The rain hadn’t stopped for hours. It was relentless — pounding against the windows of the small apartment Lara shared with her roommate Jean. Lightning carved across the sky like celestial scars, and thunder followed with growling menace. Lara sat on the living room couch, a blanket wrapped around her legs, flipping through a mystery novel that no longer held her attention. The storm outside had swallowed all comfort.
Jean had been out for hours. She said she was just going to grab coffee with a friend and pick up some art supplies, but Lara had started to get that crawling feeling in her gut — the kind that whispers something is wrong even when everything seems fine.
Then came the knock.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Lara jumped, nearly dropping her book. The knock was frantic, almost violent, echoing through the walls.
“Lara! Open the door!” a voice cried out. “It’s me, Jean! Hurry, please! Someone’s following me!”
Lara bolted to her feet. Jean’s voice was unmistakable — breathless, desperate, terrified. Her stomach turned as she rushed to the door, one hand reaching for the lock.
And then her phone rang.
She froze, her fingers inches from the deadbolt. The ringtone sliced through the air like a warning bell.
Caller ID: Jean.
She answered with trembling fingers.
“Lara,” the voice on the phone gasped. “Don’t open the door. It’s not me. I don’t know who that is, but it’s not me. Please — don’t let them in.”
Her blood turned to ice. She stared at the door, then at the phone in disbelief.
“Wh—What do you mean it’s not you?” she whispered, backing away.
“I’m still two blocks away. I ran into something. It looked like me. It sounded like me. It’s been following me for days. I don’t know how to explain it, but it mimics. Don’t trust it, Lara. Don’t open the door no matter what you hear.”
Outside, the voice pounded again. “Please! Let me in! It’s freezing out here, and someone’s chasing me! Lara, it’s me!”
The two voices. One inside her ear, one outside the door. Both Jean.
Lara’s hands trembled as her mind spun. This had to be a prank. Some awful prank. Or she was losing it. Hallucinating.
No — the voice on the phone was steady, low, frightened but composed.
“Lara,” it whispered again, “I’ll be home in two minutes. Do not open the door until you hear me say the safe word. I’ll knock in this pattern — three knocks, pause, two knocks. Then the word.”
“Safe word?” she choked.
“Yes. Juniper. That’s how you’ll know it’s really me.”
The line went dead.
The knock outside stopped.
Silence swallowed the room, so total that Lara could hear her own heartbeat thudding in her ears.
She stared at the door. The shadows under it remained motionless. The storm kept roaring.
And then—
Click.
The doorknob twisted.
Slowly.
She hadn’t even unlocked it.
The deadbolt groaned but held firm.
“Lara,” the voice said again, now eerily calm. “I’m cold. I’m scared. Don’t you trust me?”
She backed away, not answering, not blinking. Her eyes darted to the kitchen, where a small knife sat drying on the rack. She dashed for it and gripped the handle like a lifeline.
Footsteps began to circle the house.
One set. Then two?
Then silence again.
Until—
Knock. Knock. Knock.
(pause)
Knock. Knock.
She raced back to the door, hesitated, and pressed her ear against it.
A voice whispered, “Juniper.”
“Jean?” she asked.
“Yeah. It’s really me. Please. Let me in.”
Still, Lara hesitated. Her thoughts raced. What if the thing heard the phone call? What if it knew the password too? What if it could change again?
Then something occurred to her.
“What did you say to me the night we got drunk last month?” she asked cautiously.
Silence.
Then, laughter. “You mean when you started singing Taylor Swift at the top of your lungs and swore I was your soulmate?”
She flushed, but her heart surged with relief.
She unlocked the door — slowly, carefully — and opened it just a crack.
Jean stood there, soaked, shivering, with a deep cut on her forehead and her shoes missing. Her lips were blue.
Lara flung the door open and pulled her inside.
“God, are you okay?” she cried.
Jean collapsed into her arms, trembling. “It was right behind me.”
Lara helped her to the couch, locked the door again, and drew the curtains.
Jean explained everything. The thing — whatever it was — had started following her two days ago. She’d first seen it outside her art class, standing in the rain. She thought it was someone she knew until it turned and smiled at her with her own face. Since then, it had been toying with her — hiding in mirrors, mimicking her voice, always staying just out of reach.
“What is it?” Lara asked.
“I don’t know,” Jean whispered. “But I think it can only come in if we let it.”
Lara froze.
Then came the sound again.
From the back door.
Three knocks.
Pause.
Two knocks.
Then — her voice again.
“Juniper.”
Lara and Jean turned to stare at each other.
There were two of them.
And it had been listening.
---
Lara and Jean leapt to their feet. Jean grabbed the fireplace poker, and Lara still had the kitchen knife. They crept toward the back door, hearts slamming against their ribs.
“Do we open it?” Lara asked.
Jean shook her head. “It’s testing us. Trying to see how far it can go.”
From the other side of the door, the voice said again — coldly this time, mockingly:
“Juniper, juniper, juniper. Let me in. Let me wear your skin. Let me be you.”
They recoiled.
Lara rushed to wedge the heavy dresser against the back door. Jean followed suit. The thing outside began pounding again — violently, no longer hiding its true voice. The wood creaked. The hinges groaned.
“Lara,” Jean whispered, “I think it’s losing patience.”
“Then we need to survive until it does.”
Suddenly, the lights flickered.
Then died.
The apartment went pitch black.
Lara couldn’t even see Jean, just hear her shallow breathing.
The thing outside stopped knocking.
And then… they heard it inside.
A laugh.
Behind them.
How had it gotten in?
They spun around.
A shape moved across the room.
Two glowing eyes.
Too tall. Too thin. Its limbs bent wrong. Like it had once been human, but had forgotten how.
Lara screamed and swung the knife. Jean struck with the poker. The creature dodged both, its smile stretching wider.
“You invited me in the moment you believed me,” it whispered.
Jean threw the lamp at it. The bulb shattered. Lara lunged and stabbed — the blade sinking into something cold, almost rubbery.
The thing shrieked, its skin flickering between Jean’s face and something monstrous, like a strobe of identities.
It lashed out and knocked Lara into the wall.
Jean screamed, ran forward — and grabbed the box of matches from the drawer. She lit one and hurled it onto the curtain.
Fire spread.
The creature hissed and backed away, its form twitching, unraveling.
“You don’t belong here!” Jean yelled. “You’re not real!”
The fire grew. The creature screamed, louder now, thrashing against the floor as its form melted and twisted. It turned to Jean one last time with her exact face and said, “But I could have been perfect…”
And then it vanished.
Smoke filled the room.
They ran outside into the rain, coughing, choking — but alive.
---
The next morning, the fire department declared most of the damage superficial. The fire had burned out quickly. There was no trace of the creature. No explanation.
But Lara and Jean knew.
They never spoke of it to anyone.
They moved apartments two weeks later.
To this day, they never open the door without checking twice.
---
Moral Lesson:
Not everything familiar is safe. Evil can mimic kindness, but true trust must be earned through more than a voice or a face. In life, as in fear, we must learn to see past appearances — and listen to what our instincts tell us.
