The Silent call- Mystery on the other side of the phone | Read exciting mystery stories

 The Silent call- Mystery on the other side of the phone

The first time someone called me at 2 – 13, I was in a slumber, struggling through the deep end of the subconscious abyss of the mind. The sound of the vibrating on the nightstand jerked me up in bed, my heart was thumping as if I was running from some sinister figures. Then I screwed up my eyes again at the screen and the numbers flickered and were different from the other. My groggy mind thought it was a joke and submerged into the bed for the elusive tranquillizer I couldn’t find. 

 But the calls kept on coming. Night after night—2:13 AM. An unbreakable routine I was undergoing every day. Every time, I looked at the caller ID and wondered whether to answer it or not and never did have the courage to speak into the empty air. Stillness was always a kind of foreboding, but when the thing that called me from the void beyond was still, it was eerie. 

 One week of mute calling and I found myself sitting at my shiny kitchen countertop, paging through the list of messages as numerous as our stars, untitled and uncredited, belonging to no one but a nameless, faceless number. Hiding under the anger, I felt a twinge of panic in my abdomen. My thoughts went to the news part which I saw two days ago—it was a series of violent muffle which turned our little town into the blackest corners, where the whispers of the security were heard. 

 It was a small town anyway. Greetings were made to the neighboring families; some of us went to the farmers’ market and others observed children flying kites at the park. But many secrets that are vile were well hidden. My phone was still ringing – calls were coming in, and these seemed to be getting increasingly unusual – a sort of fitting to the increasing tenseness of the mood. I started being very much aware that they are related in some way, two different entities which on first glance one can hardly believe are related in any way but in fact may be as related as flowers in a vineyard of twisted grapevines. 

‘You are overemphasizing it,’ Lia said to me when I told her. “It’s most likely just a joke, people have way too much time on their hands these days. ” The smile on her lips lasted a brief moment, then slipped away, but the sound of her laughter hitting me in the chest was like a pistol shot; I realized I was dealing with someone who was guarding something precious. 

 But I was determined. At 2:13 of that very same night I would reply. I had a chasm of silence in my life, I felt like I need to cross that gap, to cope with my fear. The hour was near and I was shivering holding the phone tightly with my hands, while my heart was beating fast against my ribs. It sounded like a tom-tom in the silence of the room The noises that usually filled the night were nonexistent. 

 It was 2:13 in the morning and my phone rang. I gasped and pushed the green button on the phone.

 

 “Hello?” I whispered and cleared my throat, my voice no louder than a whisper despite the angry rush of blood in my veins. 

 Silence. The type that goes round the neck, you kno the one. It was as if, I could sense that the other end of the line was breathing or maybe it was my over-wired thought process. 

 A few minutes of total silence passed so with some level of anxiety on my voice I said ‘hello… Who is this?’ I tried to hear something up to the deepest silence and the only thing I could hear was a barely audible background noise. 

 I then noted there was movement, a shuffling, the sound that I believe sent shivers down everyone’s spines. It was as though there was still someone there I could sense it. Desperately I exclaimed, “If you’re only joking with me, I don’t find it funny at all!” Only silence for a moment before the call disconnected itself. 

 

The next day I was dragged into the conspiracy of internet and phone records. I searched through posts warning fellow citizens of the recent local crime spree and rumors of a kidnapper who abducts people and lays in wait for anyone foolish enough to try to get near them. As a suspect list appeared in my mind I saw that one name I was so familiar to me and I saw his face, Marcus Hale, the strange boy who used to live in a two- blocks apartment from me. 

 In my heart there grew a resounding discomfort. I had seen him, dark hair, shadowy eyes, he was always alone yet forever looking at something nearby. Whenever there were short intermissions of looking into one another’s eyes, I got an eerie feeling. But Marcus was just a local quarantined hermit; he obviously did not follow the footsteps of being a criminal, right? 

 I refused to allow my path to be over shadowed by that fear hence I decided to confront him the next day before the expected call. I went to his small house, a dilapidated house which had been claimed by the vine, unvisited by the sun. As he walked, barefoot, with a heavy tread on the smooth and time-yellowed boards of the porch, I felt the hackles rise on my arms, caused by the dread that lived in the dense darkness behind me. 

 I knocked, my pulse racing, my mind churning out each and every possible thing that could be a logical outcome. Finally, the last moments slipped off my hands, and I was no longer able to stand the pressure The moment when I wanted to run away, the door creaked, and opened – Marcus, who looked astounded, stood before me. 

 

 ‘‘What do you want?’’ He growled at me his voice filled with distrust. 

 “Marcus, I have a question—Are you calling me?” It was ridiculous that my fear destroyed me from inside and showed externally. 

 He looked, the glint of suspicion making a swift appearance, something that was able to cut through the banality of life. This is the collapse of understanding in a dialogue I have transcribed: Participant 1: “I don’t know what you are saying” 

The hairs at the back of my neck stood on end at the way his eyes shifted away from me and around the street as though expecting somebody else to be spying on us. I continued, “Listen, there have been phone calls—most peculiar, at 2:13 AM. , for Christ’s sake! I have a feeling they are somehow linked with you—those crimes…” 

 Those bleak eyes cleared visible and with a swift change in stance, the door opened with a loud protesting sound. “U don’t know me, but someone is behind you. “ Watch it!” 

 What he said kept floating in the room. That night as I went back home late in the night, the call came as usual, this time in silence once again but with a promise of mysteries that I did not comprehend. 

 The next evening I decided I want to clear everything once and for all felt some kind of nakedness deep inside of me. Acting on instinct, I retraced my moves back to Marcus’s house only I got there a few minutes too late. A door was opened slightly and it was shaking in the wind as if a wild beast. I whispered into the night, “Marcus?” The words were shaky at the end of the question.

 

 The answer which I received with my question was an answering silence and this made me a little spiritless. Inside I saw decks and papers being scattered and furniture damaged – it was as if riots had occurred in the area. Alone, in the midst of chaos, I discovered something: She saw that there were some drawings and awkward writings about the recent eve-teasing incidents, some check lists of women and some dates. 

 A cold breath swept down my spine, and I understood that I have entered a world of conspiracy. But someone had been closer than I thought, lost in that mess I now found myself in, concealed in the darkness. 

 The phone rang for the second time and I stood right there stunned by this new development as the ADRENALINE pumped through my veins. I answered without thinking. 

 “Your next call is coming, Sarah. “ A voice, lower and menacing, whispered into the phone, and I was drowning in terror. 

 

 I backed away stepping on something that crunched like a piece of dried up foliage. An old newspaper clipping, barely yellowed with age: Local woman’s body found – her missing case connected to unsolved phenomena.

It all clicked. The calls were warnings, a desperate plea from Marcus and their intended recipient was never him—it was always me. I turned to flee the house, the realization burning behind my eyes, as sirens wailed in the distance, creeping ever closer.