Fiction Monday – 307
Threat
The villagers had always warned newcomers about the old lighthouse.
Not because it was falling apart.
Not because of the cliffs.
But because of the lantern.
Every night at exactly midnight, the dead light returned.
No electricity had reached the building in years, yet the lantern burned silver against the dark sea, sweeping across the waves like an eye searching for something lost.
Or someone.
Elena considered the stories nonsense until the first message appeared.
LEAVE.
The word was scratched into the fogged bathroom mirror.
She blamed exhaustion.
Salt air.
An overactive imagination.
The second warning came three nights later.
This time, her radio crackled alive on its own.
A voice, distorted and hollow, whispered:
“Before he comes back.”
Cold settled into the room.
Outside, thunder rolled across the ocean though the sky remained clear.
Then came the knocking.
Three slow taps.
Always at 3:13 a.m.
Never anyone outside.
Never footprints.
Never wind.
Only the growing feeling that the lighthouse wasn’t haunted by something trying to hurt her—
but by something desperately trying to protect her.
On the seventh night, Elena ignored the warnings and climbed to the lantern room.
The silver light spun wildly.
The air turned ice cold.
And there, standing beside the shattered glass, was a pale man soaked in seawater.
His voice trembled as he pointed toward the cliff path below.
“You were never the one in danger,” he whispered.
“He followed you here.
”Behind her, footsteps echoed in the darkness.
With love, coffee, poetry, and stardust,
— Maggie The Afterlove Voice 💫
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