Has your building management ever put up a notice that made absolutely no sense? Something like "Please do not hang red clothing on your balcony at night," or "Send a WeChat message to confirm before answering any knocks on your door"?
I got one. Pinned to the bulletin board in the lobby, printed on plain white paper, bold headline, red stamp at the bottom. I was walking past with two bags of discounted groceries from the supermarket. Glanced at it. Didn't think much of it.
Who would? The notice said no peephole use after nine at night, and if someone knocks, call the front desk first. What was this supposed to be? A horror movie public service announcement?
I live at Jade Bay, Building 6, Unit C, Apartment 603. A year out of college, working as a layout artist at a small children's picture book company. The pay barely covers my expenses.
Rent eats up half. The rest goes to takeout, subscriptions, and the occasional milk-tea-money transfer to Su Qing. That's about it.
The most expensive thing in my apartment is a three-year-old laptop. Second most expensive: a two-seater sofa I got off Xianyu.
The day it arrived I spent an entire afternoon taking the covers off, washing them, hanging them on the balcony to dry for three days. When I put them back on I realized I'd reversed them. Couldn't be bothered to fix it. Sat on it like that for a year.
Across from the sofa is a white folding table. The tabletop is perpetually buried under a drawing tablet, a mug, half a pack of tissues, three pens with missing caps.
Next to the table is a window. Outside the window is the side wall of the neighboring building. Twelve AC units mounted on that wall, roaring in unison all summer. Jade Bay bills itself as a "2003 cultural community." It's just old.
The elevator doors take three seconds to start moving after they close. The hallway walls are peeling in patches, bulging outward. Touch them and they feel soft, like something's growing underneath.
Apartment 603 has one of those old brown security doors. A small round peephole sits embedded in the center—copper-tinted frame, the glass a little clouded, everything through it looking like frosted film.
The peephole stares straight down the hallway, about a dozen meters long. Windows on one side, wall on the other. Someone left a half-dead pothos plant on the windowsill. Still standing there, dried out.
At the far end is the elevator lobby. Property management notice posted to the left of the elevator. A framed sailboat picture hanging crooked on the right. Been crooked for over a year. Nobody's straightened it.
I use the peephole constantly. Takeout at the door—look. Package delivery—look. The upstairs neighbor's dog collar jingling down the hallway—look.
Sometimes I hear someone walking in the corridor and just go press my eye to it. See who it is. I figure everyone does this. Why put a hole in your door if not to look through it?
The morning I got the email, I was sitting on the toilet scrolling through my phone. "Jade Bay Property Management" popped up on the screen. Subject line: "[Important Notice] Supplementary Instructions on Nighttime Community Safety Management."
I opened it. Two paragraphs, really:
"Dear Residents and Tenants: Pursuant to recent guidance from relevant authorities, and to further strengthen nighttime community safety management, the following notice regarding peephole usage is hereby issued: Effective immediately, between 21:00 and 06:00 daily, all residents are to refrain from using their door peepholes to observe the exterior.
In the event of a knock, please contact the property management 24-hour hotline at xxxx-xxxxxxx first. Duty personnel will assist in confirming the visitor's identity. Thank you for your understanding and cooperation."
I screenshotted it and sent it to Su Qing. About five minutes later she replied with a voice message. I tapped it. She was chewing something as she talked. "Zhou Miao, what horror movie set did you move into? Property management's telling you when you can and can't use your own peephole now?"
I typed back: "Maybe there's been some scammers in the area lately. People pretending to be maintenance."
Su Qing sent another voice message: "Then don't look tonight. What if you see something you're not supposed to?"
I told her to fuck off.
That night I didn't get home until nine-thirty. The company was rushing a new picture book storyboard. Four rounds of revisions and the lead artist still wasn't happy. I'd been staring at a screen until my vision blurred.
The elevator jolted on the fourth floor as usual—that familiar "clunk." I was used to it. Stepped out staring at my phone. The hallway lights were sound-activated. A single dim yellow bulb flickered on. It went dark just as I reached 603.
I stomped my foot to bring it back.
Keys out. Door open. Shoes off. Bag down. Lights on. Kettle on the stove. Pulled last night's leftover braised chicken rice from the fridge. Microwave, three and a half minutes.
I sat on the sofa with the bowl in my hands, TV playing a documentary about deep-sea creatures. The host in a wetsuit standing on a reef shouting, "Look at this octopus's tentacles, everyone!"
I ate while watching, spooning rice into my mouth. Same bowl from last night, unwashed. The spoon was the long-handled stainless steel one I used for stirring coffee. I'm not picky. It's just me.
Halfway through the meal, the door sounded.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Three knocks. Soft. About two seconds between each one. Steady rhythm, like someone measured it with a ruler.
My first thought: delivery? No, I didn't order anything. Package? Packages go to the pickup station during the day. I stood up and walked toward the door, spoon still in my mouth. Two steps in, I remembered the email.
I stopped in the middle of the living room, bare feet on the tile, radiator humming behind me. Checked my phone. Nine forty-two. Pitch black outside. The AC units across the way were silent—too cold for anyone to run them.
Honestly, I found it a little funny. Zhou Miao, twenty-five years old, almost a year into my job, standing in my own apartment, scared to look through a peephole because of some property management notice?
What was the difference between this and my cousin scaring me as a kid—"Look in the mirror at midnight and you'll see someone standing behind you"? How old was I now?
I walked to the door. Leaned in toward the peephole.
My eye was maybe two or three centimeters from that little round hole when my phone lit up.
Another email. Same sender. Same subject line. I swiped it open. Only two lines remained:
"[Resend · Important Notice] Do not use your peephole. If you have already used it tonight, retreat into your apartment immediately. Do not open the door."
I stared at the screen. From the far end of the hallway, someone spoke.
The voice was soft, like someone had pressed their mouth right up against the gap beneath the door, sending the words in one syllable at a time:
"It's okay. You haven't looked yet."
I jerked backward. My heel caught on my slipper. I lost balance and slammed into the shoe cabinet. The key ring slid off the top—metal clattering erupted through the silent apartment.
The voice outside stopped.
I crouched on the floor, knees weak. My first thought was to call that property management hotline. I dialed. Five rings. Voicemail. I tried Su Qing next. Rang until it cut off. Nobody picked up.
The knocking came again.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Pause two seconds. Thud. Thud. Thud. Pause two seconds.
That three-beat rhythm, measured like a ruler, each interval identical. I counted. One set. Two sets. Three sets. When the first thud of the fourth set landed, I shuddered. My fingers misdialed 110 three times before I got it right.
"Hello, 110 Emergency Services." A man's voice.
I opened my mouth. My tongue was frozen. I might have said "someone's outside my door," "they keep knocking," "Building 6, Apartment 603." Might not have gotten it all out.
He asked me to repeat the address. I did. Then the call dropped. I looked at my screen. No signal. The network icon was an X.
"Fuck," I muttered.
Then my phone rang. Caller ID: "Jade Bay Property Management."
I picked up. A woman's voice. Standard front-desk tone—polite but worn thin. "Hello, Jade Bay Property Management. How may I help you?"
"There's someone at my door," I said. "They've been knocking. I called your hotline. No one answered."
"Which building, unit, and number?"
"Building 6, Unit C, Apartment 603."
Silence on her end. I could hear the rustle of papers.
"Have you used your peephole tonight?"
"No."
"Are you sure?"
"Positive."
The knocking stopped. The woman on the phone exhaled. So soft I barely caught it. But my ear was pressed tight to the speaker. I heard.
"Good," she said. "Don't look."
"Who's out there?" I asked.
"We've dispatched security personnel to inspect."
"Now? It's past ten. Inspect what?"
"Please stay inside. Do not open the door."
"What security?" I said. "What's the badge number? All Jade Bay security guards wear ID badges on duty. Give me the badge number."
Silence on the other end. The paper-rustling stopped.
"I'm sorry?" she said.
"The security guard's badge number. You've got shift records. You said you sent someone. What's their number? I want to confirm."
Silence lasted about four or five seconds. Then came the cleanest hang-up click I've ever heard in my life.
Before I could even lower the phone from my ear, Su Qing was calling.
She was breathing hard. "What did you just send me?"
"I didn't send anything," I said. "I called you. You didn't pick up."
"You sent me five photos on WeChat."
"What photos?"
"Hold on," she said. "Don't hang up. I'm opening them. Zhou Miao. Are you home right now? Which room?"
"The living room. Why?"
"Is your bedroom door closed?"
I looked over at the bedroom. The door was open. Lights off inside. Curtains half-drawn. Light from the street slipped through the gap and carved a white line across the floor.
The wardrobe door was shut. The vent was above the wardrobe—that square iron grille panel sitting quietly in the wall.
"It's open," I said. "Why?"
"The first photo," Su Qing said. Her voice was starting to shake. "It's your bedroom. Shot from the wardrobe direction. You're asleep in bed. The blanket's only covering one leg."
I didn't say anything. The image painted itself in my head. Last Thursday night I did sleep like that. The heating was blasting, I kicked the blanket off. Got up in the middle of the night for water, thought I should complain to management about the temperature tomorrow.
"The second one," Su Qing went on. "You're standing in front of the wardrobe, wearing that gray hoodie. Folding jeans. Shot from above. The third one—"
"Su Qing," I cut her off. "When did these photos get sent to your phone?"
"Just now. A minute ago. All at once. Sent from your account."
"What about the last two?"
"The fourth is your living room. You're crouched by the coffee table opening a package. That package, Zhou Miao—there's a Yunda shipping label on it. Dated last Wednesday."
"And the fifth?"
Su Qing didn't answer. I heard her take a breath.
"The fifth one is you. Just now. Crouched next to the shoe cabinet, holding your phone. The angle after you fell. It's… taken just now."
I stared at my screen. I opened WeChat and found my chat with Su Qing. Six new messages, sure enough. The first five were images. The sixth was text. Two characters. I didn't type them:
"She's here."
I heard something move in the bedroom.
So faint. Like a fingernail scraping across the iron grille of the vent.
"Zhou Miao?" Su Qing shouted into the phone.
"I'm here."
"Listen to me. Don't hang up. I already called the police from my other phone. Can you lock the door over there? Does your bedroom door lock?"
"The bedroom door doesn't lock, but—"
"Go lock it. Now."
I looked at the bedroom. The gap of the open door was still dark. The vent grille sat silent.
"The bedroom door opens inward," I said. "There's a little toggle on the handle. I can flip it from outside."
"Go flip it. Right now."
I stood up and walked toward the bedroom. Bare feet on cold tile. Reached the bedroom door, stretched my hand toward that toggle—
The moment my finger touched it, the door pushed open from the inside.
A crack. Maybe two centimeters.
I didn't see anyone. The gap was dark. The vent grille was still in place.
But that crack—someone inside had pushed it open.
I backed up three steps to the dining table. My hand braced against the edge.
"Zhou Miao?" Su Qing said. "Locked?"
"No."
"What do you mean, no?"
"The door opened."
Two seconds of silence on Su Qing's end. Then she said: "Run. Run for the front door. Get out. Get downstairs."
"Someone's outside."
"Then jump."
"Sixth floor."
I heard a sound from the bedroom. Soft. Like someone on tiptoe crossing the floorboards. One step. Two. Then the wardrobe door being pulled open—that dry scrape of old sliding-door tracks.
Su Qing was crying now, the kind of crying where you hold it in and your breath comes out in pieces. "Police will be there in ten minutes. Ten minutes, tops. Find somewhere to hide. Can you lock the bathroom?"
I looked at the bathroom. Two meters to my left. Plastic folding door. The lock was a tiny plastic latch. One kick and it'd cave in.
No time. The wardrobe door scraped again. Footsteps came out of the bedroom, onto that loose tile at the threshold between bedroom and living room. The one that always goes "clunk" when I step on it. I heard it. It sounded.
I dropped to the floor and crawled under the folding table. A checkered tablecloth draped over the top, covering most of my body. I curled up under there, back against the wall, phone brightness dimmed to nothing, one hand clamped over my mouth.
The footsteps stopped right in front of the table.
Through the tablecloth I saw a pair of shoes. Black. Leather. The toes pointed straight at where I was crouching.
They stood there for about three seconds. Then they bent down.
A hand reached under the tablecloth.
Fingertips touched my knee first. Then the whole hand pressed against my calf. I went completely rigid. Every muscle from scalp to toe locked up. The hand squeezed the outside of my calf, like it was checking something. Then it pulled back.
Footsteps headed for the door. Soles scraping across the tile. Moving away, bit by bit.
The door lock clicked. The door opened. Hallway light flooded in through the gap, a narrow strip of yellow across the floor. The footsteps went out.
Someone outside asked: "Did she look?"
The voice that had just left my apartment answered: "She didn't look."
"Zhou Miao?"
"Yeah." That voice laughed softly. "Good girl."
The door closed. The lock clicked back into place.
I crawled out from under the table. Every limb was limp. On the phone screen Su Qing was still talking, her voice tiny. I pressed it to my ear to make out the words. "Zhou Miao, are you there? Say something. Are you still there?"
"I'm here."
"I saw someone leave your place," Su Qing said. "I can see the hallway outside your door. Your phone just sent me a live image."
I opened WeChat. Su Qing had sent another message. A photo. The thumbnail showed the corridor outside my apartment.
I opened it. Low-angle shot, like a phone pressed flat to the floor, facing out. The hallway glowed yellow. The crooked sailboat painting hung on the right by the elevator.
Two men, backs to the camera, walking toward the elevator. One had trousers a little too short, showing a strip of gray sock. The other was carrying a toolbox. Metal, the old-fashioned kind. Something labeled on the side, too blurry to read.
"You sent this to me?" I asked Su Qing.
"Your account sent it. A few seconds ago. Is your phone in your hand?"
"Yes."
"Then who sent it?"
I didn't answer. I raised my phone and swept it across the living room. Sofa. TV. Folding table. Kitchen counter. Window. Lamp. Radiator. No one.
But my thumb scrolled down, and a new message jumped into the chat. An image. I opened it. It was me.
Me standing by the dining table, phone raised. Shot from the base of the ceiling light fixture. Dead center. Framing my entire body.
I looked up at the light. The shade was frosted glass, a disk flush against the ceiling. No gap behind it.
Another line of text appeared under the image. I didn't type it:
"He's still inside."
From the hallway outside, the elevator dinged. Doors slid shut. Then silence.
Neither of us spoke. The call stayed open. I could hear her breathing on the other end. Fast. Uneven.
I crept to the corner of the living room, crouched down, back against the radiator. Iron radiator. Burning hot in winter. But it was off-season now. Cold to the touch.
I wrapped my arms around my knees. Phone in my hand. Screen still lit.
Su Qing suddenly said: "Zhou Miao."
"Yeah."
"That window," she said. "Your bathroom window. Does it face the alley out back?"
"Yeah."
"There's a concrete ledge out there? For the AC unit?"
"Yeah."
"Does it connect to the next unit's bathroom window?"
I thought about it. My bathroom window faced north. Outside was a concrete ledge about a meter wide. The AC unit sat on one end. The other end led to Unit 602's bathroom window. About seventy or eighty centimeters between the two windows. A narrow wall edge. An adult could probably edge along it sideways.
"It connects," I said. "But it's just a ledge. No railing."
"Go knock on their window," Su Qing said. "Someone lives in 602. You mentioned it before. An old man."
"It's the middle of the—"
"There's someone in your apartment." Su Qing's voice dropped low. "Do you hear me? Someone is inside your apartment. The vent. The wardrobe. Someone. That bathroom window is the only way out that doesn't go through the living room. Go now. Don't hang up. Don't make a sound."
I stood. Legs still weak. The bathroom was right off the kitchen. I walked in, pushed the door open, flicked the light on.
Tiny bathroom. Three square meters. Sink, toilet, shower head. A small window on the far wall, about sixty centimeters square. Sliding frame. Aluminum. Warped enough to stick.
I pushed. It jammed on the first try. I pushed harder. The aluminum frame screeched open a crack. Cold air rushed in.
I leaned out the window. The back alley below. Streetlights spaced far apart. Their light didn't reach here. Pitch black.
The ledge was out there, just like I remembered. Sixty centimeters wide. The AC unit took up half. The other half—enough room to stand, barely.
No railing. I looked down. Six stories. Darkness.
At the far end of the ledge: Unit 602's bathroom window. Shut. A sliver of pale white light seeped through.
I pulled back inside. Swung one leg over the sill.
Su Qing in my ear: "You there yet?"
"Going out."
"Careful."
I climbed all the way through. My feet hit the concrete ledge.
Winter wind howled up the alley. I was barefoot. The slippers—somewhere in the living room, kicked off I didn't know where. Soles of my feet on the freezing rough concrete. The cold nearly knocked me off balance.
I held the wall and edged toward 602's window. The AC unit blocked half the path. I turned sideways, pressed flat against the wall, scraping past. The metal corner of the unit dug into my waist.
Reached 602's sill. I knocked on the glass.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
No response. I knocked again. Harder.
The pale light inside flickered. Then a face appeared behind the glass. An old man. Gray hair, white undershirt. Squinting out at me.
He saw me. Jerked backward. Startled.
I mouthed through the glass: "Open the window."
He stood frozen for two seconds. Then reached up and pushed the window open. A wave of hot, stuffy air rolled out. The smell of old person and medicinal oil.
"Miss, what are you doing?" His voice was low, alarmed. "This is the sixth floor!"
"Sir," I said. My voice was a wreck. "Can I come in for a bit? My apartment—someone broke in."
The old man's eyes went wide. He glanced behind him into his own unit. Same tiny bathroom behind him. An enamel basin on the toilet lid. Towels on the wall. He hesitated, then reached out and pulled me through the window.
I tumbled into 602's bathroom. Feet on the cold tile. I slid down the wall and crouched on the floor. That was when the shaking started—my thigh muscles convulsing so hard my teeth chattered.
The old man shut the window and slid the latch. Turned to face me. White undershirt, gray long johns, blue plastic slippers. Looked like he'd just crawled out of bed.
"You live next door? 603?"
I nodded.
"What happened? Take your time."
I opened my mouth. Something was lodged in my throat. Su Qing answered for me, her voice coming through the phone. "Sir, please call the police. Someone broke into 603. There were people blocking her door. The property management call was suspicious too."
The old man looked at the phone in my hand. Nodded. He shuffled back to his living room to use the landline. Slippers slapping against the floor.
I followed him out of the bathroom. His apartment had the exact same layout as mine, but it was packed with stuff. Dark brown solid-wood furniture from another era. A row of pill bottles and a small mirror on the TV stand. Half a cup of tea and a plate of peanuts on the coffee table.
He picked up the landline receiver and pressed three buttons. Gave them the address. When he hung up he turned to look at me, the creases on his face folding together.
"You're that girl from 603," he said. "I've seen you around. You always wear that gray jacket."
"Yeah."
"You said someone broke in?" He asked. "Did you see them?"
"I didn't get a full look." I said. "But… someone walked out of my apartment just now."
"Walked out?"
"Through the front door. Someone else was waiting outside. At least two of them."
The old man frowned, thinking. He stood up, went to his own door, pressed his eye to the peephole. Just one glance. He pulled back. His face had changed.
"Hallway's empty," he said. "But your door, the 603 one—it's open."
"Open?"
"A crack. The lights are on."
I crouched on his living room floor, back against the arm of his sofa. Su Qing's voice came through the phone. "Police should be there in six or seven minutes. Zhou Miao, stay put. Don't go anywhere."
The old man came back, picked up a tangerine from the coffee table, peeled it. Handed me half. I took it. The peel was cool. My fingertips brushed that rough surface and only then did I realize I was still shaking.
I bit into a segment. So sour it jolted me. I chewed slowly, swallowed, let out a long breath.
I opened my phone and scrolled back through my chat with Su Qing. Messages stopped right before I climbed out the bathroom window. Last one was her saying "Careful." Last image was that photo of me, shot from the ceiling light. No new messages had come in.
But as I scrolled up, something caught my eye. That photo from the ceiling light fixture—the angle was too perfect. I stared at it until it clicked. That angle couldn't have come from the light base.
The light base was flat, flush with the ceiling. There was no gap to hide a camera lens. To get that shot, you'd have to be looking down from the top of the wall between the living room and the bedroom.
Where that wall met the ceiling, there was a narrow slot. An AC duct access panel. Covered by a white plastic louvered plate.
I remembered that panel. When I first moved in, I heard scratching noises from that direction one night. Thought it was mice. Jabbed at it with a broom handle. The noise stopped. Later, a maintenance guy came to fix the heating. Told me it was an AC duct inspection port. The ductwork for the whole building ran through it.
I heard myself swallow.
"Sir," I said. "Do you have one of those AC inspection panels in your ceiling? The white louvered kind?"
The old man looked up at the corner of his living room ceiling. Same panel. Same size. White. Embedded where the wall met the ceiling.
"Yeah," he said. "Every apartment in this building has one."
"Can someone move through it?"
The old man looked at me. He didn't answer. But the lines on his face folded a little deeper.
"Miss," he said. "Why are you asking?"
"Those photos from my apartment. They were all taken from that angle. Photos of me. Day and night. Which means someone's been inside that duct."
The old man stood up and walked to the corner of the living room. Looked up at the louvered panel. He reached for it. Too high. He dragged over a chair, climbed up, pushed at the edge of the panel with his fingertips.
The panel clicked loose. He pried it open a crack.
The gap was black.
He peered inside, then climbed down. He moved carefully getting off the chair. His knee buckled before his foot found the floor.
"Empty," he said. "Big enough to crawl through."
The words were barely out of his mouth when a sound came from the ceiling above him.
So soft. Like a shoe sole dragging across the inner wall of the duct. One step forward.
The old man froze. I froze. Su Qing said "What's happening?" on the phone. I didn't answer.
The ceiling sound came again. Moving from the living room toward the bathroom. Hard to describe. Like a cloth bag being pulled across faux leather. Muffled. Continuous.
The old man backed away slowly. Backed all the way to me. Grabbed my arm.
His voice was a whisper: "To the door. Now."
He hauled me up. My legs were still rubber. He dragged me toward the front door, slippers slapping tile, the noise covering whatever was moving above us.
We reached the door. He fumbled with the security chain. It rattled. He tried the lock twice, couldn't turn it. His fingers were shaking too hard.
I turned it for him. The door swung open a crack. The hallway was empty. One dim yellow sound-activated light. Just like he'd said, the door to 603 was open a crack. Light leaking out. A trapezoid of yellow on the carpet.
The old man pulled me out of 602 and toward the elevator. I was barefoot on the hallway carpet. I could feel the cold concrete underneath through the thin fabric.
The elevator doors opened. We got in. He pressed the ground floor button. As the elevator descended, I looked up at the vent grille in the ceiling of the car. Louvered, same as the one in my apartment.
The elevator jolted on the fourth floor, same as always.
Ground floor. Doors opened. The lobby was lit with fluorescent tubes. The front desk window was shut. Nobody inside.
The old man pulled me out the main entrance. Cold air hit me. I shivered. Only then did I realize I was wearing nothing but that thin hoodie.
His white undershirt glowed pale blue under the streetlights. He let go of my arm. Let out a long breath.
"That duct," he said. "I've lived here thirteen years. Never once thought someone could move through it."
I crouched by the flower bed at the community gate. My toes were numb from the cold. Su Qing's voice on the phone: "They're here. I see the police lights. Two cars."
At the end of the alley, red and blue lights were flashing. Getting closer.
I looked up at the facade of Building 6. Every window was quiet from the outside. My bathroom window on the sixth floor was still open that crack. The one I hadn't closed after climbing out. Living room light still on. Curtains half-drawn.
Su Qing said: "The police are going upstairs. Stay put."
"Okay," I said.
I crouched there, still holding the half tangerine the old man had given me. The segments were crushed now. Juice dripping through my fingers.
The old man stood next to me, hands behind his back. Also looking up at the building.
"Miss," he said. "Where are you staying tonight?"
"I don't know," I said.
The police cars pulled to a stop. Doors opened. Two officers got out in uniform. As they walked into the building they passed right in front of me. One looked at me. One didn't.
They walked through the lobby. The elevator doors opened. Closed. The floor number jumped to six. Stopped.
I stared at that "6" for a long time. It stayed on the sixth floor.
Then my phone buzzed again. WeChat.
I didn't look. I wasn't going to look.
I flipped the phone over and pressed it against my knee. Looked up at the lit window on the sixth floor.
A shadow moved behind the glass. Then the light went out.
I closed my eyes.
When I opened them, a notification had popped up on my phone screen. I glanced at the preview. Only a few words. I couldn't make out the rest. But the last character was clear.
It was a smiley face.