Have you ever wondered how carelessly we treat our own safety? Why do we assume that the locked door of our apartment guarantees our inviolability? Why do we feel calm and cozy within our own four walls? And why do we believe we’re truly alone?

Some might agree with this sentiment. They’ll say there’s definitely something lurking in the dark, and whatever it is, it’s best not to provoke it. Above all, you must never let it know that you’re aware of its presence. If you catch a glimpse of a shadow moving down your hallway, resist the urge to check. If you hear a familiar voice calling you from the darkness while you're alone at home, do not follow it. Don’t give it a chance to grow stronger from your fear. The more afraid you are, the hungrier it becomes. Remember that. And never let it slip from your thoughts. Who knows? Maybe it’ll leave you alone.

***

Snow was falling slowly, blanketing the frozen ground with thick, fluffy flakes, creating a soft coverlet that begged to be wrapped around you on such a frosty evening. The power lines had failed again — no surprise in this remote, nearly forgotten village, where the elderly, mostly grandmothers and grandfathers, lived out their days. The scattered little houses were surrounded by low, rickety fences, maintained more for appearance than practicality. After all, there was no one to repair them, nor any real need; everyone here knew each other. Electricity outages were common, as the locals joked, “A magpie pooped on the wires, and that’s why they shorted out.”

The only thing the local grandmothers bragged about was their harvests. Everyone had a garden since the nearest proper town was 200 kilometers away. “Look at my cherry tree, Lisa! What a beauty, so lush!” one would boast. “And my tomatoes! Have you seen them? I’m almost afraid to pick them; they’re so juicy!” another would interject. Each household canned various goods for the winter, ready to pop open a jar during a snowfall and enjoy the taste of homegrown produce. It was a way to warm themselves with memories of sunnier days while the blizzard howled outside, disrupting their nostalgic musings.

Now, bundled in three sweaters, a ushanka hat, and a winter coat, a young girl shivered slightly as she rummaged through the cobwebbed cellar. She was searching for something to remind her of those not-so-distant days when the village of her childhood was warm and homely. She sneezed occasionally, batting away the dust that tried to invade her nose, and dodged strands of webbing that seemed determined to get in her mouth and eyes. Her once bright blue eyes had dimmed, turning a murky gray-blue as they squinted, scanning the shelves. Finally, her persistence paid off: a jar of pickled cucumbers lay hidden behind a wooden crate. As she bent to retrieve it, something else caught her attention, abruptly cutting through her thoughts.

At first, she couldn’t identify what it was, but then it struck her: a black-and-white photograph lay at the bottom of the small, handmade crate. The jar of cucumbers was quickly forgotten, replaced by a strange mix of emotions — awe, nostalgia, fear, and...confusion? A peculiar unease settled deep in her soul. The bitter cold no longer bothered her.

It was her grandfather. The photograph showed her young grandfather, with whom she had spent the happiest days of her childhood. Memories of fishing trips, harvest gatherings, picnics, and other warm moments flooded back. But alongside these fond recollections came darker memories — ones she had tried to bury deep within herself. The bad memories surfaced vividly, as if yanked out of a locked chest, tearing through her untouched soul, disturbing her naive belief that she had moved on. Clearly, she had not.

Shaking off the troubling thoughts, she grabbed the jar, snatched the photograph, and ran back to the house, where someone was already waiting for her.

“Dasha, what took you so long?” her friend asked, jumping from her seat by the fireplace with a mix of impatience and joy at her return.

It was Sonya. The two were the same age, classmates in the past who had gone on to different colleges and universities, only to rekindle their friendship recently, becoming inseparable. The idea to spend winter break at Dasha's dacha had come spontaneously: “It’s boring here; why not head out of the city?” they’d thought. But instead of a cozy house with a large fireplace, antique furniture, and a neat white fence, Sonya had not expected the rickety old house, steeped in the smell of age, with little furniture save a small table, two chairs, a cupboard in one corner, a double bed in another, and an ancient stove with a fireplace.

Dasha stomped her feet to shake off the snow before entering.

“I told you, we’re not heading to the Maldives,” she quipped in her usual tone, placing the jar of cucumbers on the table.

The photograph landed on the table beside it, immediately catching the ever-curious Sonya's attention. She sprang up and picked it up.

“Who’s this?”

“Want some tea?” Dasha responded with a question, clearly unwilling to discuss the subject.

“Sure, it’s freezing in here,” Sonya said with a dramatic shiver, emphasizing how cold she felt. Picking up on Dasha’s mood, she chose not to press further, hoping her friend would share the story later on her own. If not, then so be it.

As the kettle boiled, its whistle filled the room with a warmth of its own. The girls unpacked their things and set the table with what they’d brought. The aroma of herbal tea soon filled the air, mingling with the cozy atmosphere.

There’s something indescribably satisfying about sipping hot tea after braving the cold. It spreads warmth through your body, soothing frozen muscles and chasing away lingering thoughts of sadness. In that moment, you simply live, savoring the present.

By the time they finished dinner, night had fallen. In the winter, the sun departs early, and here, surrounded by dense forest, it disappeared even faster behind the tall pines. Dasha lit an old kerosene lamp, placing it on the table. Its soft, warm glow brought a semblance of comfort to the gray, bleak surroundings.

Perhaps this ambiance soothed her, as she suddenly picked up the photograph, smiled warmly, and unexpectedly asked: “Want to know who this is?”

Sonya’s eyes lit up, her green gaze sparkling as she tucked one leg beneath her. Over the years, Dasha had learned this posture meant Sonya was all ears.

“This is my grandfather. To be more precise, he's my grandmother's brother, but I always called him ‘grandpa.’ When I used to come here for the summer, he’d always be waiting for me: sometimes he’d take me fishing, sometimes he’d tell me about some local animal, and sometimes he’d tell all kinds of tales, not funny, of course, mostly to scare me so I wouldn’t go into the forest: “Don’t come across the Master. Don’t come across him... on sight...” that’s what he’d say, for a long time, even in some kind of trance, looking toward the forest. He was a strange guy, but a good one, didn’t drink, had golden hands, loved my grandmother,” Dasha said this with a warm smile on her face, constantly looking up as if recalling those moments, but after a second, her gaze changed: it became empty, almost glassy, her eyes stared straight ahead, but not at anything specific: “And then he moved to the city to live with his sister, bought an apartment there, locked himself away from everyone, I remember it was some holiday and mom called to wish him, but he didn’t pick up the phone, and we, you know, didn’t think much of it: grandpa’s old, maybe he’s asleep, maybe he didn’t hear, so we kept calling for a day, then two, then three... we decided something wasn’t right and went to him. I remember we entered the building and there was this strange smell, sickly sweet and very sharp, and the higher we went, the stronger it became...well, I was little back then, I was six or seven, I didn’t know that smell was the smell of a corpse. So, I got very upset when my parents put me in the car, called the police, and went somewhere with them. After that, I don’t remember anything. Only recently, I asked my mom if that really happened or if it was just my imagination, and she told me what happened: they broke into his apartment with the police, and the smell was so strong it burned your eyes. They went into the bathroom, and he was there in the bathtub, already bloated, the water was black, maggots everywhere, and, to make a long story short, they couldn’t determine what caused his death, because when the people who deal with this came, they just pulled him apart — he was falling apart.”

“Oh my... I’m so sorry,” Sonya whispered sympathetically, understanding why Dasha didn’t want to tell this story.

“It’s fine, it’s okay. It’s just that his strange death won’t give me peace. Why did he die? He was here, and now he’s gone. How is that? He was so young, no wife, no children. Why did what happened, happen? And no one will ever give an answer.” With these words, Dasha turned the photo. The light in the lantern danced, threatening to go out. On the back, it said: “George. 1961”

***

“I’m telling you, Galya, it wasn’t the mosquitoes, it’s Him, He’s coming for me, for my sins, I’m telling you, He’s coming! It’s His sign! He’s coming! Oh my God, what should I do?” the forty-year-old man was pacing around the house, clutching in his hands a worn-out, time-darkened, but once green knitted shirt full of holes.

“George, are you out of your mind? Who are you talking about? Don’t you see it’s the moths?! Your shirt’s been sitting in the damp dark cupboard, that’s where the moths came from. Don’t be silly! Calm down!”

And so, the brother and sister had been arguing like this for the second decade: George, Galya’s brother, once a healthy man, had turned into a paranoid, manic-depressive, troubled soul. He jumped from one thought to another, but the one thing that remained constant was some mysterious ‘He,’ whom George blamed for all his misfortunes.

“You’ll drive me crazy one of these days, George, you will!” Galya always finished such conversations with these words.

Everything stopped just as suddenly as it started: the brother simply disappeared. He didn’t leave a note, left all his belongings behind, took all the money he had. Only after a month did he call and say he was fine, that he had bought a cheap apartment in the city, gave the address, and that was all. And grandma didn’t tell anyone about it, thinking it would be better for everyone. She just said he moved to the city. No one knew what had happened to him, why he did what he did... the only thing everyone felt, especially his sister, was relief. A long-awaited, desired relief. Relief that her little brother would no longer drip nonsense and manic thoughts about someone they shouldn’t disturb. George was afraid to say his name out loud, only referring to him as ‘He’: “He’s coming!” “He’s going to kill me and all of you!” “He’s merciless!” And all of that was finally gone. It was probably very selfish of everyone who ever had to hear George’s ramblings, but no one denied it. Only little Dasha always wondered where her grandpa had gone. Why did he leave her? Why does no one care how he’s doing? Why? Why? The little girl never gave up on finding the answers to these questions, but the answers to those questions related to her beloved grandpa were never given, only met with loud silence. Everyone hoped that the little child would eventually forget she ever had a grandpa, but to their disappointment, that never happened. She waited, she loved.

So, only when grandma understood that her time was running out, she told her daughter the address of her brother and his new phone number, so she could either call him and invite him to the funeral, or go see him and tell him everything in person. That same day, Dasha’s mom called her uncle and passed on everything her sister asked her to say.

It was winter. They were burying grandma. And he never came to say goodbye to his sister. Dasha’s mom was the only one who didn’t hold a grudge against him for this offense. She still tried to maintain a warm relationship with him: she called him on holidays to greet him, brought him food to his door, but never entered his apartment, as per his request. Only when her uncle didn’t pick up the phone on New Year’s Eve, nor on the third day in a row, did she decide to ignore his ban. That’s when it was discovered that George wasn’t alive anymore...

***

The first time it happened, when he was still a little boy going to the forest for firewood: whispering. It seemed to come from everywhere. The tree crowns breathed, the forest protested, it threatened, the leaves screamed. And then silence. Such loud silence... the birds dared not fly from branch to branch, the insects couldn’t dare to buzz, the grass didn’t sway, time froze... Everyone seemed to be afraid of something, and that something couldn’t be angered. But the father of young George, dissatisfied with the unfinished task, was much scarier to the young boy than whatever was following him at that moment. And he didn’t fulfill the task, chopping into the nearest tree with his axe. And at that very moment, something screamed! The boy thought it was the tree itself screaming, contorting in pain, falling to the ground.

Since then, everything in young George’s life went wrong. Traces. He was followed everywhere by these characteristic traces. At first, he either didn’t notice them, or tried hard not to pay attention to them. Spots. They first appeared on the fence of the house where his large family lived: they looked as if someone had just burned them with a regular match for fun. Then these spots moved to the boy’s bed in the form of small but perfectly round holes in his blanket. And wherever he went, these marks followed him everywhere... and as George grew, so did these spots: they became bigger and more numerous. And he could no longer go into the forest: it drove him away, inducing panic in his mind, which only grew stronger the closer he got to the edges of the local forest.

Of course, he wondered why this was happening, since many others before and after him went to chop wood, pick mushrooms, or just take walks in the forest, but no one except him ever felt anything like it. The forest welcomed anyone, accepting all, but definitely not him. And he was determined to find the answer to this question.

One day, when the sun was at its zenith, the birds were singing at full volume, and the cows were grazing on the neighboring meadow, twenty-year-old George decided that he had had enough of the fear. He stood up from under the scraggly oak tree, took a deep breath, and ran. And while running, the only question in his mind was: “Why?!” It echoed loudly in his head, and only then did the young man realize he was shouting it as he ran among the tall pines.

“What? Where am I?”

This place seemed unfamiliar to him... and this silence... again, this silence pressed on his mind, which exploded in the next second... exploded with the long-awaited answer:

“You. On sight... to me. You. You. To me. On sight. ON SIGHT TO ME-EE,” it screamed this phrase, and it seemed not only in the boy’s head: the birds, with terrifying... shrieks? Yes, exactly! They were also screaming, flapping their wings, they were shouting the word “EYES.” The young man’s head was spinning from all the turns he made, searching for the source of the voice answering him, everything.

George found himself lying in the same place where he had been before his trip to that evil place — under the large oak tree near the pasture, where his cows were calmly grazing on the fresh, juicy grass.

“Could it all have just been a dream?..Why was it so realistic? Was I sleeping, or not?”

That same day, the young man decided to visit peasant woman — Marfa — the local healer and fortune-teller. She received the boy with some fear and, after listening to him, gave him an unhopeful answer.

“Marfa, I don't know what this is or how to appease it, how to ask for forgiveness for what I did when I was young. Perhaps you can help me somehow? I’m willing to pay... I’m willing,” George stretched for the money in his bag, the only money he had, but the old woman stopped him by raising her fingers in the air.

Her gaze was full of pity, genuine sympathy... Her voice was hoarse and deep, speaking with pauses for breath in her aged lungs:

“My son... unfortunately, you can’t solve this with money, and neither with apologies. I’d like to say it’s the Forest Spirit, but it’s not him, it’s something much... much worse,” her eyes widened: “You’ve stumbled upon true evil, one that won’t rest until it sees your death... and maybe it will be the cause of it. It’s a demon. No one knew its name and no one will, neither before me nor after me. It’s wild, wicked, and treacherous, and you just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, son. I am so, so sorry...”

The boy withdrew his hand from the bag, slumped, and his gaze became empty. With no hope in his voice, he asked:

“Can... can I delay my...” he hesitated, the last word barely escaping his lips, almost whispered: “death?”

“Leave here, young man. And never return. Go, before your time runs out completely, and maybe it will forget about you.”

And it was only after twenty years from that day that George got a chance to flee his native village, far from that forest: he had saved enough money to buy a small apartment in the city. But how disappointed he was when, after ten years of peaceful, quiet life, it still found him...

***

You know, sometimes it happens: it’s deep night outside, you’re sleeping, bothering no one, and it feels like you had such a wonderful dream, but then bam! You wake up. But why did you wake up? Most of us just fall back asleep after that, but not George. How could he sleep after hearing that painfully familiar, animal-like horror of a whisper?

Knock-knock. The sound you get if you tap something dull and large against glass. Or a window. That’s what woke him first. A light tapping on the window of the fourteenth floor...

Everything inside him tensed, and he tried not to breathe, but the frantic beating of his heart gave him away. He thought that if he stayed perfectly still, whatever it was would just go away, but this visitor turned out to be more persistent than George could have imagined. It wasn’t in a hurry, almost as if it knew it had the right window. It was relentless, tapping rhythmically, with slight intervals, but it did so gently, as if just trying to grab his attention, to make the man turn his face toward it. It knew the victim knew it was there. It loved to play. It loved to drive people like George mad before consuming their terrified, thus delicious souls. It soaked up wild fear, savoring it as it anticipated its future meal, and it drove it even further.

And it always got what it wanted. Just like this time — George finally turned his head. Slowly, trembling, he turned his eyes to the window, where... there should have been an echo. It was always there, he knew that for sure, but the body clinging to the window completely blocked the familiar view outside. It, gripping the window frame, was banging its head against the glass, which had already cracked...

Oh, how terrifying it was. You know, George had never imagined a demon like this... There were no horns, no tail, no wings, it wasn’t red, and it didn’t have hooves. The demon didn’t look like anything described in various scriptures. It was something very unfamiliar to our human brain: it was like solid smoke that constantly changed shape, and each form it took was more terrifying than the last. In those two seconds of delay on the bed, he thought he saw a regular human, a large, hairy, anthropomorphic insect, a three-headed bull with human limbs, and a whole bunch of other wild images, but there was one detail that remained constant: the big, ear-to-ear smile and tiny white, glowing pupils in the impenetrable darkness.

And when their gazes met...

“Got you. Your. Eyes. Found,” the voice was a blend of screams and buzzing, mixed into a cacophony, which was cut off by the sound of the glass shattering.

A lunge. A scream. A fall.

“Damn it!” the fifty-year-old man jumped on the bed, gasping for breath. This kind of dream had started haunting him a year ago, but in the last month, the nightmares began tormenting him more and more often, and tonight was no exception.

This dream was so realistic this time that he grabbed his heart in the moment.

“Well, well... phew,” a slender hand wiped the cold sweat from his forehead.

His body almost automatically led him to the kitchen. The thirst was so strong that he, almost in a trance, grabbed a glass and filled it to the brim with water from the tap. He would’ve drunk it all, but the sudden, annoying "tilin-tilin" of the doorbell kept him from fully quenching his thirst with what seemed like the best water ever. Instead, a slight sense of unease settled in his stomach. It was the intercom.

“Who the hell is out there so late? Damn kids, I swear, I’ll go down there and give them a piece of my mind!” George walked up to the loudspeaker, grabbed the receiver, and was about to shout at the curfew violators, but he didn’t even get a word out: the background noise, like white noise from a radio, mixed with voices — one was laughing, another crying, a third was speaking disconnected words, there were children’s, women’s, and men’s voices, none of them were familiar to him, who still couldn’t understand why he was listening to this. None... except...

“YOUR EYES-FOUND YOUR EYES-HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAH.”

George jumped away from the receiver and turned his head toward the kitchen window, which faced directly to the entrance of his building, where the person who had just called him should have been standing... but the man didn’t dare approach and look for him.

“I think I’m just imagining this! Ten years, and nothing... bam! Haha...” his own nervous laughter made his skin crawl: “I’d better...”

As he walked toward the bathroom, George could no longer see the silhouette crawling along the wall of his house like an insect... or maybe it was the three-headed bull... or perhaps it was just a regular person with some strange white pupils?

***

“Eyes. Did anyone see the eyes by the body? Where did his eyes go? What should I write in the report?!” the chief forensic expert yelled at the police officers like puppies.

“We don’t know! What do you want from us?”

“You mean to tell me the man went to bathe and just died? Oh yes, and he pulled his eyes out of the sockets, right! And then he cut open his chest and took his heart out! Just great! Oh, and let me remind you, the apartment was hermetically sealed, there were no signs of a break-in, and yet, his heart and eyes are missing. Can you imagine?!”

***

The candle was almost burned out, the tea had long been drunk, and the wrappers now lay alone in the center of the table. The girls were yawning, each lost in their own thoughts.

“Want to hear an interesting fact?”

Sleepy Sofia suddenly perked up and nodded eagerly.

“My grandmother told me, well, the sister of my late grandfather,” Dasha pointed to the turned-over photo: “that one day, when their father sent Maxim to the forest for firewood, he came back with different eyes.”

‘What do you mean?”

“One eye turned green, and the other stayed gray. There's a local legend that this kind of anomaly marks the demon of the area, and my grandfather was one of those marked, but it’s just a story to scare children so they don’t go into the woods without adults,” Dasha yawned and, getting up from the table, collapsed into the bed that had been made.

Sofia followed her example and, cleaning the table and extinguishing the oil lamp, snuggled into the soft blanket.

The cold wind blew through the old frames under the glass, making it seem like it was whispering something to the girls. But they were already drifting off to the realm of Morpheus and didn’t see the bright white pupils staring directly at them through the window. And in the whisper, the word ‘eyes’ could occasionally be heard...