The Empty Static

I lived in a two-story house with my brother, mom, and dad. We had a crawlspace beneath the floorboards and a loft above the garage. My brother and I were up in the loft, watching old VHS tapes on a dusty TV, sprawled on a stained mattress. Mom was at the night shift at the hospital, and Dad was in the living room, engrossed in a basketball video game.

As we watched, we heard a faint sound—children giggling. At first, we thought our aunt had brought over our younger cousins for a surprise visit. We clambered down the ladder, eager to say hi, but when we asked Dad who was here, he just shrugged, eyes glued to the screen, ‘No one, must be the neighbors.’ We exchanged uneasy glances, then climbed back up, dismissing it as the wind or the old house settling.

The laughter came again, but this time it was right beside us, as if someone was whispering in our ears. We froze, the hair on our arms standing up. We bolted down the ladder, slammed the door to the loft, and ran to Dad, who was annoyed by our antics. ‘There’s someone up there!’ I yelled, but he waved us off, ‘It’s just your imagination. Go watch your movie.’

Later, my sister arrived with a friend. We had bought a small blue remote-controlled car, but we hadn’t put batteries in it yet. As we sat on the living room floor, the car suddenly lurched forward, spinning in tight circles. We all jumped back. ‘Who’s doing that?’ my sister’s friend asked, but the remote sat on the coffee table, untouched. The car kept spinning, faster and faster, until it slammed into the wall and stopped.

We stared at each other, a chill settling over the room. That night, I couldn’t sleep. I kept hearing that laughter, but now it was coming from the walls. I got up to use the bathroom, and as I passed the loft door, something made me pause. A faint blue glow seeped from under the door. I pressed my ear to it, and I heard a child’s voice, sing-song, ‘The floorboards are hungry.’

I ran to my parents’ room, but they were fast asleep. When I returned, the loft door was wide open, and the static from the TV buzzed in the darkness. I switched on the light—nothing there, but the TV was on, showing nothing but snow. As I backed away, the static began to form a face—a pale, gaunt child with empty eyes, smiling at me. I fell, scrambling backward, and the face slowly faded, replaced by the words, ‘We’re still here.’

I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. The next morning, I told Dad, but he just blamed the old TV set. Over the next weeks, strange things kept happening. The car would move on its own, doors would slam, and the laughter would follow me from room to room. One night, I saw my reflection in the mirror, but it was wrong—it had a child’s face, smiling back at me.

I finally confronted the loft alone, armed with a flashlight. The TV was on, even though it was unplugged. The static formed a clearer image: three children, standing in that same loft, watching me. They turned to each other and began to laugh. The last thing I remember was the loft door slamming shut behind me, and the sound of their laughter filling every corner of the house.

They never found my body, but sometimes, if you stand in that loft, you can still hear the static, and if you listen closely, you might hear the laughter of children who never left.