The Figure at the Sealed Window

I was eleven that summer, staying with my grandparents in their fifth-floor walk-up on the edge of a city that never quite slept but always seemed to hold its breath. The apartment was compact, a maze of narrow corridors and rooms stuffed with the relics of lives half-lived. It was a few minutes past ten when I left the living room, my grandmother’s knitting needles clicking a steady rhythm behind me, my grandfather’s eyes fixed on the evening news.

The hallway was a long, dim tube, the only light spilling from the living room and a faint glow from the bathroom that never fully dissipated. As I walked, the floorboards complained under my bare feet, and the air carried the musty smell of old wood and boiled cabbage. The toilet was at the very end, a cramped closet of a room with a window that faced the brick wall of the neighboring building, so close you could touch it if you leaned out. I hurried, thinking of the others waiting for me, the warmth of the living room, the familiar drone of the TV.

Coming out, I felt the familiar prickle at the back of my neck. The darkness of the two bedroom doors, one on my left and one on my right, seemed to pull at me, like deep water. I paused, as I always did, to glance in. The first room, my grandparents’ bedroom, was swallowed in shadow, but my eyes adjusted quickly. There was the dresser, the tall armoire, the bed with its heavy quilt. And there, by the window, was my grandfather.

I froze. He was standing with his back to me, his torso leaning forward, his elbows resting on the windowsill. His head was bowed, as if he were watching something far below, but we were on the fifth floor, and there was nothing down there but the darkened alley and the dumpsters. His shoulders were hunched, and he was perfectly still. I remember thinking it odd, because he had been in the living room just moments ago, and I had heard him complain about his knees. But there he was, silent, unmoving.

I took a step closer, my heart starting to tap a fast rhythm against my ribs. I wanted to call out, to ask what he was doing, but the words caught in my throat. Then, as if sensing my presence, he began to turn. It was not a natural movement. His body rotated in segments, his torso spinning while his feet remained planted, his neck twisting far more than it should. I saw his profile, his chin, the line of his jaw, but his face was wrong. The features were blurred, as if smudged with charcoal, and where his eyes should have been, there were only dark hollows.

I stumbled back, my breath catching. I blinked, and when I opened my eyes, the figure was gone. The window was empty, the moonlight falling on the sill. I stood there, shaking, my mind racing to explain what I had seen. A trick of the light, a shadow, my imagination. I convinced myself it was nothing, and I hurried back to the living room, not daring to look into the other bedroom.

My grandfather was exactly where I had left him, slouched in his armchair, his eyes heavy-lidded. ‘Did you see anything strange?’ I asked, my voice small. He looked at me, puzzled. ‘Strange? No, just the news.’ My grandmother laughed, a dry sound. ‘He hasn’t moved from that chair all evening.’ I wanted to tell them what I had seen, but the words wouldn’t come. I sat down, my hands cold, and I watched the clock tick toward midnight.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. I lay in the narrow bed in the guest room, staring at the ceiling, listening to the building’s creaks and groans. At some point, I heard footsteps in the hallway, slow and heavy. They stopped outside my door. I held my breath, waiting. The doorknob turned, a half-inch, and then stopped. I squeezed my eyes shut, praying for it to be my grandfather checking on me. But the door didn’t open, and the footsteps retreated.

The next morning, I asked my grandmother if anyone had been up during the night. She shook her head. But as I passed the bedroom again, I noticed something on the windowsill. A thin layer of dust, and in it, a perfect set of handprints, as if someone had leaned there for a long time. The skin of my arms prickled. I never told anyone, not then. I just wiped the dust away with my sleeve, erasing the evidence.

I still think about that figure sometimes, the way it turned, its featureless face. And I wonder what would have happened if I had called out, if I had stepped closer. Maybe it was nothing. But I know what I saw. And to this day, I can’t look through a window at night without checking who is on the other side.