00:00I never wanted a stepsister. When dad remarried, I thought I could handle the awkward dinners,
00:05the fake smiles, and the endless attempts at pretending we were one big happy family.
00:10But the night she moved in, I realized this was going to be different. Her name was Claire.
00:15She was quiet, polite, and almost too perfect. The kind of girl who never raised her voice,
00:21never messed up, and never left a trace behind. But something about her presence felt wrong,
00:25like the air around her carried a secret no one else could sense. The first night we shared the
00:30house, I heard footsteps outside my bedroom at 3 a.m. slow, deliberate, measured. I thought it was
00:37dad or his new wife. But when I opened the door, I saw Claire standing there, barefoot, staring at my
00:43door as if she'd been listening. She didn't say a word. She just turned around and walked back to
00:48her room. The next morning, she acted like nothing happened. She smiled, offered me toast, and talked
00:54about school. No mention of the midnight visit. No explanation. And when I brought it up, she
01:00tilted her head and said, You must have been dreaming. But I knew I wasn't. Over the next few
01:05weeks, strange things began to happen. My room, my safe space, started to feel invaded. Items went
01:12missing. A notebook I'd left on my desk showed up under my bed. My phone charger disappeared, only to
01:17return neatly coiled on my pillow. Once, I woke up to find my closet door wide open, though I never sleep
01:24with it that way. And when I glanced down the hall, I swore I saw Claire's door crack shut. Dad said I
01:29was being paranoid. His new wife told me I just needed to adjust to having a sister. But Claire,
01:35Claire just smiled. It wasn't a warm smile. It was something else. One evening, I was doing homework
01:41when I heard soft humming coming from Claire's room. A tune I didn't recognize. Low, eerie, almost
01:47hypnotic. Curiosity got the better of me. I leaned against her door to listen, and that's when I heard her
01:52whisper my name. Not once. Over and over. I knocked. The humming stopped. When she opened
01:58the door, her room was completely dark. No music. No lights. Nothing. She just stood there
02:04and said, Do you need something, brother? Her eyes looked almost black in the dim light.
02:09After that, I started locking my door at night. But even that didn't help. Because locks can't
02:14stop the feeling of being watched. I'd wake up at random hours and feel it, that heaviness in
02:19the room. That sense that someone was standing, just out of sight. Once, when I dared to open my
02:25eyes, I saw the shadow of feet under my door, motionless, waiting. Another time, I swear I
02:31heard my own voice outside my room, whispering my name. Except I was inside. I was awake. By the time
02:37school ended for the year, I barely slept at all. Then came the night that changed everything.
02:42It was storming outside. The wind rattled the windows. Thunder shook the house. I lay in bed,
02:48wide awake, when I heard it. The sound of my doorknob turning. Slowly. Testing the lock. I
02:54froze. The knob twisted once, twice, and stopped. A few minutes passed in silence. And then, three
03:01gentle knocks. Not loud. Not demanding. Almost playful. I didn't answer. The next morning,
03:07I went downstairs and found Claire at the table, sipping tea. She looked at me and said,
03:12You locked your door last night, didn't you? Her tone wasn't accusatory. It was amused.
03:17Like she'd been testing me. I tried to tell dad, but he brushed it off again.
03:21She's just trying to bond, he said. You're overreacting. But I knew better. The next few
03:26days felt unbearable. The more I avoided her, the more she seemed to enjoy it. Her smiles grew longer.
03:33Her humming grew louder. Once, I caught her standing in front of my door in broad daylight.
03:38Her ear pressed to the wood. When I confronted her, she just laughed and said,
03:42I like hearing you breathe. That night, I couldn't take it anymore. I decided to confront
03:47her directly. I pushed into her room while she was out and looked around. Everything was
03:52unirvingly tidy. Bed perfectly made, clothes folded, desk wiped clean. Except for one drawer
03:58that didn't close all the way. Inside, I found things. My things. The missing notebook. A photo
04:04of me from years ago that I'd never shown anyone. A shirt I thought I'd lost. And worst of all,
04:09a page torn from my diary, with my handwriting copied beneath it in hers. Word for word,
04:15my stomach dropped. That night, when she came home, she didn't go to dinner. Instead,
04:20she went straight to her room. A little while later, I heard the humming again. That same
04:24haunting tune. And underneath it, whispers. My own words from my diary, spoken in her voice.
04:31I wanted to scream, but fear pinned me down. The next morning, Claire acted as though nothing
04:35happened. She even offered me tea, her smile soft and unshaken. But her eyes, they lingered
04:42on me too long. From that day forward, I stopped trying to confront her. I just avoided her,
04:47avoided the house when I could, avoided the nights when I couldn't. But avoidance doesn't erase the
04:52truth. Because one night, when the storm returned, I woke to find my lock no longer holding. The door
04:58handle was already turning. And this time, I wasn't sure I was strong enough to keep pretending.
05:03The storm outside hadn't stopped for three nights in a row. Each evening bled into the next.
05:08Thunder rolling like a warning. Lightning splitting the dark sky opened just long enough for me to see
05:14her shadow moving down the hallway. Claire had stopped pretending. The polite smiles,
05:19the innocent questions, the attempts to act like my sister were gone. What remained was silence,
05:25and watching. Always watching. At breakfast, she sat across from me without touching her food.
05:31Her eyes locked on mine until I couldn't eat another bite. At night, I'd hear her pacing the
05:36hallway for hours. As though she was circling me. Waiting for the perfect moment. And then came the
05:42whispers. Not outside my door this time. Not from the hallway. They came from inside my room.
05:47Sometimes right next to my bed. Sometimes from the closet. Sometimes, even from under the mattress.
05:52Soft. Breathy. Deliberate. Stop resisting. You're almost ready. We are the same. I would bury my head
05:59under the blanket. Covering my ears. But the whispers sank deeper than sound. They weren't
06:04just in the room anymore. They were inside my head. One night, I decided to test reality.
06:10I set up my phone to record while I slept. I propped it against a book, angled at the door,
06:15and hit record. If this was all in my mind, then the footage would be blank. And if it wasn't,
06:20the next morning, I almost didn't want to look. But curiosity won. The video showed me sleeping soundly.
06:25Hours passed without incident. But at 3.12am, the door opened. Slowly. Quietly. Claire walked in.
06:33Except it wasn't Claire. The thing that entered had her shape. Her movements. But the face wasn't
06:38right. The skin seemed too tight. The mouth stretched too wide. The eyes black as voids.
06:44It stood at the foot of my bed and tilted its head back and forth, like it was studying me.
06:49Then it leaned down. Close. Too close. The frame cut off just as it reached my ear.
06:54The recording ended. I dropped the phone, my chest burning, my stomach twisting. I wanted to run.
07:00I wanted to scream. But the house felt like a cage, every wall closing in. And Claire?
07:05She sat at the kitchen table that morning, calmly buttering her toast, and said,
07:10Did you sleep well? Her smile widened when I didn't answer. For days, I avoided her as best I could.
07:16But the house wasn't big enough to escape. Every time I closed a door, I swore I'd see her shadow
07:21just beneath the crack. Every time I turned a corner, she'd already be there, waiting. The worst
07:27part was that dad and his wife noticed nothing. To them, Claire was sweet, helpful, even charming.
07:33She did chores. She smiled. She asked polite questions. But the second their backs were turned,
07:39her eyes slid to mine. Cold, unblinking, predatory. I started to wonder if they even saw the same person
07:45I did. One night, as the storm raged harder than ever, I woke to the sound of humming again.
07:51That same tune I'd heard the first week she arrived. Low. Off-key. Hypnotic. But this time,
07:57it wasn't coming from the hallway. It was coming from inside my closet. I grabbed a flashlight,
08:02my hands trembling so hard I could barely keep the beam steady. Step by step, I approached the closet.
08:08The humming grew louder. I yanked the door open. Nothing. Just clothes swaying slightly,
08:13as if disturbed. The smell of dust and old wood. And then, behind me, boo. I spun,
08:20light flashing across her face. Claire stood inches away, her pupils blown wide,
08:25her grin stretching unnaturally. You're finally listening, she whispered.
08:30I shoved past her and locked myself in the bathroom until dawn. The next morning,
08:34I found a note slid under my door. In her handwriting, for words, let me all the way in.
08:40I didn't know what it meant, but I felt it. Like the words weren't just a request,
08:44but a demand. Over the following days, I began to lose time. Hours would pass without memory.
08:50I'd come back to myself and realize I was standing in the hallway outside her room,
08:55hand on the doorknob. Or I'd wake up at my desk with pages filled with handwriting that looked like
09:00mine, but wasn't. Sentences repeating over and over. We are the same. I am already here.
09:06My reflection began to betray me. Sometimes, when I looked in the mirror,
09:10my face wouldn't move exactly when I did. My smile would lag. My eyes would linger too long.
09:16And once, I swear I saw her face looking back instead of mine. I was unraveling.
09:20Then came the night it all ended. The storm outside was violent.
09:24Rain slamming against the windows, thunder rattling the glass. I lay in bed, sleepless,
09:30heart racing. At exactly 3am, the power cut out. The house fell into total darkness.
09:36The door opened. I didn't even flinch this time. I knew she was there. I could hear her bare feet
09:41against the floor, slow, deliberate, each step bringing her closer. When she reached my bed,
09:47she crouched low, her face inches from mine. And in the flash of lightning, I saw it clearly.
09:53It wasn't Claire anymore. It was me. My own face stared back, grinning wide, eyes black,
09:59skin too pale. My own voice whispered,
10:02Living with me wasn't what you expected, was it? I couldn't scream. I couldn't move. The darkness
10:07folded over me like a blanket, heavy, suffocating. When I woke, the storm was gone. Sunlight streamed
10:14through the window. Everything looked normal. Dad was in the kitchen, sipping coffee. His wife was
10:19humming softly. And Claire, Claire was gone. Where's Claire? I asked, my voice shaking. Dad looked at me
10:25strangely. Who? I froze. There's no one named Claire here, he said, frowning. You must have
10:32been dreaming. But I knew I hadn't. Because when I glanced at the hallway mirror, my reflection smiled
10:37before I did. And whispered, in her voice, we are the same.
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