NEVER PLAY HIDE AND SEEK IN THE DARK

It started as a joke, as these things often do.

A late-night dare born out of a mixture of boredom and too much alcohol. We were on break from college, spending the long weekend in a cabin nestled deep in the woods—a rental scored by Emma’s family for some “quality bonding time.” What we got was isolation. The trees crowded so closely around the property that moonlight barely reached the ground, and the nearest town was miles away. Our phones had no signal, leaving us to entertain ourselves like restless children.

Emma suggested the game first, her voice dripping with challenge. “Let’s play hide and seek. In the dark.”

It was ridiculous. Juvenile. But maybe that’s why it appealed to us. The idea of slinking through shadows, feeling the thrill of being caught or staying hidden, made us all nod along. Plus, what else was there to do? Watch another crappy horror movie? Drink until our heads spun?

The rules were simple. We’d play only on the cabin property—no wandering into the woods—and the seeker had to count to fifty while the rest of us hid. Flashlights were forbidden; we were only allowed to navigate by memory and instinct. The cabin’s rooms, with their narrow hallways and creaky floorboards, provided plenty of cover. Outside, the backyard, with its shed and towering trees, was even more daunting.

We were five that night: me, Bria, the skeptic; Emma, the leader; Nate, our self-proclaimed tough guy; Olivia, always giggling at everything; and Jason, the quiet one who rarely spoke unless it mattered. By the end of the night, we would never be the same.

I remember the first round vividly. Emma volunteered to seek first, practically bouncing with excitement. “You’ve got fifty seconds!” she called, pressing her hands over her eyes. We scattered immediately, laughter bubbling in the air.

I slipped into the kitchen, crouching low behind the island counter. I could hear Olivia’s muffled giggles from somewhere nearby. The darkness was thick, nearly impenetrable, but my eyes adjusted slowly. Shapes emerged—the outline of the fridge, the shimmer of a knife block on the counter. My heartbeat quickened, the thrill of the game starting to sink in.

Emma’s voice cut through the silence. “Ready or not, here I come!”

Her footsteps echoed on the wooden floor, slow and deliberate. The sound sent a shiver down my spine. It was just a game, I reminded myself. But in the silence, every creak, every shift of the shadows, felt like something… more.

She found Olivia first. Her scream of surprise echoed through the cabin, followed by Emma’s triumphant laugh. “Gotcha!”

One by one, she tracked us down. Nate, who’d been hiding under the porch; Jason, who tried to squeeze behind a bookshelf. By the time she found me, I was already grinning, the anticipation too much to bear. “You suck at hiding,” she teased, pulling me up by the arm.

We laughed about it later, sprawled across the living room, planning the next round. This time, Nate insisted he’d be the seeker. “You’ll never get away from me,” he bragged, flexing his arms. It was typical Nate behavior, all bravado and bluster.

The second round began, and we were giddy, tipsy, and reckless. None of us noticed the man watching from the tree line.

It was Emma who saw him first during her turn hiding. She told us later, in a shaky voice, how she’d been crouched behind the woodpile near the shed when she felt it—a presence. She thought it was one of us trying to sneak up on her. But when she turned, she saw him.

A man, standing completely still at the edge of the woods.

“He was wearing a suit,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “A black suit. His face… I couldn’t see it. He was too far away.”

“Maybe it was a shadow,” Nate suggested, brushing it off. “Or your imagination.”

Emma shook her head vehemently. “It wasn’t. He was real. Just standing there. Watching me.”

The rest of us laughed it off, calling her paranoid. But something about her tone—about the way her hands trembled as she held her drink—stuck with me. I found myself glancing toward the windows more often, expecting to see a shape standing against the night. Of course, there was nothing.

But then the third round started, and things changed.

Jason was the seeker this time, his quiet demeanor adding an eerie edge to the game. I hid upstairs, slipping into a bedroom closet and pressing myself into the corner. The house was utterly silent, save for the occasional creak of the floorboards. My breathing sounded too loud, and I kept holding it, trying to blend into the stillness.

Minutes passed. Then, a sound—a low, rhythmic tapping. It was faint at first, barely noticeable, but it grew louder, closer. My heart raced as I strained to identify it. Footsteps? A branch against the window?

No. It was something deliberate.

The door to the closet swung open violently, and I screamed, tumbling backward. But it wasn’t Jason standing there.

It was the man in the suit.

The closet door slammed open, and I froze. He stood there, framed by the faint moonlight filtering in from the bedroom window.

A man—but not quite.

The suit he wore was immaculate, far too pristine for someone in the woods. Its black fabric seemed to drink the light, and the tie hung at an unnatural angle, as though gravity itself had no claim on it. His face… no, I couldn’t see his face. It was blurred, smudged, as if reality had distorted itself around him. Only his eyes burned through the darkness, pale and cold, like a winter sky devoid of mercy.

I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. The air seemed to thicken around him, as if his presence alone was a weight pressing on my chest.

He tilted his head, slowly, like a predator sizing up its prey. Then, without a word, he stepped back and melted into the shadows.

I don’t know how long I sat there, shaking. Eventually, Jason’s voice echoed through the cabin, muffled and distant. “Bria? Game’s over. I found everyone else.”

I staggered downstairs, my legs weak and trembling. Everyone was gathered in the living room, their faces lit by the dim glow of an oil lamp. Emma and Nate were arguing, while Olivia sat on the couch, nervously chewing her nails.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Jason said, raising an eyebrow.

I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t tell them what I’d seen. Instead, I sank into the nearest chair, my mind spinning. But Emma was quick to fill the silence.

“He’s real!” she shouted, her voice shaking. “The guy I saw earlier. He’s here.”

Nate rolled his eyes. “You’re just trying to scare us.”

“I’m not!” Emma snapped. “Bria saw him too. Right?” She turned to me, desperate for validation.

All eyes were on me. I opened my mouth, but the words wouldn’t come. Instead, I nodded. Slowly.

Olivia let out a nervous laugh. “Okay, guys. This isn’t funny anymore.”

“It’s not a joke,” Emma hissed. “He’s out there. Watching us.”

Nate shook his head. “You’re both nuts. It’s probably just some drifter or—”

A loud knock interrupted him. Three sharp, deliberate raps on the front door.

The room fell silent. We all stared at the door, none of us daring to move.

“Who the hell knocks in the middle of nowhere?” Nate muttered. But even he sounded uneasy.

Jason stood, his expression unreadable. “Stay here. I’ll check it out.”

“No!” Emma grabbed his arm, her eyes wide with panic. “Don’t.”

Jason hesitated but shook her off. “It’s probably nothing.” He grabbed the fire poker from the hearth and approached the door cautiously. The rest of us huddled together, too scared to stop him but too terrified to look away.

He opened the door.

There was no one there.

Jason stepped outside, peering into the darkness. “Hello?” His voice echoed, swallowed by the vast emptiness of the forest.

I glanced at the others. Emma looked like she was on the verge of tears, while Olivia clung to Nate, her knuckles white.

Jason stepped back inside and closed the door. “No one’s there,” he said, but his tone was uncertain.

“That’s it. We’re leaving,” Emma announced. “I don’t care what time it is. We’re getting in the car and—”

“Wait,” Jason interrupted, holding up a hand. “Do you hear that?”

We listened. At first, there was only silence. Then, faintly, the sound of something dragging across the porch. It was slow, deliberate, like claws scraping against wood.

Nate grabbed a flashlight and shone it through the window. The beam cut through the darkness, revealing… nothing. Just the empty porch and the swaying trees beyond.

“See? Nothing,” he said, but his voice trembled.

Then the dragging sound moved—around the side of the cabin, toward the backyard. And with it came a low, almost imperceptible hum, like a distant choir holding a single, haunting note.

“I’m not staying here,” Emma said, her voice cracking. She headed for the door, but as she reached for the handle, it burst open, slamming her backward.

And there he was.

The man in the suit.

The room plunged into chaos. Olivia screamed, Nate cursed, and Jason swung the fire poker, but it passed through the man as though he were made of smoke.

He stepped inside, moving with a fluidity that defied logic. His presence sucked the warmth from the air, leaving the room unbearably cold. He didn’t speak. He didn’t have to. The sheer weight of him was enough to paralyze us.

Emma scrambled backward, her breath coming in ragged gasps. “What do you want?” she whispered.

He tilted his head again, that same unnerving motion. Then, slowly, he raised a hand and pointed—directly at her.

Her scream was cut short as her body convulsed violently. Her back arched, her eyes rolling back into her head, and for a moment, she seemed suspended in midair. Then she collapsed, motionless.

“Emma!” Olivia rushed to her side, but she froze when she saw Emma’s face.

Her eyes were open, but they were blank. Her skin had turned a sickly gray, and her mouth hung open in a silent scream.

“She’s dead,” Olivia whispered, her voice trembling.

“No,” Jason said, shaking his head. “She’s breathing. Look.”

Emma’s chest rose and fell, but it was shallow, mechanical. Her body lay limp, her gaze fixed on the ceiling, unseeing.

“What the hell did you do to her?” Nate shouted at the man, stepping forward. But the man didn’t respond. He simply turned and walked out the door, vanishing into the night.

For a long moment, none of us moved. Emma lay crumpled on the floor, her chest rising and falling like clockwork. Her face was utterly devoid of expression. It was as though she had been hollowed out, leaving only the husk of her body behind.

The man was gone—out into the woods or nowhere at all. He had simply… vanished. And yet, his presence lingered, saturating the air like the scent of smoke after a fire.

“We need to get her help,” Jason said, breaking the silence. His voice was steady, but his hands shook as he crouched beside Emma. “She’s alive. We can still—”

“We’re not leaving,” Nate interrupted. His voice was sharp, panicked. “That thing is out there. You saw what it did to her! If we go outside, we’re next.”

“Staying here isn’t safer!” Olivia snapped, tears streaking her face. She gestured to Emma. “What if he comes back? What if—”

A loud creak cut her off. It came from the second floor, directly above us.

“No one’s up there,” Jason said, standing slowly. His eyes darted toward the staircase, which loomed like a mouth waiting to swallow us whole.

Another creak, this one heavier, more deliberate. Like a footstep.

The oil lamp flickered. Shadows danced across the walls, stretching and curling in impossible shapes. For a moment, I swore I saw a figure standing at the top of the stairs—a silhouette in a suit, head cocked to one side. But when I blinked, it was gone.

“We can’t stay here,” I whispered. My voice felt foreign, distant, as if someone else were speaking for me. “He’s not going to let us.”

In the end, fear made the decision for us. We bundled Emma into Nate’s arms and headed for the door, our flashlights casting nervous beams into the dark. The cabin’s porch groaned under our weight as we stepped outside. The air was colder now, biting and damp, and the forest loomed like an endless wall of black.

Jason led the way, gripping the fire poker like it was a lifeline. “Just get to the car,” he muttered. “We’ll drive into town and—”

The engine wouldn’t start.

We piled into Nate’s car, breathless and frantic, but no amount of twisting the key or pleading with the dashboard brought the engine to life. Jason tried his own car next, with the same result. It was as if the vehicles had been gutted, their lifeblood drained.

“We’re walking,” Jason said finally, his voice grim.

“No,” Nate said firmly, stepping out of the car. “Not with her like this.” He gestured to Emma, whose limp body slumped against the backseat.

Jason grabbed his arm. “Do you want to die here? Because if we don’t leave now—”

The argument stopped suddenly when we noticed Olivia wasn’t with us.

We called for her, our voices rising into the night, but only the trees answered, rustling faintly in the wind.

“She was right behind us,” Nate said, his voice tight. He turned in a circle, shining his flashlight wildly. “I saw her when we left the porch.”

Jason cursed under his breath. “We’ll find her. Stay close.”

But the forest didn’t feel like a place where things could be found. Every tree looked the same, gnarled and ancient, their branches clawing at the sky. The shadows were too deep, too numerous, swallowing our flashlight beams like water.

As we searched, the humming returned.

That same low, haunting note. It came from nowhere and everywhere at once, vibrating in my chest like a second heartbeat. Jason stopped in his tracks, his flashlight trembling in his hand.

“Do you hear that?” he whispered.

“Yes,” I murmured. The sound felt wrong, as though it carried something with it—a whispering presence brushing against my skin.

Nate didn’t respond. He was staring ahead, his flashlight fixed on a spot between the trees.

There she was.

Olivia.

She stood motionless in the clearing, her back to us. Her hair hung limp around her shoulders, and her arms dangled unnaturally at her sides.

“Olivia!” Nate shouted, running toward her.

She didn’t respond.

Jason grabbed Nate’s arm, pulling him back. “Wait,” he hissed.

“Why?” Nate snapped, wrenching free. “She’s right there—”

The man in the suit stepped out from behind her.

No, not stepped—he slid, his movements impossibly smooth. He was taller now, or maybe the shadows made him seem that way. His head tilted again, his featureless face fixed on us. One of his hands rested lightly on Olivia’s shoulder, like a shepherd guarding his flock.

“What do you want?” Jason demanded, his voice shaking.

The man didn’t answer. Instead, Olivia began to move. Her head turned first, slowly, until we could see her face.

Her eyes were gone.

Where they should have been, there were only dark, empty sockets. Blood trickled down her cheeks, but her lips curled into a wide, unnatural smile.

“You’re next,” she whispered, her voice hollow and brittle, like glass about to shatter.

Then the man reached out, wrapping his long fingers around her arm.

She collapsed. Not like Emma—not with the mechanical breathing and hollow stare. Olivia crumpled into herself, her body folding inward, shrinking until she was nothing but a pile of fabric and pale, withered skin.

Nate screamed.

The clearing fell deathly quiet. The pile of what used to be Olivia lay still under the flashlight beams—her clothes untouched but her body shriveled, like all the vitality had been sucked from her. None of us moved. None of us spoke. Even Nate, who had been shouting moments before, was frozen in place, his mouth opening and closing soundlessly.

Jason was the first to act. He grabbed my arm, pulling me backward. “We’re leaving,” he said, his voice low but urgent. “Now.”

Nate stumbled toward Olivia’s remains, his flashlight shaking so badly the beam wavered across the forest floor. “We can’t just—what the hell is this? What is he doing to us?”

“He’s not human,” I whispered. The words slipped out before I could stop them, a horrible truth that solidified the thing in the suit as something far worse than we could comprehend.

Jason dragged Nate away, though Nate kept glancing over his shoulder, muttering to himself. I kept my eyes forward, refusing to look back at Olivia—or what was left of her. The image was already burned into my mind.

We retreated to the cabin, though it no longer felt like a refuge. The man had been inside before, and he could be again. Yet there was nowhere else to go. The forest was alive with shadows, and the air carried that same dreadful hum, faint but persistent. It followed us, a reminder that he was never far.

Back in the living room, Jason locked the door, not that it mattered. Nate dropped into a chair, burying his face in his hands. His flashlight clattered to the floor, rolling to a stop against Emma’s lifeless form.

She was still breathing, still staring blankly at the ceiling. Her lips moved slightly now, as if whispering, though no sound came out.

“We’re trapped,” Nate muttered. His voice cracked on the last word. “He’s picking us off, one by one.”

“No,” Jason said firmly. “We’re going to survive this. We have to. We just need to think.”

“Think?” Nate snapped, his head snapping up. “He doesn’t play by rules we understand. Did you see Olivia? Did you—” His voice broke again, and he turned away, shivering.

I crouched beside Emma, watching her lips move. The closer I leaned, the more I realized there was a sound—a faint whisper, like wind through cracked glass.

I pressed my ear closer, straining to hear.

“…he’s… inside…”

The words sent a chill racing down my spine. I jerked back, my heart hammering.

“What?” Jason asked, noticing my reaction.

“She said he’s inside,” I whispered, my voice barely audible.

Jason glanced around the room, his grip tightening on the fire poker. “Inside where?”

Before I could answer, the oil lamp flickered. The shadows stretched unnaturally, twisting and coiling toward the center of the room like a funnel of darkness.

And then he was there.

The man in the suit stood in the middle of the room, his presence suffocating. The fire poker dropped from Jason’s hands with a clang as all three of us froze.

He was taller now, his head nearly brushing the low ceiling. His faceless gaze swept over us, lingering for a moment on each of us, as if weighing us on some invisible scale.

“What do you want?” I croaked, my voice trembling.

He didn’t answer. Instead, he raised a single hand and snapped his fingers.

Emma stood.

Her movements were jerky and unnatural, like a puppet on strings. Her head turned toward us, her blank eyes unseeing, yet her body began to move, stepping forward with mechanical precision.

“Emma?” Jason whispered.

She didn’t respond. She moved toward Nate, who scrambled out of the chair, his hands raised defensively.

“Emma, it’s me! It’s Nate!” he pleaded.

She tilted her head, mimicking the man’s eerie gesture, and lunged.

Her hands wrapped around Nate’s throat, and though she looked frail, her strength was monstrous. He gasped and clawed at her arms, his face turning red as she lifted him off the ground with impossible ease.

“Stop!” Jason shouted, grabbing the fire poker and swinging it at her. The blow connected, but it didn’t even faze her. She continued to strangle Nate, her grip tightening as his struggles grew weaker.

The man in the suit watched, his head cocked, as though amused.

“Do something!” I screamed at him, tears streaming down my face. “Please, stop this!”

He turned to me, his featureless face tilting slightly. For a moment, I thought I saw something beneath the shadows—a flicker of teeth, sharp and gleaming, though it disappeared as quickly as it came.

Nate stopped struggling. His body went limp in Emma’s grip, and she dropped him like a discarded toy.

Jason and I stood frozen, staring at Nate’s lifeless body. Emma returned to the man’s side, her head tilted back, her expression vacant.

“Why?” Jason whispered. His voice broke, raw with grief and fury. “Why are you doing this?”

The man didn’t respond. Instead, he turned and walked toward the door. Emma followed him, her movements still unnatural and puppet-like.

“Wait!” Jason shouted, but they were gone before he could reach them. The door creaked open and then shut softly, leaving only silence behind.

Jason locked the door again, though we both knew it was futile. We didn’t speak as we dragged Nate’s body to the corner of the room, covering it with a blanket. There was no point in trying to save him. His neck was twisted at an unnatural angle, his face frozen in a mask of terror.

I slumped against the wall, my knees pulled to my chest. Jason paced back and forth, muttering to himself, his flashlight beam darting around the room like a frantic animal.

“He’s toying with us,” he said finally, his voice tight with suppressed rage. “He could kill us anytime he wants, but he’s dragging it out. Why?”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. My mind was unraveling, fraying at the edges as the events of the night replayed in my head. Emma’s blank stare. Olivia’s hollow smile. Nate’s broken body.

The humming started again, low and resonant, vibrating through the walls.

Jason stopped pacing. “Do you hear that?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

The shadows began to shift, pooling together in the center of the room like ink spreading across water.

Jason grabbed my arm, pulling me to my feet. “Run.”

Jason pulled me toward the back door, his grip firm but trembling. The hum grew louder, pressing against my skull, each vibration a cruel echo in my mind. The shadows coiled tighter, rising into the shape of a doorway—a portal to somewhere we didn’t want to see.

“He’s playing with us!” Jason shouted as we stumbled into the backyard. “He doesn’t want us to leave—he wants us to break.”

The forest was worse now. The trees were no longer trees; they had become pillars of shadow, impossibly tall and swaying unnaturally in the windless night. Their branches stretched out like skeletal fingers, clawing at the sky.

The humming followed us, resonating from every direction. No matter how fast we ran, the sound stayed with us, constant, oppressive.

Jason’s breathing grew ragged, but he didn’t let go of my hand. “Don’t stop!” he panted. “Just keep going!”

Ahead, the forest thinned, revealing the faint outline of the dirt road that had brought us here. Hope surged through me. If we could just make it to the road, maybe—

Jason’s grip was ripped away.

I spun around, my flashlight cutting through the darkness. Jason was gone.

“Jason!” I screamed, my voice raw with panic. The beam of my flashlight swept across the trees, searching, but there was nothing—no sign of him. Just the endless shadows and the suffocating hum.

Then, I heard his voice.

“Bria,” he whispered.

It was faint, coming from deeper in the woods.

“Bria, help me…”

Against every instinct screaming in my mind, I stepped forward. “Jason?” My voice trembled as I followed the sound, deeper into the dark.

“Bria…” His voice was closer now, but it sounded wrong—too soft, too smooth, like the hum had warped it.

I rounded a tree and stopped.

Jason was there, hanging in the air like a marionette. His feet dangled inches above the ground, his arms limp at his sides. A faint, silvery thread stretched from his chest upward, vanishing into the shadows above.

The man in the suit stood behind him.

The man didn’t move, but Jason’s body jerked as if pulled by invisible strings. His head turned toward me, his eyes wide with terror.

“Run,” he gasped. Blood trickled from his nose and mouth as the silver thread tightened, cutting into his chest. “Bria, please—run!”

But I couldn’t move. I was rooted in place, my flashlight trembling in my hand.

The man tilted his head, his faceless gaze fixed on me. He raised one hand, and Jason’s body convulsed. His back arched unnaturally, his mouth opening in a silent scream as his limbs twisted at impossible angles.

“Stop!” I begged, tears streaming down my face. “Please, stop!”

The man ignored me. Jason’s body began to shrink, collapsing inward like Olivia’s had. His skin turned pale, his features hollowing out until he was nothing but an empty shell.

The silvery thread snapped, and Jason’s lifeless body crumpled to the ground.

The man turned to me.

He stepped closer, his movements fluid and deliberate. My flashlight flickered and died, plunging us into darkness.

I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. All I could see was his silhouette, towering over me, his presence filling the air like a storm about to break.

He stopped inches away, and for the first time, I heard his voice.

“You’ve seen what I can do,” he said. His tone was calm, almost gentle, but it carried an edge of something ancient and inhuman. “And yet, here you are. Brave… or foolish?”

My lips trembled, but no words came out.

He crouched slightly, his featureless face lowering to my level. “You have a choice, Bria.”

He reached out, and I flinched, but he didn’t touch me. Instead, his hand hovered above my chest, as if he were feeling the rhythm of my heartbeat.

“I can let you leave,” he said. “But you’ll carry this night with you forever. Every shadow will remind you. Every sound will echo my presence. Or…”

He straightened, his head tilting once more. “You can stay, and I will show you something no one else can comprehend. Something beautiful.”

The hum grew louder, reverberating through my body. It was hypnotic, pulling me toward him like a tide.

“Choose,” he said.

I don’t know how long I stood there, frozen between terror and temptation. My mind screamed at me to run, but my legs wouldn’t move.

“I…” My voice cracked. “I just want to go home.”

The man tilted his head, his faceless gaze seeming to pierce through me. Slowly, he lowered his hand.

“As you wish,” he said.

The hum stopped.

I woke up on the dirt road, the sun just beginning to rise. The forest looked normal again—just trees and leaves and the faint sound of birdsong.

Jason and Nate were gone. The cabin was empty when the authorities found it, though Emma’s body was still inside, lifeless but breathing. They couldn’t explain what had happened to her—or to me.

I tried to tell them about the man in the suit, but the words sounded hollow, even to me. They chalked it up to trauma, a shared psychosis brought on by stress and isolation.

But I know the truth.

I see him sometimes, in the corner of my eye. In reflections, or in the shadows of a crowded room. He doesn’t approach, doesn’t speak. But I know he’s watching, waiting.

I don’t know why he let me live.

Sometimes, I wish he hadn’t.

They found Olivia’s remains months later, scattered in the woods like dry leaves. Of Jason and Nate, there was no trace.

Emma never woke up. She lies in a hospital bed, her eyes open but unseeing, her lips still moving faintly, as if whispering to someone only she can see.

And me? I moved far away, but no matter how far I go, I can’t escape him. He’s always there.

Waiting for the day I make my second choice.