The Polished Ones

The first time I saw them was in the rain, standing under the broken streetlight on Meridian Avenue. They wore those skin-tight suits, the color of a TV screen that’s been turned off, and where their faces should be there was just… smoothness. A suggestion of a nose, a faint line where a mouth might be. I was twelve, and I thought it was a prank, some kids in morph suits. But they stood there for hours, perfectly still, and when I finally went inside, they were gone.

Over the years, I saw them more often. At bus stops, in parking lots, once outside my bedroom window at 3 AM, just standing in the yard, their blank faces tilted up toward the glass. I never told anyone, not even my mother, because how do you explain that? You see people with no faces, and they just watch you? But they never did anything. They just stood, and I got used to it. I even started to think they were harmless, just some strange part of the world that only I could see.

Then came the seizure. Four hours of my brain short-circuiting, and when I woke up in the hospital, I felt like I’d been hollowed out. The doctors talked about a central nervous disorder, gave me a thirty percent chance of survival. I spent a month in that room, the machines beeping, the ceiling tiles counting down the hours. And when I finally got out, on crutches, I was so focused on learning to walk again that I forgot about the No Faced people. They were just a memory, like a half-remembered dream.

But they hadn’t forgotten about me.

It was three weeks after I came home. I was in the kitchen, making tea, when I saw one in the garden, just beyond the hedge. It was the first time I’d seen one in months, and my heart did that familiar skip. But this one was different. It wasn’t still. It was walking, slowly, toward my back door. Its stride was smooth, almost mechanical, and as it got closer, I saw that its suit wasn’t the same matte black I remembered. It was shiny, like polished stone. And its face… instead of blank, there was the faint outline of features. Not eyes or a mouth, but the suggestion of them, like a sculptor’s first pass.

I stepped back, and it paused. Then it raised a hand, and pressed it against the glass. The window fogged where its palm touched, and when it pulled away, there was a smear. A greasy, dark smear, like it was leaking something. It held up its hand, and I saw that the fingertips were stained, almost black. It tilted its head, and for a moment, I thought I saw a smile, just a curve in the smoothness, and then it turned and walked away.

After that, they started appearing more often. But they weren’t still anymore. They moved. I saw them walking down my street, stopping at the corner, their heads turning as if they were scanning. And they were getting closer. One day, I was in the living room, and I saw one standing at the end of my driveway, just staring at the house. I watched it for an hour, and it never blinked—because it had no eyelids. When I finally looked away, it was gone. But I knew they were waiting.

Then last Tuesday, I woke up to find one inside my house. It was standing in the hallway, at the end, where the light barely reached. It was wearing the same polished suit, but now its face had a mouth—a thin, lipless line. It took a step forward, and I felt a cold draft, like the air was being pulled toward it. I grabbed my crutches, but they slipped, and I fell. The thing just watched me from the carpet, its head cocked, as if it was curious. And then it spoke. The sound didn’t come from its mouth; it came from inside my head, like a voice made of sand: ‘You see us. You know us. Now you will become us.’

I don’t remember how I got out of the house. I must have crawled. The next thing I knew, I was in my car, driving, my hands shaking. I looked in the rearview mirror, and I saw one standing in the middle of the road, watching me drive away.

Now I’m in a motel room, far from home, with the curtains drawn. I’ve been here for three days. I haven’t seen any of them, but I can feel them. They’re getting closer. The air in the room gets thick, and I hear that sand-paper voice, faint, like it’s just behind the drywall. I’ve started to notice something else, too. Every time I look in the mirror, my reflection is slightly wrong. The face I see isn’t quite mine. The nose is too smooth, the eyes a little too blank. I’ve stopped looking in mirrors. But I can feel it. The polish. It’s starting.

I know they’re not just watching anymore. They’re changing me. And I’m starting to wonder if maybe, just maybe, they’re not the ones with no faces. Maybe I’m becoming one of them.