The Unplugged

Rohan had always prided himself on his rationality. He was an engineer, a man of logic and evidence, so the concept of ghosts was as foreign to him as the idea of a flat Earth. He had moved to the city of Pune for a job at a tech firm, finding a modest two-bedroom apartment on the fourth floor of an aging building in the bustling suburb of Kothrud. The flat was functional, with a small kitchen, a cramped bathroom, a living room that doubled as a dining area, and two balconies overlooking a chaotic street. It was nothing special, but it was his, and the rent was within his budget.

For the first couple of years, everything was mundane. Rohan would leave for work at 8 AM, return late at night, eat a quick dinner, and collapse into bed. The only quirk of the building was the frequent power cuts, especially during the monsoon season. But that was a hassle, not a horror. Then, about three months ago, things began to change.

It started on a Tuesday morning. Rohan was in the shower, scrubbing the grime of a long night’s work from his skin. The water was lukewarm, a common occurrence when the building’s water heater struggled to keep up. As he reached for the soap, he heard a faint, rhythmic hum coming from the living room. It was the sound of his television. But that was impossible—he had not turned it on, and there was no power; the bathroom light was flickering with the voltage fluctuations. He turned off the shower, wrapped a towel around his waist, and stepped out, dripping onto the tiled floor. The TV was on, a static-filled screen with a low, buzzing sound. The power was out, but the TV was glowing. He stared for a full minute, then cautiously approached it. As he got closer, the static coalesced into a faint, indistinct shape—like a face underwater. His heart pounded. He reached for the plug, and as his fingers touched it, the TV shut off with a delayed pop.

Rohan dismissed it as a glitch—perhaps the power had come back briefly, and the TV had turned on due to a surge. He went about his day, but later that night, as he was working on his laptop, the same thing happened. He was in the bedroom, the lights on, when the TV in the living room blared to life. He marched in to find it showing a snowstorm of static, but this time, beneath the noise, he heard a whisper—a woman’s voice, low and garbled, speaking words he could not grasp. He unplugged it from the wall, not just the socket, but the entire cord. Yet when he returned to his bedroom, the TV was on again, silent, with a single image: a woman in a white nightgown, her face obscured by dark hair, standing in the corner of his bedroom—but his bedroom was empty.

Over the next few weeks, the occurrences escalated. The TV would turn on by itself at odd hours, always when Rohan was alone. Sometimes it would show static, other times a broken image of the room itself, as if the camera was viewing from a corner. He began to notice other things: the bathroom mirror would fog up during a hot shower and reveal a handprint on the glass, a handprint smaller than his own. The kitchen cabinets would open on their own, and once, the refrigerator door swung wide, spilling a carton of milk that pooled on the floor in a shape that looked like a crying face.

Rohan tried to tell himself it was his overworked mind, but the evidence was too tangible. He called a friend who was into paranormal enthusiast, but the friend was skeptical. Then, one night, he was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, when he felt a cold draft. He turned his head and saw the bedroom door slowly creak open, and a spectral figure—a woman with long hair and hollow eyes—glided to the foot of the bed. She raised a hand, pointing at him, and then mouthed a single word: ‘leave.’

Frightened, Rohan grabbed his phone and left the apartment, spending the night at a nearby hotel. He searched online for ‘house hauntings’ and found forums filled with similar stories, but none gave him practical advice. He decided to confront the presence. The next day, he returned home during daylight to inspect the flat, looking for any rational explanation. He checked the wiring, the sockets, the foundation—nothing. But as he stood in the living room, he noticed a faint, musty odor emanating from the wall behind the TV. He peeled back a loose corner of the wallpaper and found a gap leading into a narrow cavity. Inside, there was a small, dusty photograph of a woman in a white dress, and a folded piece of paper. He unfolded it, and it was a letter, dated twenty years ago, written by a previous tenant: ‘I am being tormented by her. She visits me in the night. She says this was her home first. I cannot stay here any longer.’

Rohan shivered. He understood now: he was not alone. The apartment had a resident ghost, and she did not want him there. He decided to move, but before he could pack, the haunting intensified. Objects began to fly across rooms, doors slammed shut on their own, and in the middle of the night, he would wake to find deep scratches on his skin, as if clawed by an invisible hand. The TV would turn on to a static screen, and in the distortion, he would see the woman’s face, her mouth open in a silent scream.

Finally, one evening, as he sat in the living room, the TV turned on by itself. This time, it was not static but a clear image: the woman standing in the corner of the room, her shadow stretching unnaturally. She raised her arm and pointed at the door. The word ‘leave’ echoed through the room, but it came from all directions at once, inside his head. He grabbed his bags, but as he did, the lights flickered, and the TV went black. A chill ran down his spine. He realized he was not leaving fast enough. He dropped everything and sprinted out of the apartment, down the stairs, and into his car. He drove for hours, ending up at a friend’s place on the other side of the city.

He never returned to that apartment. He hired movers and retrieved his belongings, but even then, the hauntings seemed to follow him. His new apartment in a different part of Pune was peaceful at first, but after a week, he started to feel a presence again—a cold spot in the room, the TV flickering at night. One night, he woke to find the TV on. The screen showed the same woman’s face, now close and clearer, her lips moving. He heard her voice in his head: ‘I have attached myself to you. Wherever you go, I will follow.’

Rohan now sleeps with the lights on, and he knows, deep in his bones, that he will never escape her. Somewhere in the fabric of his life, he has become marked, and the unplugged TV is a signal that she is always near. He no longer doubts the existence of the supernatural, but he wishes he had never discovered it.