Elias felt a breath, cold and smelling of damp earth, brush against the nape of his neck.
He reached for the remote to toggle the settings, but the plastic felt freezing, almost wet. As his thumb hovered over the button, the text changed.
But it wasn't the movie that held Elias’s attention. It was the text at the bottom of the screen. subtitle 13 Eerie
Elias frowned, leaning forward. He hadn't seen the first twelve subtitles. In fact, there had been no dialogue at all, no music, just the rhythmic whir-clack of a projector that shouldn't have been there.
The pale light of the television flickered against the peeling wallpaper of the motel room, casting long, distorted shadows that seemed to dance just out of sight. On the screen, a silent film from a forgotten era played—black and white figures moving with jerky, unnatural precision. Elias felt a breath, cold and smelling of
Elias bolted upright. He stared at the heavy oak door. The deadbolt was thrown, the chain was engaged. But as he watched, the brass chain began to slide, link by link, as if pulled by a slow, invisible hand. There was no sound of metal on metal. Only the silence of the room, heavy and suffocating.
The television screen went pitch black, leaving Elias in total darkness. The only thing left was the text, glowing with a faint, sickly green light in the center of the void. But it wasn't the movie that held Elias’s attention
Elias felt the bedframe vibrate. A soft, wet scraping sound rose from the floorboards. Every instinct screamed at him to run, to jump, to scream. But his muscles were lead. He kept his eyes locked on the television, watching his own reflection on the screen slowly turn its head toward the edge of the mattress.