Tonight was supposed to put my mind at ease.

Lately, everyone at work has been commenting on how exhausted I look. Honestly, they’re right. No matter how much I sleep, I wake up feeling drained, like I never actually rested at all. I figured it was stress or maybe just too many late nights staring at the TV after work. My routine is boring enough—come home, make dinner, watch something mindless, go to bed. Nothing unusual.

But a coworker suggested I try one of those sleep recording apps to see if I was snoring or talking in my sleep. So I downloaded one yesterday and let it run overnight.

I got home from work a little while ago and decided to listen to the recording.

I wish I hadn’t.

At first, it sounded normal. A few rustling sheets. Breathing. The occasional creak from my old apartment settling in the cold. Then, around 3:12 a.m., I heard something else.

A voice.

Not mine.

Actually… two voices.

I live alone.

“Hello,” a soft voice whispered. It wasn’t mine.

Silence.

Then:

“Are you awake?”

The same voice again.

The rustling of bedsheets followed.

“I’m here,” my voice answered.

I have no memory of saying that.

“Why can’t I move?” I asked the mysterious voice.

“Because you are dreaming,” it replied in a low growl. This time, it sounded closer to the recorder.

Then another voice spoke, softer and farther away.

“Can he see us?”

“Shhh… no. He’s sleeping,” the first voice answered.

More rustling sheets.

Then silence.

I replayed the recording three times, hoping I had misunderstood what I was hearing. Maybe it was the neighbors. Maybe the app glitched somehow. Maybe I was still half asleep and imagining things.

But deep down, I knew the voices were coming from inside my apartment.

The worst part wasn’t hearing the stranger.

It was hearing myself answer back.

I don’t remember waking up. I don’t remember speaking. And I definitely don’t remember asking why I couldn’t move.

I live alone.

At least, I thought I did.

After the recording ended, I just sat there at my kitchen table staring at my phone while the apartment around me creaked softly in the silence. Every little sound suddenly felt wrong—the hum of the refrigerator, the ticking pipes in the walls, even the faint rustle coming from somewhere near my bedroom.

I told myself not to look.

But when I finally worked up the nerve to check the app one last time, I noticed something I hadn’t seen before.

At 3:12 a.m., right when the voices started, the app detected movement beside my bed.

Not on it.

Beside it.