THE SECOND TAPE
1943 Words
The wind cut sharply across Emberly’s face as she and Elias stepped away from the ruins, leaving behind the charred skeleton of her childhood home — and the box that felt heavier than anything she had ever held.
They didn’t speak as they approached the car.
Elias opened the passenger door for her, but Emberly didn’t get in immediately. She clutched the small box to her chest, staring down at the cracked edges.
The photograph.
The drawing.
The silver key.
The cassette.
Each object felt like a trigger waiting to explode inside her memory.
She finally slid into the seat.
Elias closed the door gently and walked around to the driver’s side.
When he sat down, he didn’t start the engine.
He looked at her.
Really looked at her.
“You don’t have to listen to the tape now,” he said quietly.
Emberly stared straight ahead.
Her heart had been pounding continuously since the first tape.
She didn’t know how much more she could take.
But she knew one thing:
Waiting would make it worse.
She opened the box again and picked up the old cassette.
Her hand trembled so violently that Elias reached over and steadied it, his fingers warm over her cold skin.
“We’ll listen together,” he whispered.
Not “you.”
“We.”
Emberly’s throat tightened.
She nodded.
---
They drove to Elias’s apartment instead of hers.
Too many shadows waited in her hall.
Too many memories in that small, suffocating space.
Elias lived only a block away, in a slightly newer building — not nice, but not crumbling or stained with unease like hers. Still, Emberly couldn’t shake the feeling that something had followed them from the house.
The presence she sensed since childhood.
The one that never left.
Elias ushered her inside and locked the door twice.
“Sit wherever you feel safe,” he murmured.
Emberly sat on the corner of his couch, clutching her knees to her chest. The tape recorder Elias found in her apartment sat between them on the coffee table.
The cassette hovered in Emberly’s hand.
The room felt too quiet.
Too still.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Elias said gently.
Emberly swallowed.
Pressed the cassette into the slot.
Her finger hovered over the “PLAY” button.
Then she pressed it.
A sharp crackle.
Then:
Breathing.
Not her mother’s.
Deep.
Male.
Slow.
Emberly’s entire body went rigid.
Elias leaned forward, his posture sharp, alert.
The man’s breath filled the recorder like he was standing inches away.
Then, finally —
He spoke.
“…Emberly.”
Her blood turned to ice.
Despite the years, despite the tape distortion, she knew that voice.
It lived in her nightmares.
It lived in the walls.
Soft.
Measured.
Dark.
“You were such a quiet child.”
Elias clenched his fists.
Emberly covered her mouth with trembling fingers.
“You never cried. Not even in the room.”
Emberly’s heartbeat stuttered.
The room.
The triangular room from the drawing.
Her childhood memory — a memory she shouldn’t have forgotten.
“You were special. Your mother didn’t understand that.”
A pause.
“She tried to take you away from me.”
Emberly’s vision blurred. Her breath rattled in her throat.
“But I always find you.”
Elias whispered harshly, “How did he get this tape to your house? Emberly, this guy—”
“Shh,” Emberly said shakily. “Listen.”
The tape continued.
“Your mother thought fire could cleanse the past.”
A low chuckle.
“She underestimated what I am.”
Elias looked like he wanted to rip the machine in half.
Emberly couldn’t move.
Couldn’t blink.
A soft scraping sound echoed on the tape — like fingers sliding against metal.
“You don’t remember everything. Not yet.”
A pause.
“But you will. And when you do, you’ll understand why I chose you.”
Chosen.
The word made her stomach twist violently.
“You were the only child who didn’t scream when I opened the door.”
Her lungs seized.
The triangular room — the drawing.
The man standing beside her bed.
Her mother crying.
The closet opening.
The smell of smoke.
Memory collided with memory until she couldn’t tell which were real and which were nightmares.
But deep down, she knew:
They were real.
The man on the tape continued.
“I left something behind for you. In the old house. Under the floorboards in the room.”
Elias’s eyes snapped to Emberly.
She shook her head quickly. “No. No, we didn’t see anything under the—”
“He’s manipulating you,” Elias murmured. “Don’t trust what he says.”
The tape clicked softly.
“One more thing, Emberly.”
Her pulse hammered.
“Don’t trust the man you’re with.”
Emberly felt the blood drain from her face.
The tape ended.
Silence swallowed the room.
Elias’s expression stiffened. “He’s trying to isolate you.”
Emberly couldn’t form words.
“He wants you scared of everyone — including me,” Elias said urgently. “It’s a classic predator tactic.”
But Emberly could barely hear him over the ringing in her ears.
Don’t trust the man you’re with.
She didn’t want to believe the tape.
She didn’t want to doubt Elias.
But her mind spiraled anyway.
Elias had appeared at the perfect moment.
He lived right across the hall.
He was always awake when she needed him.
He always seemed to know when she was afraid.
No.
No, no, no.
She squeezed her head with both hands, trying to crush the thoughts.
Elias reached toward her gently.
“Emberly, look at me.”
She flinched back instinctively.
His face fell — not offended, not angry — but hurt.
“Emberly… he wants this. He wants you alone.”
Her breath came in short, panicked bursts.
Elias exhaled shakily. “Then I’ll give you space. Sit wherever you want. I won’t move closer.”
He shifted to the far end of the couch.
Emberly’s hands slowly lowered from her face.
She hated herself for doubting him.
But the tape’s words lingered.
Like poison dripping into her bloodstream.
“He knew where we’d go,” Emberly whispered. “He knew what we’d find.”
Elias frowned. “He didn’t know. He left the box years ago. The tape was meant for any moment you discovered it.”
“But the vent in my apartment—”
“I heard something, yes,” Elias admitted. “But that doesn’t mean he was literally inside the walls. Could’ve been a planted device. A speaker. A timed trigger.”
Emberly shook her head. “No… it felt like him.”
“Fear feels like a lot of things,” Elias said softly. “Fear lies.”
Her eyes snapped up. “But memories don’t.”
Elias’s breath caught.
“Emberly… what memories?”
She hesitated.
Then, voice breaking:
“I wasn’t afraid of him. Not at first.”
Elias froze.
“I think… I think I knew him before the fire. Before everything. I think he was around more than my mother ever admitted.”
Elias leaned forward slowly — carefully — like approaching a wounded animal.
“Emberly… are you saying he was part of your life?”
She didn’t answer.
She didn’t need to.
Her silence was answer enough.
---
An hour passed.
Neither spoke much.
Emberly stared at the objects again and again — as if repetition would suddenly unlock all the memories she’d spent her entire life forgetting.
Elias paced the room, though he tried not to look restless.
Finally he said, “We need to find the room.”
Emberly looked up sharply. “No.”
“Emberly—”
“No!” she snapped, voice cracking. “That room was never meant to be found. It wasn’t normal. It wasn’t safe.”
“That’s exactly why we need to find it.”
Her stomach dropped. “Why?”
Elias hesitated.
Then:
“Because if we don’t, he will.”
Emberly’s breath stilled.
“He wants you to go back there,” Elias said. “It’s the one place he knows you’ll remember everything.”
“I don’t want to remember,” Emberly whispered.
Elias’s voice softened. “But your mind does.”
She closed her eyes.
If he was right — if the room was a trigger — then finding it could either help her remember…
…or destroy her.
“We’ll do it together,” Elias promised.
But Emberly’s fear twisted into something else.
A cold, creeping suspicion — planted by the tape, blooming slowly.
“What if the room isn’t in the old house?” she whispered.
Elias paused.
“What do you mean?”
“The drawing I made… the walls in the picture weren’t burnt. They weren’t wooden. They were metal.”
Elias stiffened.
“Like a bunker,” Emberly said. “Or a basement.”
“We didn’t see anything like that at the ruins,” Elias murmured.
“Exactly.”
Her voice trembled.
“What if the room was somewhere else entirely? What if he took me somewhere… without my mother knowing?”
Elias’s eyes widened.
Pieces were falling into place — terrible, heavy pieces.
“Emberly…” he said slowly. “We need to find out everything your mother hid from you.”
Emberly hugged herself tightly.
“She died protecting me,” Emberly whispered. “And now I’m dragging both of us into this.”
“You’re not dragging me,” Elias said firmly. “I’m choosing this.”
His voice was steady.
But Emberly noticed something then — something small, but unmistakable.
His hands were shaking too.
---
Night fell.
Emberly stood by the window, staring at the city lights. Elias sat at his desk, scrolling through articles about the fire.
He stopped suddenly.
“Emberly.”
She turned.
“You said the fire was always blamed on faulty wiring, right?”
Emberly nodded.
Elias looked pale.
“That’s not what the original reports say.”
He turned the screen toward her.
Emberly approached slowly.
The headline read:
CHILD RESCUED FROM BASEMENT FIRE — CAUSE UNKNOWN
Mother claims ‘someone was in the house.’
Emberly’s blood froze.
Basement.
Basement.
Her voice came out strangled. “But we never had a basement.”
Elias stood.
“Your mother lied.”
Emberly’s knees weakened.
Elias grabbed her shoulders.
“There was a basement. There was a room. And the fire started there.”
A shiver ran through Emberly’s spine.
He continued, voice urgent:
“Emberly… the tape said your mother tried to erase your memories. But maybe she did more than that. Maybe she hid the room. Buried it. Tried to make sure you never found it again.”
Emberly whispered:
“But he knows where it is.”
And now…
So did they.
Elias grabbed his coat. “We’re going back.”
Emberly trembled. “Elias—”
“We have to go now before someone else gets there first.”
She didn’t have the strength to argue.
The truth was out of the box now — out of the walls — out of the shadows.
And the deeper they went, the more Emberly realized:
Her mother hadn’t been paranoid.
She had been right.
About everything.
Elias locked the apartment door behind them.
But before the latch clicked, Emberly heard something faint — something she wished she hadn’t.
A soft hiss, drifting from the vent above.
Then a whisper:
“Emberly…”
Her blood went cold.
Elias didn’t hear it.
But Emberly did.
He was close.
Closer than ever.
And he was waiting.
- Writer
