The Hollow in the Hill

I never thought I’d tell this story, not even to my bandmates, who’ve heard every weird tour tale I have. But after that night with Marcus, the producer from the label, I can’t keep it inside. He was in town for a session at our studio, and somewhere between mixing tracks and discussing our upcoming tour, we drifted into the kind of late-night talk that makes you check your locks. Life, death, and the spaces between. He told me about his grandmother’s premonitions, and I laughed nervously, thinking of my own. By the time he left, the sun was almost up, and I found myself driving to the old address, the one I’d sworn never to see again. I hadn’t been back in five years, but something pulled me there, like a hook in my chest.

Let me set the scene. The house was a two-story Victorian on the edge of a pine forest, in a town that didn’t even have a stoplight. I’d rented it cheap because the landlord warned me about ‘the noises,’ but I was young and broke, and the price was right. The forest pressed right up to the backyard, and the hill—Christ, that hill. It rose behind the house like a tumor, covered in brambles and dead trees, and it seemed to watch you. I never climbed it, not until the last week I lived there. That’s when I saw the window creature.

It happened on a Tuesday, around 2 AM. I was in the living room, working on a chord progression, when a flicker of movement caught my eye. The window faced the hill, and there it was: a shape pressed against the glass from outside, tall and thin, with long arms that ended in too-many-fingered hands, splayed against the pane. Its head was too small for its body, and its face—if you could call it that—was a smooth, pale oval with no features except a horizontal slit where a mouth might be. I froze. The chord I was playing hung in the air like a discordant ghost. The thing tilted its head, as if listening, and then it slid away, vanishing into the shadows of the porch. I didn’t sleep that night, and I convinced myself it was a deer or a trick of the moonlight. But the next morning, I found scratch marks on the outside of the window, deep grooves in the glass that no animal could have made.

I should have left then. But I’m stubborn, and I told myself it was a prank. The hill, though—the hill was worse. Every night, I’d hear a low hum coming from the hill, like a thousand bees trapped underground. Sometimes it would sync with my guitar, resonating in a hollow fifth that made my teeth ache. I tried to ignore it, but the hum grew louder, and the creature started appearing more often—always at the window, always watching, its featureless face angled toward me. One night, I swear I saw it point at the hill, its long arm extended like a command. The next day, I finally decided to climb it.

The hill was steeper than it looked, and the brambles tore at my legs. At the top, there was a clearing, and in the center, a dead oak tree. Its branches were bare and twisted, and at its base, something glinted. I approached, and my heart nearly stopped. It was a locket, crusted with dirt, and inside was a photograph of a woman with hollow eyes and a gaping mouth. On the back, in faded ink, were the words: ‘She waits beneath.’ I dropped it like it was hot, and the hum surged, vibrating through my boots. I turned to run, and that’s when I saw the house from above. The roof was covered in something black and undulating—not crows, not leaves. It was the creature, or a thousand like it, their heads turning in unison to face me. They opened their mouths, and the slit widened into a scream that was silent but felt like a drill in my skull. I fell, tumbling down the hill, and somehow made it back inside.

I packed my things that night and booked it out of there. I didn’t stop driving until I hit the state line. I never looked back, and I never told anyone—until Marcus. When I finished, he was pale, clutching a cross he wore under his shirt. ‘What did you record?’ he asked, referring to the part of the story I hadn’t told yet, about the recording at my friend’s house. I shook my head. ‘That’s for another post,’ I said, ‘and maybe never.’ But as I drove home from the studio, my phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number, with a photo attached. It was the locket, now sitting on my nightstand. And beneath it, a voice recording, playing in my head like a memory: a sound like a hill humming, and a woman’s voice whispering my name. I haven’t slept in three days. I’m posting this because I need someone to know, and because I’m afraid of what happens if I don’t. The hill is hollow, and she waits beneath—and I think she’s followed me home.