Lena started hearing it the day after her father's funeral. A low, almost imperceptible static, like an old TV left on in another room. Faint but constant.
She thought it was tinnitus at first. Stress. Lack of sleep. Grief. Her doctor agreed.
But it wasn't in her ears.
It moved.
Some nights it was louder in the kitchen. Other times, behind the bathroom mirror. Once, she followed it to the laundry room and swore it was whispering beneath the hum, just low enough that she couldn't quite make out the words.
"You need rest," her sister told her."You need help," her therapist said."You're fine," Lena whispered to herself, every night.
The static got louder.
One evening, she turned on every faucet in the apartment, just to drown it out. The sound was relentless, like a signal fighting to break through. She unplugged everything, TVs, clocks, even the fridge. Still, the static persisted.
Then things started changing.
She'd wake up to lights already on. Furniture slightly moved. Her toothbrush wet before she touched it. She lived alone. Or at least, she thought she did.
She began recording the nights, just audio at first. After a week of nothing but low static, she played back a clip and froze.
It said her name.
Not whispered. Not screamed. Just spoken. Flat. Unfeeling.
"Lena."
That was it.
She deleted the file and stopped recording. But the voice didn't stop.
Now, the static came with memories that weren't hers. Flashes of a hallway she didn't recognize. A red door. A cracked mirror. A name she never knew, but felt familiar.
She tried to ask her therapist about it, but when she brought it up, his mouth moved, but the only thing she heard was the static. Loud, blaring, like a warning.
Everyone she spoke to after that, static. The grocery clerk. Her sister. The man who knocked at her door asking for directions. Their lips moved, but the only sound was white noise.
She started writing on paper instead. That worked. For a while.
Then she stopped hearing her own voice.
Now, the world is silent except for the static. And within it, something is trying to explain. Not in words. In feeling. In flashes. In images of a place she's never been, but somehow never left.
Maybe she's not hearing things at all.
Maybe she's remembering.
Last known entry in Lena's journal, found in an otherwise empty apartment:
"I don't think the static is coming from outside. I think it's what's left of me, echoing back. I think I'm the signal. And something else is tuning in."