The Last Ferry

The restaurant sat at the end of a narrow lane, its wooden sign weathered to illegibility. Inside, the air was thick with the scent of simmering broth and roasted fish, and the tatami floor creaked underfoot. The room was lit by a single hanging lamp that cast long shadows across the low tables. It was called ‘The Last Ferry,’ a name that felt less like an invitation and more like a warning.

I had been coming here for years, drawn by the perfect simplicity of the set meals: rice, miso soup, pickled vegetables, and a fillet of fish grilled to flaky tenderness. The owner, an old woman named Hana, never spoke more than necessary, but her eyes seemed to hold a deep knowledge of things unspoken.

One evening, my friend Leo and I arrived just before closing. The dining room was empty, the other patrons having already left. We sat at our usual table by the window, which overlooked a small garden overgrown with ferns. Hana shuffled in, took our orders, and disappeared into the kitchen. The silence that followed was broken only by the hum of the refrigerator and the occasional creak of the old building.

As we waited, the single lamp above our table flickered, sputtering as if gasping for breath. Leo and I exchanged glances but said nothing. Then a clatter erupted from the empty table beside us. A pair of chopsticks had fallen onto the tatami, as if knocked from a set. Leo laughed nervously. ‘Maybe a draft,’ he said, but there was no draft.

The kitchen door swung open, and Hana emerged carrying a tray. She served us our meals with a slight bow, her movements precise and slow. As she turned to leave, I noticed her feet did not quite touch the floor. She glided, rather than walked, towards the corridor, and her footsteps did not echo in the way they should.

We ate in silence, the food delicious but somehow heavier than usual. The miso soup tasted of something I could not place, a bitterness beneath the umami. Leo set down his chopsticks and looked at me. ‘Have you ever heard the stories about this place?’ he asked. I nodded. ‘They say if you stay past midnight, you see things. People who aren’t there.’ Leo glanced at his watch. ‘It’s already midnight.’

As if on cue, the lights went out. We sat in absolute darkness, the only sound our own breathing. Then a soft glow began to emanate from the kitchen doorway. It was not the warm light of a flame, but a cold, blue luminescence that pulsed like a heartbeat. Shadows moved within it, tall and slender, their outlines suggesting not-human shapes.

I felt a cold hand on my shoulder. It was Hana, her face now hollow, her eyes black pools. She leaned close, and her voice, when it came, was not from her lips but from all around us. ‘The ferry leaves soon. You must come.’ She gestured towards the kitchen, where the blue glow had pooled into a doorway that was not there before.

Leo grabbed my arm. ‘We need to leave,’ he whispered. But the sliding door behind us was gone, replaced by a wall of dark wood. Hana smiled, a rictus grin. ‘There is no leaving. This is the last ferry.’

We had no choice. We followed her through the doorway, into a corridor that twisted impossibly, walls covered in intricate carvings of fish and waves. The air grew colder, and the smell of salt replaced the broth. At the end of the corridor, we emerged onto a shore, a black lake under a starless sky. A small boat bobbed at the water’s edge, and in it stood a figure holding an oar.

Hana pointed to the boat. ‘Your seat is ready.’ The figure turned, and it was not human. Its face was a smooth, featureless mask, and its hands were like the gills of a fish. I looked at Leo, and he was pale, his eyes wide. ‘I’m not going,’ I said.

Hana’s expression did not change. ‘You already paid for your meal. The price is taken at the end.’ She reached out and touched Leo’s forehead, and his body dissolved into a scatter of scales that blew away into the dark. I stood alone, the boat waiting.

I do not remember the crossing, only the sensation of drifting on a cold, silent river. When I woke, I was in my own bed, the morning light streaming through the window. I have never returned to ‘The Last Ferry,’ but sometimes, at night, I hear the lapping of water and the creak of a boat’s hull. And I know, one day, it will come for me again.