Something Has Noticed

The Next Day, 7:12 AM -Ash's Apartment

Ash woke up with the distinct feeling that something had changed.

His eyes flicked to the ceiling, tracing the familiar cracks in the plaster, but even they seemed slightly different thinner, sharper, as if redrawn in the night. His body ached, his limbs heavy, as if he hadn't rested at all. But he had slept. He was sure of it.

The clock on his nightstand read 7:12 AM. He turned over, eyes landing on the bedside lamp. It was on.

He never left it on.

A small thing. A mistake, maybe. But the nagging unease settled into his chest as he sat up. His phone was face down on the desk where he'd left it. He reached for it instinctively, half-expecting expecting what? He didn't know.

A notification blinked on the screen: Missed Call. Unknown Number. 3:47 AM.

Ash's thumb hovered over the call log before he locked the phone and set it down. It's nothing. Just spam.

Yet, as he walked to the kitchen, something gnawed at the edges of his thoughts. His apartment felt... too still. The air carried a weight to it, thick, almost expectant.

He poured himself coffee, the steam curling in delicate tendrils toward the ceiling. He took a sip. Wrong. The taste was off slightly bitter, slightly metallic. But he had used the same coffee, the same machine, the same amount of sugar.

Something had changed.

On the bookshelf near the window, an old copy of Dostoevsky's "Notes from Underground" lay slightly ajar. He hadn't touched it in months, but now it leaned outward, its pages caught mid-flutter, as if it had been recently disturbed. Had it been like that before? Or was he just noticing it now?

A book about isolation, about questioning one's perception of reality. The irony was suffocating.

He rubbed his temples, trying to shake the creeping unease. Overthinking will drive me insane. Maybe I already am.

9:34 AM - Veridion University

People were watching him.

Not in an obvious way. Not in a way he could call out or prove. But the pauses in conversation, the quick glances, the slight hesitations before answering him they all built up. Like the city itself had noticed him noticing it.

At the café, the barista greeted him like usual, but her voice felt off. Just slightly, like she had rehearsed the words a moment too long. "Morning, Ash. The usual?"

He nodded, watching her carefully. Her smile was a little too tight. Had her voice always sounded like that?

When she handed him his drink, their fingers brushed. She flinched. It was small so small he might have imagined it. But her expression shifted, her lips parting slightly, like she wanted to say something. Then, just as quickly, her face smoothed over. A reset.

Ash took his coffee and left without another word.

Outside, a street mural caught his eye one he had never seen before. It depicted a figure walking through an arched doorway, stepping from light into shadow. Above it, a phrase in faded paint: "You have seen, but you do not yet understand."

His stomach twisted. That's twice now. The feeling. The messages. He wanted to dismiss it, to rationalize it, but something inside him whispered otherwise.

11:12 AM - Psychology Lecture Hall

Ash sat at the back of the lecture hall, fingers tapping absently against his notebook. The professor was mid-lecture, voice droning over some theory or another, but Ash wasn't listening.

His name had been called earlier. "Ash, you're late."

Except he wasn't. He had been sitting there the whole time.

The professor hadn't pressed the issue. Just moved on. But Ash had seen it the small furrow in the man's brow, like he had just realized something wasn't right but didn't know how to fix it.

The room felt… off. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, but the sound seemed a little too sharp, a little too close. The clock on the wall read 11:12 AM. He blinked, staring down at his notes for a moment, lost in thought.

When he looked back up, the clock still read 11:12 AM.

His pulse quickened.

He checked his phone. 11:27 AM.

A cold weight settled in his stomach.

He pressed his pen against the paper, writing the time down. 11:27 AM. He stared at the ink, willing it to stay.

A moment later, when he glanced down again the numbers had changed. 11:12 AM.

His grip tightened around the pen. No. No, I just made a mistake. I must have. That's the only explanation.

But he didn't believe it.

2:45 PM - Campus Courtyard

Ash sat alone on a bench, turning his phone over in his hands.

He had tried mentioning something from yesterday to a classmate something mundane, a casual reference. But they had just frowned at him, confused. "That didn't happen."

At first, he thought they were messing with him. But the more he pushed, the more certain they seemed. They believed it.

Then there was the other thing.

He had checked his phone between classes, scrolling absently through his photos. Somewhere between yesterday and today, a new image had appeared.

A picture of his bedroom. Taken in the middle of the night.

His bed was unmade. The lamp was on.

And in the bottom corner of the frame barely visible a sliver of a shadow, just by the doorway.

His breath hitched.

The rational part of his brain went to work immediately glitch, accidental screenshot, corrupted file. But no excuse sounded convincing.

He locked the phone. His reflection in the screen stared back at him, his expression unreadable.

A breeze moved through the courtyard, carrying whispers of conversation, laughter, life. Normalcy.

And yet, beneath it all, the quiet hum of something unseen, pressing at the edges of his mind.

Watching.

Waiting.

Listening.

Somewhere in his thoughts, a line from an old book surfaced something about a man staring too long into the abyss.

What happens when the abyss starts staring back?

Ash exhaled slowly, rubbing his temples. His thoughts raced between explanation and denial, logic and dread. If he couldn't trust time, his own memory, or even the people around him what could he trust?

That night, he pulled out his journal, something he hadn't touched in months, and flipped to a blank page. His fingers hesitated before pressing the pen down.

"Something is wrong. And I need to remember."

He underlined the words twice, staring at them, willing them to anchor him to reality.

When he woke up the next morning, the journal was still open on his desk.

The page was blank.