Have you ever had this experience?
Working overtime until the wee hours, so exhausted your eyes are half-closed, all you want is to collapse into bed. You drive to the underground parking garage exit, and the barrier lifts by itself. You freeze for a second, thinking the system's acting up again, the property management will be arguing about it tomorrow. You don't think much of it, step on the gas and go.
The next morning, you can't even remember how you got home.
That's normal. When you've been driving for years, many roads become muscle memory—your body drives on autopilot.
But what if I told you that night, you never went home at all?
I'm a project coordinator at an advertising agency. I drive a white Honda and live in a neighborhood built eight years ago in the southern part of the city, a twenty-five minute drive from the office.
That day I worked overtime until late. When I entered the parking garage to get my car, I checked my phone: 23:57.
Two lights were out in the garage. The property management had reported them a month ago, but no one had come to fix them. I drove slowly along the B2 floor passage, the car radio still playing a podcast—two hosts arguing about whether a certain celebrity had plastic surgery.
The passage ended at the exit. I released the gas, ready to hit the brake and pay.
But the barrier was already up.
That yellow-and-black striped pole lifted slowly, uniformly, from its horizontal position, and stopped there.
I froze, looking at the display screen next to the exit. The screen was on, but it showed no license plate, no payment amount—only one line of green text: "Safe travels."
I kept my foot on the brake, staring at that pole through the windshield.
The exit lights were dim yellow, casting a sickly fluorescent glow on the reflective strips. Outside the exit was the neighborhood road, lined with parked cars on both sides, streetlamp light filtering through the holly bushes.
There were no cars behind me. At this hour, the garage was empty—only the sound of my engine echoed in the passage.
The pole just stayed raised, as if opened especially for me.
I patted my pocket. The parking card was still there. Normally, exiting costs twenty yuan. Even with a monthly pass, after midnight it's charged per use.
But the pole was raised, and the display wasn't blocking me.
I hesitated for two seconds, released the brake, and gently pressed the gas.
The car slowly passed the exit, the pole maintaining its raised height. In the rearview mirror, that yellow-and-black bar stayed motionless until I turned onto the neighborhood road and it disappeared from sight.
I thought simply at the time: system glitch, free twenty yuan. Tomorrow when property checks the records, they'll mark me as unpaid exit at most. I'll just pay it then.
The road was empty. Streetlamps cast a sickly white glow, the ground shimmering with cold light. I turned left, merged onto the main road, exited through the south gate, and got on the city expressway.
The expressway had very few cars at this hour—occasional taxis or logistics trucks. I kept my speed steady at seventy-five, rolled down the window halfway to get some air. The November night wind was cool on my face, waking me up a bit.
I got home at 00:27.
I live on the sixth floor. The elevator was empty. The stainless steel walls reflected my face—dark circles so heavy I looked like I'd been punched.
I opened the door. The living room light was on, the TV playing a shopping channel. My wife was curled up on the sofa asleep, a blanket draped over her, half a cup of cold milk on the coffee table.
I changed my slippers, went over and turned off the TV. My wife stirred, mumbled "You're back," and rolled over, continuing to sleep.
"Go to bed," I nudged her.
She grunted twice, didn't move.
I went to the bathroom and took a shower. Hot water poured over my back, and I finally relaxed. When I came out, my wife had already crawled into bed. I lay down, scrolled through my phone for a bit, and set an alarm for eight.
As I was drifting off, that image of the barrier lifting flashed through my mind.
Nothing special—just a broken parking barrier.
I rolled over and fell asleep.
The next morning, I was woken up by my wife pushing me.
"Where did you go last night?" She sat on the edge of the bed, already dressed for work, holding my car keys in her hand.
I checked the time: 8:07. The alarm had gone off, but I hadn't heard it.
"Where did I go?" I sat up, still groggy.
"I'm asking you—what time did you get home last night?"
"After twelve, before twelve thirty," I said. "Why?"
My wife held her phone in front of me. On the screen was the app for my car's built-in dashcam: "Then explain this—why does the app show you drove nearly a hundred kilometers last night?"
I took the phone, froze.
"You sure?"
"The dashcam syncs automatically—how could it be wrong?" My wife pointed at the data on the screen. "Look, you left the neighborhood garage at 23:57 last night, returned at 00:27. Total mileage: 98.6 kilometers. You're telling me you went straight home?"
I was silent for a few seconds. My mind raced through the route I'd taken last night. Office to garage, garage to home. No detours anywhere.
"The dashcam," my wife said. "Just take it out and check."
Fine.
I put on my slippers, went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my face. In the mirror, my complexion was terrible—gray and haggard from staying up late. I stared at my reflection for two seconds, remembering that barrier lifting by itself in the garage last night.
Leaving the bathroom, I took the car keys and went downstairs.
The garage looked completely different during the day. Cars coming and going, people walking their dogs back, an old man organizing cardboard boxes next to an electric tricycle. I walked to my parking spot, opened the car door, and pulled out the dashcam's memory card.
Back upstairs, my wife had already opened my laptop and placed it on the coffee table. I inserted the memory card into a reader, connected it to the computer, and opened the dashcam folder.
The dashcam records in loops, automatically segmented by time. I found yesterday's date and started watching from eleven thirty at night.
The dashcam footage began at 23:57.
I started the car and drove out. The dashcam automatically switched back to normal recording mode.
On screen, my car exited the garage. The barrier was up, just as I'd seen last night. The car turned right, drove onto the main road, then exited through the south gate.
So far, everything was normal.
But then—I didn't turn left onto the expressway.
I turned right.
The car in the footage drove onto a road I had no memory of. Sparse streetlamps, low factory buildings and walls on either side, occasional glimpses of closed scrap yards. This road—I'd never seen it before.
The speed wasn't fast, around forty kilometers per hour. The car was quiet, only the low hum of the engine and the occasional bump when rolling over potholes.
I turned up the volume, listening carefully.
Engine noise. Tire noise.
And something else.
A faint, rhythmic sound. Like someone tapping something with their fingers.
I paused the footage. My palms started sweating.
My wife stood behind me, saying nothing. I could feel her gaze fixed on the screen.
I clicked play again.
The road in the footage grew increasingly desolate. Streetlamps disappeared, only the car headlights illuminating a small patch of road ahead. On both sides were pitch-black fields, occasional bare trees.
The car drove for about forty minutes. A bridge appeared in the footage.
The bridge wasn't wide—a two-lane concrete bridge. No streetlights on the bridge. Headlights revealed potholed pavement and old stone piers for railings, some already tilted.
Water was under the bridge—probably a river. Headlights swept across the water, pitch-black, no shore visible on the other side.
The car stopped in the middle of the bridge.
The dashcam kept recording. The footage froze on the bridge surface and black water outside the windshield. The engine was still running, rpm steady.
The tapping sound stopped.
The car was deathly quiet. Only the engine noise remained.
Then I heard a sound.
My own voice.
In the footage, I said something.
But I couldn't make out the words. The voice was low, like a mumble or a question. I could tell it was my voice, but couldn't distinguish the actual characters.
After I spoke, there was silence for about two seconds.
Then I shifted gears, and the car began to turn around.
As it turned, the headlights swept across the other side of the bridge.
My wife suddenly grabbed my shoulder.
I saw it too.
In the passenger seat, someone was sitting.
Head bowed.
The headlights swept past, and light came through the side window, illuminating the silhouette of the person in the passenger seat.
It looked like a man. Wearing dark clothes, head bowed, chin almost touching his chest. Hair hung down, covering his entire face.
Just a dark silhouette, head bowed, sitting motionless in the passenger seat.
The car finished turning around and drove back along the road it had come from.
The footage was similar to the outward journey—sparse streetlamps, dark fields, occasional factory buildings. No other sounds in the car, only the engine's low hum.
I fast-forwarded.
At 00:18, a street I recognized appeared in the footage. The expressway entrance, bright streetlamps, smooth pavement. Everything normal.
But the person in the passenger seat was still there.
Still with head bowed, motionless.
At 00:24, the car entered the neighborhood. Under the streetlights, the footage was clear and steady.
The passenger seat was empty.
No one there.
My car entered the garage entrance, the footage darkened. B1 floor, then B2. The car pulled into the parking spot, engine off.
The footage froze on the wall.
I stared at the screen, fingers stiff on the touchpad. My mind was blank, like someone had scooped everything out with a spoon.
My wife released my shoulder. She stepped back, sat on the sofa, face pale, not knowing what to say.
We were silent for about two minutes.
"Were you sleepwalking?" My wife spoke first, voice unsteady. "You never had this problem before."
Sleepwalking while driving. Driving forty minutes to an empty bridge, stopping for a while, then driving back. Nearly a hundred kilometers round trip. With someone in the car.
"I don't know." My voice didn't sound like my own.
I watched the dashcam footage again from the beginning. This time, I frame-by-framed the segment where the person in the passenger seat appeared.
When the headlights swept across the bridge, light came through the left window, illuminating the passenger seat. The person's silhouette was lit for less than a second, but I captured two frames.
I zoomed in, then zoomed in again.
The pixels were blurry, but I could make out the general shape. Dark clothes—black or dark blue. The shoulder line looked unnatural, slumped, like no bones were supporting it. Head bowed, hair covering the face.
The head just hung there, as if resting directly on the chest.
I closed the laptop.
"Don't drive today," my wife said. "Take a taxi to work."
I nodded.
But today was Saturday—I didn't need to go to work.
After my wife left for work, I sat alone in the living room. The TV was on, volume turned low. I couldn't concentrate; my mind was full of that figure with the bowed head.
I went to the balcony and lit a cigarette. The November sun was bright, reflecting off the opposite building, dazzling. Downstairs, someone was walking a dog, a child in red riding a balance bike.
Everything was the same as usual.
Like nothing had ever happened.
But the odometer had gained over ninety kilometers.
Around three in the afternoon, I went to the office.
The garage had few cars coming and going in the afternoon. I walked to the exit, looking up at the camera above.
A spherical camera, red indicator light blinking.
I walked to the security booth. It was next to the garage exit, a small window facing the barrier. The window was open, and inside sat a security guard in his fifties—I'd seen him many times before, but never knew his name.
The guard was looking at his phone, a short video playing on the screen. I knocked on the window frame.
He looked up, paused the video, and asked in an unfamiliar accent: "What do you want?"
"Hello, sir," I said. "I wanted to ask—were you on duty last night?"
"Last night?" He thought for a moment. "I had the night shift—six to six. What's up?"
"Then around midnight, did you see the exit barrier lift by itself?"
The guard looked at me, expression hard to describe. Like he wanted to laugh, but something else.
"That barrier," he said. "You saw it?"
"I did."
"First tell me," the guard put his phone on the table, leaned forward. "Did you drive out?"
I hesitated, then nodded.
The guard's expression changed. He leaned back, sighed.
"Then you're in trouble."
"What do you mean?"
The guard didn't answer directly, but asked instead: "Do you know why that barrier lifts?"
"System malfunction?" I said.
He shook his head.
"That barrier occasionally lifts by itself in the middle of the night. I've worked here seven years, seen it four or five times." He said. "Every time it lifts, it's because it thinks there's a car leaving. But look—when the barrier lifts, is there a car at the exit?"
I looked at the guard. His eyes were the cloudy kind typical of older people, but I could tell he wasn't making this up.
"No car," I said. "I checked—no car."
"Right. No car. The thing that lifts the barrier isn't the property management system." He said. "It's something else. It lets you out. But not to go home."
He paused, voice lowering.
"It lets you out to pick someone up."
I stood outside the security booth, the garage entrance ramp behind me. Afternoon sunlight couldn't reach the garage, the ramp was pitch-black, cold air seeping out.
"Pick up who?" I heard myself ask.
"Did anything extra get in your car?" The guard didn't answer directly. "Go check your dashcam."
"I did," I said. "Someone was in the passenger seat."
The guard's expression didn't change—like he'd known all along.
"That's right," he said. "The ones from the bridge—they're all people who didn't make it across."
"Which bridge?" My voice tightened.
"The old concrete bridge over the river in the western suburbs," the guard said. "The one without streetlights. You've been there—you know."
My mouth opened, a buzzing sound in my head.
"Okay, don't ask anymore," the guard waved his hand. "That's all I know."
"What should I do?" I asked.
The guard stared at me for a long time. His lips moved, like he wanted to say something, but finally just said: "Next time if you see the barrier lift at midnight, don't go out."
He closed the window.
Back home, I sat on the sofa for a long time.
The guard's words played on loop in my mind. Pick someone up. The ones from the bridge—they're all people who didn't make it across.
I opened my phone map and started looking at possible routes my car might have taken last night. Turning right from the neighborhood, heading west, looking for bridges and rivers within a forty-minute drive.
On the satellite map, there was indeed a river in the western suburbs. It wasn't wide, shown as a thin blue line on the map. There were several bridges along the river. I zoomed in, checking them one by one.
Found it.
The bridge was on a fork road called "West Willow Road," surrounded by farmland on both sides. Not long, two lanes each direction, concrete surface. It matched the bridge in the dashcam footage.
I kept looking at the map.
Less than a kilometer west of the bridge, I saw a marker: Pine Crane Cemetery.
I stared at those four characters, a chill running down my spine.
Cemetery. Graveyard.
I put the phone aside, lit a cigarette, hands shaking.
After finishing that cigarette, I went to the bathroom. Turned on the hot water, splashed my face. In the mirror, my eyes were red, lips dry and cracked.
I tried to recall how I felt while driving last night. Nothing. From the garage exit to the expressway entrance, that segment of memory was blank. Like someone had cut that footage out of my mind.
But I thought of a way.
The dashcam has audio. If someone was really in the car with me, maybe I said something else.
I went back to the computer, opened the dashcam footage again. This time, I didn't watch the video—just listened.
Starting from exiting the garage, I turned the volume up to maximum.
Normal driving noises. Tires, engine, occasional bumps.
About twenty minutes into the drive, I heard a sound.
Breathing.
Very faint, very slow, rhythm different from my own.
A breath that didn't belong to me.
Coming from the direction of the passenger seat.
Then my voice. That sentence I couldn't make out before—I cranked the volume all the way up, and finally heard it.
I heard myself say:
"Are we there yet?"
It didn't sound like I was on the phone. The tone was casual, even tired. Like driving a friend home late at night, unsure of the exact location, asking casually.
After that sentence, there was a long silence in the dashcam.
Then, I said another word.
"Okay."
Just one word. Calm, like I'd received some kind of confirmation.
But I didn't hear anything.
No one answered me in the dashcam.
I sat in front of the computer, freezing. It was November afternoon, the heating was on in the house, but I felt cold to the bone.
I picked up my phone and called the property management, asking if I could access the garage exit surveillance footage.
They said surveillance footage required an application from the property management office, and only records from the past seven days were available. I said I'd come right over.
Hung up the phone, I went out and took a taxi to the property management office.
The property manager was a man in his forties, surnamed Wu, with a receding hairline. His attitude wasn't bad, but not particularly warm either. I filled out a form, saying my car seemed to have been scratched while parked last night, wanted to check the surveillance to confirm. It sounded reasonable enough.
Manager Wu took me to the security room. It was small, one wall covered with screens, a guy in his early twenties sitting in front of the console.
"Pull up last night's footage from B2 exit," Manager Wu said. "Around midnight."
The guy typed a few keys, and the B2 exit footage appeared on the screen. Time showed November 17, 23:50.
On screen, the barrier lay horizontally, quiet. Yellow lights, the neighborhood road outside the exit.
23:57.
I saw my car drive from the depths of the garage toward the exit. About ten meters from the barrier, the car stopped.
Stopped for about ten seconds.
Then the barrier lifted.
It wasn't triggered by the car's induction loop—my car was still ten meters away, outside the induction range.
The barrier lifted by itself.
My car stopped for a while longer, then slowly passed the exit and left the garage.
The surveillance timecode ticked forward second by second.
00:00. The barrier lowered.
00:14. The barrier lifted again.
But this time, there was nothing at the exit. No car, no person. The barrier just lifted by itself, stayed for a few seconds, then lowered.
"What's going on?" The guy at the console muttered, looking back at Manager Wu.
Manager Wu frowned, said nothing.
"Play that segment again," I said.
The guy played it again. Same footage, same process. My car stopped ten meters from the barrier, barrier lifted on its own, car drove away. Fourteen minutes later, the barrier lifted for no reason again, then lowered.
"System malfunction," Manager Wu concluded. "We'll have the manufacturer come check it."
I didn't say anything. I knew it wasn't a system malfunction.
Because I noticed something else.
When my car stopped ten meters from the barrier—during those ten seconds—something appeared in the footage.
The rear window of the car was closed.
But during those ten seconds, it rolled down. About a third of the way, stayed for a few seconds, then rolled back up.
The surveillance quality wasn't great, but I saw it clearly.
The rear window moved.
There was no one else in my car. Only me.
So—who got in my car from outside during those ten seconds when the barrier lifted?
Leaving the property management office, it was already dark. Winter days get dark early—streetlights came on at five thirty. I stood on the sidewalk for a while, not knowing where to go.
I remembered what the guard had said: next time if you see the barrier lift at midnight, don't go out.
But this wasn't about "next time" anymore. I'd already gone out last night, already gone to that bridge, already picked up that thing and brought it in my car.
It had ridden for forty minutes, all the way to my neighborhood gate.
Then it disappeared.
Where is it now?
I took a taxi home. On the way, my wife sent a WeChat message asking what I wanted for dinner. I replied "Whatever," staring at the flowing street scene outside the window, lost in thought.
As the taxi passed over an overpass, I suddenly remembered something.
In what the guard had said, there was a detail I'd overlooked.
He said "Every time it lifts, it's because there's a car leaving."
"A car leaving."
Not a car arriving.
Leaving.
That thing—came from inside the garage.
It wasn't outside. It was inside the garage.
It had been in the garage all along.
A string in my mind snapped.
Six o'clock in the evening. The garage was full of cars, but few people. The fluorescent lights overhead hummed with electric current, two broken ones still flickering.
I walked to my parking spot.
White car body, reflecting a pale light under the fluorescent lamps. Parked normally, same as always.
I walked around the car.
No anomalies.
I opened the door, sat in the driver's seat. The smell inside the car was the same as usual—leather, a little mustiness from the AC ducts.
I looked at the passenger seat.
The seat adjustment was where I remembered it. No traces on the cushion—no dirt, no water stains.
I reached out and touched the passenger seat cushion.
Cold.
It's winter—cold inside the car is normal. But I'd already been sitting here, the driver's seat cushion warmed by my body heat. The passenger seat should also be cold, but not this kind of cold.
This cold was different.
Not the normal chill of leather. It was a deep, penetrating cold, like something had been sitting in that seat for too long, sucking all the warmth out.
I pulled my hand back—palm soaked with sweat.
Suddenly, I remembered something. I opened the rear door.
No one in the back seat.
But the seatbelt was buckled.
I never use the rear seatbelt. Never. My wife doesn't either—she finds it too restrictive. The rear seatbelts in our car—from the day we bought it until now—should have never been pulled out.
But this seatbelt was pulled out, the buckle fastened in the latch, the belt tight across the seatback.
Like someone had been sitting here, wearing a seatbelt.
I pressed the seatbelt release. The belt snapped back, leaving a diagonal indentation on the seatback.
Staring at that indentation, only one thought crossed my mind.
Last night, after it got in the car, it sat in the back seat first.
Then at some point I didn't know about, it moved to the passenger seat.
So the rear window rolled down, it got in, fastened its seatbelt, sat there properly. Then I drove to that bridge. Then it moved to the passenger seat.
It wanted me to see it.
This thought made every hair on the back of my neck stand up.
It didn't want to hide. It never intended to hide from the start.
I locked the car, walked quickly toward the elevator. After a few steps, I stopped.
The garage was quiet, fluorescent lights humming. Somewhere in the distance, water dripped from a pipe.
I stood still, slowly turning around.
My car was parked there, facing the depths of the garage.
The lights were dimmer there, a load-bearing pillar blocking most of the view. Behind the pillar was darkness.
I stared at that darkness for a long time.
Nothing. No movement, no sound.
But I just felt—like something was watching me from that darkness.
I practically ran into the elevator.
Back home, my wife was cooking noodles in the kitchen. She asked why I was so late, I said I had to work overtime. She gave me a look, didn't ask more.
After eating, I sat in the living room, turned up the TV volume. The laughter from the variety show was loud, but couldn't drown out the buzzing in my head.
I didn't know how to get through tonight.
It was completely dark outside.
Around nine that night, my wife came out of the shower. I was still sitting in the living room, TV on, but I wasn't watching anything.
"What's wrong with you?" She sat next to me, towel draped over her shoulder, drying her hair. "You've been weird since this morning."
I thought about it, then told her about the dashcam.
She listened, hair half-dried, towel slung over her shoulder. She stared at me for a long time.
"Are you just tired?" She said.
"I know this sounds crazy," I said. "But I'm not making this up. You saw the dashcam footage yourself."
My wife didn't say anything. She took my laptop, watched the dashcam footage again. This time, she operated it herself, didn't ask me to play it.
After watching, she closed the laptop, face very pale.
"Tomorrow, let's go to a temple," she said.
"You think that'll help?"
"I don't know." She paused. "But we have to do something."
We fell silent again. The variety show ended on TV, news started. The radiator creaked.
"Leave the lights on tonight," my wife said finally.
I nodded.
That night, the living room light stayed on all night.
I turned on all the lights in every room. My wife didn't object. We lay in bed, the ceiling lamp blazing brightly, couldn't sleep at all.
I stared at the ceiling, replaying the past two days' events in my mind. The parking barrier lifting, the bridge in the dashcam, the bowed figure in the passenger seat.
And what the guard had said.
"Pick someone up."
Around two in the morning, my wife finally fell asleep. I listened to her breathing, couldn't close my eyes.
Almost three, there was a sound in the living room.
Very faint—like something had touched the floor.
I sat up immediately.
My wife rolled over, didn't wake up.
I got out of bed quietly, walked to the bedroom door. It was slightly ajar—I peeked through the crack.
The living room light was on, everything normal. Remote and cup on the coffee table, blanket draped over the sofa. Nothing unusual.
I stood there for a while, ready to go back to bed.
Then I saw it.
That cup on the coffee table.
My wife's ceramic cup, white, with a cartoon cat printed on it.
Cup facing up, placed in the exact center of the coffee table.
But after my wife finishes drinking, she never puts it in the center. She always puts it on the right armrest.
The cup had been moved.
Someone had touched it.
I froze at the bedroom door, motionless.
The living room was empty. Light on, everything normal. But that cup—it wasn't in its original position.
I closed the bedroom door, locked it.
Then I moved a chair and wedged it against the door.
That night, I didn't sleep again.
The next morning, my wife noticed the cup had been moved. She froze for a long time.
"Did you move it?" She asked me.
I shook my head.
She washed the cup, put it back in the cupboard, took out a new one. She said nothing, but from the way she was washing the dishes, I could tell her hands were shaking.
To the temple.
We went to an old temple in the eastern part of the city. It was quite popular, said to have existed since the Ming Dynasty. My wife's colleague had recommended it, said wishes always came true.
An old man in gray clothes was sweeping the temple entrance. We asked him which master we should see about this kind of thing.
The old man didn't stop sweeping, just lifted his eyes and looked at us.
"Any of them," he said. "But you have to tell him clearly—what you're looking for him to do."
I was silent for a moment, then said: "There's an extra person in my car."
The old man's broom stopped.
He looked at my face carefully, for a long time. Then he sighed, leaned the broom against the wall, and pulled something wrapped in red cloth from his pocket.
"Wear this," he said. "Don't take it off. Not even when you shower."
I took it. It was a small safety charm, tied with a red string, the cloth surface worn shiny.
"Will this work?" My wife asked.
The old man didn't answer her. He picked up the broom again, sweeping with his head down.
"The thing can help block it," he said. "But what's coming will still come."
"What do you mean?"
"You picked it up," the old man said. "So you have to send it off. Send it to where it's supposed to go—only then will it be over."
I squeezed the safety charm in my hand, knuckles white.
"Where does it want to go?"
The old man raised his eyes. I couldn't read the expression in his cloudy eyes.
"You stopped on that bridge, didn't you?" He said. "You asked it something then. It answered you. It told you."
My head exploded.
"I didn't hear its answer," I said. "It wasn't on the dashcam."
The old man looked at me, shook his head.
"You heard it," he said. "You just forgot."
Back home, I inserted the dashcam memory card again.
I listened to that segment of last night's drive over and over, seven or eight times.
After that sentence, there was a silence in the dashcam. About ten seconds. Then I said that word: "Okay."
Ten seconds of silence.
I turned the volume all the way up, put on headphones, and listened to those ten seconds frame by frame.
There was a sound.
A very low sound—like wind, or someone speaking from far away. The frequency was so low it was almost buried in the background noise.
I exported the audio file, dragged it into editing software, and zoomed in on this segment's waveform.
There was something in the noise—like someone with their mouth open, forcing sound out from deep in their throat.
Blurry, indistinct, but I could make out one word.
"Song."
Songhe Cemetery—"Song" as in Pine.
I collapsed into the chair.
All the strength drained from my body.
Around ten that night, the doorbell suddenly rang.
My wife was already asleep, I was sitting in the living room watching TV. When I heard the doorbell, my entire back stiffened.
I didn't move.
The doorbell rang twice more.
I stood up, walked to the door, and looked through the peephole.
The voice-activated light in the hallway was on.
Through the peephole, the corridor was empty. The opposite door was closed, the fire hydrant box on the wall, the light on the ceiling.
Nothing.
But I was close to the peephole—I could hear sounds in the hallway.
Footsteps.
Very faint footsteps, in the corridor, walking past, then walking back. Like someone waiting for the door to open.
I squeezed the safety charm in my hand, palm soaked.
The footsteps stopped.
Not anywhere else—directly in front of my door.
I held my breath, staring through the peephole at the outside.
The corridor was still empty.
But the voice-activated light suddenly went out.
The hallway was pitch-black.
Then I heard a sound. Not from the hallway. From inside the door.
My door lock clicked.
Not someone picking the lock.
The bolt itself had twitched.
I looked down at the door lock, at that metal bolt, vibrating slightly inside the lock body.
Once.
Again.
Like something outside the door had its hand on the doorknob, gently testing the force.
I suddenly reached out and pressed the deadbolt. Pushed it all the way in.
The bolt stopped moving.
The voice-activated light in the hallway came back on.
The footsteps disappeared.
The corridor was quiet, everything normal.
I leaned against the door, trembling all over, pajamas soaked through on the back.
The safety charm in my hand was hot.
Really hot.
Not the kind of hot from body heat. It was hot on its own—from inside out, radiating intense heat.
The next morning, I called the property management, asking to access the hallway surveillance footage from last night.
They said hallway cameras were only installed in the elevator lobby—none in the corridors.
I still went to the security room, pulled up the sixth-floor elevator lobby footage from ten to ten thirty last night.
On screen, at 10:02, the elevator doors opened.
No one stepped out.
The elevator doors stayed open for a while, then closed.
Then, the voice-activated light in the corridor direction at the bottom right of the screen turned on.
A minute later, it went off. Then came back on.
Like something was walking in the corridor.
From the elevator lobby to the end of the corridor, then back.
Stopping in front of my door.
Surveillance time: 10:08.
The voice-activated light went out. The screen went black.
About a minute later, the light came back on.
In the corridor—nothing.
I copied the video to my phone, watched it over and over, I don't know how many times.
But what made my hair stand on end wasn't the empty corridor, or the light turning on and off by itself.
It was when the elevator doors opened.
No one in the elevator.
But on the elevator floor—there was a small puddle of water.
Like something wet had been standing in the elevator.
I turned off my phone, leaned back on the sofa.
The ceiling lamp was bright and quiet.
Only the TV sound in the living room.
The safety charm around my neck—still hot.
I took it off, looked at it.
The red cloth surface was slightly charred, edges a little burnt, like something had scorched it.
I put it back on, closed my eyes.
In the neighborhood owner's group, someone posted a message.
"That garage barrier is broken again—it keeps lifting by itself at night these days. Anyone else seen this?"
Four or five replies followed:
"I saw it too—around midnight on Wednesday."
"It happened last night too—I came back around one and the barrier was up, no cars."
"Can property fix this already? It's creepy as hell in the middle of the night."
I stared at the screen, fingers ice cold.
Three days later, I drove to that bridge.
The bridge was still like in the dashcam—potholed concrete surface, tilted stone pier railings. The water under the bridge was dark, flowing slowly, almost imperceptibly.
I stopped in the middle of the bridge, turned off the engine.
The car was quiet. Seatbelt tight across my chest.
I gripped the steering wheel, glanced at the back seat in the rearview mirror.
Empty.
No other cars on the bridge, no streetlights. Only my headlights illuminating a stretch of gray-white road ahead.
I said something. Not loud, but clear in the car.
"We're here."
Silence for a few seconds.
I heard the tapping sound again. Faint, like someone tapping on plastic.
I turned my head.
In the passenger seat, a figure sat with head bowed, quiet.
I couldn't see its face.
But I heard it speak. The voice sounded like it was coming from far away, yet right next to my ear.
One word.
"Song."
My eyes burned.
I restarted the engine, turned the wheel, and drove back.
Less than a kilometer, a road sign appeared by the road.
Pine Crane Cemetery.
I stopped the car at the cemetery gate. The iron gate was closed, the inside pitch-black. I could see rows of white tombstones on the hillside in the distance.
I turned off the engine, sitting in the driver's seat.
After a long time, I turned to look at the passenger seat.
Empty.
The seatbelt was neatly retracted into the door frame, the seat clean.
The odometer never jumped again.
After getting home, I sat in the garage and cried for a long time.
I didn't let my wife see.
Later, someone in the neighborhood owner's group posted that the parking barrier had been fixed—never lifted by itself at night again.
Everyone was saying property had finally done something useful.
I muted that group.
I looked up information about Pine Crane Cemetery. There was an old post on a local forum saying there had been a car accident near the cemetery—car flipped into the river, body never recovered.
Few replies, long buried.
I still wear the safety charm. Changed the red cloth three times, the red string twice.
Once I took it off while showering and forgot to put it back on—that night the living room light turned on by itself three times.
I got up and turned it off three times.
The fourth time it turned on, I didn't turn it off.
The next day I went to the temple to find that old sweeping man—he was gone. Someone new was at the door, said they didn't know him.
I stood at the temple entrance for a long time, watching people come and go to burn incense. The sun was bright, burning my scalp.
Now I park my car as soon as the sun sets, don't go down to the garage after midnight.
Every time I drive past any bridge, I feel like there's someone sitting in the passenger seat.
Head bowed.
Quietly, waiting for me to take it to the other side.