Road to Belfast
~Anna~
I didn’t look back. If I did, I knew I wouldn’t leave. My mother’s arms had been wrapped around me so tightly at the station, her voice cracking as she told me to keep my phone on, to call if anything felt off. I think she already knew something was. Maybe it was in the job posting itself, vague and last-minute, offering good pay for something so simple. Or maybe it was in the name—Belfast. Not the capital of Northern Ireland, but a small, strange urban town nestled between old hills and silent woods.
“I packed you extra socks,” she had whispered. “You always forget socks.”
I smiled through my tears and hugged her tighter. I didn’t say I loved her out loud, I never really had, but I think she felt it in the way I clung to her for one last second before pulling away. And then I got into the taxi.
The driver was silent, the engine humming low. It was an old cab, one of those beaten-down models that looked like it had lived through five owners and ten accidents. The seatbelt barely worked, the radio spat static, and the air smelled faintly of rust and peppermint. I didn’t ask questions. I didn’t want to. We left my hometown behind slowly. The roads curved and narrowed, buildings thinning out until they were replaced by sprawling fields of dry grass. It was almost beautiful, until the sky started changing.
Thick clouds rolled in above us, slow and heavy like storm-breath. They were tinged gray and green at the edges, casting the world below in a dusky twilight though it was only midday. The further we drove, the quieter the world became. The birds stopped. The trees along the road seemed to bend away, like they were warning me. The driver hadn’t said a word the whole trip. It was only when we passed an old iron gate, half-buried in weeds, that he finally muttered something under his breath.
“What was that?” I asked. He shook his head, eyes never leaving the road.
“Nothing.”
But I knew he’d said something. Something that sounded like a prayer. The sign welcoming us to Belfast was rusted and crooked, hanging by one hinge. Beneath the town’s name was a slogan painted in faded red:
“Where Shadows Have a Home.”
A shiver slid down my spine as we crossed into the town. Everything looked… tired. The buildings were narrow and gray-bricked, old-fashioned in a way that felt frozen in time. Shops had signs with letters missing. The lampposts were bent like they’d been leaning for decades. There were people on the sidewalks, but no one looked up. No one smiled.
A man stood in front of a barber shop, his head turned toward the street. His eyes locked with mine as the taxi passed. They were golden—not hazel, not brown, golden—and they didn’t blink. I turned away too quickly.
“Where’s the job office?” I asked the driver, needing something normal to hold onto. He pointed.
“End of Cranberry Street. Next to the church.”
I looked ahead and saw the street, a crooked lane where the cobblestones looked blackened and slick with something that didn’t shine like water. At the end of it stood a large, hunched church, its bell tower leaning slightly like it was too tired to stand straight. I paid the driver and got out. He didn’t say goodbye. He didn’t even wait for me to shut the door.
As I stood on the sidewalk, suitcase in hand, the weight of Belfast pressed in on me. The air was heavier here. Not just thick with moisture, but with something invisible—like dust clinging to the lungs. The people moved slowly, almost too slowly, like they were underwater. And yet I could feel something underneath it all, watching.
I made my way to the job office. The windows were covered in yellowed paper, and the front door creaked like a scream when I pushed it open.
Inside, it was dim and smelled of dried herbs and old paper. A woman sat behind the desk, pale and thin, her eyes shadowed beneath heavy lashes. She didn’t smile when she saw me.
“You’re Anna,” she said, not asked.
“Yes,” I replied, startled.
“You’re late. The job started yesterday.”
“I what? I was told to arrive today.”
She didn’t answer. She pushed a piece of paper toward me with a single address scrawled on it in red ink: Room 6C Morningstar Complex – Elm Hollow.
“What is this?”
“Your lodging.”
“No job interview?”
Another silence. Then: “You’re hired.”
I didn’t know what to say. I took the paper, thanked her quietly, and walked out—feeling her eyes burn into the back of my head until the door shut behind me.
Elm Hollow was nothing like the name promised. It sounded like a place with gentle trees and winding paths. Instead, it was a row of shadow-soaked buildings that seemed to grow out of the concrete like tumors.
The Morningstar Complex was the tallest among them, six stories of dark brick and crooked windows. It looked like it had once been something else, a hospital maybe, or a boarding school. Whatever it was, it didn’t want to be what it had become. Room 6C was at the very top.
The elevator groaned when I stepped inside, trembling with each floor it passed. The light above flickered constantly, and the button for the fifth floor was missing, like no one had used it in years. When I reached the sixth, the hallway stretched out before me like something from a dream I didn’t want to remember. Long. Dim. Damp. The wallpaper peeled like it was trying to escape the walls.
Room 6C was at the far end. When I opened it, I was surprised to find it clean. Not new, not fresh—but clean. A bed, a desk, a window that barely opened. Someone had left a kettle on the counter and a few teabags next to it.
Home, I guessed.
I dropped my suitcase and sank onto the bed. The mattress was stiff, but my body was too tired to care. For a few moments, I just sat there, breathing. Listening.
Then I heard it. A soft scrape, like nails on metal. A soft sound, almost a sigh at first. Then another, longer. And then, a moan. Feminine. Breathless. Intimate. I opened my eyes.
It was coming from the room next to mine, thin walls didn’t offer much in the way of privacy. The sounds became clearer, steadier. The kind of moaning that made you shift uncomfortably, unsure if you should be listening but unable to turn away. There was a rhythm to it, a pattern. A bed hitting the wall. Skin against skin.
I sat up slowly. Something felt… off. Not because of what I was hearing, but because of how it sounded. Like it was too deliberate. Too controlled. Every gasp, every whimper, fell into place like a performance rehearsed a hundred times. Perfect, in a way that was unnatural.
I leaned closer to the wall, heart pounding. The same wall I’d heard the whisper from. The moans grew louder, rising in tempo. Then I heard something else beneath it, a deep, almost guttural growl. Not like a man’s. More like something… other.
"Yes! yes!" the woman screamed,
"Ooh! yes Fuck me. Just like that."
there was something about her Moans that made my hand reach for my pants. I slowly unbuttoned my blue jean, my hand slowly creeping between my now wet pussy. yes pussy and it was wet. I sat frozen on the edge of the bed, breath caught halfway between disbelief and curiosity. The room next door had fallen silent again. Not the kind of silence that comes after pleasure, but something heavier. Too sudden. Too complete. The kind of silence that made you feel watched.
But I couldn’t shake what I had heard before that, the loud moans, the breathy gasps, the slow, steady rhythm of bodies moving together. It had stirred something in me, something I hadn’t felt in a long time. Not just arousal, but longing. A hunger I’d kept buried under all the noise of life. Moving. Leaving. Starting over. And now here I was, alone in a strange town, in a room that barely felt real, hearing echoes of something intimate through the wall, and my body was alive.
My skin tingled. My chest rose and fell faster than it should. My mouth was dry. I hesitated. Then I reached for my bag. Buried under a few books and my journal was a small vibrator. Discreet. I hadn’t planned to use it, not in the first few days, at least. But now… I don’t know. Maybe it was the town. The air. The tension in the walls.
Or maybe it was me, finally feeling something again after months of numbness. I lay back on the bed, the mattress creaking beneath me. The ceiling above seemed to tilt slightly, like it was watching. I didn’t care. I closed my eyes and let myself drift back into what I’d heard.
"Ooh yes." the vibrator touched my now aroused clit.
"Fuck!" the waves of it moved the walls of my pussy.
"ooh yes!" my back arched, feet curved.
The woman’s voice, soft and desperate, as if every moan was a secret slipping from her lips. rushed in my thought
The rhythm, measured. Slow at first. Then faster. The presence, something… primal. Not just lust. Possession.
My hand trembled as it moved, brushing against the heat building in my core. I breathed in sharply, holding onto the edge of sensation, letting it carry me away from the fear, the confusion.
For a moment, I wasn’t in Belfast. I was wherever she was. Next door. Wrapped in something dark and consuming. Something that didn’t care about rules or reason. Something that wanted. I let the waves build. Soft at first. Then stronger.
My back arched slightly again, the old bedsprings groaning under me, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. The air in the room pulsed with energy, something raw and electric. And just as I felt myself teetering on the edge of release, A voice. Not from my memory. Not from my imagination. From the wall.
“Anna…” I froze.
The heat in my body turned cold in an instant. The whisper was low, male, and unmistakably real. I sat up sharply, heart pounding in my throat, sweat cooling on my skin. The room was dim, but the shadows seemed to move now, slithering slowly across the corners, curling against the walls like smoke.
“Who’s there?” I whispered, but my voice sounded far away. Thin.
No answer. Just the faintest sound, laughter.
I rushed to the wall and pressed my ear against it. Nothing. Not a breath. Not a creak.
Then, thud. From the hallway this time. Someone, or something was outside my door. I scrambled up and grabbed the nearest thing I could find: a heavy candle jar from the dresser. I stepped toward the door slowly, the wooden floor beneath me cold against my bare feet.
Another thud.
A slow dragging sound.
I reached for the doorknob, but didn’t open it.
Instead, I peered through the peephole.
The hallway was dimly lit by a single flickering bulb. The wallpaper peeled in long strips. And standing at the far end, barely visible, was a figure.
