The Faces in the Walls

Book Preview

The first night I thought I could hear it, their voices coming from the cracks in the windows, and the doors, but on the second night I was sure of it.Sometimes they'd whisper their names, or call for each other, other times they would ask for their parents. The youngest of the voices sounded only fourteen, maybe fifteen, he only ever called for his mother. This had happened for seven days.

However, on the eighth night I slept there, the decade marking of the house being abandoned, nothing happened... No nightmares, no whispering, not even them waking the halls.

It was strange and quiet, perhaps worse than when they were here and bold with their presence. It felt like the house was waiting for them to return, I could feel it in the way the floor creaked at any weight given to it, or in the way the windows would reflect the light more than usual. It was quiet.

I should have known it wouldn't last long, because, but then I found myself standing across from two boys in my basement. They couldn't see me, at least I don't think they could. However, I could so visibly see them. They're wearing school uniforms, but from different schools, and they have restaurants around their hands and feet. They looked terrified.

My mind wandered for a moment, and the image of my own brothers in the situation pierced my heart, I wanted to run over and comfort them. And when I tried, I couldn't, I couldn't even move, I wasn't even really there, I was just watching. I was so afraid of what the man was going to do, and I wanted so badly to look away...But they wouldn't let me.

And that when it happened, the moment that changed the next 3 months of my life.The boy, the younger one, first he held onto the other boy's hand, he pulled himself in front and looked straight at me, maybe even through me, but he looked my way. And maybe it was a dream, maybe I was crazy or I have superpowers. But I swear on the sun, in that moment, I could see him mouth three words. "Help me,  Yang-Jungwon."

Even after he spoke the words, and seemed to be pulled back into his own reality, I couldn't move. I took in what I could before the man got too close to them, then I shut my eyes.

The boys couldn't have been more than 17 and 19. The younger one looked the worst, exhausted and somber. He looked on the verge of complete breakage, his mouth moving once again, however, this time he spoke words of fear. He turns to the older boy, and in a slight delay to what I see, I hear his voice. "Jay hyung... I'm so scared." Despite hearing his words, they were in a foreign language, but I knew which one it was. The honorific for the older boy was the giver. And just like the delay with his voice, my vision shattered into a million pieces, followed by the noise of someone at my front door and I was brought back to my own reality. Still, faintly in the back of my mind I could hear the young boys cry for help. It played on repeat until I finally sat at my computer and typed in the boy's name... and that was where it all began. The next three months would be filled with the police at my house fourteen times, forty-six visions, forty-three spirit encounters, and seven bodies unburied from my basement.