Horror Thriller Web Novel 'It’s Me, Mom—Let Me In' - Chapter 1: Come Home, Mom! A Mind-Bending Horror Thriller That Redefines Fear

Chapter 1: Come Home, Mom!

It started with a knock. Not a polite tap-tap, not the impatient rap of a delivery man. It was slow, deliberate. A knock meant to be heard and nothing more.

Knock.

A pause.

Knock. Knock.

Debra Langley sat frozen at the kitchen table, her coffee untouched. The house was still except for the wind dragging its cold fingers across the windows. She swallowed hard, staring at the front door.

Who the hell would come this late?

She glanced at the clock above the fridge. 11:57 PM.

No one had any business knocking at midnight.

She pushed her chair back slowly, careful not to let the wooden legs scrape the tile. The kitchen light flickered, casting twitching shadows over the linoleum floor. Maybe it was just the wind. Maybe she imagined it.

Knock.

No. She didn’t imagine it.

She walked toward the door, her bare feet whispering against the hardwood. The peephole—a tiny fisheye portal to whatever stood outside—felt like an invitation she didn’t want to accept.

She hesitated.

Then, a voice.

"Mom?"

The breath caught in her throat.

"Mom, it's me. Open the door."

Debra’s hand shot to her mouth. Her knees nearly buckled beneath her.

It was his voice.

No.

It couldn’t be.

She pressed her palm against the door, her pulse hammering against her ribs. Every fiber of her being screamed for her not to open it. Not to listen.

"Mom, please. I’m cold."

Tears pricked her eyes.

The voice on the other side belonged to her son. The son who had died five years ago.

Five Years Ago

It had been a stormy night, much like this one. The police lights painted the wet asphalt in violent streaks of red and blue. The officers wouldn’t let her see the body at first.

"Mrs. Langley, we need you to stay back—"

But she had pushed forward. She had to see him. Had to know.

And there he was.

Daniel.

Her baby boy, his face slack, his chest unmoving, his hoodie soaked with blood. His hand—oh God, his hand—twisted unnaturally, fingers curled as if reaching for something that wasn’t there.

"He was calling for you," one officer had whispered.

She hadn’t screamed. Hadn’t made a sound. She just dropped to her knees, numb to the cold rain seeping into her clothes. The world had gone silent.

Now

Debra’s nails dug into the wood of the door.

"Mom, please. It’s so cold out here. Let me in."

A shudder wracked through her body. Her mind raced, searching for explanations. A cruel prank? A sleep-deprived hallucination?

Her fingers hovered over the lock.

A mistake. It would be a mistake.

Then, the voice changed.

It was still her son’s voice. But there was something… wrong.

"Mom, don’t you love me anymore?"

A sob caught in her throat.

She pressed her forehead against the door, closing her eyes. "Daniel," she whispered. "You're gone, baby. You’ve been gone for five years."

Silence.

For one horrible moment, she thought it was over.

Then—

THUD.

The entire door shook as if something had hurled itself against it. The pictures on the hallway walls trembled. The ceiling light flickered again.

And then—

"Mom, open the door… or I’ll open it myself."

The voice was no longer her son’s.

It was something else.

Something that knew her son’s voice.

Her breath came in short gasps as she stumbled back, away from the door, away from the thing outside. The lock rattled, the knob twisting violently.

She turned and ran.

The last thing she heard before she fled to her bedroom, locking herself inside, was a whisper through the crack in the door.

"You should have let me in, Mom."

And then—

Silence.

Silence draped over the house like a burial shroud.

Debra pressed her back against the bedroom door, her breath coming in rapid, shallow gulps. The thing outside—it had his voice. Daniel’s voice. But it wasn’t Daniel. It couldn’t be.

She reached for the nightstand, her trembling fingers fumbling for her phone. Her thumb hovered over the emergency dial.

Call someone. Call the police. Call anyone.

But the house was still now. Nothing stirred beyond the door. No knocks. No whispers. No threats.

Had she imagined it?

She squeezed her eyes shut, shaking her head. No. It wasn’t a dream. It had been real.

Then—

Knock.

She choked on a scream.

Not from the front door.

This time, the sound came from inside the house.

Right outside her bedroom door.

Knock. Knock.

The slow, deliberate rhythm sent ice crawling down her spine.

"Mom... why did you run?"

The voice wasn’t coming from the other side of the front door anymore. It was closer. Right outside.

No. That wasn’t possible.

She had heard it outside. There hadn’t been footsteps, no sound of movement. So how was it here?

Debra’s hand clenched the doorknob from her side, keeping it shut. A sickening thought crept into her mind—what if it was never outside to begin with?

The knocking stopped.

Then—

A long, dragging scrape. Like nails running down the wood.

She slapped her hand over her mouth to stifle a sob.

"You locked me out, Mom. That wasn't very nice."

A slow, careful inhale. Then—

"Do you want to see what I look like now?"

Tears streamed down her face.

"I changed."

The words slithered through the door, thick with something almost playful.

Then—

The doorknob twisted.

Once.

Twice.

It stopped.

A beat of silence stretched between them.

Then—

The lock clicked open.

Debra gasped, stumbling backward.

She hadn’t unlocked it.

She hadn’t unlocked it.

The door creaked open an inch. Then another. The air beyond it was impossibly dark.

"Mom."

Debra reached for the nearest thing—her bedside lamp—and hurled it at the door.

CRASH!

The ceramic shattered, plunging the room into darkness.

Silence.

Nothing moved beyond the open door.

Then—

A footstep.

Soft. Slow.

Debra’s heart slammed against her ribs.

"I don’t think you understand, Mom."

The voice had changed again. Deeper. Hungrier.

"I don’t need you to open doors for me anymore."

Then, something crawled into the room.

The floorboards groaned as a shape unfolded from the darkness.

Not walking. Pulling itself forward.

A glint of something pale—skin, or what used to be skin—dragged into the thin strip of moonlight.

It wasn’t her son.

It had never been her son.

The last thing she saw before she screamed was its face.

Something wearing Daniel’s smile.

Debra’s scream never fully formed. It hit the back of her throat, strangled and useless, as the thing pulled itself into the room.

The moonlight stretched thin over its body, revealing twisted limbs, and too-long fingers that curled against the floor. Its skin—if it could be called that—was the color of candle wax left too long in the sun.

But its face—oh God, its face—was Daniel’s.

Daniel’s eyes. Daniel’s nose. Daniel’s smile.

Only the smile was wrong. Too wide. Too full of teeth.

Debra scrambled back, hands clawing at the floor for something—anything—to defend herself. Her fingers brushed a shard of the broken lamp. She grabbed it, the ceramic slicing into her palm.

The thing crawled closer.

"Mom."

The voice still carried his lilt, his inflection. But there was something rotten in it now. Something knowing.

"You don’t look happy to see me."

Debra gritted her teeth, gripping the shard tighter. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears. This isn’t real. This isn’t real.

The thing tilted its head. Its neck cracked like dry wood.

"What’s wrong?" It pouted, dragging itself another inch forward. Its fingers—long, wrong—tapped at the floor. Tap, tap, tap.

Then—

Scuttle.

Something moved on the thing’s body.

Debra’s breath hitched.

Tiny, spindly legs rippled beneath its skin. The surface of its stomach shifted. Bubbled.

And then—

They came out.

Cockroaches.

A wave of them.

Slick, black, and pouring from the thing’s mouth. From its nose. From the cracks in its stretched lips.

Debra gagged as the first roach hit the floor, then another, then a torrent. They skittered toward her, moving in a synchronized wave. The air filled with the wet clicking of their legs, the disgusting slap of their bodies against the wood.

And the thing—the thing wearing her son’s face—began to eat them.

It scooped them into its hands, stuffing them into its mouth, its too-wide grin never faltering.

"So hungry, Mom."

Debra screamed.

She launched the shard of the lamp at its face.

The thing caught it.

Not with its hands.

With its teeth.

It bit down, the shard snapping in half like a cracker.

Debra turned and ran.

She sprinted toward the door, her feet crunching over the cockroaches, her stomach heaving as their bodies burst under her weight.

But the thing—it was faster.

It didn’t run.

It twitched.

One moment, it was across the room.

The next, it was at the door. Blocking it.

"Mom, why are you running?"

Its voice shifted again. A dozen voices at once.

Daniel’s.

Her own.

Something else.

Then, its stomach opened.

Split right down the middle, peeling like an overripe fruit.

Inside—not organs. Not flesh.

More cockroaches. Thousands of them. A writhing, undulating mass.

And deep inside the hollow, something watched her.

Something bigger.

Something that had never been Daniel.

"Come home, Mom."

And then—

It smiled again.

Debra Langley couldn’t scream. Her throat was stone. Her legs were lead.

The thing in front of her—wearing her dead son’s face—grinned too wide, its lips splitting at the corners like a ruptured seam. Black liquid pooled at the edges of its mouth, dribbling down its chin like spilled ink.

And its stomach—oh God, its stomach.

The skin there had split open, not like a wound, but like a mouth. It yawned in a grotesque, hungry O, slick and pulsing.

Inside wasn’t flesh.

Inside wasn’t anything human.

Inside was movement.

Shifting. Twisting. A mass of something alive.

Cockroaches, but not just cockroaches.

Something else.

Something that watched her.

Then—

The thing spoke.

"Mom, what’s inside me?"

The voice was Daniel’s, but something was off. Too slow. Too… thoughtful. As if it was genuinely curious.

Debra stumbled backward. Her spine hit the nightstand. A picture frame crashed to the floor, glass shattering, but she didn’t dare look away.

The thing tilted its head, like a dog listening to a sound only it could hear.

"I don’t think it’s me in here anymore," it whispered.

Its fingers twitched. Then—

They moved wrong.

Instead of curling like normal knuckles should, they folded backward. Like a dead spider curling in on itself.

Debra gagged.

"But it’s still hungry, Mom."

The thing’s voice warped. Lower now. Deeper. Like something buried beneath layers and layers of voices, all whispering at once.

Then, with agonizing slowness, it reached into its open stomach.

And pulled something out.

Debra’s breath stopped.

A cockroach. But bigger.

Too big.

As long as her forearm, its body slick and pulsating, its legs wrong. Too many of them.

And its eyes—

They were Daniel’s.

Two milky-blue human eyes embedded in the black shell, staring at her, blinking.

"Do you see it, Mom?" The thing grinned wider, cradling the monstrous insect-like an infant. "It looks like me."

Debra shook her head. “No.” Her voice barely escaped. “This isn’t real. You’re not real.”

The thing sighed.

"You always say that."

And then—

It bit into the roach.

Its teeth sank deep.

A wet, crunching sound filled the room. Thick black fluid dripped from its mouth, splattering onto the hardwood.

The cockroach—**Daniel’s-eyed cockroach—**twitched feebly in its grip.

It was still alive.

Still blinking.

And then, it spoke.

"Mom?"

Debra screamed.

She lunged for the dresser, grabbing the heaviest thing she could find—a metal candleholder.

The thing tilted its head again.

"You’re going to hit me, Mom?"

Debra’s hands trembled around the cold metal. Do it. Do it before it moves again.

Then, the smell hit her.

A wave of something rotting. But not just any rot.

Meat. Old meat. Spoiled.

And beneath it—

Daniel’s shampoo.

His old apple-scented shampoo. The one she used to buy when he was a kid.

Her grip weakened.

And the thing laughed.

Not a cackle. Not a monstrous screech.

A soft, warm chuckle.

Daniel laugh.

"You hesitated."

And then—

It moved.

Debra swung the candleholder, but it wasn’t fast enough.

The thing—the thing wearing Daniel’s face—moved like a thought, too quick for her eyes to follow.

One second, it was in front of her.

The next—

It was beside her ear.

"Mom."

Debra whirled, swinging wildly. The candleholder cut through empty air.

The thing wasn’t there anymore.

Then—

Tap.

A sound behind her.

Debra spun again.

And her stomach dropped.

The thing was sitting on her bed now, legs crossed, hands folded neatly in its lap. Like Daniel used to sit when he was little.

It smiled.

"Are you mad at me?"

Her breath hitched.

No. No, this was wrong.

It wasn’t just wearing Daniel’s face.

It was wearing his mannerisms. His way of speaking. The tilt of his head, the nervous fidget of his fingers against his knee—it had studied him.

It knew him.

And it was using it against her.

"You used to tuck me in, Mom," it said, voice soft. Too soft. "Remember?"

Debra clenched her teeth. “You’re not him.”

The thing blinked.

"Then who am I?"

"You tell me." She tightened her grip on the candleholder, forcing her voice steady. "You knocked on my door. You said you were my son. What are you?"

The thing’s smile faltered for the first time.

It looked down at its hands. Flexed its fingers.

"I… don’t know."

The air shifted.

Something about it changed.

For a split second, Debra saw something else behind its face. Not Daniel. Not human.

Something peeking through.

And it looked—

Confused.

It looked like it was trying to remember.

The candleholder felt heavier in her hands. A new kind of fear slithered into her bones.

She licked her lips, choosing her words carefully.

"What do you remember?"

The thing frowned, its too-wide lips twitching.

"The dark," it said slowly. "The hunger."

It tilted its head as if listening to something only it could hear.

"And then—"

It looked at her.

The pupils of its eyes—Daniel’s eyes—dilated, blown wide like black holes.

"You called me."

Debra’s breath caught.

"I didn’t."

The thing nodded. Earnest. Certain.

"You did."

A flicker of something old passed over its face.

"You missed him. You wanted him back."

The words sliced through her like a blade.

She did.

She had begged for it, prayed for it, whispered his name into the dark on the worst nights, when the house was too quiet when grief gnawed at her ribs like rats in the walls.

Had something been listening?

Her fingers loosened on the candleholder.

The thing noticed.

Its grin returned.

"Do you want to see him, Mom?"

Debra’s stomach clenched.

"What?"

The thing slowly rose from the bed, its spine unfurling too long, too fluid.

"I can bring him back."

No.

No, this was a trick.

But—

A tiny, traitorous part of her ached at the thought.

"Just say it," the thing whispered. "Say you want him back."

Debra took a step back. “You’re lying.”

It took a step forward.

"No, Mom."

It reached for her.

"I’m waiting for you to mean it."

And then—

The lights went out.

Darkness swallowed the room.

Not the usual kind of darkness—the soft, natural shadow of night.

This was thick.

Heavy.

Moving.

Debra couldn’t see her own hands. Couldn’t see the thing in front of her. Couldn’t see anything at all.

But she could hear.

A faint, wet shuffling.

Something dragging itself closer.

And then—

"Mom?"

Daniel’s voice.

But this time—it was different.

Not the thing’s imitation. Not the too-perfect mimicry.

This was…

Smaller.

Weaker.

Like when he was little, waking her up after a nightmare.

"Mom, I can’t see."

Debra’s breath caught. Her hands clenched into fists.

No. No, this was another trick.

She wasn’t falling for it.

"Mom, where am I?"

The voice trembled.

Debra’s pulse hammered in her throat.

“Stop it.” Her own voice was shaking. “You’re not him.”

A beat of silence.

Then—

"Mom, please—"

The desperation in the voice hit her like a knife between the ribs.

It sounded so real.

She pressed her hands to her ears. “You’re lying. You’re lying to me.”

"I don’t know where I am, Mom."

A sob choked in her throat.

"Stop it!"

"It’s dark, Mom. It’s so dark—"

Something cold brushed her arm.

She jerked back, heart slamming against her ribs.

The voice quivered.

"Why won’t you help me?"

And then—

The darkness moved.

Not away.

Inside.

It slid into her ears, her nose, her mouth.

A pressure—deep, suffocating—wrapped around her skull, pushing into her thoughts like hands rummaging through drawers.

And suddenly—

She wasn’t in her bedroom anymore.

She was somewhere else.

A place where the air was thick and damp, where the ground beneath her wasn’t wood but something softer, something that pulsed beneath her bare feet.

The sky above wasn’t black.

It was skin.

A ceiling of flesh, twitching like something vast and half-awake.

And hanging from it—

Bodies.

Hundreds of them. Cocooned in black silk, their faces barely visible through the translucent membrane.

She recognized them.

Neighbors. Strangers.

And—

Daniel.

A smaller shape.

Suspended.

Blinking.

"Mom?"

Her knees nearly buckled.

“Daniel?”

He struggled weakly against the silk, his little hands pressing out.

"It’s cold here."

Debra’s breath came in short, sharp gasps. “I don’t— I don’t understand—”

"You left me, Mom."

Tears blurred her vision.

No.

No, this wasn’t real.

But then—

One of the other cocooned bodies twitched.

Then another.

Then—

They turned their heads.

All of them.

Faces shifting beneath the black silk.

Not angry.

Not hungry.

Curious.

Debra staggered back.

This wasn’t just about her.

This thing—this place—had been waiting for someone to bring it back.

And she had opened the door.

The thing’s voice—everywhere now—whispered.

"Do you want him back, Mom?"

Her eyes darted to Daniel’s small form. He was so still.

Her heart screamed yes.

Her mind begged her to run.

And then—

The black silk around Daniel began to tear.

The black silk ripped like wet paper.

Debra watched in horror as her son—her real son—fell forward, his tiny hands grasping blindly.

His body hit the fleshy ground with a sickening, wet slap.

"Daniel!"

She lunged, dropping to her knees, hands shaking as she reached for him. His skin was cold and clammy. His little chest barely moved, ribs rising and falling in shallow gasps.

He was alive.

Alive.

But—

He felt wrong.

His hair—so much longer than it had ever been in life—hung in tangled knots, and his fingers… they weren’t right.

Too thin. Too many joints.

Like something else had been growing inside him.

Like something else had been waiting for her to take him.

Then—

His eyelids fluttered.

Debra froze.

"Mom?"

The word was so small. So fragile.

Tears burned down her cheeks. “I’m here, baby.” She pulled him into her arms, rocking him, cradling him, trying to ignore the way his skin felt almost… loose.

Like it wasn’t fully attached.

He stirred against her.

"It’s so dark here, Mom."

A sob tore from her throat.

“I know, honey. I’m getting you out. I promise.”

Daniel’s fingers curled into her shirt. His body shuddered.

"I can still hear them."

Debra stiffened.

“Hear who?”

Daniel’s breath hitched. His tiny hands tightened in her shirt.

"The others."

Then, the air shifted.

The bodies hanging in the silk twitched.

Not randomly.

In unison.

The thing that had been pretending to be Daniel—the one from her bedroom—laughed.

It was everywhere now.

"You think you’re saving him, Mom?"

Debra’s arms tightened around Daniel.

“I don’t think anything. I know I am.”

The laughter slithered through the walls, through the ceiling of skin.

"Then why does he look so scared?"

Debra glanced down.

Daniel was staring at her.

His eyes—too big now, too round.

Not brown anymore.

Not blue.

Just—

Black.

Her breath caught.

No.

No, she had gotten him back.

This was Daniel.

Then—

He opened his mouth.

And inside—

There were teeth.

Not like a child’s. Not human.

Rows and rows of tiny, writhing teeth, overlapping like a shark’s.

And they were moving.

Debra screamed.

Daniel—or whatever he was now—tilted his head. His lips curled up into something like a smile.

"What’s wrong, Mom?"

She shoved him away.

His body hit the ground hard. But he didn’t cry. Didn’t whimper.

He just laughed.

A sound too deep for his small frame.

And from the hanging cocoons, voices began to join in.

Laughing.

All of them laughing.

And then—

They began to open.

The cocoons split open like rotten fruit.

One by one, limbs spilled out. Twisted hands, elongated fingers, bodies slithering free, dropping onto the wet, pulsing ground with a sickening thud.

Debra couldn’t breathe.

Couldn’t move.

Her son—her thing-that-was-her-son—crawled toward her, his tiny fingers scraping the flesh floor.

"Mom." His voice was a whisper, a promise. "You left me alone in the dark."

The other things—the things that had been sleeping—began to rise.

Debra staggered back.

One of them turned toward her.

A woman.

Or at least, something shaped like one.

Her skin was translucent, veins crawling underneath like vines. Her head lolled too far to the side as if her neck had never been made to support it.

And her mouth—

Oh God.

It peeled back.

Not in a scream. Not in words.

Just opening.

A vertical split from chin to sternum.

A gaping, black void.

Then—

She laughed.

No sound.

Just the horrible vibration of something not meant to exist.

More cocoons peeled.

More things stepped free.

Some weren’t even fully formed.

A man with no eyes, just smooth, waxy skin stretched too tight over his skull.

A child with too many fingers, growing from places no fingers should be.

A thing that didn’t even have a body—just a mess of bones held together by something unseen.

And all of them were watching her.

Waiting.

Debra’s mind was fracturing.

This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be.

But she could smell them.

The rot. The damp. The unnatural wrongness.

And the worst part—

She recognized them.

Neighbors. Strangers from town.

Even—

Her husband.

"Patrick."

He stood near the back, his body twisting like he wasn’t sure how to hold himself together anymore. His face—half there, half dissolving into something else.

But his mouth still worked.

"Debra."

Her heart shattered.

“P-Patrick?”

"You found him." His voice was thin, stretched. "You brought him back."

Her legs buckled.

No.

Patrick had been dead for three years.

Drowned.

His car had been found in the river, the driver’s seat empty, the door wide open. The cops had never found a body.

She had wondered.

Had prayed.

Had whispered his name in the quiet of the night, the same way she whispered Daniel’s.

Had called him.

And something had listened.

Patrick smiled.

His teeth were wrong.

"You called me too, didn’t you?"

The laughter around her rose.

The cocoons kept opening.

More faces she knew. More people she had lost.

The teacher from Daniel’s school, the old woman from the grocery store, the mailman who vanished last winter.

They weren’t missing.

They were here.

Waiting.

And then—

Daniel moved.

Not toward her.

Toward Patrick.

Her son—her thing-that-was-her-son—crawled across the wet, pulsing floor and took Patrick’s hand.

And Patrick looked down at him, his not-quite-human face stretching into something close to love.

"There you are, buddy."

Daniel beamed.

"Dad."

And then—

They turned toward her.

Debra’s breath caught.

Her husband.

Her son.

And all around them, the ones that had woken up.

Waiting.

Watching.

And then—

Daniel spoke.

"Come home, Mom."

And every mouth in the dark whispered with him.

"Come home."

Debra stepped back, her bare feet sinking into the damp, pulsing ground. It wasn’t soil. It wasn’t stone. It was alive.

The walls around her—if they could even be called walls—breathed.

And all of them—Daniel, Patrick, the others—stood before her.

Smiling.

Waiting.

"Come home, Mom."

"Come home, Debra."

A chorus of voices.

Some familiar. Some not.

Debra’s hands shook.

“I—” She swallowed. “I don’t belong here.”

Daniel’s head tilted. His skin twitched.

"Of course, you do."

Patrick took a step forward, his body glitching, like a bad signal on a TV screen.

"You never really left, honey."

Debra’s breath came in short, sharp gasps. “That’s not true. I’m—I’m alive.”

Daniel’s smile widened.

"Are you?"

A terrible, twisting cold wrapped around her bones.

This wasn’t real.

It wasn’t.

Then—

The others began to whisper.

Not in words.

In memories.

Her memories.

"The blue dress you wore at my funeral."

The old woman from the grocery store. Her lips were sewn shut, but her voice pressed into Debra’s mind like fingers.

"You were late picking me up from school that day, remember?"

Daniel. His black, black eyes were unblinking.

"You let me drown."

Patrick.

Debra’s vision blurred.

No.

No, she hadn’t.

“Stop it.” Her voice shook. “You’re not real.”

Patrick’s head twitched.

"That’s funny."

And then—

His skin peeled away.

Not ripped. Not torn.

Unfolded.

Like someone removing a mask.

And what was underneath—

Wasn’t Patrick.

It was something older.

Something that had been waiting for her for a long, long time.

And it remembered her.

Debra staggered backward.

Daniel’s tiny hand reached for hers.

"You don’t have to be scared, Mom."

His fingers curled around her wrist.

"You already belong to us."

And then—

She remembered.

The accident.

The water.

The feeling of falling.

The moment when her body had hit the river when the icy darkness had closed over her like a mouth.

The moment she had died.

No.

No, she had survived.

Hadn’t she?

Daniel leaned closer.

"Come home."

And every voice whispered with him.

"Come home."

And then—

The ground beneath her opened.

The ground beneath Debra opened like a mouth.

Not a hole. Not an abyss.

A mouth.

The flesh beneath her feet peeled apart, wet and glistening, revealing rows of teeth. Not human teeth. Not animal teeth. Teeth that looked grown for something specific.

Something like her.

A perfect fit.

Debra lurched back, nearly slipping. The pulsing floor shuddered, eager, as if tasting the air for her.

The whispers hadn’t stopped.

"Come home, Mom."

"Come home, Debra."

"It’s waiting."

The cocooned bodies above her twitched, their faces stretching against the translucent silk. Not struggling.

Chewing.

She could see their mouths moving—whispering her name.

She turned, frantic, her vision swimming.

Patrick’s skinless face watched her with something that almost looked like pity.

"Why are you fighting?" he murmured. "You don’t belong there, Debra. You never did."

She shook her head.

"I don’t understand."

Patrick tilted his head, his raw, exposed muscles twitching.

"Yes, you do."

Daniel stepped forward, his small wrong fingers reaching for her again.

"You were supposed to die in the river, Mom."

A sound escaped her lips—half sob, half broken laugh.

“No. No, I—I survived.”

Daniel blinked his black, black eyes.

"Did you?"

The words punched the breath out of her.

A memory flickered—the moment in the water.

The cold. The dark. The way her body had surrendered.

And then—

The hands.

Not the rescuers. Not the paramedics.

Something else.

Something that had pushed her back.

Up.

Out of the dark.

Back into life.

But not all of her.

Debra’s pulse slammed against her ribs.

She touched her own skin, her own arms. She was here. She was real.

Wasn’t she?

Patrick smiled.

"Do you want to see?"

The cocooned bodies above her jerked.

And then—

They spoke.

Her voice.

"I never left."

"I never left."

"I never left."

The sound collapsed her mind in on itself.

She spun to Daniel. “You’re lying! I’m alive! I’m—”

His tiny wrong hand grabbed hers.

"Come home, Mom."

And then—

The flesh beneath her feet gave way.

She fell.

Debra plunged downward.

Not through air. Not through darkness.

Through something alive.

The tunnel walls—if it could even be called that—pulled at her.

Not just her body.

Her.

Her thoughts.

Her memories.

With each inch she fell, something peeled away.

Daniel’s first steps—ripped from her mind.

The scent of Patrick’s aftershave—torn from her like old wallpaper.

Her mother’s voice—gone, gone, gone.

She wasn’t just falling.

She was being undone.

Then—

She stopped.

No impact. No collision.

Just—

Stillness.

The tunnel spit her out.

She landed on her feet.

Somewhere impossible.

A house.

Her house.

But not.

Something was wrong with it.

The walls breathed. The ceiling twitched.

The air smelled like wet earth and something metallic.

She took a shaky step forward.

And then—

A voice.

Her voice.

"You shouldn’t have come back."

Debra whipped around.

And froze.

There, standing in the doorway, was herself.

The same face. The same body. The same eyes.

But this Debra—

Her skin was cracked.

Not like dry skin.

Like porcelain.

Hairline fractures ran along her face, her arms, her throat. And beneath them—

Something moved.

Something underneath the skin.

Watching her.

"You were supposed to stay up there."

Debra’s mouth went dry.

“What… are you?”

The Other Debra smiled. Her teeth weren’t teeth.

They were tiny hands.

Hundreds of them, gripped the inside of her mouth, flexing.

"I’m the one that stayed behind."

Debra’s heart thundered.

“No. No, I—”

The Other Debra stepped forward. The cracks in her skin widened.

"When you drowned, something pulled you back."

Her voice was wrong.

Like it was coming from too many places at once.

"But not all of you made it."

Debra staggered back.

That wasn’t true.

It couldn’t be true.

She was alive.

She was real.

The Other Debra tilted her head, the fractures deepening.

"If you’re real…" she whispered.

And then—

She lunged.

"Then what am I?"

The Other Debra rushed her.

Not running.

Not crawling.

Gliding.

Like something that had never learned how to move like a person.

Debra stumbled back.

Her face—cracked like old china—came closer, too close, until she could see the things moving underneath the skin.

Not veins.

Not muscles.

Something else.

"You were never supposed to return," the Other Debra whispered.

Debra's back hit the wall.

"No," she gasped. "You're lying. You're—you're just part of this—this nightmare—"

The Other Debra tilted her head.

And then—

She peeled back her own skin.

Not in strips.

Not like flesh.

Like fabric.

Like a mask, she had worn for too long.

And what was beneath—

Debra couldn’t scream.

Because it wasn’t a face.

It was a hole.

A deep, black hollow, stretching down into forever.

And inside—

Something was looking at her.

From inside herself.

"You left me behind." The voice didn’t come from the hole. It came from inside Debra’s own skull.

"You thought you survived."

Debra’s hands trembled. “I did.”

"No."

The voice wasn’t her own anymore. It was Daniel’s.

It was Patrick’s.

It was her mother’s.

All of them.

"You didn’t survive, Debra. You just left me here."

The room shuddered.

The walls breathed in.

And suddenly, she wasn’t standing in the house anymore.

She was back in the river.

Sinking.

The cold punched the air from her lungs.

Her arms thrashed.

She kicked, but the water was too thick, too strong.

And below here—

Something waited.

Not a shadow.

Not a creature.

Herself.

The part of her that had never left the river.

It reached up, its fingers curling around her ankle.

"Time to come home."

And then—

It pulled her under.

Water filled her lungs.

It rushed down her throat, cold as death, thick as oil.

Debra kicked, clawed, thrashed, but the hands—her hands—held tight around her ankle, dragging her deeper, pulling her down into something that had been waiting.

Something that had been forgotten.

"You thought you survived."

The voice wasn’t coming from above.

It was coming from inside her.

Her own voice, whispering in her skull, slithering down her spine like fingers pressing against her bones.

"But you left me here."

Debra jerked against the pull, but the water wasn’t just water anymore. It was thicker now, warmer.

And when she looked down—

She saw faces.

Hundreds.

Thousands.

All watching.

Not strangers.

Not creatures.

Versions of herself.

Some with their throats split open, red ribbons twisting in the current.

Some with their eyes stitched shut, a black thread woven through the sockets like a doll that had been sewn wrong.

Some that were still screaming, mouths open wide, but no sound escaping.

They weren’t dead.

They were waiting.

Waiting for her.

"It has to be fair, Debra."

Her own voice whispered again.

"One of us gets to go back."

A shape broke away from the others.

The Other Debra.

Her cracked, porcelain face smiled as she rose toward the surface.

Toward her life.

Toward her body.

"And this time, it’s me."

Debra’s lungs burned.

No.

No, she was real.

She was the one who survived.

She was—

The fingers on her ankle tightened.

And yanked her down.

Her last breath—stolen.

The last thing she saw before the darkness swallowed her whole was the Other Debra breaking through the surface.

And smiling.

The Wrong One Came Back.

To Be Continued...

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