The Tenant

I moved into apartment 8C six months ago.

The building was old, cheap, and quiet enough that I could ignore the constant smell of mildew in the stairwell.

The landlord only gave me one warning before handing over the keys.

“Don’t bother the people in 8D.”

At the time, I didn’t think much of it.

But the strange thing was, apartment 8D was supposed to be empty.

The mailbox had no name.

No lights ever came on.

No packages showed up outside the door.

And according to another tenant, nobody had lived there since a man disappeared inside it three years ago.

The Window

The first time I saw him was during a thunderstorm.

I was making coffee around 2 in the morning when lightning lit up the courtyard outside my kitchen window.

That’s when I noticed a figure standing inside apartment 8D.

Perfectly still.

Watching me from across the courtyard.

I nearly dropped the mug.

The apartment had no electricity.

I knew that because every single window inside was dark except for the pale blue glow coming from somewhere deeper in the room.

The figure slowly raised one arm.

Then waved.

Three small motions.

Back and forth.

I stared for several seconds before forcing myself to wave back out of pure awkward instinct.

The figure immediately disappeared.

Not walked away.

Not stepped back.

Gone.

The Hallway

The next morning, I asked the landlord about it.

The second I mentioned apartment 8D, his expression changed.

“You saw someone in there?”

“Yeah. Tall guy. Thin. Maybe middle-aged.”

The landlord looked genuinely unsettled.

Then he asked me something strange.

“Did he wave at you first?”

I nodded.

He muttered something under his breath and unlocked his office drawer.

From inside, he pulled out a faded photograph.

The picture showed four people standing in the lobby of the building sometime in the late 90s.

One of them was the man I saw in the window.

Tall.

Thin.

Long gray coat.

The landlord pointed at him with a shaking finger.

“That’s Elias.”

“What happened to him?”

“He lived in 8D alone for fifteen years,” the landlord said quietly. “One night the neighbors heard screaming from his apartment.”

He swallowed hard before continuing.

“When the police forced the door open, the apartment was empty.”

“No blood. No signs of struggle. Nothing.”

Then he looked directly at me.

“Except for the handprints on the inside of the windows.”

The Pattern

After that, I tried to ignore the apartment completely.

But every night at exactly 2:14 AM, the figure appeared again.

Always standing at the same window.

Always waving three times.

And every single time I looked away for even a second, he vanished.

I started sleeping with the blinds closed.

That only made things worse.

Because then the knocking started.

Three slow knocks against my front door every night at 2:14.

The first night it happened, I looked through the peephole.

Nobody was there.

But apartment 8D’s door across the hall was slightly open.

Just enough for darkness to spill into the hallway.

The Call

Two nights ago, I woke up to my phone ringing.

Unknown number.

I answered half asleep.

At first, there was only static.

Then a voice whispered:

“Don’t wave back tonight.”

The call ended immediately after.

I checked the time.

2:13 AM.

One minute later, the knocking started.

Three slow knocks.

I stayed frozen in bed.

Another three knocks followed.

Then silence.

Against my better judgment, I walked to the peephole.

The hallway was empty again.

Except apartment 8D’s door was now wide open.

Inside, I could see pale blue light flickering from somewhere deep in the apartment.

And standing in the doorway was Elias.

Smiling at me.

Slowly raising his hand.

Waiting.

The Apartment

I should have stayed inside.

Instead, I opened my door.

The hallway instantly became freezing cold.

Elias backed into apartment 8D without taking his eyes off me.

The blue light pulsed softly from inside.

I stepped closer and looked past him.

The apartment was impossibly large.

Far larger than mine.

The hallway inside stretched much deeper than the building itself should allow.

And lining both walls were windows.

Hundreds of them.

Every single window had someone behind it.

Men.

Women.

Children.

All pale.

All silent.

All pressing their hands against the glass from the inside.

Then I realized something horrifying.

Some of them were waving at me too.

Three small motions.

Back and forth.

Back and forth.

Elias leaned close enough for me to smell damp earth on his clothes.

Then he whispered:

“Now they know you can see them.”

The apartment door slammed shut behind me.