few feet away. He leaned in cautiously, pressing his eye to the peephole.
The hallway outside was empty.
No footsteps. No movement.
But there—something had been slipped under the door.
A folded piece of lined paper, torn at the edges, its presence as unnatural as a severed hand.
Ethan crouched and picked it up. His fingers trembled, reluctant to touch it, like it might burn or vanish.
The handwriting was unfamiliar. Sharp, slanted. Rushed.
But the message was unmistakably clear:
Don't believe what you see.
You woke up in the wrong version.
This isn't the first time.
No signature. No context. Just that.
Ethan's throat felt dry. His hands were shaking now. Not just nerves—something deeper. Primal.
Behind him, the lights flickered once.
A soft blink. Barely a breath.
But in that blink—just for a fraction of a second—he saw something at the end of the hallway.
Himself.
Standing perfectly still, watching.
No expression. No movement. Just watching.
Then the light snapped back.
And the hallway was empty again.
But the fear didn't leave.
It lodged deep in his chest, throbbing in sync with his pulse like a second, unwanted heartbeat.
He backed into the apartment, closed the door, locked it—deadbolt, chain, everything.
Then he turned on every light.
Bathroom. Kitchen. Bedroom.
He needed brightness.
He needed proof that he still existed.
Ethan sat on the edge of his bed, clutching the note in both hands, rereading it again and again.
This isn't the first time.
The words echoed like a memory he hadn't made yet.
He looked up. The TV across the room was off, black and reflective.
His reflection stared back.
And it was smiling.
Ethan wasn't.