00:00Some rules exist for a reason you'll wish you never learned.
00:03When Emma's family moved into the old house on Maple Street,
00:07her father sat her down on her, first night, and gave her one simple rule.
00:12Never, ever look at the basement window after dark.
00:16He didn't explain why, just made her promise with a seriousness that made her stomach turn.
00:21For three weeks, Emma kept that promise, but every night as she walked past the kitchen,
00:26she could feel that window pulling at her, a dark square of glass.
00:30Just visible from the corner of her eye.
00:32The curiosity gnawed at her like a living thing.
00:35What could be so terrible about a window?
00:37What was her father so afraid she'd see?
00:39On the twenty-second night, Emma finally broke.
00:43She crept to the kitchen, her heart hammering against her ribs,
00:46and slowly, slowly turned her head toward that basement window.
00:49And there, pressed against the glass from the inside, was a face.
00:56Not just any face, her own face, pale and hollow-eyed.
01:00Mouth stretched into a smile too wide for any human, staring back with an expression of pure, patient hunger.
01:06Emma stumbled backward, but the thing behind the glass didn't move, didn't blink.
01:11Just kept smiling that terrible smile.
01:14The next morning, her father asked if she'd looked.
01:17She lied and said no.
01:19But he knew.
01:21He always knew.
01:22Because now, every night, Emma can feel it, waiting in the dark.
01:27And she knows, one day soon, it won't stay behind the glass.
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